Category: Mindset

I think a sense of space and capacity are our some most valuable resources Before you turn on the world, make sure  you are ready. I had this thought after an hour or so of ‘readying’ myself this morning. I started the day with a little movement, writing and sitting and noticed even then, an apprehension to turn my phone on. I knew that in doing so the world would come flooding in. 

Turns out  I was ready enough because I was able to maintain the state I cultivated in my quiet time. When I noticed myself becoming tight and tense, it was easy enough to take a short time out and remember the reference I created at the beginning of the day.

Ready to me means uncluttered, open and receptive to life as it is.

Guiding principle: In order to maintain a ready state I need to notice how my system responds to the world coming in as I move through my day. Could it be more exciting that we get to choose a response to life that is new and unconditioned by paying attention in a certain way ?

It takes a lot because there is a momentum behind us. When I stop, I sometimes feel I am too far gone so why on earth would I stop if it means facing up to the direction I am headed. Continuing on whatever track I am on feels easier.

Stopping means I would need to do something different, dopamine is hitting from all sides. Stopping means I’ll lose the buzz of those neuro-chemicals. From this this point of view there simply very little that makes sense about stopping.

Rather go and get to some other point where all this matters less, maybe at the end of the day when I am reminiscing about what a busy day I had.

But what if stopping didn’t  mean change.  That I could  stop  anywhere and say to myself, whatever interesting behaviour I am in the midst of, that  somehow it’s all ok.  Slow down a little,  invite curiosity and pay attention without the weight of needing  or wanting to find a more perfect person at the other end of it.

Instead, oh here I am. Isn’t that interesting. Gravitating in this or that direction, being distracted, emotional or frustrated  in some way,  pleasure seeking or avoiding, doesn’t matter. It’s all food for consciousness.  And to me more interesting that anything, as I am less afraid of the content so it goes  that I am less afraid of the stop because I know  I am  bound to face the momentum of the past and there is space inside  to hold it all. But and this is a big but, a little bit at a time. When I push myself to look too hard at the content of my thoughts, feelings and sensations it’s easy to become overwhelmed, despondent and uninterested. Gentle awareness works best.

Sometimes it really is ok to leave the world exactly as it is and rest in the awareness that never changes. There is too much too enjoy!

It feels like an especially important week to keep up my practice. I’ve been seeing how inexplicably we are connected to the greater whole. I’ve had a lot going on in my body, much of it because of what we are going through as a (South Africa) nation. It sometimes feels almost impossible to stay in the body. But I keep seeing that every time I do there is chance for more peace because all these currents are temporary and in continual change. Energy rises and falls. My clinging to anything in this rise and fall becomes my suffering. Let go the little voice in my heart tells me.

And stay with it for any length of time and there will be a relaxation, even if very small. But that’s all it takes sometimes, just giving ourselves a little relief tipping the scales in the direction of regulation and balance. A moment of being still and just being with the body exactly as it is. what now ? and now ? what next ? experiencing the sensation directly. Allowing, accepting, breathing, resourcing. It all passes. As Loch Kelly likes to say, Unhook from the mind and let your attention drop into the body. We must unhook because the mind gets in the way. It is storied by its very nature. We need to relax the story we have about the world and our life in it so we can allow the energies in the body some breathing space. Given time, the body comes to rest.

Key: Receive the condition of the body, the heart and the mind just as it is. Although it can feel very personal, is it really ? how much did you choose to think, feel or act in that way ? are you in control of the next thought you have or the next emotion you experience ? what does it feel like if very little of this is personal ? An important choice I see is our ability to bring our awareness to our condition with kindness. From there change is natural, we are in the currents of effortless evolution both collectively and individually. Effort of course is needed but absent of force. Flow.

Another way of seeing resilience is self care and maybe this is closer to the essence of whats it means  to be resilient –  to care enough about yourself so as to follow the natural movements that help restore balance and harmony in your life. 

Natural movements are the ones that connect our egos with the life intelligence inside us, that life force that knows beyond our limited thinking patterns and we know when we’re following it because it feels good. Not in a fleeting or ephemeral way but rather in the ways we start to connect with the ground underneath our feet, with the knowing that regardless of what happens we are held by life (even when we feel just the opposite!).  Life still has us,  the earth still supports us. We are still breathing, heart beating, life still expressing in a myriad of ways all around us. 

In any moment we can stop and notice just how beautiful this all is, what a miracle it is. Not in the way that we think about but rather in the lived experience of being awake to ourselves. From this place,  at the centre of our own circle, life comes streaming in and when we let it, will move us in all the right ways towards the destiny we long to walk, the life that is only ours to live. 

The cost is simply being willing to meet the unpleasantness and disease in our systems. To turn towards ourselves, bringing our attention into the body and little bit at a time, to meet what is there as it is.  Not in a way of attaining  some kind of end goal but rather in the willingness to embrace the entire spectrum of human experience which includes both pain and pleasure.

The good news is the benefit of doing this far outweighs the cost. The result of a consistent practice of coming home to ourselves is that we see that this is what we are really looking for, more so than any material or social attainment. The experience of simply being present and available to life, living the life that calls to us moment by moment. Less stuck in past patterns or fixated with future projections. Rather a gradual surrender to the shape and form that is our life right now.  

What I notice in my own practice  as well as the people I coach, is that the most important principle is to slow down. Even if its speeding up you want, slowing down will get you there faster.  
Slow down consistently as you move through your day. Pay attention to how you feel, whats happening in your body and when you  need to, stop from time to time. A pause here and there can make all the difference because you give your system a chance to reset itself. Expect some discomfort in the beginning but know that  you will get better at handling it.  Like Ken Wilber famously says, it can hurt more sometimes but also bothers you less as you practice. That’s the paradox of paying attention, it not like the pain goes away. Its just not what we thought it was and without our resistance to it, ones whole experience changes.