Balance and the Next Step Forward

Certainly with the year we’ve been experiencing, many of us are just trying to make it through each day. We don’t always have the luxury of finding moments to reflect on the great unknown. But what if there’s a way to find some joy in the thrill of choosing to step into the space of the unknown? Trust your body. I'm fully aware that you may feel like you're not only precariously balanced on a tightrope, but under a hot spotlight inside a circus tent. But. Trust your body. If we focus on tuning in to our body and taking it one step at a time, the next right step in our path often begins to emerge. Stepping forward into the unknown requires patience and is a process...but we might surprise ourselves - feeling positive anticipation or perhaps even rediscover a sense of joy in the journey.

The body possesses a natural intelligence that we often ignore - we consider ourselves thinking beings who feel, when we are actually feeling beings who occasionally think. Note: I'd love to take credit for this line, but it isn't my original thought. It came from the authors of Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle. In short, instead of asking us to ignore the very real obstacles and societal pressures that stand between us and our well-being, they explain with compassion and optimism what we’re up against - and how we can be empowered to create positive change.*

I felt an immediate connection to this topic, as in my work I often talk about cycles and the importance of taking time to consider them when it comes to our habits - specifically the idea of the cycle of "Before, During and After.” We find ourselves most often recognizing (or catching ourselves!) in afters, as hindsight is of course, quite an enlightening tool. Focusing on the process of habit, learning, and unlearning we can work on changing by not only affecting the during of any situation, but really looking at the before; or, what starts the cycle in the first place. This can be tricky because it requires balance. Recognizing where we’ve been, where we are, and not forgetting to consider where we want to go. Sometimes we have to stop and actively create the opportunity to establish a before...something not impossible but that requires intentionality. When we stop we have choices and can create opportunities to identify these before moments. In doing so, we create space for true change and both interrupt the loop of habit creation while completing this cycle, and reinforce the value of this practice

It’s often reflected to me that something as small as a change in mindset, posture, the way you walk or even sit can become a catalyst for other changes in your life. "There are certain habits that, once broken or adopted, tend to produce a landslide of other positive changes. These are known as 'keystone habits.' They reveal that successful change doesn’t depend on getting every single thing right, but instead relies on identifying a few key priorities and fashioning them into powerful levers." (This and other thoughts on habit come from an article on The Psychology of Habit, with excerpts drawn from Charles Duhigg's The Power of Habit.)

So whether you feel like you are precariously balanced on a tightrope or caught in a cycle you can’t seem to break, know that there are ways to shift into a different space. Focus on the next step, exploring your balance, and your path may just illuminate as you go!

*excerpt from an online description of “Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle

Taking Time to Think about R&R

Good old fashioned, R&R. When was the last time you thought about rest and relaxation? It's certainly been an extraordinary time where the idea of self-care and rejuvenation are not as easy to connect with, create, or feel. 

But actually, I'm not talking about that kind of R&R today. I'm talking about reaction and response. And the differences we can explore in that space. I've been thinking about the perhaps subtle but important distinction in the comparison of these two terms: Reaction and Response. Reaction is a natural process; albeit a fairly habitual one. Response however appears as something a bit different - and implies making a choice of some sort. In breaking this down a bit further, we are reminded that reaction can have levels. (We can over-react.) So does response - we can respond thoughtfully or impulsively. Of course I am not implying that one of these is better than the other. We can react well to a situation and respond poorly, so one does not necessarily supersede the other. But in the thought landscape we inhabit, I believe another important part of this distinction is the idea that we often react in parts, but response is often more a product of the whole. 

This tendency exhibits itself in all ways and manners - when pain or an issue occurs we often focus on it without consideration of all the factors involved. One one hand we can be grateful for this evolutionary tool for efficiency! It's an indicator that our system is attuned to our environment and able to adapt - a skill that especially now is very needed. However if we react to one condition without considering a total response, we must also consider the long term effects. After all, when our system is in this mode of reaction, it isn't concerned with sustainability and longevity...it's foremost concern is working through the current task, issue, or question at hand. 

The creation of some sense of predictable routine is something the system appreciates, but reaction can also easily wind its way in to our lives as new habit - occasionally as habit(s) we don't necessarily choose. We’re at a point in the year where the changes around us move quickly and swiftly. I'll ask to you to consider the following questions that might highlight reaction and response: 

• How does your body react or respond to changes in the world around you? When it gets cold, do you find yourself scrunching your shoulders more? When you begin pulling out heavier clothes and shoes, what do you feel more (or less) of?

• How often (if ever) do you look at the choices you make in regards to your day to day habits?

• Does anything change now that much of life has transitioned to ‘virtual’? How does your body respond to the way you engage with your computer? Does the volume of your voice change adjust to this environment differently?

• What physical reactions or responses occur when you read or hear good news? Bad news? Talk to someone you are excited about? Have a difficult conversation? 

It can be tempting to reach for "reasons" or solutions outside of ourselves - place a reactionary blame on other people or situations; but there is both empowerment and comfort in knowing that we are the sole proprietors of our ability to move forward. And we possess the tools within us to do so. As I've often reminded my students, a focus on these thinking principles is much more and deeper than how we sit or how we stand. These activities just happen to be simple, meaningful, and accessible opportunities to safely explore and access both new learnings and rediscovering what our systems may have efficiently adjusted over time. This brings us back to the bigger picture connection with ourselves and our world, and even in a time which requires quite a bit of response, we can work on honing these skills. 

