Today,
We're going to be talking about what it means to allow what's here,
Our thoughts,
Our emotions,
Whatever it is,
To just be present.
Because in today's world,
There are so many ways that we're taught to move away from what we're feeling.
We distract ourselves.
We intellectualize things.
We try to fix them or reframe them.
Breathe through them,
Journal our way out of them,
Or convince ourselves that we shouldn't be feeling the thing in the first place.
And to complicate things a little more,
Sometimes even the tools that are meant to support us can become another way of trying to move past something without actually processing it.
And there's a real difference here between trying to fix what we're feeling and actually giving ourselves enough space to feel it.
And that can be really uncomfortable.
And so the question becomes,
What happens if,
Instead of immediately trying to change what's here,
We practiced allowing it?
Not indulging it and not becoming consumed by it,
But just allowing ourselves to acknowledge that this is what's here right now.
And I've been thinking a lot about this because there can be this subtle pressure,
Especially when we've spent time learning about ourselves or developing practices that are meant to support us,
To feel like we should know how to handle everything really well.
We know the tools,
We know we can breathe or meditate or move or.
.
.
Do something creative.
All to shift our state.
And those things can be incredibly useful.
But the goal isn't to get so good at these practices that somehow we stop having difficult emotions altogether,
Because we're human.
And we're going to feel all of it,
Whether we like it or not.
And making room for that full range of emotion is part of what it means to be really alive.
Ram Dass liked to say that resistance to the unpleasant situation is the root of suffering.
Meaning that when we resist what's here,
We tend to create even more friction around it.
Because there's the feeling itself,
And then there's everything we start to pile on top of it.
The judgment,
The shame,
I shouldn't feel this way or I thought I was past this.
I need to figure this out or I should feel differently.
We need and should ourselves into exhaustion.
And then suddenly,
We're not only experiencing the emotion itself,
But now we're also in conflict with ourselves for having it at all.
And maybe that's where the practice really begins,
Not by changing the feeling,
But by changing how we meet ourselves in it.
So again,
The gentler question is simply,
Can this be here?
Can I let this feeling exist for a moment without immediately trying to make it mean something or make it go away?
Can I be curious about it before I try to solve it?
Can I give myself permission not to have the answer yet?
And that doesn't mean that we stay there forever.
There may absolutely be a time to act or make a decision,
Set a boundary.
Ask for help,
Or consciously shift our state.
But there is a difference between moving with a feeling allowing it to be felt.
Processed and understood.
And moving away from it by bypassing it.
And I think the more willing we are to stay with ourselves through all of this,
The better we actually get to know ourselves,
What we need,
What matters to us,
Maybe what something is asking us to pay attention to.
We're not trying to reach some ideal state where we respond perfectly to everything that happens to us.
We're building capacity to meet ourselves more honestly when we don't.
To listen a little more closely,
To stay curious about what's here.
To give ourselves enough space to feel something without immediately deciding what it means,
What we should do about it,
Or how quickly it needs to change.
Sometimes that might lead us toward meditation or movement or writing or breath.
Sometimes it might simply mean letting ourselves have the feeling.
Either way,
The invitation is the same.
That for a little while,
See what happens when you stop asking yourself to be somewhere else and allow for what's here.
