Etikettarkiv: inner chatter

Podcast 29/52 – Bearing witness

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Here’s a new recommendation for you, at long last! I have tons of episodes from On Being, Good Life Project and One You Feed that I’d love to recommend for you, but I also want to give you a taste of something new. So here’s Rich Roll in conversation with Andy Puddicombe, the voice and co-founder of Headspace, the meditation app that I’ve been using for almost a year now.

I’ve just listened to a few episodes of the Rich Roll Podcast, and I will be recommending some more as time goes, but the episode with Andy was really interesting, in part because I honestly had no clue to Andy’s extremely unusual background! I might be the only one in the Western world who’s missed out on that story, but… go figure. There I was, anyway. Rich and Andy cleared that up for me though, which I am happy about. Because Andy has lived a life with a story worth telling, that’s for sure.

BoldomaticPost_Most-people-assume-that-meditI’ve never taken to meditation before. Haven’t really tried, properly, and never got interested enough to actually give it a go. And I’m quite happy about that actually, because I sure had it wrong.

Andy got it right, in this quote. That’s the mis-conception that I had. That meditation was a way to stop the inner chatter, the endless jabber, that’s accompanied me all my life.

Perhaps lucky for me, I’d already gotten an understanding of how thoughts work, how they shape the world as I experience it, and what with daily blogging (being a form of self-coaching for me) for a couple of years, I’d gotten pretty ok at stepping back from myself, bearing witness.

So when I started on the Headspace-journey, I had absolutely no wish, desire or ambition for it to help me ”stop my thoughts”. Not at all. I just really enjoyed giving myself 10-15-20 minutes a day devoted to stepping back and bearing witness, just being with myself. Sometimes in absolute calm. Sometimes agitated as hell. And not getting caught up in either of those states, but rather just seeing it, seeing me, in the moment.

Anyway. Whether or not you meditate or if you really loath meditation and such mumbo-jumbo, this interview is worth listening to, in my view. And if, by chance, you get interested in the Headspace app and want to give it a go, start with the free 10-day routine, and then let me know if you want to try more. Because I have a 30-day voucher to give away to someone who want’s it! Might it be you?

 

 

A part of being human

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I listened to Parker Palmer giving this commencement address to the graduating class at Naropa University, and several times I got goose bumps and shivers. For me, those have become telltale signs that there’s something important and/or very true being shared.


The six suggestions Parker provides on living a life worth exploring are simple. And powerful. So powerful I followed my urge to split this recommendation into six consecutive blog posts. You can read my thoughts on the first, second, third and fourth suggestion here.

BoldomaticPost_Since-suffering-as-well-as-joThe fifth suggestion is: Since suffering as well as joy comes with being human, I urge you to remember this: Violence is what happens when we don’t know what else to do with our suffering.

As Parker says, violence can be directed inwards as well as outwards. And it’s not the answer, it’s not. Hardest for me has been to stop being violent inwards. Beating myself up, verbally, in the harsh and terrifying inner chatter, that accompanied me for so long. It’s almost weird trying to look back at it. I have a hard time remembering what it sounded like, specifically, because it’s so far from the inner chatter within me right now. My mental chatter has shifted, and as a result. I don’t suffer as much either. It’s like a merry-go-round. I suffer, beat myself up over something, and then suffer more, think I’m a wimp for it, so I beat myself up over it some more…. and so on.

And now. A totally different tone. A gentleness. Towards me. And to think I only realized it was possible to be gentle towards myself around my 35th birthday. (Born in 1972, you do the maths.) When I stopped being harsh on myself (and yes, I do believe that to be a form of violence) something else became possible. Because at that time not only could I could start to take in all of my own feelings, I could also start to take you in. And with that, your suffering no longer scared me (as much anyway). Being less likely to want to thrash out, verbally or physically, at your ways to try to escape your suffering. Understanding it doesn’t say much – if anything – about me, and everything about you.

Me being ok with feelings of suffering (both my own, and yours), those same feelings seem to pass through me quicker and more easily. The rabbit holes of my past used to be so deep it took me forever to get out of them. Now I fall into them, but not as deep, and not for as long. Maybe because I no longer fight desperately to get out of them?

 

 

Love and understanding

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Love and understanding. Yesterday I was reminded, again, that love and understanding is always the answer.   

Asking myself, I know that if I have done something wrong, something I am not proud of, perhaps even ashamed of having done, getting told off, made to stand in a corner to repent, perhaps even being ostracized, that never (!) creates a setting where I dare to truly look within and take ownership of my actions, and know or find a way forward from them, away from them, levelling up, rather than just repeating them over and over. Never.

What does create a setting where I am willing, able, to look within, honestly and consciously, and evolve, is, always, love and understanding. Unconditional. Non-judgmental.  That always does the trick. Given that I step into it myself. That’s the barrier for me. I also need to look at me with love and understanding.

Sometimes I don’t. And then I won’t. Evolve I mean, by looking honestly within. Taking full ownership of myself, my believes and my actions. If I’m stuck in a mode of self-loathing, judgment and disdain, there is no progression. I am stuck. Believing the inner chatter telling me how bad, worthless and pathetic I am, I don’t get away from it. I cannot rise above it, seeing it for what it is: thoughts. Transient, as thoughts are to their very nature. 

But when I step into love and understanding within myself, seeing whatever mindless mental chatter there is for what it is, transient thoughts, not Truth, anything can happen. That’s what I’ve experienced. Anything can happen from that place, the potential is unlimited, endless. Anything. 

And what a place that is to come from, to live from, where anything is possible. Where love and understanding forms the base, the come-from-place. Love and understanding for me. For you. For us. For everything. 

What happens for you when love and understanding is your come-from-place?