Tiny Buddha

Tag: Happiness

  • How I’m Freeing Myself from the Trap of Stuff I Don’t Need

    How I’m Freeing Myself from the Trap of Stuff I Don’t Need

    “In the marketing society, we seek fulfillment but settle for abundance. Prisoners of plenty, we have the freedom to consume instead of the freedom to find our place in the world.” ~Clive Hamilton, Growth Fetish

    I come from a time where passbook savings accounts were the norm.

    I can recall skipping along to the bank, aged eight, with one pudgy hand enveloped in my dad’s and the other clutching a little booklet.

    I’d wait my turn in line with butterflies in my belly. The teller was always so far away. But once I got to her, it was magical. She’d open a hidden drawer, extract the exact notes, and scribble the remaining balance into my passbook. Et voilà—cash in hand!

    Everything about this performance was concrete and transparent: Whenever I withdrew money, I immediately saw my bank balance decline. And without the risk of it nosediving into overdraft, it’s how I understood money was a finite entity. It’s how my parents taught me to not spend beyond my means, to only buy stuff I needed or had saved up for.

    Having a passbook savings account in my childhood and adolescence protected me from buying stuff carelessly.

    Fast-forward to 2018, now living in Australia—which equates to residing in opulence for those living in developing nations—I’m not only thirty-six years apart from my eight-year-old self, but also thirty-six worlds away. In this world my eight-year-old self would throw a tantrum if she didn’t get the Barbie doll she wanted. I blame credit cards for that.

    What also saw me come out on top all those years ago was the absence of the advertising glut that now penetrates an eight-year-old’s sphere.

    In 1982 Fiji, TV did not exist. I played outside. I read Enid Blyton. I didn’t read the newspaper. And I can’t bring to mind any specific billboards of that time, even though I’m sure there were a few in the city, where I did not live.

    Today, at forty-four years of age living in the era of affluenza and having a disposable income, advertisers know my attention is priceless. Yet, they get it on the cheap. This is despite my creating an anti-advertising bubble to cushion me: In 2014, I deleted my Facebook account. In 2017, my Twitter account. While I have Instagram, I do not use it. And I rarely watch commercial TV.

    The ads for stuff don’t just infiltrate this bubble—they gush in. Into my inbox, even when I didn’t sign up for the next celebrity’s latest self-help book because I am something to be fixed. On my phone, when I receive a text promoting a sale of 15% off TVs all day today (and today only!). On trams, trains, buses, buildings, freeways…

    The humble bus shelter does not escape from being turned into a billboard either. When I walk my dogs, I pass one that is currently telling me I can “drive away in a Polo Urban for only $16,990.” (Do I need a new car? After all my current one is nine years old, although it is running smoothly. Hmmm…) The posters on this shelter change weekly. It does not allow me the grace to become immune.

    Even if I could construct an impenetrable bubble, it’d be pointless. The Internet and its cookies would see to that.

    These cookies know—and remember with unfailing memory—what I desire (printed yoga leggings!). And they flaunt my desires by dangling carrots in front of me, whether I’m reading an online article, watching a video on YouTube, or searching on Google.

    And if the Internet tempts with its cookies, then it decidedly seduces with its availability. I can now stare at the blue light on my ever-ready smartphone and make decisions to buy yoga leggings whenever I want.

    The perfect time to do just that is before I flop into bed, after a long day’s hard work, cooking dinner, washing dishes, and watching an episode or two of my favorite show on Netflix. I should feel elated when I hit the buy button, but I find myself getting into bed not only with my husband, but also with guilt and a larger credit card debt.

    The grab for my attention and time under the guise of convenience and a better life is, however, simply the tip of the iceberg. What no one can see is that I am waging a war against myself—with the monkey-mind chatter that jumps from one justifying thought to another, convincing me that something is a need not a want. This is an example of what the Buddhists call suffering.

    About two years ago, my husband and I moved into the new house we built. It’s much bigger than one we’ve ever lived in. And as we prepared to move into it months beforehand, the justifications began:

    We need new furniture to match the modern feel of the house. (Danish style, as we had been subconsciously brainwashed by Instagram with everything that was hip in interior design.) And we need a bigger TV for the bigger living space. A new fridge because our old one won’t neatly slide into its allocated spot of the spacious kitchen. And more paintings, since we now have more walls…

    Not only did we ‘need’ all this stuff, but we also had to choose stuff that was ‘us.’ And it all had to look ‘just so’ when put together. So we researched online. Visited furniture, home, and electrical stores each weekend. Read reviews. Let the cookies take our minds into a rabbit hole of stuff we didn’t realize we needed.

    Just thinking about all the time, money, and energy we invested to get it ‘right’ sets my heart aflutter and raises a sweat. It was gruelling—the number of choices, the number of decisions (Did you know that an eight-year-old now has hundreds of different Barbie dolls to choose from?). Luckily my husband and I have similar tastes; otherwise, I’m afraid, adding a number of arguments into the mix might have broken us entirely.

    The evidence continues to pile up in favor of stuff even after the purchases have been made. After decking out our new house, I soon learned that not only did I possess things, but they also possessed me.

    I worried about scuffing the freshly painted walls, staining the white kitchen benchtop with turmeric while making a curry, and my nephews scratching the wooden dining table by racing their toy cars on it. (What’s that saying? Is it “Stuff is meant to be used and people loved”?)

    If I didn’t feel the compulsion to fill in the space, to make everything perfect, simply because the world presents me with the choices and pressures to do so, what would—what could—I do with all that extra time and energy, not to mention money? Read, write, hang out with my mum? See another part of the world? And, more importantly, who would I be? A happier, more relaxed person? The irony.

    So, with the odds stacked completely against me, how do I even stand a chance of coming out on top of all this stuff? (How does anyone?)

    I don’t believe the answer is to cut up my credit cards and get a passbook savings account, or to become a Luddite. The answer lies in cultivating awareness. By becoming aware of my thoughts and feelings, I can regain my power. Asking questions is paramount:

    Will it give my life meaning? Make my life easier, better? Why do I really want it? Is it only because I am chasing a feeling? Or because I want to squelch one? What would happen if I didn’t buy it?

    Failing this, I can always remind myself that almost everything material is optional.

  • What It Means to Live Life with Open Palms and How This Sets Us Free

    What It Means to Live Life with Open Palms and How This Sets Us Free

    “Letting go gives us freedom, and freedom is the only condition for happiness. If, in our heart, we still cling to anything—anger, anxiety, or possessions—we cannot be free.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

    Roughly one year ago, I was having the time of my life.

    Everything seemed to be going well. My stress levels were at an all-time low. I was enjoying myself in a new city. Work was engaging. My meditations were deep and fulfilling.

    And when I looked back on things one year later, I was kind of, well, frustrated.

    Because things haven’t been going that smoothly lately. Don’t get me wrong; they haven’t been terrible. I’m in a loving relationship, and I’ve achieved a couple of significant milestones this year, but some aspects of life have been challenging.

    A couple of months ago I was talking to a meditation teacher who I occasionally consult when I’m having issues with my practice. I was honest about my situation, and my frustration with it.

    So I asked her what I was genuinely thinking; why doesn’t it feel like things are as good as they were twelve months ago?

    And what she told me stunned me. I mean, it really left me thinking.

    “You need to start living life with open palms. You tried to grasp onto the good times you had, and the experience has gone. But any challenges you have now will also go, you just need to hold onto them softly, with open palms.”

    The metaphor was so poignant. It made complete sense. I could feel myself grasping onto the idea of the old scenario and making dozens of assumptions about the new one.

    And those words stuck with me. They truly resonated. In fact, echoed might be a better description, because since then, whenever I’ve started to stress and hold onto my problems too tightly, the image of two open palms would arise and drift around the back of my mind, calling me to pay attention to it.

    There’s a reason why this metaphor is so accurate—the left cerebral hemisphere, which we use for focused attention, is also responsible for the grabbing motion our hand makes. The right hemisphere on the other hand (pun absolutely intended) is used for both open-minded thinking and open exploratory motions. So when someone tells you to hold on or to let go, they’re telling you what to do with your mind, not just your hands.

    So over the last few weeks, I’ve tried to reflect on what this means from a practical perspective, and while teachings like this take years to really digest, I’ve come up with a few ways in which you can start to live life with open palms, right now.

    Appreciate things momentarily.

    At first, I didn’t really understand why this was important. To only appreciate things for a split second seemed to be to under-appreciate or even neglect them. But I soon realized that when I was trying too hard to enjoy something, I ended up quickly telling myself a story about how good it was—and soon enough I wasn’t actually experiencing the object anymore, I was enjoying the idea of it.

    By making a conscious attempt to appreciate things momentarily, I’ve been able to achieve two things. Firstly, I get used to short-term experiences so when pleasure leaves, it’s okay because I know something else will come soon. And secondly, I’m able to focus on the direct experience and not get lost in my judgments about it.

    Remind myself about the transience of things.

    This is relevant to letting the momentary experiences go.

    Whenever I see a pleasure arise, whether it’s a nicely cooked meal, a Netflix show, a hot shower, or just sitting down after a long day, I try to remind myself that it will soon pass and something else will replace is.

    When I’m experiencing less pleasurable states, like physical discomfort, boredom, tiredness, or even pain, I similarly try to watch it come and watch it go, not getting too attached either way.

    Identify with my experience over my narrative.

    Though relatively simple, this idea is incredibly profound.

    My worry over whether or not I was better off than twelve months prior was largely rooted in the story I was telling myself. The story, once I had told it enough times, quickly became my experience.

    If however, I had just been focusing on the sensations I was having in each moment, there would have been no ruminating on the past, and a lot of the problems I was creating for myself simply would’ve ceased to exist.

    Don’t shy away from pleasure.

    One of the ways we protect ourselves from subtle feelings such as a fear of loss or feelings of not being worthy is by not allowing ourselves to fully appreciate positive experiences when we have them. It takes a certain kind of vulnerability to give ourselves over to pleasure, and oftentimes there is an unconscious shield between us and our experience that may manifest itself in slight muscular tension or distracting thoughts.

    I’ve made a conscious effort to focus on getting the most out of joyful moments when they come up and not holding back from completely enjoying them.

    Question my relationship to time.

    A lot of the suffering that comes from our experience arises because we can’t help but compare it to another moment in time. In my own case, it was because I was arbitrarily using the marker of a year to make judgments about how I should’ve been feeling.

    I felt that this year should be as good as or better than last year. Not only is it pointless to make the comparison, but it’s impossible to do so accurately. When we’re told to be present and not focus too heavily on the past or the future, it’s not only practical advice, it’s rational advice; our ideas about time are incredibly skewed and often dictated in large part by our emotional state in that moment.

    The ways by which I’ve been trying to live life with open palms are nothing groundbreaking. They’re tried and tested ideas that most of us have already had some exposure to. What is difficult, however, is our ability to remember these in any given moment, when they should be most useful.

    We can do this by anchoring ourselves to the ideas, whether through a mantra, a memorable metaphor, or simply just repeated exposure, as you’re doing right now reading this article.

    How have you tried to live life with open palms? Let us know in the comments. We’d love to hear from you!

  • Swipe Right on Mindfulness: My Apprehensive Journey into Meditation

    Swipe Right on Mindfulness: My Apprehensive Journey into Meditation

    “You have to be where you are to get where you need to go.” ~Amy Poehler

    I sat there and listened, pretending to be interested.

    Did he really just say he meditates every morning? Don’t roll your eyes. At least he’s really attractive. You can just ignore the hippy meditation stuff. 

    But c’mon. Meditate every morning at 6am? Who does that? How ridiculous.

    So I did ignore his hippy meditation stuff; he eventually ignored me.

    I have an endless supply of ill-fated dating-by-way-of-phone-app tales. Most of them end in a relatively similar fashion, but that’s for another blog or a cabernet-supported whine-fest with a good friend. This dating experience in particular was quite a bit different.

    Although this was the last time I dated a beautiful actor-slash-model-slash-writer, it happened to be the start of something else. Something much bigger than the initial lesson I learned—that sliding my finger across a cracked iPhone screen while waiting in the grocery line behind an adorable elderly lady writing a check for donuts was, sadly, not going to lead me to my soulmate.

    However, it would guide me to a discovery far more powerful and impactful.

    Not until years later would I look back on this casual swipe right on my handheld device as one of the most profound decisions I had made in my adult life. To say it changed the trajectory of where I was headed wouldn’t be an overstatement.

    Thanks, Tinder. I really should go back and award you those four stars. Remind me later.

    But back to this awkward date.

    Shortly before this guy began to “forget” to respond to my texts, before the “new phone, who’s this?” kick-to-the-gut, before the inevitable self-doubt blame game, there was a brief, almost forgettable moment during this date that I now fondly look back upon.

    The Start of Something New

    I was super insecure at the time.

    How does my hair look? Why did I wear this old sweater? God, he’s a GQ cover model and I look like a rejected 1999 Old Navy performance fleece ad fused with the ‘before’ Proactiv infomercial image that airs at 2am.

    My mind never stopped. I was the king of insults, and I was my favorite target.

    But somehow, amidst the relentless inner dialogue and self-destructive thought patterns, I noticed a striking presence from this guy. When he spoke, he was so focused. When he listened, he did so intently.

    Also, he was so nice. Plain and simple nice.

    I suspected he wasn’t worried about what his hair looked like. (Note: It looked perfect. Whatever.) And it seemed like he wasn’t thinking ahead about what to say next, or regretting what he had said prior. He was present. So much so, it made me very uncomfortable.

    As for myself, I had a checklist of things in my head to say as well as some predetermined witty lines that I was proud of—for real, some of them were funny. I even prepared some self-deprecating jokes about being a late-twenties directionless bartender, so I could at least claim to insult myself first if that subject came up.

    It was exhausting.

    Spoiler alert: This dating experience with Perfect Hair was short lived. But I beat myself up about it for a while.

    What did I say? Why didn’t I get my haircut? Why didn’t I get a spray tan!? I went on and on. These questions were endless and unnecessary. Except maybe the tanning one. I really should have bronzed up a bit— a little color never hurt a pale person, as my mom always says. But I didn’t. And so there I was, annoyed, bitter, single—and yes, pasty.

    At the time, it didn’t make any sense to me. I was bummed. I chalked it up to my continual bad luck and blamed the world for being out to get me. Ya know, the usual.

    Little did I know that this one date would be such a turning point in my life.

    A Seed Was Planted

    My mind was a messy field of weeds and cobwebs, but somewhere among them was perfectly conditioned soil that could harbor some new kind of life. Something about this guy stuck in my mind. And that something grew. I would continue to insult myself for the foreseeable future, but I took a brief respite from the witty yet destructive banter in my head to explore that “silly hippy meditation stuff.”

    “I meditate every morning,” I remember him saying.

    I still thought this was a ridiculous admission, but I decided to look into it. Maybe for just five minutes. What did I have to lose?

    So instead of spending further time mindlessly scrolling through my Instagram feed and wondering how I know so many people with flawless beauty who are perpetually on breathtaking vacations, I pulled up Google.

    In addition to a roll of my eyes, the word “meditation” used to elicit a visual of an un-showered, bearded hippy sitting cross-legged, surrounded by a cloud of suffocating incense smoke, chanting unintelligible words.

    It’s partly because the term carries with it some dated, preconceived ideas, sure. But I also grew up in a very conservative town a few miles down the road from the not-so-conservative Woodstock, NY, where a drive through would be a sightseeing tour of extreme body hygiene practices of “hippies” with a side of snide judgmental comments.

    That was my introduction to this world. That was my initial—and only—understanding of people who participated in silly hippy meditation stuff.

    But hold up: Meditation really just means sitting quietly and focusing on what’s going on in the moment? And breathing? That’s basically it? Is it really that simple?

    Yah, man, it’s that simple.

    There is obviously much more to it than that, of course. There are books upon books, courses and classes upon websites and blogs on meditation. But at its core, it really is so simple: Sitting and breathing.

