life's an upndown
Something I've been talking/thinking about quite a bit lately.
Working with people and the emotional stuff that's been going on for them shifts and changes my perspective all the time.
We are like the weather, sometimes we are unpredictable, sometimes we are settled, sometimes we are cold, sometimes raging, sometimes just so goddam hot!
Getting as close as we can to some kind of okayness with all of this seems to be the thing that keeps coming back. How can I be ok with feeling let down, feeling low, feeling great (not so hard to be okay with) and where does the balance lie within all of this?
I look again towards what I would call overarching cultural habits and see that we are extreme in our reactions, we judge and criticize others and ourselves all the time for not being good enough. This is everywhere, from media headlines, "bad thing, good thing!" to the wellness industry "get yourself feeling great because you don't want to be feeling bad!"
Our culture shuns the middle way, like what would be the point in feeling ok? "Just ok?!"
But it's not 'just ok' is it? Ok is where I feel gratitude and compassion and appreciate what's around me in a way that doesn't want it to be different.
Is a tree good or bad? Have you ever seen a guilty heron? Is it possible to see that everyone was born the same and will die the same?
We go through our lives deciding what's good and bad, more often than not based upon others' ideas of what is good and bad. but what IS good and what IS bad? Many of us see ourselves as good but often inside we feel bad. What's going on there?
The way I see it we are programmed to see the world as good and bad and programmed to feel good and feel bad. These are not 'natural' states, these are learned behaviours. Apps that were installed when we were kids.
The good news is that we are animals and so we can learn from our wilder cousins. If a wild animal worried all the time it would be dead. We have the luxury of worry, you could say. But how do we break the pattern of worry? I'm working on how I can describe that in a single sentence but currently that's not possible!
Firstly, I am pointing towards something - how nature works - there is harmony AND harshness AND beauty AND cruelty BUT nature doesn't look at any of it that way, our unconscious mind, which only wants our survival, doesn't look at things that way. Only consciously do we think that things are good and bad. No-thing and no-body is bad. Essentially, we are just stuff that's happening in the universe.
Discuss
Also, I wanted to reach out to those of you who may be struggling with addiction or know people who are. I have a small amount of funding to do sessions with people to help shift what may have been causing addictive tendencies and I'd especially like to assist people who already know me or you, if you are reading this, or your family member, or friend.
On the same note, I am also looking for donors for this work. I am in the process of starting an organisation dedicated to freeing people from addiction on a non-clinical way and I'm lucky enough to be gathering some great support in doing that, both from individuals and people already working in the field of addiction.
Have a good weekend! You filthy animal!