How two chickens led me on the journey of unconditional happiness
A while ago a dear friend of mine shared this meme.
It was supposed to be just a joke but it made me think about why the fuck I’m suffering and not enjoying my life. I live in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, I’m in good health, I’m in a beautiful relationship, I have amazing friends, I like what I do for a living. So why am I not completely happy? It made total sense to me why I wasn’t happy in the past. I was attributing it to the circumstances I was in but now I had everything that was important to me. Still...something was missing. I’m a go-getter, so my usual response to this kind of situation would be to do something, i.e. move countries, change jobs, earn more money. This time there was nothing to go and get.
The pressure inside me was building up but there was no outlet.
I read a number of books. I started with the How to Do the Work by Nicole LePera (@the.holistic.psychologist on Instagram). It’s a great book about self care, boundary setting, childhood trauma. It led me to John Bradshaw’s work on healing childhood trauma but more in depth. I thoroughly recommend the Homecoming and Healing the Shame that Binds You. Then books around co and counter dependency by Barry and Janea Weinhold, Breaking free from Co dependency Trap and The Flight from Intimacy.
I started working with a coach around this topic.
Then a few months back as if by accident the Michael Singer Podcast landed in my inbox. I’ve heard that he was the author of the New York Times bestselling book the Untethered Soul, but that was the extent of my knowledge.
From the very first podcast episode I was hooked. I liked his calm energy, his sense of humour and of course the teachings. He sounded like a man who had figured something out, he seemed content.
I dove right in and consumed everything he had available, the Living from a Place of Surrender course, the talks, the books. It made complete sense to me what he was teaching, it was so simple and at the same time life changing.
I understood the full meaning of the quote I’ve loved so much: ‘What got you to this point in life is not what will get you to the next.’
I appreciate a brevity of words, so here’s what I learnt.
Life is happening all around us and we experience it. Each event is either negative, positive or neutral.
Neutral events are easy, they don’t affect us in any way. If I asked you how you feel about the lines on the road you’d probably just shrug.
But then there is the good, the bad and the ugly. Depending where we are at in our personal journey we either have the ability to handle those events or we don’t. By ‘handle’ Michael means we can experience them without resisting if they are negative or trying to hold onto them if they are positive.
For example when someone criticizes us it feels uncomfortable. The natural reaction is to become defensive and not to let this experience in. Or if we meet someone and they say how great we are then the tendency is to keep replaying this encounter in our mind so we can re-experience it.
In short, we resist negative events by pushing them down and we hold onto positive ones. Over time we build up a library of experiences that we liked and disliked. All the past experiences become a measuring stick for the world around us. If we don’t like snakes (literally and metaphorically), then we probably won’t like ropes that remind us of snakes. So we better not go anywhere where there are snakes or ropes.
Instead of saying ‘I’ll be ok with whatever life brings, I’ll experience it, I’ll learn from it and I’ll let it go’, we say ‘I will only be ok if I get what I am comfortable with and I don’t get what I am not.’ And what’s crazy is that even if we get what we want we then start worrying about losing it. So even the positive experience becomes a negative one.
That’s why our minds are so busy. The mind is trying to figure out how to make the world around us the way we want it to be. That’s why we want to control everything and everyone around us. Our happiness becomes an outside experience when in reality it’s an inner experience.
If we didn’t have all the past impressions stored inside of us we’d be able to experience love, joy and happiness unconditionally. That was huge for me! I got this far by being a go-getter, but to get to the next level I had to let go, as Michael says to surrender.
So that’s the ticket! Let go, surrender, experience everything as it comes. Serve life instead of trying to make it serve you.
Now that I have the ticket I still need to make the journey. How do I do that?
First thing is to understand who ‘I’ am.
I’m not my physical body. It’s what I see and experience.
I’m not my thoughts. Those come and go and can change at the drop of the hat.
I’m not my emotions. I am who feels the emotions.
I am the one observing this drama of life I created. I was there when I was a kid with different body, thoughts and emotions and I am the same ‘I’ watching life unfold now. When I get pulled into thoughts and emotions I think I am them, but given little space and awareness I am the observer.
The next thing is to let go of wanting the world to be a certain way for me to be happy.
How?
The formula is simple but requires practice:
Trigger → Awareness → Relax → Release → Repeat
An event triggers us, we notice tension, anxiety comes up, breathing becomes shallower, we notice thoughts come up, we relax our body, we ‘lean away’ from our thoughts so there is some distance, we don’t suppress the feeling or thought and we express them, we simply sit, breathe deeply and experience it all until there is no more charge left.
What’s great about this work is that we only have to deal with things as they come up, one at a time. We don’t have to start with childhood and work our way up. Deal with what’s in front of us.
For example the weather. OMG, the weather! I’ve lived in England for 17 years now and weather is a BIG topic. Can we do anything about it? No! So let’s start with that one, shall we?
As we learn to let go of the small things the bigger ones will come up. Bit by bit there will be less things that bother us and create suffering.
It works! Since I've started this journey I’m more centered, calm and content. I can create space to observe my thoughts and emotions instead of being pulled into them. When the personal stuff is not in the way, life is easier. All of a sudden it’s not about me, it has never been about me…
How long it will take me to get rid of all the stuff. Probably years, but I’m willing to make the journey.
Michael doesn’t like giving tools, but here are some that he mentioned and that have worked for me personally:
Meditation - to start with guided or counting breaths. It helps train our attention and will.
Positive thinking - instead of thinking what we don’t like we think what we do like about the situation. Make it a game!
Mantra - there is nothing magical about a specific word. It helps to distract us from our thoughts.
Contemplation - I found it useful spending time in the evening running through the day and checking what triggered me in the positive or negative way and letting go through just sitting and experiencing the emotions, journaling or rewriting memories.
If you’d like to learn more then you can start with Michael’s free three part video course The Mind Can Be a Dangerous Place or a Great Gift.
I am not affiliated with these courses in any way, I just want to spread the word.