    Why the hell didn’t someone tell me that it wasn’t this weird, silly, far-left liberal belief system? That it didn’t require a robe, facial hair, and skipping a bunch of showers. I don’t have to chant? What about sitting cross-legged? Incense and a beard? No, no, and no?

    WHAT. THE. HELL.

    It sounded so easy and was also a huge relief, because I look terrible with a beard and I’m not at all flexible.

    I had no reason not to give it a try.

    I was finally in the perfect place, mentally and physically (no beard!), for my exploration of this topic to begin.

    So I started reading. Book after book after book. With an apprehensive perspective and holed up in a coffee shop with my hand covering the title so no one could see what I was reading (Uh, It’s Game Of Thrones, bro,) I immersed myself in this stuff.

    I also realize in hindsight that telling someone I’m reading Game Of Thrones is not any “cooler” than revealing I’m exploring meditation. It’s basically a dorky tie.

    I started by seeking out authors who had the same skeptical approach that I initially had, as it helped me tread cautiously into something that could scare me away if I dove in too deep, too fast.

    Initially, I thought it was a bunch of ridiculousness. I gave up once. Twice. Five times.

    But I pushed through. I kept remembering that fleeting moment from that cringe-worthy date. How relaxed, how present, how kind he was.

    He meditated every day.

    If it worked for Head & Shoulders Model, it would work for me. I should put that on a hat.

    Ever so slowly, in the subtlest ways, I began to notice a difference. It was minimal. It was almost unnoticeable.

    I just felt… better. Lighter. Happier? Maybe. I couldn’t really pinpoint it, but it was something.

    And it was exciting.

    Everything Happens—Yes, You Guessed It—For a Reason

    At this point, my perception of this ill-fated date started to shift. Maybe, just maybe, there was a purpose of this encounter. Maybe, just maybe, it was exactly what I needed at exactly that time in my life.

    The phrase “everything happens for a reason” used to drive me crazy. Mostly because I find it’s something people usually say in lieu of giving actual advice. It’s a cop-out, really. If I tell you I was ghosted by awkward Prius guy, I don’t want you to tell me everything happens for a reason. I want you to confirm my beliefs that Prius drivers are obviously the worst and that it definitely had nothing to do with me.

    But I now believe that everything really does happen for a reason. Even the existence of the Prius, though for reasons I have yet to understand.

    And yes—even uncomfortable, no-good, very-bad dates.

    Sometimes it just takes a little surrender and hindsight to come to this realization. For me, it also took a lot of cheap red wine and years of reflecting on past decisions—and eventually immersing myself in some mindfulness practices—to confidently say I understand this clichéd phrase. There’s always a lesson to be learned.

    One of those lessons is that boxed wine gives me a bad headache.

    Everything had happened as it should—to bring me to this moment, to this blog post, to this glass of wine (from a bottle), to this place in my life where I can reflect and appreciate. And what a liberating and exhilarating feeling it is to say, “Yup, that happened. Here I am. What’s next?”

    I’ve spent most of my life under the impression that I made every wrong decision possible. That had I just gotten one thing right along the way, just one, I wouldn’t be where I am right now.

    I would be married to the perfect person. I’d have a perfect career. A perfect kid. A perfect house. A perfectly filtered Instagram feed. A perfect chicken dinner, because clearly my inability to cook a simple meal stems from some bad decision I made somewhere along the way. Everything would be perfect and my chicken wouldn’t be rubbery.

    But it’s not.

    Or is it? Maybe this is perfection. (Not my chicken, though—I still overcook it every time!)

    I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.

    It’s such a freeing feeling to let go of the past, to trust in where I am, to understand that everything I have experienced, whether I can understand it now or will come to a realization at some point down the road, has been leading me to where I am meant to be. My only job is to go with it.

    Because, yes, everything is happening as it should, for a reason. Even the dates that don’t turn into what I had initially hoped they would.

    Adopting this way of thinking has led to a much more relaxed, stress-free day-to-day life. Instead of wondering why something happened, I look for what I can take from the experience. Dating has led to endless discoveries about myself, other people, the world, and perspectives I was previously unfamiliar with.

    Some monumental, some minimal.

    Some dating experiences are so profound they lead you to stumble down a path to mindfulness and meditation, while others have more minor impacts, like several years of free HBO because a certain someone forgot to change his cable password after he abruptly and inexplicably stopped talking to you. (Thanks man! Hope you’re well!)

    I’d say a more positive, mindful outlook and free weekly dates with VEEP’s President Selena Meyer are both steps in the right direction as well as perfectly fine reasons that these experiences occurred.

    I believe all moments in life—big or small, happy or sad—always provide a takeaway. Of course, the harder the journey and the tougher the struggles, the more difficult it may be to find the reason. Maybe the reason will never be apparent. Perhaps we just have to trust that our path took us into—and through—these situations for a reason.

    Not much has changed for me these days in terms of circumstances. I still go on the occasional bad date, have unexpected bummer days, and periodically find myself in inexplicable bad moods. But instead of dwelling on these moments or trying to find the reason behind them, I accept them. I trust that what seems “bad” on the surface may be beneficial in some unapparent way.

    Plus, if I always tried to find a reason, I would drive myself mad and I would have less time for my aforementioned Instagram scrolling—by the way, I need to do more sit-ups. Oh and for real, am I the only one from my graduating class who isn’t #married?

    Eyes closed, deep breath.

    It would be misleading and simply unrealistic to say that meditation can lead to a smooth life filled with endless happiness. I don’t believe that to be true, and I think that would be missing the point.

    I’m also not officially a psychiatrist—or psychologist? I confuse the two. But whichever one would be professionally informed on this subject, I am not that. Or the other one, for that matter. So I could be totally wrong about everything that I’ve just written.

    But for me, this mindfulness exploration has helped me clear out ugly thoughts and acknowledge patterns of behavior that aren’t healthy. I feel like a better person today than I was just a few years ago. I’m not nicer because I just want to be nice, but also because it’s easier.

    It’s easier to be patient, kind, understanding, and humble. It takes so much energy to be mad, hold grudges, and judge. Forgiving and letting go is freeing. Holding on to anger? Exhausting and it gives me pimples.

    A New(ish) Me

    My biggest concern with this new journey was that I would lose my edge. I’m generally a sarcastic wise-ass. I didn’t want to become soft. And I’m not talking about physically soft, because this new journey has not yet made me less vain, as I still care far too much about my physical appearance.

    But baby steps, right?

    By soft I mean I didn’t want to become an emotionally mushy pushover. I roll my eyes at those people.

    Yes, I know, I roll my eyes a lot. Again, one step at a time.

    I’m far from perfect and still have many strides to make. I’m finding the careful balance of being a mindful, better person while not changing who I am at heart.

    I still unnecessarily curse at traffic despite my most valiant efforts.

    If I realize someone isn’t going to acknowledge me holding a door open, I’ll sometimes maybe probably prematurely let it go so it gently bumps them.

    I am ridiculously impatient with people who stand on escalators. They aren’t lazy stairs, walk!

    And I firmly believe that Arbonne is basically the Crossfit of skincare and I’m not at all interested but I’m certain you’ll breathlessly tell me about it anyway.

    I am a work in progress. I’m learning every day.

    I’m single. I’m happy. I’m present. And sometimes, every once in a while, yes, I’m still a jerk.

    But a mindful jerk at that. And for this, I am grateful.

    And I owe it all to a little dating app with the cute cartoon flame.

  • Healing Chronic Pain Is an Inside Job

    Healing Chronic Pain Is an Inside Job

    “Time is not a cure for chronic pain, but it can be crucial for improvement. It takes time to change, to recover, and to make progress.” ~Mel Pohl

    Let’s face it, living with any kind of physical pain is a challenge. I understand that completely. In the fall of 2007, I contracted an extremely painful and debilitating condition, Thoracic Outlet Syndrome, a structural collapse that compresses the muscles, nerves, and arteries that run between the collarbones and first ribs.

    Yet, as most of us do, I believed my condition would, naturally, clear up soon and the pain would leave. That’s what happens most of the time for most of our physical ailments. Pain arises because of an illness or injury and disappears as we heal over the following days or weeks. We might lay low for a while, take some medications to ease the discomfort, and then we’re back into the swing of things. No problem.

    Except when it doesn’t work that way.

    What happens when pain becomes a fixture in our lives and no amount of medication or treatment or therapy can eradicate it? What do we do then?

    Our usual response is to fight. We put on our battle armor and spend every day in an effort to overcome pain so it won’t take over any more of our lives. We search for the right therapies and the right medications, trying one approach after another, with the attitude of defeating a mortal enemy.

    If nothing works, we eventually exhaust ourselves. We wake up one morning with our anti-pain armor in a heap on the floor and find we have no more reserves to fight, so we leave it there. We just don’t have the energy to go into battle anymore.

    So, we swing to the other end of the spectrum, deciding that the best thing to do now is to ignore the pain we’re living with. This is just the way it is right now, we say to ourselves. These are the cards I’ve been dealt and I’m going to have to live with the situation. We put on our best face and try to function despite the pain, doing our best to ignore its insistent cries for attention.

    We may even decide the doctor is right if s/he tells us that the reason we’re still in pain isn’t because our condition won’t heal, but because our brain is misfiring. Okay then, I’ll put the blame on my brain and pretend the pain doesn’t exist, we say.

    But the pain stays and stays and stays.

    Neither of these extremes usually works very well for chronic pain. Fighting pain is exhausting. It creates stress and tension not conducive to healing. Fighting causes us to tighten and contract in the body, also not great for healing. Acquiescing, on the other hand, can lead to feelings of helplessness and hopelessness over time. If pain isn’t improving, one day we might find ourselves looking up from the bottom of a dark well, filled with despair.

    Are these really our only choices? Isn’t there a middle path that might offer something less fatiguing than constant battle and less hopeless than acquiescence or denial?

    What do we do? What can we do?

    I spent years swinging back and forth between the two poles, finally settling into a kind of stoic silence until one day I couldn’t stand it anymore. I just couldn’t face a life sentence of living in unremitting pain. I decided there had to be a different way to live, to find more ease and grace even in the midst of pain.

    So, I decided to turn my belief about what pain is and how I was dealing with it on its head. I changed the way I perceived pain and the way I responded to it. I found ways to shift my relationship with pain into a more positive, constructive one and, after many years of having no perceptible change, began to finally experience some relief.

    Here are three important ways I shifted my relationship with pain and thereby began to experience more healing in my body.

    Making Friends with Pain

    It helped me a great deal to understand that pain is not an enemy but a signal and a message that tells us that the body is trying to heal. Pain is a voice from within that announces that something is out of harmony and is trying to put itself right. Instead of experiencing pain as torture, I began to understand that it was a natural communication from my body. In a way, it was me talking to me. A part of me was hurting and asking for attention.

    Since fighting pain only seemed to make things worse, I asked myself, what if I imagined that pain wasn’t an adversary, but had a positive purpose? What if pain wasn’t trying to put me through hell, but was simply trying to get my attention? How could I make friends with it instead of opposing it?

    I began to ask pain what it needed, what it was asking for, what I could give it and do for it to help my body heal. I understood that it was asking me to slow down, both on the outside and on the inside. Pain needed me to be with it just as it was, to stop pushing against it, and to listen to it.

    What I learned from pain was that, instead of offering it my anger, denial, or hate, it required a very different kind of attention. The pain, the signal from my body, was asking for a different approach to healing, a softer approach.

    I understood it to be asking for the kind of compassion and understanding you would offer a small child who is hurting. I found that when I turned a more loving ear toward it in an effort to listen to it, respect it, and offer it kindness, my whole body relaxed, my breathing shifted, my stress lifted, and my pain began to decrease.

    Finding Positive Ways to Express Pain

    I began to journal about living with pain, which helped me see it differently. I wrote about my emotional responses to living with pain. I wrote about the loss and the loneliness, the shame and the frustration. Then I read what I wrote out loud to pain, and to myself. We both listened. Something shifted. We both relaxed. Pain started to move.

    I then went a step further and found someone I could trust to hear my pain story. I asked them to please not offer any advice, to not try and fix me, but just to listen with an open heart and mind. I told them about the sadness and the terrors, the loneliness and the shame. I told them things I had never told anyone because I was simply trying to hold it all together from one day to the next.

    Having someone simply witness me in my pain without asking me to be any different, but allowing me to be in the pain I was in and really seeing it and acknowledging it was hugely healing. And pain relaxed a little more.

    Allowing Pain the Time it Needs

    I also discovered that pain was asking for time. Healing simply wasn’t going to be rushed. My body didn’t respond well to being hurried or pushed, and healing could not be approached as another goal to be achieved. Pain kept its own timetable.

    Allowing pain to take the time it would take rather than trying to hurry it out of my body allowed for a healthier emotional and physiological response that was far more conducive to healing. My body became more relaxed around the pain and I began to release stress, tension, and contraction. I breathed more freely, moved more slowly, approached everything in a more relaxed manner, and stopped obsessing as much about my healing.

    I stopped pushing against the pain and pushing against the situation and began to trust the healing process. Paradoxically, when I allowed pain all the time it needed to heal, it began to release. When I demanded that it leave immediately, it dug in its heels, but when I related to it soothingly and with patience and love, I felt relief more rapidly.

    —

    I have found over my years of living with chronic pain, that these approaches are fundamental to creating more ease and grace on a daily basis, to releasing stress and tension in the body, and to relieving long term pain. None of them are guarantees of becoming pain free overnight, but all can offer relief, hope, and positive shifts almost immediately and, as those of us who have been living with pain for a long time know, any movement toward relieving pain is cause for major celebration.

    I’ve gained valuable insights from my journey with pain as well. I’ve learned to find a place deep within myself, a clear place at my core that is resilient and eternal, a place I can draw on for strength and comfort in any situation. I’ve learned how to be kinder to myself and to others. I’ve learned how to find new appreciation and satisfaction in simple things and to celebrate the small joys in life.

    Pain, then, has become something of a spiritual mentor over time. It has, in the end, taught me how to live more deeply, more authentically, and more wisely. Living with pain has not only helped me understand what really matters most to me in life, but how much I matter to myself.

  • Why We All Need Time Unplugged

    Why We All Need Time Unplugged

    “Life is what happens while we’re busy worrying about everything we need to change or accomplish. Slow down, get mindful, and try to enjoy the moment. This moment is your life.” ~Lori Deschene

    Technology is everywhere today, integrated into our lives from the moment we wake up and check our email to the twenty minutes we spend checking our Twitter feed before falling asleep.

    From smartphones and tablets to Fitbits and multi-display work computers, it’s hard to use technology mindfully, and most of us spend a great deal of time throughout the day looking at screens.

    Choosing to unplug, disconnect, and put down our devices is a deliberate decision. For me, the decision to unplug came as I was preparing to set off for a year and a half of traveling around New Zealand.

    The Problem

    I had just left a job where I spent most of my day emailing, updating social media, and scouring the Internet for websites that would be useful contacts for my company. I would get home from the office and eat something while simultaneously scrolling through my personal Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and email accounts. The barrage of information was endless. I would often end the day red-eyed and battling a headache.

    I realized I didn’t actually know how to relax and unplug, and I also realized I didn’t know what a huge toll the excessive screen time was taking on me until I stopped the flow. It took a few weeks, but slowly the constant need to check feeds and update statuses faded, and I spent a great deal more time actually, well, doing things in the world—without posting about it.

    Deciding to Unplug

    Since I was embarking on a new chapter in my life, it seemed like a good time to try something new and try to not let technology take over my life. I was afraid of missing out on the experiences I would have while traveling because I was too busy trying to take the perfect photo or craft the perfect post instead of just being there and enjoying the moment.

    I sold my smartphone, cancelled my cell phone service, deleted my social media accounts, and asked all my friends and family for their mailing addresses so I could send postcards and letters instead of emails and tweets. I went cold turkey and all-in.

