It’s been a while again since my last nudge… you know that way that sometimes life just takes over, chucks a few curve balls, and all the best laid plans of mice and men go straight out the window? Well that’s pretty much how it’s been in the past couple of months…
In the past, this would have quickly sent me into overwhelm, over analysis and stressing big time about all the things I should be doing…only thank goodness these days I’ve learnt that’s not only really unhelpful, it’s actually counter productive.
No, instead I’ve just taken my hands off the wheel for a bit, my foot off the pedal, and surprisingly, the world has not come to an end (gosh all the silly things we tell ourselves in the name of having to be seen to keep going, present a particular front, or give ourselves a false sense of control… just exhausting…)
So, I wanted to share some insights I’ve seen around the okay-ness of letting go, and how that’s not only been helpful, but, I’ve come to see, essential for living through difficult times.
Acceptance versus resistance
Accepting things as they are can be hard, but so often it’s our own resistance to accepting something we might not want or like, which causes us upset rather than the event itself.
Put another way, ‘what you resist, persists’. The quicker you can drop the resistance, and take the view it is what it is – whilst not seeing it worse than it is – the quicker some semblance of equilibrium returns … and from there, even if only in tiny steps, things incrementally start to feel more manageable.
Being in the moment
Yeah yeah, I know we’ve all heard this before and, for sure, it’s one thing to know it and quite another to put it into practice. For me, this isn’t something that can be forced (or endlessly meditated over…). It’s simply a case of noticing when I am … Noticing that whatever’s happening, life continues to live us … we find ourselves getting out of bed, brushing our teeth, doing the same old chores, cooking our meals, following our routines, more unconsciously than consciously.
Like life’s moving us in the moment rather than us consciously having to make things happen. And the more I’ve experienced that, the more I’ve also seen it’s not all down to me. I’m just doing the next thing that comes to mind, things are still getting done, and the more I stay out of past or future thinking, and just be in the moment, the better things feel.
We can’t control thought
Overthinking in difficult times can be so draining.
We can all have a tendency to get stuck in a particular pattern of ‘either/or’ or ‘right or wrong’ thinking. The mind will then seek out all the evidence to support your point of view – part of a survival mechanism that’s wired into us.
Seeing that’s just the way thought works and we can’t control it means I relate so differently to any thoughts these days. I engage way less with what I’m thinking now that I’ve seen a crappy thought = a crappy feeling. This has helped me to catch myself more quickly when negative thoughts are looping round my head. I’ve seen that, if left alone, thoughts naturally come and go by themselves, there’s nothing to do, they eventually pass through. I’ve seen that when I’m in a quieter state of mind, this happens much more quickly. When it does, new, better thinking always comes in, regardless of what I’m grappling with.
Trust the system
The more I trust that it’s just the way we work, that we’re all only ever doing the best we can with the momentary thinking we have that can look so real to us – until it doesn’t – the easier it gets to trust the system in difficult times. It’s a constant learning curve, but now I see that we have no control over the myriad thoughts that are coming and going all day long, I’ve learnt to be a lot kinder to myself – and by default others…
If you’re living through a difficult time right now, I hope these insights are helpful. As I shared in my last nudge, 7 Life Lessons from my Nan, she had an innate understanding about this. She knew that the best thing to do when you’re feeling stirred up was to let go of your thoughts, give yourself some quiet space and let your mind reset … I got more responses to that nudge than any other I’d written before, so I’m guessing we can all see the wisdom and truth in this.
Until the next time, consider yourself nudged for now.
All the best
Tamsin
PS I’m just about to launch my new Facebook nudgeme page so I can share different conversations and insights in a more dynamic way … both my own nudges and other helpful tips and ideas for living an easier life – I’d love it if you’d follow me there, thanks!