Lighten Up (and do something different)

Taken from Comfortable with Uncertainty by Pema Chodron (one of my favorite books of the moment)

Being able to lighten up is the key to feeling at home with your body, mind, and emotions, to feeling worthy to live on this planet.

For example, you can hear the slogan “Always maintain only a joyful mind” and start beating yourself over the head for never being joyful.  That kind of witness is a bit heavy.

This earnestness, this seriousness about everything in our lives-this goal-oriented,

we’re-going-to-do-it-or-else attitude, is the world’ greatest killjoy.  There’s no sense of appreciation because we’re so solemn about everything.  In contrast, a joyful mind is very ordinary and relaxed. So lighten up.  Don’t make such a big deal.

When you’re aspiration is to lighten up, you begin to have a sense of humor.  Your serious state of mind keeps getting popped.  In addition to a sense of humor, a basic support for a joyful mind is curiosity, paying attention, taking interest in the world around you.  Happiness is not required, but being curious without a heavy judgmental attitude helps. If you are judgmental, you can even be curious about that.

Curiosity encourages cheering up.  So does simply remembering to do something different.  We are so locked into this sense of burden---Big Deal Joy and Big Deal Unhappiness—that’s it’s sometimes helpful just to change the pattern.  Anything out of the ordinary will help.  You can go to the window and look at the sky, you can splash cold water on your face, you can sing in the shower, you can go jogging---anything that’s against your usual pattern.  That’s how things start to lighten up.

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A friend of mine's symbol for lightening up is the Camel.  Travel lightly.  Less seriousness, more awareness and joy.  If our bodies, emotions and thoughts are bound up in patterns, good and bad- probably mostly old and useless, then observing ourselves, we can begin to lighten.  Wow, if that's a sentence at all it certainly is long!!!  (one of my patterns I enjoy is writing run on sentences!)

Notice your body, notice your thoughts, notice your emotions.

This week:

What patterns of sitting, walking, talking, driving did you notice and shift?

Could you add some nice deep breathing while listening to a friend or even just notice what muscles you’re tensing while listening?  Do you tense different muscles when you’re with different people/different situations?  What can you let go of?

Could you stop and notice the feeling that preceded an action? (an action like snacking) 

Let me know your observations.