    While resistant at first, most people close to me were supportive of this change in the long run, although I did get the occasional, “How will I ever contact you if you’re not on Facebook?!” I figured the people who mattered would find a way to stay in touch, Facebook or no Facebook.

    My partner and I decided that while traveling, we would share one iPad mini we’d use to post monthly blog posts about our travels, and all other devices would stay at home. No phones, no nothing.

    Technology’s Impact on Behavior

    The effects of technology on our thought patterns and behaviors aren’t great. The presence of technology seems to give us a free pass to be rude and unmindful in group situations (i.e. texting during dinner), or to flake out on our friends. It also changes the way we interact with others, including our children, when doing an activity together, like reading.

    “Electronic readers seem to change the types of conversations that parents and children have over a story,” according to KinderCare Learning Centers. “With e-readers, we adults tend to be more prescriptive when talking—push this, swipe that—and less conversational…”

    For all the talk about technology connecting people around the world, it certainly does its share of creating disconnection, too. I strongly believe we would all be happier if we spent more time face-to-face and less time face-to-screen.

    Together but Apart

    I recently moved into a new house, and it took a few weeks for my Internet to get hooked up. There was a very noticeable shift in my behavior and that of my roommates once we were online.

    Before the Internet, we all interacted with each other when we were in common spaces, playing games and talking about our days. With the Internet, we were more likely to be in our own rooms, procrastinating and wasting time.

    Of course we still interacted and still have frequent game nights together, but often the presence of a smartphone or laptop changes the entire vibe of an evening. I long for the days when we were unplugged and connecting more deeply.

    Physical Reasons to Unplug

    In addition to emotional and behavioral patterns, the physical costs of excessive screen time are great. Vision and eye problems like dry eye syndrome can be exacerbated by too much screen time, while headaches and back problems are common among people who sit in front of computers all day. Lack of exercise due to too much sitting in front of computers directly leads to obesity and other health issues.

    Somehow, these ailments don’t seem to stop us. We’d rather end up at rehab camps for tech addicts than set down our devices. Do we really want to be chained to the Internet and at the beck and call of each notification that lights up our smartphone?

    A Different Way

    It’s unrealistic to banish technology from our lives completely. But we can take steps to unplug from certain networks or devices, or to designate a no-tech period in the day that’s screen-free. For me, finding that balance is key.

    Once I returned home from my travels, I found myself wanting to connect to all the social media networks I had abandoned. I wanted to share travel photos and stories and see what friends had been doing while I was gone. I felt torn between this urge to scroll and post and the desire to stick to my commitment of trying to be a more mindful user of technology.

    So I made some compromises. I waited a year before getting back on Facebook (and have since found it significantly less interesting) and I use a flip phone (I know, I know—living in the Stone Age) instead of a smartphone. I know I have to make it easy for myself to not get sucked into the social media/internet vortex.

    One technique I also like to use is list-making. Have you ever gotten online to do one simple thing and then found yourself staring blankly at your computer an hour later, having no idea what you set out to do in the first place? I like to make a specific list of what I need to accomplish online and stick it in front of my laptop where I can see it. That way I’m reminded of my goal and purpose for opening my computer.

    Finding individual solutions is the key to success, whether you need to get outside and completely away from technology, or you simply need some productivity tools to keep you on task so you can be done with your work sooner. Either way, everyone can benefit from unplugging from time to time. Our health depends on it.

  • The Key to Happiness: Compare Less, Be More

    The Key to Happiness: Compare Less, Be More

    “Happiness is found when you stop comparing yourself to other people.” ~Unknown

    Stepping off the bus I was in shock.

    This tiny thing? With no doors in the doorways and no glass in the windows?

    This little place? With walls that looked like they were lone survivors of war?

    I would’ve been sure it was abandoned if it wasn’t for the hundreds of little footprints on trampled soil making up the floor of the school. A giant field with two erect logs on either side served as goals for what was supposed to be a gym. I always thought these types of experiences were supposed to make you feel grateful for what you have. Yet what happened that day made me feel poor.

    Today we were painting a school in northern Costa Rica. As the second bus pulled up, children flooded the campus. Brushes in hand and paint cans open wide, the workday began. Even though none of our group spoke Spanish, communication flowed effortlessly.

    Stroke after stroke, the diligence and level of attention of these kids was inspiring. Yet what struck me the most was how happy they were. It was as if they were not even aware their school didn’t have a floor. I couldn’t understand where this abundance of happiness was coming from until I met Luis.

    Somewhere between his broken English and my broken Spanish we bridged an understanding. I asked him about his life and he asked bout mine. I was stunned when he had no idea what New York was. How could he not know New York? I tried to explain, but our language barrier made it hard to paint a picture. Moving from words to gestures, back to words, I was like a mime trying to act out a song. These kids were truly happy in a way that I never saw kids in the states be.

    Then it hit me.

    What his family lacked in their bank accounts, they made up for in happiness.

    These people did not check their Instagram feeds, spending hours a day comparing their lives to people they never met across the world. Everyone around them was relatively on the same economic level.

    These kids prioritized relationships and time outside, not their cell phones or game consoles. Their expectations were low and enthusiasm for life high. They were rich in every way I wasn’t. They were happiness millionaires with no credit limits on their joy.

    Taking it With Me

    Life isn’t made up of many big decisions, but the compounding of thousands of small ones. When looking at our credit card bills, these decisions are easy to see, but most of life doesn’t come with such a transcript.

    I couldn’t reprogram my mind instantly, short of hitting myself over the head and hoping to forget the world I knew. I wondered what small, compounding changes I could make in my life to be more like Luis. If I could identify the moments in the day where I compare myself to others and minimize that, could my happiness level rise?

    I decided to run the experiment.

    After spending three days being hyper aware of all my actions I found, on average, thirty-seven instances a day where I compared myself to someone else.  Here was the breakdown where these moments occurred:

    58%: While on social media

    33%: In the world (going to work, from work, shopping, etc.)

    10%: During a conversation with another person

    Seeing things broken out like this was eye opening. This task went from overwhelming and impossible, to actionable and realistic.

    My Results and Action Plan

    Social Media

    Even though this made up a huge percentage, I was never one to be on social media for hours a day. However, I noticed that in just one session I could rack up multiple counts of comparing myself to others. To combat this, instead of turning off social media, I changed who I was paying attention to.

    Any celebrities that added nothing to my life except their flashy lifestyles were unfollowed, deleted, and replaced by more useful content. Most acquaintances that I didn’t really know well were also removed. My feed became a mixture of close personal relationships and cool interesting things I could learn from.

    In the World/In Conversation

    These two were much harder to combat. Yet while the solution to cutting them out was far from easy, it was quite simple. Since I could not prevent myself from getting these thoughts, I would use the notepad on my phone and record the instances after they occurred. After noting each occurrence, I would write, “Compare less, be more.”

    In about two weeks something strange began to happen.

    Not only did I see a dramatic reduction in my count, but now my brain would catch itself. Right as I was about to compare myself to something or someone, the principle would play in my mind instead, “Compare less, be more.” This would instantly break my thought pattern and put me back into the present moment. This wouldn’t happen every time, but it happened more and more every week.

    After one month I noticed a dramatic increase in my happiness. I conducted the experiment again and found the number of daily comparisons were reduced to thirty-seven to nine.

    Ultimately, much of our unhappiness comes from us looking onto others’ greener grass while neglecting our own yards. We focus on comparing and competing instead of creating and being. Not having a Ferrari does not make us any less, but constantly reminding ourselves we don’t have a Ferrari absolutely does.

    When we attach our self-worth to anything or anyone, it’s no longer ours. We limit the flow of ideas and range of action as we approach life from a state of lack.

    The next time you find yourself being obsessed over something you don’t have, just remember to compare less, be more. Maybe one day we can all be as rich as Luis, the richest kid in the world.

  • Accepting People You Dislike as They Are: How It Benefits You and How to Do It

    Accepting People You Dislike as They Are: How It Benefits You and How to Do It

    “We often give our enemies the means of our own destruction.” ~Aesop, The Eagle and the Arrow

    We can sometimes have difficulty accepting our friends, family, and loved ones as they are when their habits, quirks, or behavior annoy us. Our natural tendency is to try to change what we don’t like about them, which often leads to resentment. Nonetheless, given their importance and presence in our lives, we are usually willing to make an effort to accept them as they are.

    But what about people we dislike—people who cause us grief? For example, an overbearing boss, a scheming coworker, or an annoying relative. Should we also make an effort to accept them as they are?

    Before you decline to do so, consider that when we don’t accept such people as they are (and more about what that means shortly), the adverse consequences for ourselves can be even worse.

    One problem is that we will be prone to engaging them in combative, retaliatory ways, as was my modus operandi. I now realize that I suffered unnecessarily from my refusal to accept people I disliked or despised, in terms of both greater personal anguish and counterproductive responses to their actions.

    And especially so when I was betrayed by a business partner several years ago.

    I Refused to Accept My Business Partner for Who He Was

    During a particularly difficult period in my life when my first wife and I were on the brink of breaking up, a business partner was intent on squeezing me out of my most profitable real estate investment in the Midwest. He controlled the purse strings and withheld the money due to me from the investment.

    He also made disparaging remarks about my wife and me to our banker. The problem was, we shared the same banker—my partner introduced us—and my partner happened to be one of the bank’s wealthiest clients. The bank called my loans, and I didn’t have the means to repay them.

    Accepting this person for who he was and acting in my best interests under the circumstances was not even a consideration. Instead, consumed with unbridled anger and resentment, I foolishly launched a costly five-year legal battle that brought me to the brink of bankruptcy.

    My sense of urgency also caused me to miss important doctor appointments for the removal of a small lesion on my nose, which later resulted in my losing half my nose to a vicious tumor and enduring four major reconstructive surgeries.

    When an offer to settle came in shortly before trial, my attorney asked me what I wanted out of the case—meaning financially. I righteously announced to him my intention to make my partner stop taking advantage of people and change his unscrupulous business practices.

    Dumbfounded, my attorney turned to me and exclaimed, “Danny, you must be kidding! Do you really think you are going to change this man? That’s just not going to happen.”

    And it didn’t!

    What Acceptance Is—and Isn’t

    As I mentioned, accepting my partner for who he was and not trying to change him was not a consideration. At the time, I equated acceptance with surrender and excusing bad behavior—and being weak. I also believed that I had the power to change people’s ingrained ways, which I now know is myth conquering reality!

    I have since learned that true acceptance has nothing to do with surrender, backing down, condoning bad behavior, or the like. Rather, true acceptance means accepting people and things as they are without judgment or harboring negative feelings such as fear, anger, resentment, and the like (or at least minimally so).

    As such, true acceptance is the detached, even-keeled acknowledgment of the underlying or objective reality—the “how is” and “what is”—of the person or situation.

    With that mindset, you are able to accept someone you dislike as they are, and still terminate the relationship if you determine it is in your best interest to do so. You can also change the dynamics of the relationship if cutting ties is not practical or realistic.

    For example, you can accept a divisive sibling (or other family member) as they are, and still set boundaries, such as avoiding problematic topics of discussion, or choosing the type, extent, and frequency of contact you wish to have.

    Further, acceptance does not mean that you need be passive or give up principles and values that are important to you. Thus, whether in dealing with dishonest politicians or business leaders, or when you feel an injustice has been done, acceptance does not mean that you shouldn’t take corrective actions that voice your own “truths.”

    The Gifts of Accepting People You Dislike 

    When you are able to accept people you dislike (or anyone for that matter) as they are, you can then recognize the choices that will serve you best.

    Why? Acceptance induces a critical shift in focus from what you are powerless to change or do to what you can do to better serve your needs. In short, accepting what is lets you discover what might be—and no less so when dealing with people you dislike.

    I certainly had viable choices with my business partner besides pursuing the combative, self-harming course I chose. One choice was to not sue and instead devote my time and energy—and money—to improving my other properties. However, my unprocessed fear and anger obscured this much wiser path.

    A related gift of acceptance is that it brings you freedom by releasing the shackles that bind you to troublesome relationships. (This is particularly true when dealing with past parental transgressions, control freaks, and other “crazy makers.”)

    Acceptance is also a great stress and anxiety reducer. When you accept people and things as they are, you have little to stress (and lose sleep) over.

    Keys to Accepting People You Dislike

    Practicing acceptance with people you dislike is challenging. It is often a process that evolves over time and in which incremental steps are fruitful. Certain keys will facilitate the process.

    Process your fears.  

    Unprocessed fear prevents acceptance because it dominates our thoughts instead of allowing us to make the choices that serve us best. Apt acronyms for FEAR are “Future Events Already Ruined” and “False Evidence Appearing Real.”

    With my partner, for example, I was in that “already ruined” mode because of my strong fear that his actions would irreparably impact my livelihood—but they in fact wouldn’t because I had other profitable investments.

    We thus need to process and reduce our fears in order to benefit from the even-keeled type of acceptance I have described. Most fears are illusory and speculative; they diminish and even leave when they are closely examined.

    It helps considerably to examine the objective reality of the person or situation you are dealing with rather than be guided by negative speculations about what might happen and what could be. Face and lean into your fears. Their bark is much greater than their bite. When you so process your fears, their hold over you (and your thinking) will lessen considerably, and viable options and choices will be revealed to you.

    Defuse your anger.

    In much the same manner, our anger and resentment toward people we dislike obstruct acceptance. Moreover, anger can easily exacerbate situations in ways that are harmful to us, like it did for me when I dueled with my business partner.

    The late Carrie Fisher expressed it well in her book Wishful Drinking: “Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.” (I certainly drank a lot of poison while waiting for my former business partner to change his dishonorable ways!)

    It softens the edge of your resentment if you try to see things from the other person’s perspective. Many—perhaps even most—times, people’s behavior is based on their fears, anxieties, and self-interests and not on any intent to harm us.

    An overbearing and controlling boss, for example, is likely guided by fears and anxiety about his business rather than your job performance. A fierce competitor, whether in business or on the playing field or at school, is likely guided by her need to win rather than a desire to suppress you. And an unkind gossiper is likely guided by her low self-esteem and need to be liked rather than an intent to harm you.

    In the case of my partner, looking back I now recognize that he acted mainly out of the concern about how the break-up of my marriage would impact one of his largest investments.

    Look for the good!  

    Some—maybe most—of the time we are so engulfed in the turmoil with those we dislike, that we can’t see the “positive” influences that they have on our lives. I learned an awful lot from my partner during the years we worked together. He’s a very astute businessman. My departure totally changed my career trajectory. It lead to establishing a real estate investment company in which I have been able to apply what I learned from him in my own business dealings with great success.

    Another major gift was that he played a major role in helping me to prove to myself that I can take care of myself under severe pressures and adverse circumstances. I always had doubts about that.

    Recognizing these “good” things removed my anger and I was later able to accept my partner for the person he was, even offering a toast to his good health at a dinner gathering of friends following the settlement of the law suit.

    Acceptance Intentions

    Below are some intentions that will assist you in accepting people you dislike as they are.

    I will: 

    Process my fear and anger.

    Not take what they do personally.

    Recognize the fears and anxieties that drive them.            

    Pause, reflect, and think objectively.

    Not assume an intent to harm me.

    Set appropriate boundaries.

    Trust that I will be able to take care of myself.

    Be true to myself.

    In doing these things, you will feel less annoyed, more grounded, and more focused on taking care of your needs—and the gifts of acceptance will be yours!

  • The Most Powerful Tool for Healing: Tell the Right Stories

    The Most Powerful Tool for Healing: Tell the Right Stories

    TRIGGER WARNING: This post deals with an account of sexual abuse and may be triggering to some people.

    “Our wounds are often the openings into the best and most beautiful parts of ourselves.” ~David Richo

    In my mid-thirties, I had what I experienced as a breakdown.

