Happy four days after Thanksgiving everyone! Hope you've all had a wonderfully resting and relaxing holiday filled with joy and turkey or tofurkey!
So, I seem to be on a poetry kick lately because I was listening to a lecture on mindfulness and psychotherapy the other day and was struck by this poem they included by Rumi.
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
~Rumi
It's quite a beautiful poem, no? And it can also be some really good advice. Our natural instinct is to run towards pleasure and happiness and run away from sorrow and pain. But what if I said that sometimes, if not alot of times, it's by embracing and confronting the negative that you can become more okay with it, less anxious, and decrease its impact on your life? We've all heard the phrase, "running away from your problems," and we all know that typically those problems tend to catch up with you if they were ever even gone for a moment to begin with. A lovely side product of embracing the negative as well as the positive is that over time the negative seems to diminish a bit, leaving you generally happier than you were when you were desperately clutching at happiness. It can be tough to do and feels a bit wacky to think of actually embracing or welcoming with open arms our trials and tribulations. Often we put so much energy into denying those things or pretending they aren't there, all the while living with the anxiety that they may rear their ugly heads tomorrow. How much of a relief might it be not to have to expend all that energy in fear and instead directing it towards dealing with our pain and suffering. Try it and see what might happen. Oh, and let me know how it works or doesn't work out for you!
Monday, November 28, 2011
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Self-Absorption
It feels like I've been saying "get out of your own head" a lot these days.
Anxiety can be a pretty pervasive concern for a lot of folks. Many times, we can boil anxiety down to a constant litany of negative self-talk in our brains which dictates our behavior and our emotions. The daily "I'm not good at this, I'll never succeed at this, Why would someone think I'm good?, I'm going to fail, I'm not going to say the right thing, I screwed up, I'm too fat, I'm too skinny, I'm not smart enough, Why me?, etc, etc, etc. There's a lot of "I" and "Me" in those statements.
I'm reminded of a poem I once read by Thomas E. Brown:
If thou could'st empty all thyself of self
Like to a shell disinhabited,
Then might He find thee on the ocean shelf,
And say, 'This is not dead,'
And fill thee with Himself instead.
But thou art all replete with very thou
And hast such shrewd activity,
That when He comes, He says, 'This is enow,'
Unto itself - 'twere better let it be,
It is so small and full, there is no room for me.'
Now obviously, there is a strong religious intent to this poem, but if we were to take the religion out of it but keep a sense of the spirituality or interconnectedness with the world around us or even replace "He" with "Life," it can take on meaning for everyone.
If we could just empty ourselves of Self; get out of our own way, then might paths open up to us that were hitherto unseen? (Yes, all of a sudden I've developed a floweriness to my writing.) If we could get out of our own heads, who knows how much Life we could be living - in the present moment? It's those times when I've been least concerned with myself that I've felt like I'm most fully living. How often do you think you're truly living?
Anxiety can be a pretty pervasive concern for a lot of folks. Many times, we can boil anxiety down to a constant litany of negative self-talk in our brains which dictates our behavior and our emotions. The daily "I'm not good at this, I'll never succeed at this, Why would someone think I'm good?, I'm going to fail, I'm not going to say the right thing, I screwed up, I'm too fat, I'm too skinny, I'm not smart enough, Why me?, etc, etc, etc. There's a lot of "I" and "Me" in those statements.
I'm reminded of a poem I once read by Thomas E. Brown:
If thou could'st empty all thyself of self
Like to a shell disinhabited,
Then might He find thee on the ocean shelf,
And say, 'This is not dead,'
And fill thee with Himself instead.
But thou art all replete with very thou
And hast such shrewd activity,
That when He comes, He says, 'This is enow,'
Unto itself - 'twere better let it be,
It is so small and full, there is no room for me.'
Now obviously, there is a strong religious intent to this poem, but if we were to take the religion out of it but keep a sense of the spirituality or interconnectedness with the world around us or even replace "He" with "Life," it can take on meaning for everyone.
If we could just empty ourselves of Self; get out of our own way, then might paths open up to us that were hitherto unseen? (Yes, all of a sudden I've developed a floweriness to my writing.) If we could get out of our own heads, who knows how much Life we could be living - in the present moment? It's those times when I've been least concerned with myself that I've felt like I'm most fully living. How often do you think you're truly living?
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