by Eliza Wing
So much about mindfulness and living a freer, less whipsawed life is about finding more space. The space of awareness, where we can notice what is happening in the moment; the space of intentional response, where we can take more deliberative and loving action in the face of disturbance; the space we can give to ourselves when we are in pain or in need.
How can we make this space? We can try simply letting go. There are two major moves that humans make in response to life. On the one hand, we want more of what we perceive as pleasant and on the other, we want (sometimes a lot!) less of what we experience as unpleasant. There are various intensities to this. Your reaction can be a tiny, twinkle of a thought or your entire life can be organized around attraction or avoidance. Either way, when you begin to take note of your response to what is happening for you, you will notice that the mind buckets most experiences as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. And you will also notice that you are interacting with those experiences by engaging in them. What if, instead, of driving towards the pleasant and running from the unpleasant you let go of the impulse to react? What if you stayed there and noticed the play of emotions and sensations? This is the Letting Go of impulsivity and reaction. Letting go here is not (or ever) about pushing away and denying. That action creates even more pain and difficulty.
But what if you’ve tried awareness and making space for something that is really upsetting or something that feels intractable? What else can you do to help bring space and openness to the situation? One of the key places that we experience pain is in our relationships with others. We may have a family member who is challenging, who raises our hackles no matter how calm and still we hope to be. Or perhaps we are struggling with work relationships, or we find our friendships changing in ways that we find painful.
In these cases, one of the most exquisite and effective responses is to send the one who is engendering these difficult emotions some love. I have found this response to really disentangle the heart from its hurt and pain and, instead to open to the beautiful truth of life – that we all are interconnected and that we are all seeking love.
Rather than just randomly thinking nice thoughts though, I recite the metta phrases for the individual, really imprinting them into my heart. The effect is immediate and deeply powerful. Try this: next time you are caught up in a negative mind loop about someone, close your eyes, take a quiet calming breath with a longer exhale than inhale and then say some version of the following (inserting the person’s name)
May they be happy
May they feel safe and secure
May they healthy in body and mind
May they be at ease and at peace
Repeating these phrases with an open heart and with genuine goodwill is a beautiful letting go into our universal interconnection.