    If you had asked me ten or even twenty years earlier whether I had been sexually abused, I would have said no. But in my mid-thirties, strange and scary memories started surfacing in my body—along with pieces of story and language.

    These pieces of memory and my responses to them seemed to glue together many of the disconnected, unincorporated experiences of my life; it was as if I were connecting the dots and seeing a shape that had been there all along but that I had never perceived before.

    In part, my reading had taken me to recognizing the trauma that I was unearthing. I found myself reading again and again about violence: violence in war, in families, in almost every facet of society. And almost every book I read about violence referenced Judith Herman’s Trauma and Recovery. So finally I took the book out from the library.

    Reading the book, I felt as if I were looking in a mirror.

    I thought I’d had an easy, carefree childhood. Now I needed to reconfront that story and reimagine who I was.

    Herman’s book, published more than twenty-five years ago, is still the bible of trauma studies: it maps out, step by step, how trauma and PTSD affect people; it draws the link between public and private traumas, between PTSD in war veterans and survivors of domestic and sexual abuse.

    It put into language so many of the experiences that I had never been able to name: feelings of dissociation, disconnection between the mind and the body, fear, self-blame.

    At first the experience of reading the book was empowering, and then, as the memories became stronger, I began to have panic attacks. I felt as if I were in the grips of something so much more powerful than myself that I didn’t know if I’d make it through.

    It was as if enormous waves of pain and horror were sweeping over me, and I would lose all sense of myself, all grounding. I felt somersaulted, upside down. I felt as if I was losing the person I had been, slipping away from my old, composed, presentable self into a new identity dominated by this early wounding, scared by the world around me, horrified at what humans do to one another, unable to even imagine feeling safe.

    I felt as if the ground were falling out beneath me.

    Over time, I came to piece together the trauma story: a babysitter had sexually assaulted me when I was very young. Because I was so young and because there were no other witnesses, fear, horror, and shame were lodged in my body without having clear language around them.

    But at first, as the memories started to come, my memories were more physical than verbal: I experienced physical sensations and flashbacks of being pinned down, of not being able to breathe, and piercing sensations of both physical pain and psychological and existential terror.

    It took all of my energy to keep my life from falling apart. I was a mom of two young kids and had a relatively successful professional life as a writer and academic. But now I didn’t have any energy for anything other than raising my kids and taking care of myself.

    I tried to concentrate my energy on bringing my best self forward to get through the day for my kids and to keep up with the daily demands and to be the kind of mom I wanted to be—present, listening, compassionate, even fun. I was able (mostly) to remember how to do this in their company, and the routine of being with them kept me on track and reminded me of the good in the world and, despite my pain, of hope and love.

    But once they went to sleep at night, I was immersed in a dark world of struggle.

    I didn’t know who I was anymore. And my basic trust in my body and in the world felt eroded. Along with the physical memories of the sexual assault and my fear and horror was a deep physical sensation of shame.

    For complex reasons, shame seems to arise as one of the symptoms of sexual abuse, more than in other forms of trauma, especially when the abuse occurs in children. The violation of the body often brings up feelings of self-blame, of separation from the self, and of disgust that gets turned on the self.

    In children especially, it is often easier to blame themselves than to blame the adults who should be taking care of them—it’s a way, subconsciously, to create an image of a safer world, where the adults are reliable, and a sense of control.

    So when these feelings came flooding back with the memories of what had happened, even though intellectually I understood I had not in any way been to blame, I was nevertheless overcome by a physical sensation of shame, spreading from my stomach up into the rest of my body.

    Because the wounding had affected me so deeply, I (irrationally) felt that it had colored every part of me, as if I were covered in filth. I felt as if the very fact that I had been violated as a child spread contamination in my own house as an adult.

    When I wrote, the stories I found myself telling were stories of trauma and horror, violence and violation. And I wasn’t comfortable sharing these stories. These weren’t the stories I wanted to be putting into the world. I largely put my writing career on hold, unsure of whether I’d ever get back to it.

    It was 2009. Sexual abuse was still largely a taboo topic. I felt that I would be judged poorly if I shared my experience.

    I didn’t personally know anyone who was public about childhood sexual abuse. Or if I did, it was something long in the past that seemed no longer to affect them. I certainly didn’t know anyone who was public about being affected by PTSD. And it was clear that what I was suffering from was PTSD.

    I didn’t know anyone who had healed from PTSD. Was this a life sentence?

    At first, I had thought I would get through this breakdown relatively quickly, but I found myself plunging farther and farther.

    Ashamed and scared that I would never heal, my crisis was something I mostly kept to myself. For a long time, I didn’t tell anyone what I was going through other than my husband, my very best friends, and the professionals I reached out to for support.

    I had friends who got sick with other illnesses, and mutual friends looked after their kids, brought home-cooked meals, and the whole community came out in support. But I had no such support, and so in its own way the secrecy around my struggle with PTSD perpetuated the cycle of shame and the silence that I had experienced as a young child.

    One year turned into two and then three. The future that I imagined for myself as a writer and professional seemed forever out of reach.

    Gradually, though, and very slowly, I worked my way out of the crisis. I began to put myself back together, but with a less rigid story of myself.

    I went to therapy. I joined groups of women also suffering from PTSD and practiced speaking about what was happening to me. I developed a strong meditation and yoga practice.

    I began to break the silence and reformulate my own story, and I wrote and wrote in my journal at night, a safe place where no one could see what I was struggling with, but where I could learn to witness all the many different parts of myself.

    Putting into language what had happened and listening to my body with compassion helped me begin to turn the tide.

    As I began to tell just the few people I felt most safe with, many people who I never knew had suffered from trauma began to tell their trauma and healing stories to me, or friends would put me in touch with other friends who had also suffered from sexual abuse and healed. There was a whole underground network of people sharing stories and sharing techniques about how they had healed.

    I was so moved by the stories I was hearing haphazardly that I began to interview people who had suffered any number of different kinds of trauma to understand how they had gotten through their crises. I wanted to learn more for myself if and how people got through the healing crisis and came out on the other side.

    I talked to people who had lost their children and people who had been incarcerated, people who had suffered serious cancers and people who had healed from sexual abuse. I learned from their strength and their ability to make sense of and learn and grow from their own stories—a capacity that I saw made many draw on a deep spiritual sense of self and connection.

    In the people I interviewed, I saw not people broken by trauma, but strong people with great vivacity and much to teach. And I saw that the people who could tell compelling narratives about their life experiences, that is, those people who had really faced head-on, explored, and healed, had a kind of luminosity to them.

    Many had suffered a great deal, but in the face of that suffering, many of them had also found an internal and spiritual richness to meet their challenges.

    Listening to others, I came to have more distance from my own suffering and came to be able to witness my story from the more compassionate space of a witness.

    As I saw how others had grown and deepened in response to their life experiences, I also began to reframe what I was experiencing. I came to develop my own spiritual life more fully. I deepened my meditation practice and was trained as a kundalini yoga teacher.

    Though I had been eager to get on with my life and had perceived the pain and turmoil I was in as harmful and keeping me from all that I wasn’t doing (getting on with my career, etc.), over time, I came to see that that period was not a breakdown, but a time of healing, transformation, and growth.

    And I came to see that I was only able to go through that period of healing and transformation because I was strong enough to bear to look at and process what I had not been able to bear as a child or even as a younger woman. I needed a certain amount of stability in my life and inner strength to face the challenges of my past and allow myself to remember my horror and confusion.

    And as I did this, I began to develop new strength and appreciation within myself.

    What can feel like weakness, confusion, and failure very often is the doorway to courage and resilience.

    Today, I am happy to say that not only have I healed my PTSD, but I also feel much better physically and emotionally than I did before my crisis. I’m able to listen with more openness, compassion, and understanding not only to myself but also to the suffering of others’ around me. And I’m more able to let go of my fear of joy, what Brené Brown calls foreboding joy, and be fully present for the pleasures and beauty of the world.

    I was able to heal because others shared stories that let me know that healing was possible. These stories gave me faith in the ability to heal and were the foundation for allowing me to do the work necessary to get through the crisis. They allowed me to see the disruption in my life and psyche not only as a descent into darkness but also as a path to more light.

    Because I knew to trust the process, even when a part of me found it hard to believe there was ever going to be a light at the end of the tunnel, I kept going.

    From Judith Herman’s Trauma and Recovery to the friends who shared their stories to the therapists who offered trauma support groups to the yoga and meditation teachers who offered their wisdom, I was supported by others who knew about and believed in the possibility of healing from PTSD.

    There were any number of times when I might have turned away from healing in despair, when I might have looked outside myself to solve my problems, turning to substances or throwing myself back into work or even looking to move or change my marriage, instead of staying with the pain inside of myself.

    But I was supported because I knew that the pain and even the shame were part of the process—that they were not unique to me, that there was no way around, but only through, and that when I felt I had hit a wall, it was not time to stop, but instead time to look for extra support and more tools.

    If we believe a narrative that tells us that we need to be moving forward all the time and that feeling pain and shame is a sign of weakness, we will almost certainly miss out on opportunities to heal and grow.

    Like Brené Brown, who calls her breakdown a spiritual awakening, I believe that we can only grow if we allow ourselves to go to those difficult, hurting places, if we don’t expect our lives to unfold in a straight line, and if we share stories not only of the way trauma happens but also of the ways healing happens.

    We need to talk about how healing takes time and energy; the way it often seems to take us down before it can bring us up; the way we sometimes need to go back before we can go forward; and the way, ultimately, it can make us much happier, healthier, more connected to ourselves and others, and more resilient, if we stay with it.

    And we need to make safe places available for healing so that it can run its course. We need to give people time and safety and understanding.

    In the past, cancer was a word that was only whispered, as if the disease itself were somehow secret and shameful. Today, we are public about cancer, but we still often whisper about abuse and PTSD.

    The #metoo movement is starting to change this; more and more people are coming forward to publicly share their stories of abuse.

    And just as our trauma stories are powerful, our healing stories are equally powerful and important. We can and must break the silence and taboo not only around the trauma itself but also around the complicated, messy, long, but ultimately rewarding process of healing from trauma.

    Though PTSD is not often spoken of, it is estimated that 10% of women will develop PTSD in their lifetime and that at any time more than 5 million people in the US are suffering from PTSD. But it’s likely that those numbers are much too low.

    We live in a largely traumatized world, and we can’t heal that trauma if we don’t have the tools to recognize it, name it, witness it, and patiently offer supports for the healing process.

    Denial and shame are natural but immature coping mechanisms and ultimately prevent healing. It can be difficult to break these patterns and look directly at the truth; facing what is difficult can lead to what seems like a crisis and breakdown, but if we stay with our experiences, trusting in the power of healing, we can transform, both as individuals and as a society.

  • There Are a Gazillion Little Ways to Be Kind (and It Benefits You Too)

    There Are a Gazillion Little Ways to Be Kind (and It Benefits You Too)

    “The place to improve the world is first in one’s own heart and head and hands.” ~Robert M. Pirsig

    One day while grocery shopping I was reaching for a head of lettuce when I heard a shrill, high-pitched wail from a few aisles over. It sent shivers up my spine. It was one of those sounds that grabs your breath and pulls it to your heart.

    It brought me back to a time I had long forgotten—a memory engrained in my brain from about twenty-two years ago when my children were toddlers. I remember those days of being exhausted and trying to wrap up the weekly shopping trip before the tantrum.

    Most people in the store tried to ignore it, but the shrieks came like contractions about every six minutes. People started rolling their eyes. One lady commented that children shouldn’t be allowed in stores. I felt really bad for this parent. I mean, we were all children once, right? It’s pretty rude to fault the parent for something that occurs naturally as a part of being human.

    Eventually, as I filled my cart, I ended up in the same aisle as the mom and child. Mom was spent. There was a Ziploc bag of Cheerios tucked next to the child and a stuffed animal that had probably been picked up off the floor of the aisle about fifty times.

    It is during times like these when we, as humans, need to pause and show some compassion. As a woman, I wanted to support a fellow sister. As a parent, I wanted to support a fellow parent. As a human, I wanted to let her know that stuff like this happens and it’s okay, and in a few years she’ll laugh telling stories like these.

    What I wanted to convey is that this was simply a very human moment.

    I think we’ve conditioned ourselves to overlook many things in life—to shrug it off, roll our eyes, and simply walk away. We evade interaction on a very basic level. We miss so many opportunities to extend our human kindness to each other.

    We live in a fast-paced world; we’re always on the go. We’re too worried about getting from Point A to Point B. Our brains are filled with thoughts and worries. We’re trying to stay two steps ahead of ourselves. Often this results in the failure to stop and do something nice for someone else.

    I think what’s happened in the world today is that we see poverty, abuse, disease, war, hunger, bullying, and violence so often that it is overwhelming. We feel dispirited. What we must remember, no matter how distressing the news is, that we have the power to make a change. It starts with us understanding that because we are human we have been bestowed with the power to change the world with kindness.

    What we need to remember is that when we offer kindness to strangers, we not only brighten their day, we brighten our own. When we express kindness to each other we establish or strengthen connections with each other. Sometimes it’s just a fabulous reminder of our humanness.

    The beautiful thing about kindness is that it lives in your heart. It’s always there waiting to come out and make an appearance. You always know it’s a true kindness when you don’t expect anything in return, like gratitude or reciprocation; you simply want to make someone feel better.

    Also, kindness is good for your health. Being kind regulates our heart rate; we get a warm, cozy feeling. Our brain releases dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and endorphins, all of which make us happy. And oxytocin also reduces inflammation in the heart, so kindness is literally good for your heart!

    Committing regular acts of kindness or simply showing kindness to others on a regular basis lowers blood pressure and reduces your chances of dying early.

    Regular practice of kindness also decreases pain and anxiety while giving your energy a boost.

    What are the human benefits of kindness?

    * Kindness builds empathy. It can help us to put ourselves in another’s shoes. It encourages us to do nice things for others because we would like others to do nice things for us.

    * Kindness builds gratitude. We look at the situations others are experiencing and we become grateful for what we have. Even when it’s not a lot, we can find the gratitude easier when we are kind to others.

    * Kindness creates a ripple effect of kindness. One simple act of kindness can put a smile on someone’s face for the rest of the day. It can make someone feel good. In their energy of feeling better that they, chances are they are going to say something nice or do something good for another person, and that baton of good feelings will get handed to another as the days go on.

    * Kindness gives a boost to our own self-worth as well as to the self-worth of the person we are giving the kindness.

    * Kindness is calming. It gives a new perspective for us to step away from a woe and allow that warm, cozy feeling to run through our veins.

    * When we are kind, we become a better human. Everything about us changes. Our demeanor, outlook, and our way of thinking. We become a conduit of hope.

    As for me in the grocery store? I played peak-a-boo for two aisles. I managed to get a smile and the baby’s tears dried up. She even offered me a Cheerio, which I pretended to eat.

    Something as simple as a childhood game relieved a bit of stress for another parent. It was a very simple act of kindness that didn’t cost a thing. To the mom, it was an unsaid acknowledgement of “You’re not alone and I understand what you’re going through.” It really is that simple.

    What did I walk away with? Well… I had pulled up some memories from a quarter century ago that made me smile. That evening when I got home I actually pulled out the kids old photo albums and started to recall my own adventures with them. I felt good knowing that I didn’t add to someone else’s stress by being rude or uncaring, and I made a child smile. I think that’s a pretty good day.

    You don’t have to wait until you see a screaming child in the grocery store; there are a gazillion little ways to spread kindness:

    Hold the door for someone (even if you are running late).

    Smile at people.

    Give up your seat on the bus or train.

    When you see a homeless person, look them in the eye and offer them a meal.

    Stop at an accident to see if anyone needs help.

    Help a parent get their baby stroller up the stairs.

    Volunteer somewhere.

    Let someone ahead of you in traffic without complaining.

    Help someone reach something off the high shelf.

    Visit an elderly neighbor.

    Buy lemonade from a child’s stand.

