Meditation: Calm, 7 Days of Managing Stress: The Art of Surrender Length: 12 minutes Where: Bedroom, Los Angeles How It Felt: Like clarity
This year has been an incredible journey. I’ve learned so much, and continue to learn. I’m extremely grateful that I was given the opportunity these past two years, while life has slowed immensely, to work on myself and grow so much as a person.
Take the blessings, right?
This meditation felt like a confirmation of something I’ve been hearing over and over: Don’t fight against life, but let it flow through you. So many of my hardest times have come while I try to deny the reality of something that’s happening. I try to change or control things that are outside my sphere of influence or spend time lamenting the facts, but it doesn’t help anything. Some people just suck. Others are determined to live in their trauma. Some situations are hard, or not what we wanted. Some days everything seems to go wrong. This is life.
What I’ve learned, clearly now, is that we have to feel our feelings, grieve or forgive or whatever we need to do, then find acceptance and let it go. The most suffering we find in life is when we try to avoid pain or discomfort, rather than just letting it be so we can move on. I’m starting to notice when something gets under my skin that is just a waste of my energy to worry about. I’m calming so much more quickly. I feel more at peace than I ever have, and I’m not ruminating on hard things nearly as much.
I’m learning to let go and move forward, to not carry it with me.
To stay present.
I’ve been listening to the book Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, and it is blowing my mind. So many things I thought were just regular personality traits of mine can be traced back with a straight A to B line to things I experienced in childhood. Of course I’m overly responsible, overly empathetic, the one to take charge, always trying to help everyone around me. That was my role in childhood, but I don’t need it anymore. It’s giving me insight into so many people around me, as well- my siblings, husband, kids. We’ve all dealt with things we weren’t prepared to deal with as children, and now we have stress and anxiety and fear of speaking openly and whatever else has come because of this.
It reminds me of going to Al-Anon, feeling so unbelievably seen. This book could have been written specifically for me, and I’ve cried tears of relief more than once. I’m just a normal person who had a normal, scientific reaction to an extreme amount of bullshit, and, what’s more, I made it out okay. I built a life I love, despite what I had to overcome. I continue to take responsibility for my life and heal. I’m happy and loved and try to be kind, empathetic, ambitious, generous, and loving.
I’ve seen the other ways this story ends, and I’m grateful and proud of myself.
At the end of the day, we are the only ones who get to decide what’s on the next page. We may be up against a lot we can’t control, but we are always in charge of more than we tend to understand (as adults). I’ve realized that the number one type of person I want to have around, to be in my life, is a self-reflective person. These people take responsibility for themselves and their part in things. They tend to be empathetic, aware, kind, forgiving, and to see the world in all the shades of grey, instead of black and white. They are the best listeners, the most curious about people, the least self-absorbed.
These are my people.
Getting to the “wrap up” stage of this blog, but I definitely plan to keep meditating, and I’ll likely do a little check-in now and again, something to keep me honest. I really want to keep meditating daily. Life is long and I want make the most of it!
Highly recommend that book for almost everyone! We have just entered in the past few decades the era of raising children with an eye to their emotional needs, not just physical ones. Many of us could benefit from understanding what was missing in our most formative years. If you had a perfect, blissful childhood with loving parents who were consistent and cared about you first and foremost, then be happy! That’s a beautiful thing. But if you ever felt like you couldn’t bring up your feelings safely, or that you were dismissed, or forgotten about, or made to parent your parent in any way, it may speak to you. Check it out!
Flying to Michigan tomorrow night, so lots to power through here! Holidays, here I come!
My Year of Meditation 