Connecting With Positive People: Embrace Softness

You can embrace softness and use softness to your advantage once you understand how the modern world makes you hard. In this talk, you will find your softness without feeling weak. You will find out what qualities serve you when, and understand that it is possible to be strong and soft at the same time when needed.

Transcript

This world you live in is hard the economic system you're obliged to work in is hard the school system you have been brought up in is hard when i say hard i'm not talking about these things being difficult i'm talking about the quality art the opposite of soft the quality heart can serve you protect you it can give you strength but the quality heart can also make you less flexible less open-minded less friendly and can also make your human connections less personal so today we're looking at the quality heart and the quality soft our goal is to understand how living in the modern world automatically increases the quality heart in your body and your mind we will explore what softens actually is softness actually is and how you can take advantage of that we want to raise your awareness of when it serves you to be soft and when it serves you to be hard hanea kuri trappa said when we learn to soften we'll respond to our pain from a place of ease let's explore this ease today so all of us are born with certain qualities you might be born with a personal predisposition that is a bit more direct or indirect fast or slow a bit heavier light and maybe also a bit heavier light and maybe also a bit heavier light and maybe also a bit heavier light more hard or soft we are all different and we all possess different qualities by nature that is what makes you unique and your combination is perfectly fine so my first point today is that there is nothing wrong with being a bit more soft or hard by nature but it is important to understand these qualities and to be able to enhance or decrease them in certain situations next to you birth given qualities that influence you are the qualities of your surroundings for example you could live in a fast-paced city or a slow-moving countryside village you could live in a culture that is very direct like northern europe or a culture that is rather indirect like new zealand your surroundings are constantly influencing your personality and decreasing or increasing all sorts of qualities you have by becoming more conscious of these influences you will learn to pick and choose certain surroundings to your advantage now why are the qualities soft and hard especially important first of all soft and hard are qualities we are usually the least aware of furthermore in the modern world the quality of heart has been increased to an often unhealthy amount and alongside this the quality soft has been made an enemy this used to be true only for men but now seems to be a case for both genders the word soft is often used to offend others the word is misused to describe someone as weak flaky and inferior this is important to understand because the first step in order to embrace softness is to get rid of a potential aversion towards softness and the misconception of it is to get rid of a potential aversion towards softness and the misconception of it is to get rid of a potential aversion towards softness and the misconception of it is to get rid of a potential aversion towards softness and the misconception of it is to get rid of a potential aversion towards softness next i would like to look at the quality of heart in a bit more detail why is this quality so popular and how does it influence you the quality of heart is so popular because it makes people competitive productive and successful these are all attributes that are glamorized in modern society but being too hard makes you less in touch with your human side and does not allow you to experience harmony for example the world's political and economic leaders have an unhealthy amount of the quality heart which allows them to be so powerful but also makes them less empathetic now apart from society pushing you to be hard you can also become hard when you get your feelings hurt when not emotionally mature hardness can be used to protect you from fully experiencing negative emotions this can be perceived as beneficial but it actually isn't because it makes you less connected to yourself and that holds you back from being able to grow on the other hand if you allow yourself to be soft then you will experience more sadness but you will also learn and grow from your sadness and you will also receive more empathy and love from others my last point about the quality of heart is that its long-term effect is to become brittle and things that are brittle will one day break it is often the case that over the years people become so hard that mentally they completely break one day thus the famous saying a mental breakdown being able to use the quality soft in your life will protect you from being brittle and risking a breakdown so there is now talk about a few more advantages of the quality soft the first advantage soft has is that it allows you to be flexible you live in a world that is extremely goal oriented which decreases your flexibility when you're flexible and allow other people to change your thoughts and actions then this is perceived as a loss for you society of lords had strong people who get what they want getting what you want is of course not a bad thing as such but it can isolate you when used to an unhealthy extent be soft enough so that you can stay flexible and connect with other people the next big advantage of softness is that it allows you to experience intimacy at a deeper level and i'm talking about physical and emotional intimacy here softening and opening up to another person is not only one of the most beautiful experiences any human can have it is also necessary to live a fulfilled and happy life now being soft also allows you to do things in a more graceful way often it is not a matter of what but a matter of how being soft immediately allows you to do things in a more open and relaxed way which allows for grace being graceful then allows you to truly experience all facets of an event or a person because your grace invites other people to connect with you grace makes you approachable and likable another effect of softness is that you become less judgmental towards yourself and also towards others and being less judgmental allows for higher quality human connections so now that we know the benefits of softness how can you increase softness in your life the very first thing you need to know about softness is that softness can be experienced both physically and mentally for a lot of people feeling the body is easier so the body is often a great way to start and by the way when talking about softening your body i'm not talking about your shape i'm talking about your physical experience how relaxed you are and how softly you move now once your body feels it will immediately influence your mind to become softer too as an experiment you can try and soften your jaw your face and the way you walk this increase in physical softness will immediately affect your state of mind as well and there are plenty of easily achievable ways of softening your body you can even try and clinch your hand into a fist and then let go and let your whole body soften or you can use practices like yin yoga in any case observe how your mind reacts to your physical softness now another way of increasing softness is to surround yourself with people who accept both your qualities soft and hard surround yourself with mature people who are comfortable around softness immature people often cannot handle softness and need to make fun of it because they're scared of allowing themselves to experience softness surround yourself with high quality people who support you the next way to increase softness is to talk in a soft voice maybe you have a job where you need to use your voice in a loud direct or hard way that can of course be useful but see if you can consciously change the tone of your voice when it is not required to be hard next the way you set up your house can also create softness if you do want to increase softness at home you can use soft colors soft lighting soft sitting options soft music and so on all these external stimulations will have a big impact on your overall mindset lastly i want to suggest that you spend as much time in nature as possible nature automatically softens you in case you are in need of it because nature moves all your qualities towards a balanced state so make use of your raised awareness around the qualities soft and hard remember neither of them are good nor bad both serve a purpose and both can serve you at different times in your life