    Tell someone you love their outfit or hair.

    Tell someone they are a good parent.

    Leave a generous tip.

    Offer someone a tissue if they are crying.

    Do you have anything to add to the list?

  • To Reduce Stress, Stop Globalizing and Put Things in Perspective

    To Reduce Stress, Stop Globalizing and Put Things in Perspective

    “I’ve had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened.” ~Mark Twain

    Life happens. And sometimes when life happens, we can get pretty stressed out. I’ve found that the way we view situations can either reduce our stress or make it worse. Here is just one way we aggravate situations, possibly unnecessarily, and how we can adjust our perspective to keep stress in check.

    A colleague of mine claims that he is “calendar-challenged.” He is often unable to attend meetings at the last minute or shows up late. I am, by contrast, a planner. I live by my calendar and know what I am doing months in advance. The different approach that my colleague and I take in the way we plan—or don’t plan—can cause friction.

    I could interpret my colleague’s behavior as merely irresponsible and chalk it up to a fairly ingrained part of his personality. That situation is irritating at worst. Or, I could take his lackadaisical approach personally by assuming that he doesn’t value me or my time. That’s somewhat stressful. I could even interpret his behavior as intentional and assume that he takes delight in making me angry. That is really going to stress me out.

    Do you see how my interpretation of the behavior can be as benign as “he’s not a planner” and it can escalate all the way to a vengeful person determined to sabotage my career?

    When we draw conclusions about a situation without checking the facts first, we can escalate it into a full-blown crisis in our minds. In other words, our negative thinking can spiral out of control, rapidly increasing our anxiety, unnecessarily.

    That’s called globalizing. How we think about our circumstances can make all the difference in the level of stress we feel.

    Many of us have experienced a workplace where budget cuts or a bad economy results in layoffs. The pall that can settle over an organization going through a period of like this can cause a great deal of stress, even for those employees still employed.

    Enter globalizing. I have what I call “straight to bag lady” syndrome. I can become convinced that if I lose my job I will never find another one, I will become homeless, and then I will be forced to live on the street.

    During the downturn of 2008 when many organizations were shedding employees like leaves in the fall, I occasionally went into this spiral in my mind. My good friend and colleague, however, did not. When I would ask her if she was stressed out by the loss of colleagues around us, she would say, “Yeah, I’m not going to worry about it. Even if they let me go, I assume I can just find another job.”

    Wow. What I wouldn’t give to have her attitude.

    She wasn’t oblivious to the fact that there was a good chance she might lose her job. However, instead of globalizing and assuming everything would just get worse and worse, she was able to stick to the facts in her mind and not globalize. She knew she still had a job. She knew there was a good chance she might lose her job. If that came to pass, she had a plan in mind. Being a bag lady was not part of her plan.

    About a year into our firm’s layoffs, my colleague really did lose her job and she put her backup plan in place. She started her own business, something she had always wanted to do. Most importantly, throughout the year of layoffs, a legitimately stressful time in her life, she didn’t drive herself crazy with worry along the way by imagining the worst.

    I’ve heard that our bodies and brains respond to an imaginary worry in the same way they would if the imagined situation was actually happening to us. Why put ourselves through the stress of something that just isn’t as bad as we think?

    Globalizing places a very negative filter over our perception, causing stress and anxiety to feed on itself. We are, then, far more likely to interpret every situation as disastrous and to give the least benefit of the doubt to every person we encounter.

    The loss of a job is made worse by globalizing that we will never find another job again. The loss of a partner is made worse by globalizing that we will never find anybody else with whom to share our life—or that every member of our pool of potential candidates is horrible. The loss of a marriage is made worse by globalizing that we are not loveable.

    The best way to reduce anxiety is to look at the facts rather than our subjective interpretation of them. It is all the more important to doublecheck facts if we have come from anxious environments, where the people around us were globalizing up a storm.

    Digging into our own background to make sure we have not applied a negative filter to everyone we encounter is an important step. Doing so will cause us to lose the opportunities presenting themselves in times of perceived crisis or to miss out on all the people who would never dream of acting in a negative way toward us.

    Is my colleague’s calendar issue just an irritating quirk, is it part of an overall pattern of behavior that evidences one’s disrespect for another’s time, or is it evidence of something worse, such as intentional sabotage? Is my fear of going “straight to bag lady” based in reality in any way?

    One way I bring my perspective back to an objective one is by whipping out a pen and some paper and making a list that separates the facts from my fears.

    I can list the times that my colleague’s lack of organization affected me. Then I can all of the ways my colleague is respectful of me. When I step back and look at both lists, I will have a better picture of what that calendar quirk of his really means, if anything.

    My lists may show his calendar challenges as an anomaly compared to a long list of behaviors in which he is respectful and supportive of me. In that case, I can chalk up poor planning skills to an irritating and innocent habit, find a workaround to the problem, and be thankful I work with such a good guy. No one is perfect.

    On the other hand, if I see that there is a pattern of behavior in which my colleague seems to genuinely devalue me and my time, or the list reveals someone who is intent on sabotage and it is directed squarely at me, then I have clearly defined the problem at hand. Regardless of the results, they will bring my perspective much closer to reality instead of the anxiety-provoked interpretation that may be in my head.

    In gauging my risk of becoming a bag lady, I can write down all of the factors I have working in my favor. If I have solid work experience, a good education, and a good network of contacts, is there a reasonable expectation that I will find work, even in a poor economy?

    I can also list the backup plans available in case it takes a while to find another job. Perhaps I have savings, supportive friends and family, or an available line of credit at the bank. Since someone is always hiring even in the worst economies, I may need to start exploring other geographic areas or industries with opportunities.

    Reigning in our brains from globalizing a situation—even if it reveals that a problem does exist—still relieves our stress significantly. It defines the problem and it clarifies the extent of it, which enables us to respond appropriately. A problem accurately defined is already partially solved.

    Keeping globalization in check also means that we reduce the stress of the people around us. If we are constantly overreacting to others, assuming they have done something intentionally when their behavior is well intentioned—though perhaps imperfect—we are creating conflict that need not exist. People around us will distance themselves from us, since no one feels they can trust an overly sensitive, over-reactive, and accusatory colleague.

    If I freak out every time another of my colleagues is laid off, then the people around me will also keep their distance. They are focused on keeping their own anxieties in check and a frenetic worrisome person in their midst only makes it harder. Anxiety is contagious, but fortunately, so is calm.

    Are you inadvertently making a difficult situation even worse? Unfortunately, it is human nature to globalize about how badly things might be. It is our ego’s misguided attempt to gain control over an unknown. If we think about the worst-case scenario, then we will be prepared if it turns out to be true, right? Wrong. Globalizing just leads to the escalation of a situation.

    Regaining an objective perspective prevents us from floundering in negativity and enables us to move forward into a resolution that accurately addresses the situation.

  • How to Start Dating from a Place of Self-Love

    How to Start Dating from a Place of Self-Love

    “You must learn to love yourself before you can love someone else.” ~Sonja Mylin

    It’s tough being out there.

    I remember myself some years ago embracing the world of online dating. Everyone kept telling me “be yourself” (and I kept telling myself that), but when I was actually on a date, “myself” would fly out the window.

    I’d go hard on the impressing, second-guess myself, drink too much, look for every little thing we had in common (even if the person did not feel right), feel devastated if I was rejected, and utterly lose sight of what I was on the date for in the first place. Perhaps I didn’t really know who I was or how to be her in what I saw as a confronting environment.

    Dating brings out all our fears and vulnerabilities. You’re basically putting yourself on a platter, asking folks to judge you: “Pick me! Pick me!” like someone on a reality TV competition. You forget that it’s a two-way street. That you are looking for a suitable love (or a lover) to be with you, and that is all.

    We get the little brain buzz from being swiped right, from the initial contact message, from a nod of approval when we arrive. All of these microsigns can feel so great that they interrupt our reasonable thinking around who we’re looking for.

    Or, at the opposite end of the spectrum, we’re bombarded with messages from people we’re just not into (and straight up jerks), we go on dates that end up in an awful mess, we get rejected or we reject, which crushes someone, and it all feels terrible.

    It’s easy to lose heart.

    Dating doesn’t have to be like that. There are ways to bring it all back to what you are actually dating for in the first place. I know for myself that love came my way when I dug down a little deeper, stopped adjusting what I wanted from a relationship, gave it some time, had fun, and was really myself—warts, opinions, and all.

    Here are five ways to be out there from a place of self-love and have a much better chance of finding the real love you’re looking for.

    1. You are dating to find someone for you, not just to impress.

    This isn’t a job interview: dating is an opportunity for two people to find out if they like each other enough to keep finding out. No one is in a position of power over the other.

    Try not to spend the whole date putting all your energy into impressing the other person. Remember that you are checking them out as much as they are checking you out, and that you are making a decision too.

    2. Identify your values and then look for a match based on those instead of just shared interests.

    Sure, you want to be able to enjoy spending time with your partner, but contrary to popular opinion, your partner doesn’t need to be your best friend. You don’t need to do every single thing together. It’s far more important that you have similar core values. Interests can change, but values at their very core generally hold.

    What traits and ways of behaving are most important to you? What do you believe in? What world issues really pull your heartstrings? What would you fight for? How will you be able to tell if someone shares your values?

    Spend some time with yourself to drill down into the deeper stuff and then look for matching connections. Shared values will make for rich conversation and bring you back together when times are tough, not the fact that you both like white water rafting or watching RuPaul’s Drag Race.

    3. Stop performing a version of you.

    Many of us filter out the stuff we think might be seen as weird or boring or stupid when we’re dating. Or, it becomes normal to present a curated, cooler version of you. Of course you want to put your best foot forward, but sometimes it’s stripped back so much that who you are becomes completely invisible.

    Dating is not a numbers game. You don’t need loads of matches to find someone. You need matches with fewer folks who are really going to get you. Who will think you’re cute and funny and smart and interesting (even when you’re driving them mad).

    If you love binging Pretty Little Liars and cheap chocolate, painting old furniture, sleeping in until 4pm on Saturday afternoon, devouring true crime podcasts, attending the odd rally, and you wish you were an earth mother but are really more of a city gal who likes to shop, then that’s you.

    And my bet is that you are pretty unique and special with all your faults and quirks. We fall in love with real people, not pretend ones. If someone doesn’t love the real you, why are you with them in the first place? Wouldn’t it be far more wonderful to be cherished even when you are not the curated version of yourself?

    4. Don’t interpret “fun” as just the other person having fun.

    Hands up: Who is fantastic at helping other people relax—so much so that you forget to actually notice if you are having fun too?

    We all have roles we tend to play in life, and if yours is along these lines, then I’d encourage you to swallow that role somewhat and see what happens when you don’t leap into “Make them feel good” mode.

    Live with an awkward silence. Notice if you’re being asked questions, listened to, or engaged in conversation on a similar level to what you’re putting in. Spout an opinion or two. Not going well? Then it maybe this one isn’t for you. And phew! You found out early on.

    FYI: “Fun,” for those who have forgotten (because you’ve been out there way too long) is having a bit of a laugh and feeling relatively at ease.

    5. Yep, it should be pretty easy.

    Myth-busting time: Relationships don’t need to be hard and shouldn’t need to be “worked on” all the time. Are your friendships like that? My guess is that the good ones are not. Sure, they have ups and downs. There are misunderstandings and times of trouble. But ultimately, you really like each other’s company. You can rely on each other.

    The best relationships are fairly easy. They need to be able to stand the test of time. If it’s hard when nothing hard is happening, how is it going to be when something really hard is happening?

    Sure, there are situations that are supposed to be fun but instead can be fraught with issues (like moving in together). When we’re invested in someone and then mesh our lives together, that has some serious weight and it makes sense there will be teething.

    But if you’re on date four and it’s uncomfortable, combative, awkward, and pressure-filled, and you feel bad about yourself, or the other person is trying to control you? This one is most likely not for you.

    —

    Ultimately, dating from a place of self-love is about believing that you are worthy just as you are, and that there is someone out there (maybe several someone’s) who you can and will connect with.

    It’s not just about being loved—it’s about you loving someone else. And if you’re coming from a place of self-love, then you will ultimately run the dating gauntlet with kindness, self-respect, and vulnerability without heaping a load of meaning onto rejection. Rejection means this one wasn’t right for you, nothing more, and thank god they did you a favor! Because you are deserving of the real, luscious thing with someone truly amazing.

  • 8 Things I Learned from Watching My Mum Die

    8 Things I Learned from Watching My Mum Die

    “Pain changes your life forever. But so does healing from it.” ~Kayil York

    In 2012 my mum got diagnosed with cancer. After an operation, she was cancer-free for some time when in March 2017 it was discovered that the cancer had returned and had spread everywhere, notably to her lungs.

    She was adamant that she did not want further treatment, which would have been palliative at best anyway and would have had significant side effects. Nobody was able to make a prognosis regarding how much longer she had left. Being seventy, there was a chance that it would develop slowly.

    Nothing much seemed to happen for a little while when suddenly from one day to the next, she couldn’t use her legs anymore, and a few weeks later in July 2017, she was able to move into a hospice, having her last wish fulfilled. After a further four weeks, she passed away.

    Those four weeks were a rollercoaster. Her condition changed up and down. But mostly I could not get my head around how she could die. I simply couldn’t imagine how her body could go from functioning to shutting down.

    I lived about 500km away and went up to see her for long weekends during that time. I experienced the hospice as a very peaceful place. Nevertheless, I often sat by her bed, holding her hand and feeling utterly overwhelmed and helpless and scared.

    I was convinced that I should be doing something, saying something, but could not think of anything at all that might ease her final passage. The relationship with my mum had always been difficult, thus this also felt like the last chance to make my peace with her, with us.

    Seeing her in pain was horrific. She quickly advanced to a stage where she was no longer able to ring for the nurses. Wrinkling her forehead became the indicator for her pain. It was terrible to know that this was probably happening when nobody else was in the room and who knows how long it could take for anyone to notice.

    Once the nurse came to administer more painkillers, it took another ten to fifteen minutes until you could see them work and my mum’s face slowly relaxing. The ten longest minutes.

    After three weeks, swallowing became an issue. Even just taking a sip of water became a massive struggle and ended in coughing fits. The doctors said there was nothing they could do to make it easier. With all the medical advances, it seemed crazy that she had to endure any pain at all.

    Her last four weeks were the toughest in my life so far and the first time I experienced the death of somebody close, and from such close quarters. At the same time it also turned out to be the most rewarding time.

    One of the things that struck me was that almost everyone has or will experience the death of a loved one. It had such a monumental impact on me, and I can only assume that it does for a lot of people, too, and so I would like to share my story.

    Here are some of the lessons I learned, which arose from a very specific situation but which I feel are equally applicable to other challenging situations in life.

    1. You are alone.

    Dying is personal. Watching somebody die is personal. Your whole life is personal.

    There is simply no manual or set of guidelines to refer to. Not to how we live, not to how we die, and not to how we grieve.

    Sometimes we might confuse our personal life lessons with universal laws. A number of people were giving me advice (I didn’t ask for). Advice about having to be there for her final breath (in the end my mum decided to slip away with no one else in the room). Advice about the importance of the funeral or on the appropriate length and ways of grieving.

    Some of the forcefulness behind the messages were overwhelming at the time and had me doubting my own feelings and decisions. While I fully appreciate they meant well, I had to remind myself that only I can decide for myself what to do and how to do it. There is no right or wrong. What feels right to someone, might feel very wrong to you.

    Listen to your inner voice! Tune in, and your heart will tell you what to do. We all have an inner compass; it’s just a matter of learning to access and trust it. Equally, when the tables are turned, be conscious of how you talk to people. Offer support and share your experiences by all means but give room for the other person to go their own way.

    2. You are not alone.

    In other ways I was not alone. One of the most important lessons for me was to accept help. Yes, bloody ask for help! I tend to be a control-freak, proud of my independence, always having been able to deal with things by myself. Suddenly I felt frighteningly helpless. I felt like everyone else had it figured out and I was failing miserably.

