Meditating Is Like Flossing

Let’s inhale, pulling in all kinds of fresh and nourishing air. Let it go. Inhale, nice and deep into your belly. Let it go. Welcome to a Hit of Hope, and this one is salty. I went to the dentist recently. It had been a year and a half since I had gone, and pretty much every time before this recent visit, I’d had to go back and get crowns and root canals. Ah, the joys of aging.

Transcript

Let's inhale,

Pulling in all kinds of fresh and nourishing air,

And let it all go.

Inhale deeply into your belly,

And release.

Welcome to a hit of hope,

And this one is a little bit salty.

I went to the dentist recently.

It had been a year and a half since I had gone,

And pretty much every time before this most recent visit,

I'd had to go back and get things like crowns and root canals.

Ah,

The joys of aging.

So before this visit,

I had steeled myself for more work.

But glory be,

I didn't need any.

Can I get a hallelujah?

Now while I've had some deep cavities recently,

I blame my children for leaching out all of my calcium when they were inside.

But in spite of the deep cavities,

I actually have pretty healthy teeth.

And still,

My hygienist was not so subtly urging me to floss.

It makes all the difference,

She said.

In fact,

Some argue that flossing is more important than brushing.

I'd heard this before.

And as I sat in that chair with my mouth open and the saliva pooling at the back of my throat,

Listening to a drill in someone else's room in someone else's mouth,

I vowed I would start to floss every damn day.

That was two weeks ago.

I have flossed twice.

I know I should floss.

I know it has all kinds of benefits.

Most of us do.

The same is true for meditation and even yoga.

When I tell people I teach yoga and meditation,

They say,

Oh,

I should do that.

I know my life would be better if I did.

Yep.

And still,

Life.

I'm serious.

The reason I don't floss at the end of the day is because I am usually so exhausted I can't wait to stumble into bed.

It's the very same reason I don't meditate every night the way I need to.

Exhausted as I am,

Do I sleep better when I meditate?

You betcha.

Do I get my ass on a meditation bench?

And that led me to wonder why.

I think it all comes down to habits.

We all know the power of habits.

A study from Duke University in 2006 found that almost half of our behaviors that we perform each day,

They're automatic.

That means five of every 10 minutes or half an hour out of every hour is spent doing something we aren't even aware we are doing.

Why do we do this?

And how do bad things not happen because of it?

Well,

Our brains do this to save energy and time.

If we had to think about every single thing we were doing with hyper awareness,

We would probably drop dead from exhaustion or go insane.

Okay,

That's maybe overstepping it a bit,

But honestly,

Our habits save brain energy.

And our brains welcome habits as this way to conserve our energy because the more we do something,

The less brain power it takes.

And the groove in our brain gets deeper and deeper,

Which is what makes bad habits so hard to break.

On top of that,

There are so many demands on us,

So many good things that we can be doing for ourselves that it's hard to add or it's hard to choose.

Yes,

Totally.

So if that's true,

There are too many good things.

How do we choose?

Well,

I think it's important to think,

To consciously think about how we are living.

We have to consciously decide.

So in my case,

Here is what I have to consciously own up to and admit.

Okay,

I am not going to floss and I'm going to accept then that I will probably have to have dental work in my future because of that choice.

Well,

Shit,

When I put it like that,

Where the hell is my floss?

Same with meditation and maybe yoga.

Okay,

I'm not going to meditate.

I'm going to accept that it's going to be harder to be grounded or hold on to my center.

I'm going to accept that I will not sleep as well,

Which will leave me exhausted going into my next day so I can get even more exhausted.

Fine,

Where is my meditation bench?

And I shouldn't say it that way.

And there we go back to that should and that's the go around.

And yet those are the realities we have choices to make.

Do we make them or not?

And the saying,

Or thinking about this reminds me of that saying that many of you have probably heard,

Pick your battles.

Very true.

But in this case,

It's pick your habits,

Because then we have done it mindfully.

And as people we get to choose to do what serves us to do what brings us to our best,

Our even better selves,

Step by step,

Tooth by tooth,

Meditation by meditation,

Habit by habit.

Namaste.

Reviews

You were spot on! You identified a very common practice amongst us and given a way around it. I’m super inspired and Thank you for your insights 🙏🏻

Always love you Betsy! So authentic- thank you 🙏🏻⭐️❤️

So true and amazing.

