mindfulness – peterelbridge.com

Does today count?

Does today need a certain quality, a certain worthwhileness, before it really counts?

You know the days that count. When you trekked the windy miles to that mountain peak. When you started that job you’d been studying for and searching for since you were 20. When you cheers’d a glass of wine over a fancy dinner on that last dreamy night of your honeymoon.

Life is made up of so, so many moments. Like literally over 2 billion seconds. Which sounds like a lot and also sounds like not much.

It does go by.

And you can live for the big days.

Or you can live for all of them.

Wishing you aliveness today. <3 Throw your email below if you could use a little fuel now and then.

Your disappearing place

Where is your disappearing place?

What place makes you remember your freedom, your self, your own breath?

Where can you truly feel “away from it all” for a soul-filling minute?

Emotional on purpose

Non-rational corners of the brain get little respect. We are supposed to be “smart” creatures, do what “makes sense,” “think carefully.” And yes to all that. And also yes to purposefully manufacturing feelings and emotions that access the more primitive corners of the brain and have nothing to do with logic and sensibility.

Here’s what I mean.

“People often say that motivation doesn’t last,” Zig Ziglar points out. “Well, neither does bathing. That’s why we recommend it daily.”

When we plan and think about how to do life day-to-day, we want to grow, stretch, learn, accomplish–and so we tend to put a lot of emphasis on the rationality-stuff, and forget to plan for our emotions.

We are emotional creatures. We do big, brave, beautiful things because we’re having deep feelings.

What gives you those deep feelings? What triggers them? Fuels them? Replenishes them when you’re running on empty?

Reading a good book? Singing along to the Les Misérables score? Discovering a new poet? Getting the biggest, tightest hug? Asking your heart how it’s doing and writing the answer in a journal? Volunteering to help people in need? Laying quietly for an hour by the lake? A phone call to your best friend? Reading a story that deals with death or loss or grief and purpose? Finding a good quote to live by? Gazing at photos of Mount Ida, visualizing yourself, hiking boots, backpack, all geared up, trekking the wilderness? Joining a crowd to dance, sing, cheer, laugh, or some years just seeing a bunch of smiling faces on Zoom? Holding the little hand of your sweet kiddo as they drift to sleep?

We call them “mountain top” experiences, and they change our lives, and then, when the feels wear off, and we’ve been feelingless for a good while, and we got all rational again, and we barely recognize our once-emotional-selves, we remember those episodes and call them “mountain top” experiences again but with a sort of disapproval this time, like we had fallen for something, like how silly to get so high on feelings. Or maybe like we’re just feeling insecure and a little lost deep down now, because we can’t find our way back up the mountain.

So get emotional on purpose.

What gives you those deep feelings?

Do it,

plan it,

schedule it,

repeat it,

commit to it,

obsess over it,

enjoy it,

cry about it,

share it,

keep it sacred,

ritualize it,

commemorate it,

do it again,

do it again.

Let’s not undervalue the truly life-changing impact of finding our feelings.

What emotions do you need today? And where could you get them? Go look, find, take them.

There is nothing silly or senseless or worthless about manufacturing vitality-giving emotions on purpose.

We’re creatures with feelings.

Feel on purpose.

The cost of fixating

What is something you really want that you CAN’T have right now?

I’m not running right now, and it’s driving me crazy. In any given year, if you asked me to list my top 5 favorite things in life, “Running” would be somewhere on that list. I never want to not run. Unfortunately, these last couple years have been sort of on-again-off-again for me as a runner. And some pain in my glute, leg, and feet, these last couple weeks are keeping me sidelined for a spell. And it is making me really sad Every Single Day.

I think about people who find out they can never run again, dance again, sing again, hike again, play sports again–at least not in the same way they always have. People who have a big thing permanently taken away from them. I can’t think of a much yuckier feeling.

So my little thought for you today–little reminder, since I know it’s something you already know:

Can we stop fixating on the one thing we don’t or can’t have, and missing all the amazing things we could have instead?

Before we charge ahead with our new-found positivity, let’s hold up and acknowledge something together. Because if we don’t, we’re going to run out of steam. There IS time for SADNESS. If you love love love running and you can’t run, that is sad and you should feel it. Denying your feelings doesn’t go well. For example, positivity can feel tough for me around the specialest holidays. Holidays are supposed to feel happy and cozy with family to excitedly see and catch up with and love on. And that’s not something I have in my family. And each holiday will have a little bit of that sting. Respecting and exploring that sting for a while helps me feel better. Sadness is supposed to be felt through. The sadness also teaches me good things, it reminds me to be a good person, of the good things to nurture and the bad things to avoid. Sadness teaches people to break sad cycles. And it makes happy-things, loving-things, good-things more special.

