When we’re banging on a brick wall, hoping to get answers, change an outcome, or get through to someone and it just isn’t happening, often the kindest thing we can do inside, is to allow ourself to accept the lack of listening or closure as a form of answer by default, to let go and to move on.
Trust, grieve if you need to, and leave it to karma.
It’s often not worth focusing any more valuable energy on.
It’s obvious to feel gratitude when we are experiencing something beautiful or something that makes us happy.
Another thing to understand is that we can access gratitude even within deep sadness.
We can be grateful that we are alive, feeling deeply, and that we can learn to feel safe enough with our own heart, to acknowledge and allow any feeling.
It is helpful to practice and cultivate gratitude. Write or speak out loud things we are grateful for in any moment. Even if it is simply that we have clean air to breathe, there is always something we can learn to recognise.
We can find gratitude for the completeness of life and our healing process.
I do know of course, how hard it can be in times of darkness and sadness and fear. And how at times that fills our entire experience. Sometimes we don’t feel grateful, and that needs to be allowed authentic expression too.
And even that is perfectly ok.
The nature of life is duality. Where there is happy, there will be sad. Where there is light, there is dark.
Being grateful for the light side means without realising it, we are grateful for the dark. As without each other neither is known.
Feel what you need to heal.
If we are not growing, we are not truely humanly alive.
Remain connected to your willingness to put down anything you might be holding to too tightly.
Wisdom has the inner freedom to be able to reconsider, change perspective, see another’s truth as equal and simultaneously present, acknowledge what you don’t know and let go of old thinking.
Humble wisdom gives gentle, open and gracious space to move. It also paves the way for compassion and understanding to surround your relationships.
Consciousness knows what feels right inside. It’s not a thought process, it’s just a knowing. When we’re listening on this level, we don’t actually get to decide, our job is to listen, trust and follow.
Often times when we are really listening, we don’t particularly like the answer. We might try to manipulate it, because something in us fears what we might have to face, lose or be challenged with if we follow.
However it’s when we don’t follow that there is a painful consequence of some kind.
Often we resist, judge and try to ignore or avoid our challenging emotions.
With this resistance they persist.
When we tell ourselves it’s not ok to feel this or that or that we should be other than what arises, we suffer further. We can then become anxious about feeling anxiety or depressed about feeling sad.
Emotions themselves can be hard to be with, but when we allow them, we don’t add a further layer of suffering on top of them.
When you’ve got a tough feeling hanging around, take time to sit with it. Tune into where you feel it in your body. Breathe with it. Let your body totally feel the sensation of that feeling. Really let it’s fullness be had and expressed. Speak it out loud, name it to the sky, let tears be had or frustration be voiced.
We can even have gratitude in those moments that we are safe enough with ourself to really feel. We are alive.
With this we often find our emotions will pass through and release.
I often say (inspired by @jonbernie) that our emotional body is like the weather system of our being; always moving, changing and passing through. We can trust that even with a great storm, the rain at some point will always pass. And there is no point trying to stop it, it’s just life. And we also need the rain for things to be able to grow.
If the same feeling keeps circling back, or pulling us to it, it is often necessary to
investigate what thoughts/beliefs/narratives are there that are perpetuating our feelings and to really look into them. Are they true? Do you need to keep choosing to follow them?
Yoga gives us many benefits:
Health and fitness, flexibility, relaxation and strength. It regulates our hormones and helps our digestive system and internal organs.
It has been proven to be one of the most powerful ways to heal from and release trauma.
It is a profound and reliable way to process; allow and release emotions safely.
And with all of those things said, after practicing regularly for some years, I am learning that the main healing power of yoga, is that it provides a pathway that brings awareness and consciousness into full embodied presence.
It is good to be in your body and not just feeling like a walking head.
Another part is usually there too, judging the angry part. On this level of experience we are not merely one self. We have many parts. Our one true Self however, is that in us which sees and is aware of all our parts.
Learn to look within.
When there is a strong feeling, fear or defensiveness, a useful question to ask yourself is ‘which part of me is feeling and acting this way?’.
If you had to paint a picture of their character for someone to act as them, how would you describe that part of you?
Gain this information to start to identify the parts of you that play out. They usually have similar patterns or ways of thinking that will show up again and again.
When we can gain awareness of which part is on the ‘stage’ and acting through us, we can start to step back and make choices from a conscious place.
Sometimes in our relationships we need to stand firm with our deeper knowing, which goes beyond mere beliefs, opinions or ideas and more resides in the realm of our intuition, direct experience and higher wisdom.
Sometimes we need to let go of our mental position, our defending and our need to be right and instead focus and prioritise connection and understanding in our relationships.
With the ability to shift mental perspectives and see from different view points, we gain more acceptance, allowing, relaxation and respect.
RATNA DYER 