    Everyone in the hospice was amazing, whether it was talking to me, listening to me, letting me cry, offering me a cup of tea, providing me with food, or holding my hand. It meant the world and I stopped regarding accepting help as a weakness. There is no merit in going it alone, whatever it may be. You want to help those you love—allow them to be there for you, too.

    3. The power of a good cry.

    In line with my wish to be independent, I hate crying in front of people. I worried it would upset my mum. I worried I made other people uncomfortable. I worried the tears would never stop.

    Then somebody told me that it’s physiologically impossible to cry continuously. I can’t remember the time, but it’s something like twenty minutes after which the crying will automatically cease. That thought comforted me: The worst that could happen would be to cry for twenty minutes. That seemed manageable. Besides, there didn’t seem to be much I could do to stop the tears from coming anyway.

    Once I relaxed about crying, I discovered how transformative tears could be. They offered and still offer a release of tension that would otherwise keep building up inside. They have a message that is worth listening to. They are part of life. Don’t feel ashamed. Don’t worry on other people’s behalf, because it’s not for you to figure out how they deal with your tears.

    4. Feel it all.

    I used to strive for a life made up of only happy moments. People would tell me that without the crap, we wouldn’t appreciate the good. But I’ll be honest: I was not convinced.

    When feeling ‘negative’ emotions, in addition to feeling them, I was annoyed that I felt them, adding another layer of frustration. I engaged in an internal fight against those emotions, and as you may guess this only made things worse.

    Here I was dealing with feelings that were new to me, also in an intensity that was new to me and which felt uncomfortable as hell. I quickly worked out though that I couldn’t push them away. I couldn’t distract myself. Eventually I came to accept them as part of me and part of the experience. And the thing is that everything passes—the “good” as well as the “bad.”

    Don’t judge your feelings. Allow them to flow through you. Fighting them will only make them linger longer. Feel them and seek to learn from them. Everything we feel can teach us a lesson.

    5. Some things you cannot prepare for.

    Since my mum’s initial diagnosis, I had been mentally preparing for her death. Or so I thought. Grief took on many different forms for me. I hadn’t expected any of them and had nevertheless been going through various scenarios beforehand. It turned out to have been a waste of time to even attempt preparing for any of it. And this applies to most things in life.

    It will be whatever it will be. But most importantly you will be okay!

    It sucks at times. It still comes over me at random times. The realization that she is no longer around hits me again and again, as if it’s news. I often dream of her. Things happen, and I want to tell her about it and then realize that I can’t talk to her ever again. I have no idea where else my grief will take me so I have given up spending time of trying to anticipate it but I have faith that I will manage.

    6. Carpe diem.

    We know we will die one day, yet we still generally live our lives as if we will be around forever.

    Okay, I’m not saying that I’ve seized every minute of every day since my mum passed away. I forget. But I also remember. I remember that life is short. Death puts things into perspective in many ways. Is it worth getting upset or stressed over certain things? Do I really want to hold a grudge? Is this really worth my time? Is this who I want to spend my time with? How will I feel looking back on my life when my time comes?

    I ask myself these questions more often nowadays, and it has changed my life for the better. I am overall more relaxed and I stress less. I am more precious over how I spend my time and who with. I am less willing to put up with things that don’t feel good to me (this is where your inner voice plays a crucial role, too). It is liberating to say the least.

    7. Gratitude rocks.

    Almost a decade ago, I started a daily gratitude diary. I found it tough in the beginning. After a crappy day, I just didn’t think anything good had happened. But practice changed my mindset with lasting effects.

    It’s not about forcing yourself to be happy all the time; it’s about changing your perspective and focusing on the “good” without denying the “bad.” It helps me not to take things for granted in everyday life.

    Even during my mum’s last weeks, I found many things on a daily basis that I felt grateful for: I was grateful that even on her deathbed we were able to share a laugh. I was grateful to witness through her friends and family how she had touched other people’s lives. I was grateful how it brought me back closer to some people. I was also grateful for little things like sitting on her balcony in the sun or listening to music together.

    Above all I was and am grateful for having been given the opportunity to witness her dying. Especially given our difficult relationship, I am grateful I was able to say goodbye – I am aware not everyone gets the chance.

    8. Resilience is a superpower.

    If I got through this, I will get through other stuff, too. Death is outside your control. You have no choice but to deal with it when it comes your way. You do have a choice how to deal with it though.

    You can find the lesson in whatever life serves you. You can combine all of the above and be safe in the knowledge that you will be okay. I feel more resilient and I am confident that it will help me master other situations in the future. It doesn’t mean that there won’t be pain. But you are able to handle it and bounce back.

    I sense that my list of lessons learned will continue to grow. One of the keys I believe is to be open-minded, drop the pre-judgment and expectations. I never would have imagined that all or any of this would come from my mum’s death.

    Whether it’s grief you are dealing with or other challenging circumstances, I hope you will find the cathartic power in your experience that can lead to incredible personal growth. Whatever this may look like for you.

  • We All Need to Define “Success” for Ourselves

    We All Need to Define “Success” for Ourselves

    “There’s no such thing as what you ‘should’ be doing with your life.” –Lori Deschene

    How often have you thought about what success means to you?

    If you’re anything like my younger self, that would be almost never. It’s not that I didn’t want to be successful. It’s just that it wasn’t something I’d given much thought to. No one ever asked me about it or even encouraged me to think about success. I’d just absorbed it from the people and culture around me, watching how they lived and what was important to them.

    From what I saw around me, I internalized a vague idea of success as looking like a decent job and a house with a dining room and a tidy green lawn. So that’s what I was going to do. I was going to follow that plan for success and live happily ever after. How could there be anything wrong with this plan? Who wouldn’t want these things?

    I was going to make this dream happen. I went to college, got a good corporate job, and waited for happiness to rain down on me. It didn’t. I was miserable in that job and left it to try a different position. And then another different position.

    Along the way, I became a homeowner with a dining room and a tidy green lawn. Okay, happiness—I’m ready for you! But it turned out that I hated the upkeep of a lawn, and the dining room gathered dust because it was hardly used.

    This was not going as I’d planned. I was confused. I’d done all the “right” things, so why wasn’t I feeling better about my life?

    Because I wasn’t really living my life. I was living others’ ideas of how I should live my life.

    That’s a big difference.

    When we’re young, our understanding of who we are and the how the world works comes from what we see around us. For the most part, you don’t question it because it’s your normal. What your normal looks like is defined by your family, friends, community, and culture. Whether it’s told to you explicitly or it’s how you see people behaving, you learn the rules and expectations of your world.

    As a child, your job is to follow the rules, like go to school, finish your homework, do your chores, be good, and do what you’re told. And by following the rules and meeting these expectations, you’re rewarded. You get good grades, praise, maybe a trophy or an allowance.

    It’s expected that you’ll stay on track, hit the education goals you’ve been training for, and make your way in the world as a bona fide adult. Even though the people who steered you on this path meant well, it’s a one-size-fits-all path toward an accepted idea of success that wasn’t questioned.

    And that’s the problem. Because one size does not fit all. That path may be perfect for some people, and that’s great for them. They’re able to take the rules and expectations and run with them.

    But for everyone else, it’s a different story. Does this sound familiar? You did everything just like you were expected, you followed the rules… and yet, you wonder why you’re not happy. You worked hard to get here. Your life looks good on paper, but it doesn’t feel like it looks. Is this what success is supposed to feel like?

    (Hint: No!)

    It’s important to understand that you haven’t done anything wrong. You followed the obvious path that was set before you when you didn’t know any other way. But following someone else’s idea of success is like wearing a toddler’s outfit as an adult: it never fits and it feels really uncomfortable.

    But even at that point, when we’re squirming in the toddler clothing version of our life, sometimes we still go all in on the idea of success we’ve been given. Because what else do you have? You weren’t taught any other way.

    It’s like driving a car into a ditch and stepping on the gas pedal. You put more effort into the thing that isn’t working, pushing yourself further into a rut that seems inescapable. You end up stretched thin, exhausted, working too much, and frustrated that you can’t make this better.

    When the old way isn’t working for you and you’re ready for a change, it’s time to create your own definition of success.

    This means you determine what success looks like for you, on your terms. You stop trudging dutifully along the path that’s not right for you. You uncover what’s important to you and live your life in a way that aligns with your values.

    This is very different from following someone else’s plan for your life. It’s about deliberately and authentically choosing how you want to live and focusing on what means the most to you.

    This doesn’t necessarily mean that you turn your entire life upside down and inside out (though it can). Sometimes small shifts can make a big difference. There’s no right or wrong way—it’s distinctly personal and specific to each of us because we’re crafting our own unique definition. (Like the unused dining room in my house—you may love having a formal space in your home for people to gather.)

    Have you ever asked yourself what you really want? This is a big question. Answering it might take some patience and time.

    And, this might sound a little crazy but you don’t want to think too hard about it. Your mind will likely start yammering about what you “should” do (which will probably look a lot like the old ways you want to change).

    Your deeper wisdom will provide the answers you seek. You’ll feel it in your body—a spark, a sense of freedom, a burst of joy or enthusiasm—as you uncover what’s most important to you.

    Look at the old idea of success you’ve been living. Was the whole idea wrong for you? Or were only parts of it problematic? What parts did you enjoy? Your answers will begin to illuminate your new definition of success.

    Dig deeper into what you value and what you want more of in your life. How do you want to spend your time? Where and with whom? Consider all aspects of your life, not just work, including relationships, intellectual development, spiritual growth, hobbies and leisure, and health and wellness.

    I wish I’d known how to think about success back when I was zigzagging through different careers and dusting the dining room table. But it’s okay, really, because we can always start right from where we are and make choices that move us in a different direction.

    We each have our own journey of discovery. Where we are isn’t who we are; it’s just a step along our path. It’s so important to keep in mind that we’re never too late, too old, or too stuck to change the direction of our lives.

    Sometimes it can feel like the life we want is unattainable, always out of reach, and we’ll never get out of the rut we’re mired in. This is a big fat lie and I urge you to shift “I can’t” to “I can” (or at least “maybe it’s possible”) because you can choose to start doing something different. Even small changes toward your vision of success will start to shift your entire trajectory. It’s a process and a practice. Keep going, one step at a time, in the direction that calls you.

    I now live in a different state, in a house that’s dining room-free and doesn’t have a blade of grass in the yard. It’s a life that’s so right for me. And I know you can find your just-right life too, when you define success for you.

  • A Simple Practice to Help You Appreciate How Wonderful You Are

    A Simple Practice to Help You Appreciate How Wonderful You Are

    “Stop criticizing yourself for everything you aren’t and start appreciating yourself for everything you are.” ~Unknown

    Are you your own best friend, your own worst critic, or somewhere in between? Do you tend to focus on what you see as your flaws, mistakes, and imperfections, comparing yourself to others you think are better than you? Sometimes, do you even wish you were someone else?

    It’s easy to get trapped in that way of thinking, especially in today’s consumer culture. From magazine ads to TV commercials, we are trained to compare ourselves to others and are subtly told we are not enough—not attractive enough, smart enough, popular enough, etc.

    While I try to practice mindfulness and not fall into this trap, living in this culture, I am not immune to that way of thinking. I was reminded of this just the other day, when I met a young couple who came to stay in a suite my husband and I rent out in our house.

    Having been doing housework and, not realizing the time, I opened the door with no make-up, in faded jeans, an old tee shirt, and sneakers. On the other side of the doorway, the young woman stood with perfectly applied make-up, perfectly styled hair, a cute dress, and heels, looking like she had just left a fashion magazine shoot.

    Meanwhile, the young man stared at me with a blank expression, which I took to mean he did not like me. I felt intimidated and inferior.

    A few days later, my husband saw the couple and had a short conversation with them. In it, he later told me, they actually raved about me!

    They said they were deeply impressed with a calm, “Zen” quality they sensed I had and instantly felt comfortable and relaxed around me. Considering what I had thought of the encounter, I was astonished to hear that. This taught me an important lesson.

    While we might worry about what we see as one of our flaws, others might not even notice it and instead be dazzled by one of our virtues.

    If others can see us in this positive light, so can we. But how?

    After studying several personal growth books, articles, and online classes, I gathered some key points about self-appreciation and wove them into a powerful practice. It helped me tremendously and I share it here in hopes it will do the same for you.

    Through it, you might experience for the first time in your whole life a real sense of self-appreciation and self-love. It’s something you can do any time you feel self-doubt or self-judgement or inferiority. It can help you relax into the knowingness that you are a unique, wonderful being.

    Embracing Yourself Practice

    Sadly, we often overlook the miracle that’s closest to us. It’s available to us from the moment we’re born to the moment we die. It’s ourselves.

    This practice is designed to help you connect with your own miraculous nature and appreciate how wonderful you really are.

    1. Centering yourself

    To get the most from this experience, feel free to turn off distractions like the TV, the ringer on your phone, and any kind of message alerts. Put your mental to-do list aside, just for now. It will still be there after this experience.

    Create some quiet, uninterrupted time to step back and nourish yourself. Give yourself permission to pause and receive the gift of this time. Make yourself comfortable, either sitting or laying down, preferably laying down.

    Gather your thoughts and energy from all the different directions they’ve been going. Bring them in and let them rest for these few moments, while you turn your attention to being here now.

    Take one slow, calming breath and release it. Take another deep breath and release it.

    2. Appreciating your body

    When you’re ready, rest your hands over your heart. Can you feel your heart beating?

    Breathing in, feel your lungs expand with air. Breathing out, feel your lungs relax. Again, feel them expanding in and relaxing out.

    Leave your hands over your heart or wrap them around your torso in a hug. Breathing in, feel your lungs expand. Breathing out, feel your lungs relax.

    Breathing normally, think about the amazing processes happening in your body right now, this very moment—the blood being circulated, the oxygen being exchanged, the cells absorbing nutrients, the nerves and neurons allowing you to hear the sounds around you.

    Feel the sensation of sitting or lying down where you are.

    Reflect on how a thought sends an impulse from your brain to your spinal cord, to your nerves, to your muscles, allowing you to move. Feel appreciation for your body for allowing you to experience life in this way.

    3. Appreciating your essence

    Now, reflect on your uniqueness. Of the billions of people on this planet, there is only one you.

    Think about the spark of life that animates your body, your essence that makes you, you. You might think of it as your personality or your spirit.

    Can you sense it? Do you feel or see anything related to it? Feel awe and appreciation for it.

    Think of the special qualities that make you a unique individual.

    Think of one quality you are grateful for about yourself. Maybe that quality is the fact that you are trying your best or something else. Whatever quality comes to mind, appreciate that about yourself.

    Feel grateful for another thing about yourself, maybe your intelligence or something else. Then feel grateful for another thing about yourself, maybe your kind heart or something else.

    Reflect on this idea: Life has good reason for expressing itself through you.

    4. Sending yourself love

    Feel the warmth of your hands on your heart or your torso. Feel appreciation for the unique individual you are.

    Think to yourself or say out loud, “I love myself.” Pause.

    Think or say again, “I love myself.” Pause.

    Think or say again, “I love myself.” Notice how that feels. Let that love sink in.

    Add anything else positive you’d like to say to yourself. What do you need to hear right now?

    Appreciate yourself for doing this practice. Rest your mind, taking a few more deep breaths. Look out and around you from this place of connection with yourself.

    Feel free to do this practice as often as you like, maybe a few times a week before getting up in the morning or before going to sleep at night—any time you’d like to feel a greater appreciation for yourself, any time you’d like to remind yourself that you are a miracle…because you are!

  • Why I Got Caught Up in the Drama of an On-and-Off Relationship

    Why I Got Caught Up in the Drama of an On-and-Off Relationship

    “One reason people resist change is because they focus on what they have to give up instead of what they have to gain.” ~Rick Godwin

    Dave and I met earlier this January. I was immediately attracted to his aquamarine eyes and his tattoos. I met him on the eve of my twenty-sixth birthday and, based on our interaction, I assumed we’d have a casual fling. Things didn’t end that simply, to my surprise.