But then . . . once we’ve felt the sad through . . . do we stay there?

Denying sadness costs things. But so does staying there. Fixating on the things we can’t have paralyzes us. It sucks the life out of us. Sometimes “You only live once” is the best reminder. How much of this unique, once-in-a-lifetime year are you going to spend regretting–wishing hopelessly?

“When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us. Defeat is nothing but education; it is the first step towards something better.” ~ Alexander Graham Bell

Fixating on what we can’t have leads to bitterness, purposelessness, anger, burnout, lifelessness, addiction, heartbreak and broken relationships. Yes, there are some beautiful things that, had life gone differently, you could have, but that just aren’t for you now. So we can brood. We can chase. We can try to find illicit ways to take those things. We can complain and complain. We can find ways to numb the pain, sometimes replacing the thing we’re sad we can’t have with another thing we probably shouldn’t. We can become so obsessed with the idea that we can get our thing back that we neglect and run over the good things and the good people in our lives to try to get the one missing thing back. Sometimes we get it back, only to realize it cost too much.

This pandemicky year holds lots of great illustrations of what happens when people fixate on what they can’t have, instead of processing the sadness and then moving forward toward things they still can. Anger, bitterness, and tantrums every day from those who really just want to go to the theater, a concert, to eat out at a restaurant, who can’t have the state fair now, who don’t get to see their grandchild for a while. If you’re feeling like that’s not fair, let me say again–these are really sad things, you should feel grief and anger. But feel it through, feel it big, express it, explore it, and then remember to turn and look at the good things a lot, too. To chase the things still here. This year, we have seen each other get so fixated on things we’re losing that, in our grief, we offer to sacrifice other really important things–like vulnerable people–to get back the stuff we want. The cost of losing our things is so high, that we feel it would be better to just let the sickness and death happen to more people, because my life without XYZ is worthless. . . . . . Is it? What other good things are you forgetting? Things you still have? Things that, even just temporarily, you can transfer your energy to?

I’ve had lots of times to learn and relearn this lesson in my life. Running is a big one. Concussions are big, too. Sometimes people don’t realize the long list of things a simple concussion can take away from you. I’ve spent days and weeks in recovery from concussions fixated on the fact that I can’t go for a run or even a walk, on the fact that it hurts to watch movies, the fact that I don’t even enjoy music or laughter or friendship for a while, because everything got scary and all the noises and sounds are massively overwhelming. I had forgotten that I have spent weeks in my everyday life craving the freedom to just sit or lay quietly, to just sit under a tree and feel the breeze on my skin, to try meditating for hours. Fixating on what was lost . . . cost me so much precious time that I could have cultivated beautiful things that were still there waiting for me. Sometimes this happens with little one-person vacations. I love, love, love having time totally alone. Time to check in, to reset, to sink deep into who I am, how I feel, what I want. Time to read, to write, to plan, to dream, to feel, to rest. If you ever ask me, “How would you like a weekend all to yourself?” I ‘d say ohmywordYES howaboutTOMORROW! But then when those weekends come around, I feel this pull to fixate on the temporarily lost things. Human connection. Missing my best friend and life person. Conversation. The security of being seen and heard. It takes a lot to refocus, to let those things go for a few days, and to embrace all these wonderful things I’ve been wanting. Isn’t it strange how good we are at latching onto the losses and the hurts and the disappointments? This year, I’ve found some presence to try on some mindful focus during a pandemic. There are a lot of favorite-things I can’t have this year, but I’ve gotten to practice shifting my focus to the good things I can have. To see that as some doors shut, others are opening. To ask what possibilities this unique year holds. It has helped.

Of course, it’s not natural or easy to let go of the heartbreak and redirect toward the good things we still have. Here’s a little hint for moving forward: Sometimes the thing keeping us from looking at all the good things we have is the fact that we’re squeezing our eyes shut tight so we don’t have to look at the hurt of the things we’ve lost. The best way to get to the other side of sadness is to feel it all the way for a minute. Feel all the sad. And then open your eyes to all the beautiful possibilities.

So I’ll ask again:

Can we stop fixating on the one thing we don’t or can’t have, and missing all the amazing things we could have instead?