This one really steps on my toes!
But you are SO right.
Thanks for the (slightly) salty Kick in the Pants I needed. 🤣

Not as "salty" as some. I mean, the cuss words are sprinkled lightly, sure, but the tone behind them wasn't packing nearly the punch as some of the others. 😊 Besides, I could personally relate to this on almost every point.

I shifted a while back to a lot of music backdrops for my meditation, mainly for the brainwave entrainment which seems so incredibly helpful and effective for me, but also because I got tired of trying new practices and the uncertainty of the content going in. In today's climate within the USA, there is already so much uncertainty and terrible surprises and rhetoric that I decided to disengage with most social media, move to headline-only news (which I then review using multiple sources due to the rampant reporting bias these days), local news to remain somewhat in touch with the communities in which I Iive and work, and be more deliberate in my practice choices. I noticed one teacher I followed had started to slide into more religion-specific wording than before, and said when I mentioned this in a review for the benefit of future listeners that I could swap out the terminology if I chose. True, and I knew that - but there are many practices out there where that isn't necessary and I currently lack the mental reserves to do the surprise substitutions in a new audio track, particularly if I am in a deep state of meditation at the time. Mental fatigue is a very real thing, as is compassion fatigue.

To combat this, I decided a couple months ago to examine my daily activity. You know, Betsy, that I work and am professionally educated in mental health first and foremost within my field, and I am a research geek through and through. I determined that to reduce my mental fatigue, I needed to declutter, get organized, continue to be selective in my media exposure, guard my personal time fiercely, practice better self-care, and set some goals down on paper to see - maybe put my vision of them on a vision board rather than just in my head where they have resided for so long.

So I pulled out the small handful of books I have which work well for me regarding decluttering and organizing with my specific style/circumstances in mind. I re-read them, then set them aside. Next, I listened to Stephen Guise's book about mini-habits. I had already been working towards increasing my minor habits to conserve mental energy for more complex tasks. (Like how Steve Jobs and Barak Obama generally wore the same color/style of clothes every day to eliminate that "What should I wear today?" decision effort.) I used to lay out my clothes the night before to eliminate that issue in the morning, but I fell out of the habit. Why? Too many choices, took too long to select the night before.

Continuing on that theme, I knew I wanted to pare down my closet. I also knew that I would need to replace some staple items. I reviewed some books I have regarding dressing for body type and colors for complexion/hair, etc. I want to feel good and look good in the clothes I choose to keep. So I then created a mini-habit. Each day, I will select one item from my closet and determine if it's to keep or donate somewhere. I decided to start with tops, as I have the most of those. At this point, I have filled one garbage bag to donate to the women's shelter, and am halfway through another. I have been rigorous with myself and ordered some new clothes that I have tried on at the retail outlet, refusing to purchase on the spot and giving myself room and time to think about it first. These items are versatile and durable, and are "blank canvases" in style so I can dress them up or down with accessories I already have, thus reducing my need to hold onto that one shirt that only matches that one skirt, etc. Makes it easier to declutter as I go.

The mini-habit of choosing one item to donate each day led to another ini-habit of bringing one piece if non-obvious trash downstairs with me each morning. Not trash can items, things like a cup I never got around to fixing the handle on, outdated magazines, etc.

This has been freeing up mental space and allowing breathing room for critical self-care habits to be developed - like flossing. 😁 (Seriously, that's on my list.)

My first mini-habit in development though is to get enough sleep. As a night owl with multiple sleep disorders, this is difficult. But having the mental energy to tackle this issue is a wonderful thing which I did not have before. The more I can automate my routine activities, and automate habits that will lead to positive improvements (such as a more minimalist environment which in turn requires less care and attention from me), the more rested and relaxed I am able to genuinely feel.

Sleep is my priority... then dental hygiene. Creating an environment conducive to that is taking front and center now, and to do that, I have had to make some hard decisions and create habits based on sound science that works for me and how I operate. I'd glad I acquired those resources years ago and am familiar with them to know the contents and location so it was easy to do the background research needed.

I need more dental work, but have to wait a bit due to expense. When you combine the mental fatigue, dislike of the process (it's painful for me due to medical issues), and utter overwhelm, and then the heritage dental issues many members of my family have dealt with, I apparently at some point decided to play ostrich. I went to my regular check ups and dutifully scheduled follow up work at the time, telling the front desk that if I didn't schedule it then, I almost certainly would put it off, but if I had it on my calendar, I would show up or call to reschedule if there was a conflict. I know myself and my habits in that respect, too.