    When we were lying in bed together that first night, holding hands, he turned to me and asked if there was any chance we could get to know one another without sleeping with other people.

    This was strange to hear, but as a single woman in Los Angeles, I felt as though I had stumbled across some sort of rare species of man who was actually interested in pursuing a commitment without me having to do much.

    A part of me felt caught off guard and suspicious, considering I’d made it clear that this was just supposed to be a hook up. On the other hand, it was kind of nice that someone who I was incredibly attracted to wanted to get to know me exclusively. In retrospect, I realized that it filled me with this feeling of warmth that I’d been deprived of before I’d met him.

    Within five days, Dave asked me to be his girlfriend. Although I found his eagerness to jump into a relationship to be a bit off, I agreed because I liked him and wanted to go with the flow.

    The first few weeks were amazing, as we shared intimate conversations, romantic outings in Los Angeles, amazing sex, gifts, and the beginning of what felt like something that could blossom into a true partnership. However, the passion was intense, and we hadn’t had much time to develop authentic trust. It became increasingly evident to me that this relationship would be a ticking time bomb.

    Within a month and a half, I was overwhelmed with Dave’s jealousy, suspiciousness, and paranoia. He was becoming increasingly controlling and accusatory toward me.

    I was incredibly loyal to him and began to resent feeling like I was always doing something wrong when I was trying my best to be a good girlfriend. His gifts started to seem like a farce—like he had simply gotten me them to possess me instead of genuinely liking me for who I was.

    I broke up with him a few times because I couldn’t tolerate his jealousy and the way he degraded me. However, I would go back to him because I’d remember the good times and was becoming addicted to the kind of intensity he provided for me.

    I would question myself and think perhaps I was being too critical; after all, no one was perfect, and I should be flattered that someone was evidently so invested in me. I was in it too deep to see things clearly and make the right decision.

    When he and I would split, I’d attempt to get out there and date others, but no one was able to elicit the same warmth and stimulation I’d felt from him. So I’d go back to him. Just three months into this, we’d already established an on-and-off relationship that began to deteriorate my mental, emotional, and physical health.

    The fourth and final time we broke up ended with him yelling at me in public. I had wanted to leave a particular bar because I’d had an anxiety attack, and he accused me of wanting to exit because of “some guy” there. He was totally delusional. There was no guy in the bar I was trying to hide from him.

    I remembered chasing Dave after he’d stormed out from the bar and thrown money at me, demanding I take a bus back to my house. I was actually crying on the street chasing him while he yelled at me! I hated myself and the woman I’d regressed to.

    For comedic relief, there were two women watching us fight, standing outside a movie theater eating popcorn.

    “Don’t chase him, girl,” they told me. “He’s mean. Look at how he’s yelling at you. You deserve better.” Dave cussed at the girls before running off. I stopped chasing him. I came to my senses. It was brutal, but I realized that this relationship just wasn’t worth all the pain anymore.

    Part of me hates myself for letting myself get involved in such a clearly self-destructive relationship. I would like to say that this is my first on-and-off relationship, but it isn’t. Based off my experiences and observations, it seems like once you’ve been in one on-and-off relationship, you’re prone to more.

    Why couldn’t I just walk away the first time I broke up with this guy? Why do we get hooked on the drama of on-and-off relationships? Here are some theories I’ve formed.

    1. Life wasn’t much better before.

    Looking back, I recognize that I wasn’t in a solid place in my life before I met Dave. I was bored and at a crossroads with my career. I was highly susceptible to getting caught up in something like this because I was unhappy with my life and the drama provided both stimulation and a nice distraction.

    2. Pain felt familiar and comfortable to me.

    Even though Dave had shown me his mean streak within a month of dating, I stuck with it thinking I deserved it and that I should endure it for the greater good. My parents often shamed, invalidated, and criticized me when I was growing up, and as an adult I’ve been attracted to partners who do the same.

    3. I wasn’t clear on my deal breakers.

    I knew I was turned off by extreme jealousy, but I didn’t know it was a deal breaker for me at the time. Now, looking back, the deal breaker I’ve settled on is being degraded or humiliated for someone else’s uncontrollable jealousy.

    4. I developed an addiction to him and the drama.

    I’d become addicted to Dave, the sex, and the whole act of reconciling. There’s something intoxicating about the highs that follow the lows. It’s a cycle many are familiar with, and I am one of the lucky ones that got out of this relationship before it became even more destructive.

    —

    Now that I’m armed with this knowledge, I’m going to focus on understanding and working on my masochistic behavior. I’m going to get more clarity on what my deal breakers are and make sure to end things once I feel someone isn’t respecting them.

    I’m sure there are some on-and-off relationships that end up working out, but in my experience, the whole act of repeatedly getting back together and breaking up undermines trust. I’d love to hear any experiences you’ve had with on-and-off relationships and any insights you’ve formed.

  • Happiness Is About Loving What You Have and Being Grateful for It

    Happiness Is About Loving What You Have and Being Grateful for It

  • How Journaling Helped Me Heal from Grief and How It Can Help You Too

    How Journaling Helped Me Heal from Grief and How It Can Help You Too

    “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.” ~C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

    The day I was told that the man I loved was going to die from cancer, I did two things: I made a pact with myself never to have more than one bottle of wine in the house. I knew the risks of numbing pain and I knew that it didn’t work. Then I went to a stationery shop and bought a supply of fine moleskin journals.

    My journey through grief started the day the pea-sized lump behind my husband’s ear was given a name. Metastatic melanoma. Over the course of two years it spread to his lungs, then his brain. A brain tumor the size of a golf ball is what killed him.

    Four weeks after his death, a tightly sealed plastic box containing a dozen diaries was the first thing I grabbed when I had to evacuate my home ahead of a monster cyclone. Seven years after those events, the plastic container, which by now contains several dozen moleskins, is still the first thing I’ll grab at the next cyclone warning.

    Why? Because those journals were my lifesaver at a time when no therapist could help me. Grieving is a very long and lonely journey, and those journals were my most intimate, trusted friends during the most difficult time in my life.

    Grief comes in many forms. Divorce, being made redundant, a stillborn child, the list is long. We all have access to the world’s oldest and cheapest self-help tool.

    Here is how it helped me.

    1. Your journal is your best friend during the lonely process of grief.

    Grief turned me into a depressed mess, which made me feel like an outsider. It’s a common experience. As anybody who has been there will know, one of the most surprising things about grief is how alone it makes you feel. Only those who have grieved will be able to understand what you are going through.

    Your friends and loved ones will offer as much comfort as they can give, but they’ve got their own lives to live and nobody wants to hear your sad story over and over again.

    Writing provided comfort and relief at a time when nothing else did. I lived remotely and didn’t have access to a therapist. My journal became my lifesaver and my best friend. It was the only place where I could speak my truth and where I could safely express all of my emotions.

    My journal was always there for me to listen to the same story, over and over again, without judgment, until I was finally ready to let it go.

    2. Journaling allowed me to tell the story nobody wanted to hear.

    We live in a culture that is averse to grief. In the absence of proper grief rituals, people struggle for words and end up offering platitudes that diminish your grief. Before my bereavement, I too was ignorant about what to say to a grieving person.

    How many times did well-meaning friends, lost for words, offer meaningless platitudes? “He’ll be okay,” some would say, when it was clear that he was never going to be okay again.

    “You’ll be okay,” was just as hurtful. Of course I would be okay. I hadn’t died, even if it felt like part of me had. But I needed people to acknowledge my grief, not diminish it. Writing was a way of giving voice to the story nobody wanted to hear.

    I needed to say the things that I couldn’t say, that even the doctors wouldn’t say, as we desperately clung to hope.

    It was only in the pages of my journal that I could safely and without judgment write this messy story in the raw voice of pain. It helped me understand it and slowly craft a new narrative.

    I knew instinctively that my writing would lead me there, not my well-meaning friends who assumed to know what the appropriate timeframe for grief might be.

    3. Writing allowed me to hold on to memories.

    Journaling was also an effective way to hold on to the memory of him. I recorded the story as it was unfolding. The way he reacted to radiation treatment. The words he said when the word palliative care entered our conversation. The way he looked before and after each operation. The words he whispered into my ear, holding on to my hand as his strength faded during his last days.

    4. Journaling helped me find redemption after loss.

    For several years after my bereavement, the story I told about myself focused on the events that had burnt my life down. It was what defined me at that moment and I didn’t want it taken away from me.

    Writing about my pain allowed me to eventually gain a new perspective. Reading over my words, I became a detached witness of my story and I was able to see how my story is related to the universal narrative pattern of what Joseph Campbell calls “the hero’s journey.”

    Today I am able to tell my story as a narrative of redemption. I stumbled into the dark woods of grief and I came out of it transformed, stronger, and more aware of the preciousness of life. It’s a story I share with those who accept grief as an opportunity for deep transformation.

    5. Journal writing gave me the courage to venture into creative writing, which was healing in unexpected ways.

    Two years after my husband’s death, for my fiftieth birthday, I gave myself the gift of a year-long online creative writing course. I’d planned to write up my story as a memoir. But revisiting my pain in the pages of my journals felt like peeling the scab off a wound. It was still too raw.

    Writing creative fiction on the other hand, turned out to be incredibly liberating. I no longer had to write the story of how my life had exploded. I was free to write anything I wanted. I could create characters with red hair and freckles, I could make them Olympic swimmers or war correspondents. But deep down, the emotions I wrote into my characters were my own.

    By sorting the core of my personal grief story into a narrative arch, I could see how personal growth results from conflict and suffering. I could see how this is fundamental to the character’s journey and I could finally see redemption and envision a new ending for my story.

    I don’t know how I would have coped without my writing, it’s what guided me through my pain and showed me the way forward.

    Here are five suggestions on how to use journal writing during times of grief:

    1. Have your journal always with you.

    I found it incredibly comforting to have my journal always by my side. Sadness catches up with you in the back of a taxi or in the hospital waiting room. Being able to scribble in my journal provided relief.

    2. Do a brain and pain dump.

    On most days I’d do a simple brain and pain dump. I’d free write without editing or worrying about grammar for as long as it took to feel better. I found it helpful to record what was happening in detail and to name my emotions and reactions.

    By writing everything down, I felt like I was sharing my pain. It was liberating, even if it didn’t make the pain go away. It allowed me to see patterns in my thinking and to focus on the positive.

    3. Write a gratitude list.

    A gratitude list is a powerful way to focus on what is positive during a time when it seems that you will never find happiness again. By listing the things I was grateful for, I was able to momentarily reverse the feeling of overwhelming negativity.

    There was the bad test result, sure, but there was also the friend who brought a casserole around. It was always surprising and refreshing to acknowledge the things that made me feel grateful. It put my pain into perspective.

    4. Do timed writing exercises.

    If you are not naturally inclined to writing, you might find it useful to make journaling part of a routine and to set a timer. Timed writing exercises are surprisingly effective. Start small. Ten minutes of free writing every morning is a good start.

    5. Use writing prompts,

    Journal therapists will often use writing prompts. I personally feel too restricted by prompts, since my writing will naturally lead me towards the story that needs to be told. But when I am stuck, I find it helpful to pause and write “How I really feel is …” or “What I really want to say is …”.

    I also found great relief in writing unsent letters to my husband, both during his illness and after his death.

    Here are some writing prompts for you to try:

    I remember when …

    The first time we …

    My happiest memory of you is …

    What was good about today is …

    What I treasure is this …

    Today my grief feels like …

    —

    Back when I went through my grief, I didn’t know that expressive writing and journal therapy are recognized modalities for healing, widely used by psychologists and therapists, especially with trauma victims.

    I’ve always used reflective and personal writing as a way to make sense of the world and my place in it. Faced with my husband’s progressive illness, I’d instinctively reached for my journal to process what was happening. By naming the emotions I felt, I could make sense of what seemed ungraspable and find healing.

    Journal writing really is the cheapest form of self-care there is. I hope you’ll try it, using some of the suggestions above. Or maybe you already have a journal writing practice and have your own favorite prompts. Feel free to share in the comments.

  • “You’re Too Sensitive” Is a Lie

    “You’re Too Sensitive” Is a Lie

    “I used to dislike being sensitive. I thought it made me weak. But take away that single trait, and you take away the very essence of who I am. You take away my conscience, my ability to empathize, my intuition, my creativity, my deep appreciation of the little things, my vivid inner life, my keen awareness of others pain and my passion for it all. ~Unknown

    My phone rang and it was my boyfriend. I slipped out into the hall. “Hey you,” I answered. We’d been texting about getting together that night.

    “Why don’t you just come over to my place and I’ll cook?”

    “Hey there,” he replied. “I’d really rather go out. What about the Swan? I can meet you there at 7pm.”

    “Okay…” I hesitated, “That will work. I should probably get back to work, but see you tonight.”

    I didn’t really want to meet at the Swan, a pub near my house. I just wanted a quiet evening at home, but it felt stupid to argue about it.

    “What’s wrong with me?” I thought. “Why can’t I enjoy going out for dinner like a regular person?”

    I arrived at 7:03 pm and he was already there. We found a table in a quiet-ish area and sat down.

    The music was loud and there were what seemed like 100 different conversations happening at once. I was having a hard time concentrating on what my boyfriend was saying.

    He got up to go to the washroom.

    “My boyfriend’s taking me out for a nice meal,” I thought. “I should be grateful.”

    But the chair felt hard and my back felt sore.

    “Seriously, what’s wrong with me??” I thought. “I somehow find a way to complain about everything. Why can’t I just have a good time? Why can’t I focus on my boyfriend and the yummy food and enjoy myself? I really am spoiled…”

    My boyfriend returned and I ordered a second drink to numb the overwhelm I was feeling and the voices in my head.

    Whether to go out or stay in was a constant point of tension between us. He ran his own law office and so worked from home most days. He wanted to get out of the house in the evenings. I worked in an office and was introverted and sensitive, so at the end of the day I really just wanted a quiet evening at home.

    It wasn’t until months later when I found a Facebook group for highly sensitive people (HSPs) that I realized I wasn’t the only one who felt like this.

    As I scrolled through the posts I found a whole community of people who get overwhelmed by loud noises, fluorescent lighting, and more than one conversation happening at once.

    A whole community who can’t watch scary movies, who are very sensitive to other people’s emotions, and notice when others are upset even when they’re pretending to be fine.

    I realized that I wasn’t the only one who felt things deeply and who gets overwhelmed by cocktail parties and grocery stores.

    As I read through the posts I felt relief flood through my body. I finally understood that I wasn’t stupid or ungrateful or spoiled. I was just built differently. I was just highly sensitive, and so my needs are different than other people’s need.

    Like most HSPs, I like quiet. I like warm and soft lighting. I like hiding under the covers. I often can’t wait to get home to the quiet oasis that is my house at the end of the day.

    Now with the help of the HSP community and my therapist I’m learning to stop trying to get rid of my sensitivity and how to embrace it.

    If you think you might be highly sensitive, here are a few things you can do that might help:

    1. Take the HSP test.

    Taking the test and getting confirmation that I was highly sensitive helped me accept my sensitivity. If you’re highly sensitive that’s simply a fact and there’s nothing wrong with you.

    You can take the test here.

    2. Join an HSP community.

    Joining the Highly Sensitive People FB group was a real turning point for me in accepting my sensitivity. I didn’t post in the group for over a year but reading other people’s posts gave me confirmation that I wasn’t crazy.

    There’s nothing like knowing you’re not alone and others share the same struggles. Joining this group or another HSP community will bring you a sense of peace and acceptance of who you are.

    3. Embrace your sensitivity and protect yourself.

    I live alone in a quiet neighborhood. I only invite a couple of people over to my house at a time. I politely decline invitations to loud or overwhelming parties.

