Stay present with the wind
Don’t let it blow you away
Stay focused on the drops of rain
As they cleanse your hidden pain
Don’t move from the cold
Feel the fear paralyze your bones
Lift your eyes to the warm spring skies
The light of truth will melt the lies
Step deep into the mud with your feet
As you feel stuck in your emotions and your thinking
Move towards the very edge of reason… and then let go
Free falling into the abyss you do not know
The limitless resides in here and now
It eats what you eat and sees what you see
The boundless remains beyond the familiar space
Be fearless and you will too experience this place…
…like you were meant to.
Since I was a little girl I have heard the phrase “you are supposed to” over and over until it has become an unquestionable part of my life.
“You are supposed to listen to your parents”
“You are supposed to listen to your teachers”
“You are supposed to be a good girl”
“You are supposed to work hard”
“You are supposed to be happy”
“You are supposed to be polite”
“You are supposed to be normal”
“You are supposed to dress appropriately”
“You are supposed to complete the impossible to do lists, succeed, succeed, succeed… no room for failure”
As I sat down in my daily meditation one windy (almost) spring afternoon, rushed thoughts of all of my to do’s and next steps began to roll around in my mind. My mind was telling me what I was “SUPPOSED” to be doing that day and that the meditation should be brief, as I would never accomplish all of these things. My mind was in a rush for the next more important thing.
If you listen to your mind’s constant chatter of what you are supposed to do and who you are supposed to be, you will eventually feel completely unfulfilled and maybe even worthless, since you can never accomplish it all. The list of items on the “supposed to list” just never ends and it holds us and all people around us to an unattainable high standard. As I heard my mind rush me that afternoon, something deep within me responded “I am NOT supposed to do anything”. I felt a deep urge to sit there for as long as I could manage. Manage through the thoughts of “this is a useless activity and a waste of my time”. Manage through the discomfort of my upper back, as it began to hurt from just sitting doing nothing. I sat and I sat. I was filled with simultaneous excitement and anxiety because I gave myself permission to do something, which my mind didn’t agree with. My mind thought I was supposed to be doing something else.
How do we become so accepting of the demands of our mind? Accustomed to the noise inside our own heads? Numb to the negative effects this inner dialogue has on us? I guess the same way we can get used to anything else, we stop being aware, we disconnect.
The mind’s primary job is to regulate our daily functions and make sure that we succeed. We need to fulfill 1001 tasks, from feeding ourselves, to driving a car, to thinking through a complex work project, to nurturing a complex social environment around us. Our mind is the tool to assist in all of those tasks. It is the reason we can accomplish them. If we are absent minded, we can get into a car accident, or go on without eating a proper meal at the right time, or be unkind to those around us. But the mind has been put in charge in most people’s lives as the captain of this life raft, as if the mind decides the priority of things, or take a righteous perspective on people, and give us permission to be ok with our own success and failure. I know if I let my mind make these decisions, I will feel like a failure all the time, having not done most of the things my mind thinks up of on a daily basis.
What if we could release ourselves from the impossible goal of accomplishing what we are told we are “supposed to”. What if instead of our mind being the captain, we kindly re-mind ourselves who is really in charge. To unburden our minds of this responsibility means to live in a much more peaceful state within your own head. The priority of actions is chosen daily one moment at a time. No need to expect every single thing on your to do list to be done in one day. Of critical importance become the quiet moments of meditative reflections, when we sit and listen to our own minds go on and on about what we are “supposed to do” but then only select those few truly important things that matter that day.
For a number of years now, I have been using a method of writing down my priority list for the week, with a goal of accomplishing 3 items a day. I make sure that I really focus on accomplishing them, giving it my all, my undivided attention, staying present with them like they really matter, while other things have to wait their turn. I stopped believing in multitasking long ago and encourage the same presence of spirit in myself and in people who surround me for personal or professional reasons. We are not supposed to do anything extraordinary, like finish every item on our to do list, or write the next great American novel. We are simply here to live out our experiences to the fullest, one moment at a time, with awareness and respect for each moment. Taking nothing for granted. Breath in, breath out, one foot in front of the other….
Simple reminders for living as you were meant to:
- Take up a daily meditative reflection practice to listen to all the chaos in your head without judgment
- Write down weekly priority list, with commitment of fulfilling only 3 tasks per day
- Re-mind yourself who is in charge of the decisions in your life
- Nurture awareness of your thoughts and emotions while fulfilling a task, stay present