Listening to this HoH did cause me to pause and consider my meditation practice though. I am wondering now - perhaps it's just semantics, perhaps not - if my daily routine is accurately termed a meditation practice, or if it's instead a lot of personal self-care with frequent pauses for a "regular" meditation. I use a meditation bench but haven't pulled it out in months. I"m looking at it in the carrying case right now, in fact. But I instead sat up in bed this morning and listened to some brainwave entrainment music to help become more alert, and then some affirmations. I'm not sure either were accurately termed meditation though. Mindful awareness in the music, yes...but is THAT meditation? What IS the definition of "meditation"?

I set a mini-habit a couple years ago to spend five minutes daily on my mat using the meditation timer feature. That lasted about 2.5 weeks. I think 5 minutes was too big a chunk, and having to roll out my mat and put the leg on my meditation bench made it a "process" in my mind and thus a much more involved procedure than it actually was. As Guise says about setting mini-habits, they need to be kept "stupid simple" to keep the brain from resisting the change in it's usual operations. This is how I came to just sitting up in bed instead. Now I think my mini-habit will be to just roll out my mat each day. It's easy to overachieve, and hard to fail when your new habit to be is so "stupid simple." Guise's own journey with this was setting his own mini-habit to do one pushup a day to begin his journey towards physical fitness. He overachieves regularly, sometimes by a lot, but even if he forgets and is in bed, he can just flip over, do one pushup right there in bed, and go to sleep having achieved his goal for the day and keeping that habit streak going. (Or as Jerry Seinfeld puts it, "Don't break the chain.")

Reverse engineer for current habits and environment to create the space to rebuild new habits that serve you better in whatever stage or circumstance of life you find yourself in. That habit of collecting every Hot Wheels car you saw in the store when you were 8 years old probably hasn't,t served much purpose if you're still doing it when you're 45 (unless you're a collector) and might even be doing harm if it interferes with relationships and changes how you would want to live. I recommend an annual "habit check-up" to evaluate how you actually spent your time each day and make appropriate adjustments. Using phone apps to track your use of time, or how consistent you are in keeping your habit streak going are also things I have found very helpful.

For me, I want to feel relaxed with having time to get the sleep I need, and not be overwhelmed y all those things on my "to do" list. Then it's that dental hygiene habit. 😁 It's just super important to create the environment - get that fertile topsoil in place - to help your new habits blossom and grow, which means often doing a lot of behind the scenes prep work. (Case in point... Hubby walked in and saw j was reading a book on dressing for body type. He said, "I thought you said you were going to be cleaning out your closet." I said, "I am. It's a process." He looked confused, as I grabbed a shirt out of the closet that I never felt looked good on me and knew now from the book why that was the case. I put it in my donation bag, pulled out my phone, marked off that I had accomplished my mini-habit if one item minimum for the day, and then said I was do e and headed downstairs, leaving hubby trailing after, shaking his head. But small actions add up, and I can move relatively freely now that I have gotten rid of so many clothes. Designing ways to keep things organized is vastly improved after reviewing those specific books on the subject (and the YouTube channel one author has). I can sustain and maintain THESE systems where I couldn't before.

Just as with meditation, small doses done consistently can lead to great change. A conscious periodic evaluation of your habits and how you spend your time is, in my opinion, a critical piece of this.

Habits and flossing. Yes, been there, still working on that. But first...sleep. 😊

I almost always have basically an essay I want to write after listening to your HoH, Betsy. It has actually prevented me from listening at times, because I know I don't have the time afterwards to write it all out. Perhaps as I free up my mind space through habit automation, this will be less of an issue for me. Right now though, I'm thinking I am likely to continue limiting my new inundation until well after the election, though I may start venturing into forays with new meditation practice with familiar teachers in the near future, just to stay connected if nothing else.

Thanks for sharing this one. Spoke directly to what's going on right now, and as always, spot on. Thank you again for what you do, Betsy. I see you and the light within you. Be well. 🤲🏻❤️🤲🏻

needed this one lately! thank you!

Meditation and exercise are habits I’m delighted to cultivate. Thank you for this meditation.

can't hear this truth enough times. Thanks for posting. oh yeah and water pik

I’ve similar dental experiences. Enjoyable, challenging and inspiring. Thanks!
I will floss more, too!