    If you’re highly sensitive you have to be insanely protective of your energy. HSPs are often amazing creatives or healers, but if you’re drained because you aren’t protecting your energy you won’t have much to give back.

    I know it can sometimes feel stupid to walk around the city with giant headphones playing white noise or declining an invitation to a friend’s party, but I guarantee you’ll be happier and healthier if you protect yourself.

    That boyfriend and I ended up breaking up for a number of reasons, but one of them was that he couldn’t accept my sensitivities.

    4. Ask for help from the people you trust.

    This might be the hardest one to do. Well, this and protecting yourself are both really difficult!!

    I sometimes dissociate if there’s loud music or even something as simple as a very intellectual conversation. The hardest but also best thing to do if this is starting is to tell the person I’m with what’s happening to me.

    I might say something like, “I want to stay in this conversation, but I’m starting to feel overwhelmed and am having a hard time connecting. Can we slow things down for a minute?”

    The more you can explain to the people you’re close to what’s happening, the more they can help you. I’m learning that most people actually want to help me when I’m overwhelmed but just don’t understand what it’s like or what they can do.

    The more you can say things like “I’m feeling overwhelmed. Can we just walk in silence for a minute?” or “Will you just hold my hand for a minute?” or “Can we just turn off the music for a little while?” the more the people who care about you can help.

    You’d be surprised, your non-HSP friends want to help you; they just have no idea what it’s like or how they can help.

    5. Do things that make you feel happy, safe, and protected.

    Figure out what you love and what makes you feel safe and prioritize those activities.

    This might include:

    • baths with candle light
    • hiding under the covers for as long as possible
    • walks alone in nature
    • canceling a coffee date and staying in
    • telling a friend you trust what it’s like to be highly sensitive
    • hanging out with other HSPs who totally get it!

    I’ve come along way from the days when I would say yes to invitations just to fit in, and my life has transformed into something more beautiful than I could have ever imagined.

    I quit my office job with bright lights and lots of other people’s emotions swirling around and went out on my own. I designed my business where I walk outside in nature while helping people out on the phone.

    Just yesterday I was out beside Lake Ontario watching a flock of swallows dip and dive and play. And I had this moment where I thought, “Is this really my life? Is this really what I get to do?”

    I’ve realized that the more I protect my energy, the more I can really give to the people I work with, and so I am more protective than ever.

    As a highly sensitive person, you have a special gift to share. As you learn to accept your sensitivity and protect your energy your life will change. You’ll become happier and healthier and have more to contribute.

    By protecting yourself you’re not being selfish or greedy or difficult; you’re actually being generous. The world needs your gifts and when you take care of yourself, you’ll be able to give more and make the impact on the world you were meant to make.

  • Healing, Forgiving, and Loving After a Painful Break Up

    Healing, Forgiving, and Loving After a Painful Break Up

    “People come into your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. When you figure out which it is, you will know exactly what to do.” ~Anonymous

    About five years ago, I learned the biggest lesson of my life about self-love and losing oneself in a relationship, through a breakup that almost killed me.

    After going through another night of three hours of sleep, I drove myself to the ER to save my own life. I hadn’t eaten or slept much in three weeks, and the scale pointed to ninety-seven pounds. I felt weak, malnourished, and unloved.

    Three weeks prior to that morning, I had found out that the love of my life, whom I had to break up with in March 2013, had started dating the girl we’d had the most painful fights over.

    He’d met her at a party when I was visiting family and continued flirting with her, despite saying he chose me. Though he would have been happy to stay in a relationship with me, I knew I couldn’t be with someone who openly flirted other women.

    When I learned he was now dating her, I heard a thump on my heart. Literally. It ached sharply as if there was a chestnut-sized rock sitting in the middle of it, vibrating strongly in response to a transmitter signal far, far away. I half-died that day.

    As I climbed back up from that point, I discovered truths about love, forgiveness, and healing.

    Maybe you are in the middle of such a painful breakup, or maybe you are in the aftermath of a breakup that left you shattered and undone. You are sitting on a ball of emotions you don’t know how to unravel.

    Although I can’t give you a personalized plan to heal and grow from your experience, I can share some pointers, as someone who is on the other side of it all, looking back over the five years of her recovery. These ideas may help you fine-tune your own healing process.

    1. Don’t make an event your whole life story.

    What I learned about letting go is that the pain starts changing form into wisdom when we make a decision to not make one specific event from the past our whole story.

    Instead of thinking your life is over because you’ve lost this one relationship, gain a broader perspective and try to see the breakup as valuable to your personal growth.

    The purpose of the pain was to reveal what needed healing and to gain the wisdom you will need further along your path. A relationship that taught you something about how to love and be loved is a win. A relationship full of mistakes but expanded by wisdom and forgiveness is a successful one.

    We are story-making machines. It is natural to make a recent event the focus of our current experience. But your story is not over. You are still writing your story with the choices you make today.

    2. To heal, you have to  be an active participant in your life.

    People often say, “Just let it go. Let the past stay in the past,” but this is misleading. Letting go isn’t as easy as turning off a switch or erasing words off a whiteboard.

    I didn’t know what letting go meant. As far as I was concerned, that part of my life was still alive in me, balled up and tangled. Every time I heard those words, I pictured removing an organ out of my body. That didn’t make sense. I wondered how other people let go and why I couldn’t just let go and live happily ever after.

    Here is what I discovered: You are never going to forget those relationships with deep soul connections. You just won’t be dwelling on them daily when you are busy exploring life and the depths of your own inner being.

    You don’t need to have forgiven or be completely healed to participate in life around you. I spent a year and a half in isolation. Nothing healed. Not even a feather moved during that time. My healing didn’t start till I started living.—by volunteering, going on lunch dates with friends, and going to events to meet new people. Sometimes letting go means simply living a full life, without the other person.

    3. Allow for forgiveness to unfold in its own time.

    I must admit, making the choice to forgive was not easy, but being patient while the process took place was even harder. Letting go, forgiving, and healing from a relationship is not like hitting a reset button. It takes time to build up the courage to face that buried pain and allow it to leave you. And sometimes, before we can forgive, we need time to experience enough joy and connection with others to dilute the pain of how we were hurt.

    Forgiveness is about digesting pain into wisdom. Into acceptance. Into compassion. Into an expanded heart that can hold space for it all. It is not about living like nothing painful happened, because life does not stop for us to heal. Flowers still bloom and the sun comes out every day. We heal while we take in more of life. The death-rebirth cycle in nature that exists in life also exists within us. It is a never-ending cycle.

    As I started opening up to new experiences and actually living, I allowed new insights to come in. My heart had time to breathe. I put myself in his shoes. I asked myself, “What would I do if the person I loved but kept hurting unintentionally left me when I didn’t want the relationship to end?”

    When I eventually developed enough courage to admit that I would have gone onto the next best thing (the other girl) to ease the pain, compassion came. It took me nearly two years to register the depth of his loss and how he must have felt left out in the cold. We all do what we can to find relief from pain, and that was his way. I didn’t need to judge it or to see it as a transgression against me.

    When you want to increase the temperature of water in a bath tub, you don’t take out the cold but add hot water until it reaches your desired temperature. That is how grief, healing, and forgiveness work. Trust your body and soul to hold you through the processing of a whole chapter in your life.

    4. Update your perception on relationships.

    I loved my ex deeply. I can carry that in my heart’s memory and still know that we were teachers to each other who were not destined to be together for a lifetime. I am no longer hurting because of not being with him. I have done my releasing ceremonies and let memories run through my mind, bringing up various emotions—anger, resentment, grief, jealousy, and lots of tears, too. I sat through them. Some of it hasn’t been pretty.

    We are taught that a ‘good relationship’ is one that lasts a lifetime. If it didn’t last, we believe that it was a failure. If we have several ‘failed relationships‘ behind us, we assume that it is because we are just unlovable. Success seems to be the most prized value in our modern society. But wisdom through experience can be even more valuable.

    I realized that the way I had been viewing relationships was outdated. What if relationships were intensive training programs for our souls to learn about love? What if they were the perfect set up to practice being loving, kind, understanding, forgiving, and accepting both toward ourselves and the other person?

    If you learned the lessons you needed to, the relationship was a success, whether it lasted three months, three years, or for decades. Take your wins and carry them forward with pride. You are a survivor. No one can take that away from you.

    —

    I am now in a relationship that is continuously growing and teaching me more about love than any book on the planet could. I am in love and enjoying practicing new ways of doing relationships.

    I have spent time and energy recognizing how I put up walls, respond from a place of immaturity when I feel hurt, or disregard my partner’s needs because my inner child was triggered into her pain.

    I’ve learned to give him space, to do things that make me happy, to recognize and own my projections, and to practice self-love so I don’t expect it all to come from him. These were some of my mistakes in past relationships. I had to get honest with myself, own them, and work on them.

    Our love is not fickle; it is resilient because we both are. I found out that two people who have walked through fire and excavated their soul truths with their bare hands create a relationship that can stand the test of time and the tricks of their own egos. I can’t know for certain this relationship will last forever, but I now know all relationships are valuable and there there is life after a breakup.

  • Why I Stopped Trying to Fix Myself and How I Healed by Doing Nothing

    Why I Stopped Trying to Fix Myself and How I Healed by Doing Nothing

    “Everything in the universe is within you.” ~Rumi

    When I was twenty-three, I lost my job through chronic illness. I thought my life had ended, and I spent the next few years an anxious, panicky mess—often hysterical. Eventually, I took off to scour the globe for well-being techniques, and searched far and wide for the meaning of life and how to become well again.

    If you’re chronically ill, like I was, whether physically or emotionally, you’ve probably experienced the same misunderstanding, the same crazy-making “well, you look okay to me” comments, the same isolation, depression, and frustration that I felt.

    You’ve probably been on a bit of a quest for self-recovery. And so, you’ve probably also felt the same exasperation when trying to figure out which self-help theories actually work. It can be overwhelming, right? I thought so, too, but I came to find it was actually really simple!

    Searching the Globe for Self-Help Techniques

    So many people are full of advice: “Try CBT/ tai chi/ astrology/ vitamins/ rest more/ exercise more/ zap yourself with electricity/ eat better/ stop being lazy (always helpful!)/ do affirmations/ yoga/ meditation/ wear purple socks…” Okay, so no one ever actually recommended trying purple socks, but there were so many weird and wonderful recommendations that I found myself lost, which might explain why I went away to find myself!

    I traveled far and wide with my illness, training in every holistic therapy there was (which I loved; I’m curious, and well-being is my passion). But I was always searching for a ‘cure’ for my brokenness. I connected with yoga, meditation, and mindfulness on my journey, and I heard the very familiar Rumi quote: “Everything in the universe is within you.” This served only to confuse me even more as I struggled to analyze what it meant!

    In Bali, though, I felt I had found home in yoga, meditation, and mindfulness. I felt connected to myself. I felt like I understood that all I needed was within. My anxiety had gone, my panic had gone—and my chronic illness had gone, too! Then, I came home to the UK, and it immediately returned.

    I was disheartened. I still lived yoga and mindfulness—I loved it and I taught it at home—but the joy had gone from what I had once thought of as the answer. So, how was I absolutely okay in Bali and not at home? Was I a fraud? What was going on? There was so much thinking…

    What I Learned About Being Human

    It wasn’t until a year later that I discovered why, when I heard something differently. A colleague introduced me to a mentor who shared some profound insights about how the world really works.

    She explained the basic underlying reality of humanity: that underneath all of our thinking about “how to be happier” is a healthy wholeness and perfection that is already innate—without having to do anything. You see, the reason that I had felt any anxiety or panic at all was because I had just forgotten the truth of what it is to be human.

    The Power of Thought: All You Need Really Is Within

    Our human reality operates entirely through thought in the moment. Everything we feel is a result of our thinking. If we feel anxious, it’s because we are experiencing anxious thinking. If we feel happy, it’s because we are experiencing happy thinking. Our entire reality, therefore, really does come from within! It is an inside-out world.

    When we were born, we were perfect and whole, and not anxious. Then, when we gained the beautiful power of thought, we learned that the external comfort blanket was super comforting, because “it made us feel better,” right? Wrong. The blanket is an object, with no capacity to make us feel anything. One hundred percent of the comforted feeling came from our own thinking about the blanket. It’s the same with all of life.

    So, when I was in Bali, I thought I was okay because I was enjoying yoga and meditation, which I loved with all my heart. Thinking that the external could impact me, I felt 100% whole. I returned from Bali and my thinking about the external changed; it felt like I wasn’t happy, because I thought that I needed to be back in Bali. But the thinking came from me: the happiness or unhappiness was all dependent on my thinking in each moment.

    I didn’t remember this, so I attributed my happiness to the external. But it wasn’t, because we are always living in the feeling of our thinking in any moment. Everything comes from within.

    The Innate Wisdom Under Our Thinking

    The funny thing is that as much as this seemed profound to me when I heard it, it was also as if I already knew. It is innate wisdom that we just forget to tap into as we bustle through what feels a hectic pace of life.

    As I began to remember this wisdom, I found that I would start to notice my thinking; I’d become an observer of it, almost in a mindful, meditative kind of way, but I no longer needed to sit and meditate to be happy.

    New insights would come up as I stayed in the conversation about life, and more and more would drop away: the absolute reliance on meditation and affirmations in particular (though the joy returned for meditation when I realized there was less pressure to love it and just followed it because it was in my heart).

    Because under my thinking—under your thinking—is an innate wholeness that is always accessible to you in any moment, if you just see that your reality is entirely experienced through thought in each moment.

    Analysis Paralysis

    We spend hours of our lives analyzing how to be happy, how to stop being negative, how to meditate, how to be less attached, how to be more empowered, how to be more creative, how to be more whole. Don’t get me wrong, this can be interesting, if (like me) you have your own small self-help library! But it’s more important to drop out of your head and into your heart—like I did in Bali, and like I did when I allowed my thinking to just flow and stopped analyzing it.

    I still love yoga and meditation—I teach both and connect with them—but it’s to follow my heart, and I don’t need it. I’ve observed with clients, though, that sometimes it’s easy to misunderstand these concepts and get wrapped up in over-complication, analysis paralysis, denying true feelings, and forcing, trying to be ‘positive.’ This is why I ditched affirmations completely.

    Don’t Miss the Point: Clarity Through Trusting and Flowing, Not Forcing

    Some people miss the truthful essence of this beautiful wisdom. I’m a believer that we often try and force happiness and positivity through techniques like affirmations—and even in some meditation practices that suggest people need to “let go of thinking.”

    We can’t let go of thinking; it’s part of being human. And affirmations serve only to suppress our true feelings, which is dangerous. When we allow our thoughts to just flow through us instead, dancing with them through life, we create space where we would once have analyzed how to solve them; and it’s in this space where clarity can arise and we can see the truth.

    The truth is, we humans are a vessel of energy, and, I believe, part of something greater that has a plan for us—and through this human life, we are blessed with the amazingly abundant, creative power of thought. All we really need to do is let go and flow.

    All we really need to do is allow the feelings that arise from our thinking, conscious of the fact that our reality is constructed through thought. We just have to observe what comes up, embracing pleasant feelings and allowing the darkness without paying it much attention. Like an uninvited guest, it will eventually pass through, without you needing to do anything to get rid of it.

    These days, I laugh at the thoughts that come up and watch them with curiosity, marvelling at the creative capacity of beautiful brain, and knowing that underneath all of my thinking is the real truth: that I am entirely whole, perfect, and complete. Just like you. And you know what? I’ve not been anxious, panicked, or chronically ill ever since I remembered this truth of being a human living life through thought.

    I’m not suggesting that our illnesses are “all in our head” and that we can think (or stop thinking) our way to health. Everyone is different, and there are many different causes for the illnesses we experience, chronic or otherwise. But for me, everything changed when I allowed my thoughts to just flow.