Free Your Mind (and the Rest will Follow)

"When we resist change, it's called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into its dynamic quality, that's called enlightenment, or awakening to our true nature, to our fundamental goodness. Another word for this is freedom." - Pema Chödrön, Living Beautifully with Uncertainty and Change

I've been guilty so often of trying to run and hide from my feelings. Fear? I'll just go back to bed and sleep this angst away. Anxiety? Pass me a glass of wine, please. Sadness? Who wants to be sad? Not me! True story: I binge watched old episodes of Parks and Rec on Netflix for almost a week straight when a narcissist a-hole, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, "won" the presidency. Leslie Knope helped me get through by avoiding the fear, the anxiety and sadness that overwhelmed me after Nov. 8, 2016.

So while reading Living Beautifully with Uncertainty and Change, by Pema Chödrön, I came across a novel concept... stop running.

Chödrön, a renowned and beloved Buddhist teacher, writes, "There is something more fruitful we can do when that edgy feeling arises... it involves directing your full attention to the pain and breathing in and out of the spot that hurts. Instead of trying to avoid the discomfort, you open yourself completely to it. You become receptive to the painful sensation without dwelling on the story your mind has concocted, 'It's bad; I shouldn't feel this way; maybe it will never go away.'"

So I've been trying to practice this lately, in yoga, and in life outside of the studio. When a feeling arises that I would normally run from, I try to lean in to it instead.

Feel. Breathe.

It seems too simple to actually work, but I've noticed that each time I stop and let myself experience whatever it is I'm feeling, for just long enough, even a minute or two, that the next time the feeling is triggered, it just doesn't have quite the same effect on me. I grow to accept the feelings and not judge myself for them. It is what it is, my mind seems to say. And that's okay.

And little by little, a few of those pesky, old, recurring thoughts that sent me running to hide under the covers, cease to even bother me much at all. They're just thoughts. They're not who I am.

So with that, I'll pour myself a glass of red and turn on some Parks & Rec, but not to escape, but because I enjoy a glass of wine now and then and I love Amy Poeller, and let's admit it, I still need to shield myself from the horror of who's in the White House, just a little.

Namaste.