A challenge: Can we be our same “good” selves even in the “bad” contexts?

I am a person with a lot of good inside of me. And, um, there is some bad inside of me.

Sometimes I do these big wonderful things to help people. And sometimes I choose things that I know could harm me or the world.

I have this deep passion for kindness, gentleness, being compassionate, and not being an asshole. And then sometimes I hear myself saying something heartless about someone and I think “wow, I am being an asshole.”

So I have both. Good in me. Bad in me.

“Good” and “bad” are tricky concepts. We each have different words for them, and some of the words come with a lot of baggage. Maybe your words are “good” and “evil.” Maybe your words are “right” and “wrong.” Maybe your words are “beautiful” and “ugly.” But somewhere–somewhere deep down, no matter our big picture, we have a sense of “yes, that is how life is meant to be,” and “no, that is sick sick sick.”

And we each have some of both in us.

And the bit of bad doesn’t mean we’re worthless!

When your 3-year-old can’t draw to save her life, that is perfect. You love her awful, beautiful picture she made with her little trying hands. She’s 3. And you love her.

And when I catch myself thinking or saying or doing something that isn’t fair or isn’t my business or is actually pretty shitty–it doesn’t mean I’m worthless. I’m trying at this “life” thing, and I’m getting some of it wrong, and sometimes I give up on trying for a minute. But…I’m 28. And I, too, am loved.

But even with all the love and acceptance, it is worthwhile to stop and say: “We each have some good in us and some bad in us.” Yin and yang. Life. Humanness.

Have you noticed that sometimes . . . a lot of times . . . it depends on the context?

With an inspiring group of fitness friends, we’re kind. On the phone with customer service, feeling annoyed and unimportant, we’re rude and aggressive. . . . On vacation, out in the great outdoors with other adventurers, we’re just the nicest and openest. Racing the clock in traffic, we cut people off and give people nasty looks. . . . Volunteering for a couple hours at a food shelf, we’re friendly and interested in our fellow volunteers. At the end of a stressful day at work, we have nothing but moody looks for people who try to connect. . . . On our Instagrams, we’re all inspiring and motivating and positive. Then we get sucked into a political debate and all bets are off. . . . Sometimes it even just depends on which people we’re around. Our group of kind and uplifting buddies? Or our group of sarcastic and negative buddies?

Have you noticed that some of us internalize big-picture assumptions about how “most people are generally well-meaning and kind,” while others of us internalize the idea that “most people are generally mean and selfish?” Maybe we’ve just been spending most of our time living and learning in one type of context.

For example, some people live in worlds where they get to see a lot of mindful, thoughtful, excited good, good, good–inspirational conferences, leading high energy workouts, working with precious children at a daycare . . .

On the other hand, some people live in worlds that seem to frequently center on or bring out the careless, mindless, thoughtless bad–customer service, politics, law enforcement, litigation, working with…precious children at a daycare . . .

It’s not that the world is made up of sunshine and rainbows. And it’s not that the world is full of awful people. It’s that the world is full of PEOPLE. People who show up a little differently depending on the context.

The SAME PERSON will find the GOOD pulled out of her in some contexts, and the BAD pulled out of her in other contexts.

Do you ever catch that in yourself? Like, “I’m usually pretty nice, but apparently not when I’m asking for a refund!” . . . Or like, “I thought I had grown up into a mature adult who gets along with other adults, but then I went to a family reunion!”

Do you ever notice someone doing the Jekyll/Hyde thing to you? Where you’re like, “wait–I thought this person was nice? Where did this come from???”

We all have some of both: Good and bad. Love and hate.

Potential for both.

Are we different per context? In some contexts, wonderful? In some contexts, a little less than wonderful?

All begs one big question:

How can we move more toward WONDERFUL?

How can we bring out the GOOD more often in ourselves? And in others?

Can we consciously tip the scale toward a more consistent, mindful life of LOVE? Even in the tougher contexts?

Can we pick up the entire spectrum and shift it a few smiles and thoughtful words to the KIND side?

Yes, we’ll still have both sides of the spectrum in us. It’s just . . . can we get a little more mindful, so that we can bring a little more GOOD to the “bad” contexts?

If it seems hopeless–if you think Little You can’t tip the world’s Kindness Scale–remember that Love can be profoundly contagious.

It starts with you and me.

namaste

Martin Luther King Jr - stick with love hate too great a burden