Be Okay

Be okay with imperfection.
Be okay with broken-ness.
Be okay with things that can’t be fixed.
Be okay with open-endedness.
Be okay with the mess.
Be okay with chaos.

There is this idea of Perfection.
That we must attain to avoid feeling bad.
Our future must be perfect.
And our past is never perfect.
It is filled with memories of a hundred thousand imperfections.

In trying to fix the future, the mind is like a juggler with too many sharp knives in the air.
In trying to fix the past, the mind is like a dog chasing its tail.

Be okay with things as they are.
Let go.
And relax.

Acceptance

The mind-body is my connection to this world.
It’s the device I use to sense reality.
But when it suffers, how can I let it go?
Acceptance.
To come into the moment and accept what is.
The moment is so much better than what is being said in my head.
Acceptance releases resistance in the body and allows it to heal.
Acceptance is letting go.

A Different Relationship to Thinking

It is interesting how I can look at the content of my mind.

How I can look at the thoughts in my head and the emotions in my body.

In watching the content of my mind, I have discovered that I have an evolving relationship to thinking.

There is one kind of thinking that is involuntary. 

It is the thinking that is going on when I am lost in the narrative of my mind, and I am reacting to it as if I was watching an engrossing movie. When the movie is engrossing, I am unaware that I am in a movie theater, surrounded by people, in some city on earth, hurtling through space. I am having emotional responses to the movie—which is a phantom of light and sound.

When I am in this state in life, I am lost in a thought-stream that is an ongoing narrative about “me.” Mostly about what has happened to “me,” what will happen to “me,” and how do I feel about all those things.

The emotions feel like they are along for the ride. They simply react.

There is another kind of thinking when I am aware and consciously using thinking. 

These are the times I am aware that I am in a theater, surrounded by people, watching a movie which is a made up story told by actors—a phantom of light and sound.

I am not connected to thinking the same way as I am when I am lost in thought. 

Rather, I am there. I am awake. I am present and accounted for. I am alive.

When I am lost in thought, then the thinking is using me.

Instead of me using the thinking.

A very different relationship to thinking.