Of course, we all do need the other kind of R&R too…one choice at a time keeps us moving forward.

We always have a choice; and our choices allow us the opportunity to change.

Learning to Change

“Change is the only constant in life” -Heraclitus

I’ll be honest in admitting that I’ve never quite been sure whether to be utterly annoyed by this fact or it gives me an incredible amount of hope. Truth be told, things always change, and there’s an absolute bittersweet quality to this fact - in times of struggle, change is a welcome friend and in good times, change can seem a cruel reality. The dichotomy of change is that it happens whether we want it to or not; but we do actually have a choice when it comes to managing it.

Heraclitus, the Greek philosopher of the above quote, also had another worth considering:

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.

After all, let’s just start by considering ourselves at a human level and in how change manifests with a very simple tool: our breath. It’s estimated we experience around 23,000 breath cycles per day! Of course, this drastically varies by person, size and a number of other factors, but let’s just take a moment to marvel at the fact that in this startling large number, no two breaths are exactly the same. Much like the river’s constant flow, we too are in a state of constant change. Even in moments of “stillness” movement still lives and breathes.

So, back to the topic at hand. Can we ‘learn’ to change?

Well, if experience is our best teacher, these last few months have certainly proven that the answer would be a resounding YES. (Of course, whether we had much choice with regard to this change is a whole other topic!) What we usual don’t notice in this process of change is just that…the process. Any activity has what we can call three stages: 1.) the BEFORE, 2.) DURING, and 3.) the AFTER. We’re really good at catching the after (hence the well-used phrase that hindsight is 20/20). Sometimes if we’re really connected, present and focused we can tap in to the during. But the before is tricky.

This is partially because we don’t compartmentalize anything we do - and (back to the constantly flowing river image) it all becomes quite fluid. Which means an after is actually also a before; and a before is also an after. So when we’re aiming to tap into this process of processing change, one of our aims might be to focus on just letting there BE a before. Create a little more space; a moment to establish that we choose to engage in part of the cycle of our all-the-time flow. Or just sitting with the after and for a few moments, check in with how that feels.

In some ways I guess it becomes an “one after the other, all together” sort of experience. And maybe that’s the learning. A little like stepping into the river and seeing where you end up once you cross over to the other side.

Unprecedented Times

Let’s play a game, shall we? It’s called “Never Have I Ever.”

Never have I ever been alive during a global pandemic.

Never have I ever worried about getting sick because I left my house to go grocery shopping.

Never have I ever experienced a world where there just wasn’t any other news to report.

Never have I ever had to go over three weeks devoid of physical contact with another human being.

Never have I ever felt like I’m living in some sort of bad dream.

Are you out already? Oh. I am too.

Perhaps ironically, I played this game this weekend, with some friends over a FaceTime call while celebrating my 36th birthday. We were trying to be silly and take our minds off the fact that everything we’re dealing with is on one hand totally unbelievable, and on another one of the scariest occurrences of our lives. And on yet another (because right now I wouldn’t even flinch if you told me we actually have three hands) I think what we’re dealing right now is absolutely for a reason.

My "emotional receptors" are quite active: overly alert, acutely responsive, and firing easily these days. I've been struck recently about the levels of grief that accompany this pandemic - the barrage of losses we are experiencing at the moment - and how easy it becomes to just "deal with it" or "figure it out" without taking the time to honor and accept the devastating nature of so many of these losses and accompanying changes being thrust upon us.

My friend sent me an article on grief a number of weeks ago, one that actually labeled it as "Embodied Remembering" - for which I found an incredible resonance. We’re quick to forget that the body doesn’t lie, that we can’t hide what we are experiencing on a physical level, and that our bodies are no doubt in a state of total shock at the moment. Our parasympathetic nervous system (the fight or flight fear response) is probably in a state of near constant triggering for many of us; and for good reason. We’re dealing with inputs we’ve never dealt with before, at level that’s unimaginably heightened.

We are unbelievably resilient and quick to adapt: important survival skills for ourselves and the current state of the world. But often, we’re lacking in the tools to process our body’s state of pure shock right now. For some, our bodies may even be giving us pushback - in the form of pain, fatigue, or even physical anxiousness. Maybe you have tools to help adjust to these unprecedented times, or maybe not. If not, try to really “do” the things you’re doing throughout the day:

If you’re sitting, really sit. Feel the seat of a chair under you.

If you’re walking, feel that you have feet that are connected with the ground.

If you’re lying down, revel in that fact that even if it’s just for those moments, you don’t have to hold yourself up.

At the least, take a moment to consider that just remembering to breathe will help you pause and reconnect, to yourself, and to the universal life force all around us.

It’s never been more apparent that we are all so much more the same than we are different; the far-reaching effects of what we are dealing with don’t discriminate - we’ve all been fairly stopped in our tracks, and if we listen closely, something is being asked of us…

So…what’s being asked of you?