Hi,
And welcome to Hints of Gladness.
Today I want to talk about detachment and invite you to join me in a mindfulness exercise.
Meister Eckhart said,
Detachment,
Detachment,
Detachment.
What got me thinking about this was my own inability to detach from my own thinking.
So I began to write down some things that I thought might help.
And I want to share those with you now.
So I invite you to practice detachment through mindfulness.
Here are some of the things I identified that I think can help.
First of all,
Be still.
Say to your mind,
Be still.
Say to your body,
Be still.
Relax.
Relax your shoulders.
Relax your chest and heart area.
Be here now.
You can ask,
Am I here now?
Be aware of the voice in your head.
Just being aware of the voice in your head can help you to detach from the voice in your head.
A self-inquiry question that you can ask is,
Who's doing the talking?
There are many words for it,
For the self and the small self.
But for now,
Let's use the word true self and false self and try to become aware of the voice in your head.
Are you listening to the voice of the false self and responding to the voice of the false self?
Or are you listening to the voice of the true self,
Which I find is often a divine sort of silence?
Very helpful practice to detach from our minds is to notice our breath.
So I invite you to take a few conscious breaths.
Acceptance can really help us to let go of and detach from our thinking.
I invite you to accept what is,
What is for you right now.
Accept that.
Don't try to push it away or shut it down.
Just be aware of it and accept what is.
Let go of time.
Let go of the past.
You can pick it up again later if you want,
But for now,
Let it go.
Let go of worrying about the future.
In order to detach from your thoughts,
It doesn't do any good to try and stop your thoughts.
So right now I invite you to simply be aware of your thoughts.
Be aware of your feelings and be aware of some of your favorite concepts.
Don't attach to any of these.
Allow them to run the show.
Don't identify with them.
You are not your thoughts,
Feelings and concepts.
I know those are a lot of don't statements.
What you really want to do is just be aware.
Be aware of your thoughts,
Feelings and favorite concepts.
Let go of who you think you are.
Let go of who you think others are.
And a tremendously helpful thing to do is to let go of what you think will make you happy.
Because what we often think will make us happy is really just something that is impermanent and fleeting.
And true happiness comes when we let go of all of those things.
The things that we think will make us happy,
But we know deep down they really won't,
At least for any length of time.
Let go of judgment.
Let go of resentment.
Let go of self-condemnation.
Let go of self-hatred.
Detach yourself from all of these things.
Stop resisting life.
A positive way to put that is to surrender to life.
Let go of resistance.
Naturally be.
Go with the flow of life.
Allow change to happen.
Just do.
Just be.
Be empty.
Empty,
Empty,
Empty.
I know it can be hard,
I'm having the kind of day as I record this,
Of or to let go of obsession.
Let go of whatever you are obsessing over.
Be open.
Be willing.
As Richard Rohr has said,
Stop protecting the small,
Fragile self.
Love it and let it go.
And as Thomas Merton said,
Be the keeper of the still point of nothingness.
Don't try so hard.
Don't try at all.
Don't struggle,
It isn't necessary.
Don't try and manage your addictions.
Surrender.
Be open to love.
And in all of this,
Know that you are held.
You are always held.
You are always held.
You are always held.
You are always held.
