Okay, so yesterday you figured out how you process some events. You know your brow furrows and you get tension in your neck, or you know you won’t be able to sit still, or that your feel nauseous, but you’ve figured out what your dominant emotion is and how it impacts you. You’ve already done more than you realize.
Maybe you already noticed it yesterday. Just your awareness of where your suffering sits physically makes you more aware. Your stomach starts to tighten but now you have the association as to why. You may even have known why right away, but being in tune with that–seeing that information as a tool is not something you’re likely to have done. People think their emotions are results not signposts.
Let’s use the new job example I started yesterday. In that case our overwhelming unfamiliarity leaves us more vulnerable and therefore more wary or… anxious. That’s a natural reaction to all that newness. So if you were going to feel a bit anxious it makes sense that you would feel that just before a new job, where you’ll meet a bunch of new people. And in that context you’re essentially hunting–you’re going to use the money from work to buy the most basic things, like having food or shelter. So if you feel your food and shelter might be threatened then Maslow would suggest that it seems like the appropriate time for the very human emotion of very active concern or anxiety.
Can you see how that you’ve already started the change you wanted to teach yourself? Because by becoming the real you who is watching for the fake you, you can’t think the fake you’s narrative thoughts. That’s a big deal–you’re now busy being the person watching those thoughts and their reactions in your body. You are now real you watching ego you. Congratulations! And that only took a day to get familiar with. You’ll only get better from here.
Starting tomorrow we’ll hone this skill even further. But for today focus on practicing being an observer. Don’t just notice that one emotion; start to add the others. Feel all those emotions. Feel the chemistry of your body not as your day but rather as the result of your thinking. Note that if you change your thinking or circumstances change it, you feel differently. So spend today focusing on that relationship between what you think and how you feel.
Stop talking to yourself about your day and start being alive within it. Stop living the thoughts and start existing as the being that thinks those thoughts. You are the projector not the screen.
Remember, don’t add to negative narratives by chastising yourself. Chastise or not every thought is an act of creation. Watch them go as easily as they came. That is your day. That flow. You don’t fight that flow. You get comfortable with it and then you can start to feel its currents and use its forces. Before you know it you’ll be a Jedi. 😉
Have fun watching yourself. If you do it earnestly you’ll learn a lot. Get good at it. Then we’ll take that raised awareness and we’ll put it to good use. You’re now an active participant in your life. Congratulations. Enjoy your day.
peace, s
Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and nonprofit organizations around the world.
A serious childhood brain injury lead Scott to spend his entire life meditating on the concepts of thought, consciousness, reality and identity. It made others as strange to him as he was to them. When he realized people were confused by their own over-thinking, Scott began teaching others to understand reality. He is currently CBC Radio Active’s Wellness Columnist, as well as a writer, speaker and mindfulness instructor based in Edmonton, AB where he still finds it strange to write about himself in the third person.
