So whether a client wants to let go of their sugar habit, inject some oomph into a tedious exercise routine, or stop out-of-body-snacking (you know, “What did I just eat?”),  I want to help them do that with gentleness.

Recently, a student asked me: “Don’t you worry that if you encourage your clients to cultivate self-compassion, they will just sit on the couch and make excuses for themselves?”

This is a common belief — that if we are too compassionate with ourselves, we won’t get anything done. We have to be at least a little self-critical, a little hard on ourselves, or we won’t take responsibility for our lives.

Groaning rights

Maybe the necessity of self-compassion is clear to me because I hang around yoga people who experience how much easier it is to face challenges once they have been stretched and strengthened, lovingly grounded and centered, and finally invited to rest in that pure, humming goodness that is so palpable in Savasana.

Maybe it’s because I had a mom who encouraged me to be extra-nice to myself when I had a hard day.

Or because of my sister, with whom I shared a bedroom for 17 years, who set up a sickness-ritual: If one of us was sick or sad, we had groaning rights. Kira groaned more in bed than I did (she was gutsier that way), but letting her groan when she didn’t feel well felt loving and right. Plus, sometimes she’d let out a good one, and we’d both start laughing.

Tuning out vs. acknowledging

Granted, there is the less helpful, grumbly kind of groan that can become self-pitying stuckness.  I think this happens when we “tune out” or “forget” about our common humanity. We forget about our interconnections with others. We forget that others have similar difficulties, challenges, pains. We think we must be the only one who has it this bad.

And then there is is the active, self-healing, kind of groan. Acknowledgement of your sadness, sickness, or suffering is most helpful when it has an active element of self-tenderness, of wanting the best for yourself, of wanting to heal, and be at ease.

When we emotionally soften toward ourselves and open up to our experience, we have compassion for others who are hurting too.

Self-compassion isn’t a self-placation vacation

The student who is reluctant to encourage self-compassion is likely afraid she will invite her patients to “get away with anything.”

She worries a patient will say: “I’m trashed today, so I will be “nice” to myself and watch three hours of cringe-worthy reality TV, and eat ice cream until I’m stuffed.”  And she’s concerned her patient will do that again and again, in the name of self-kindness.

Being self-compassionate is not about repeatedly checking out to our detriment — it’s about loving ourselves up in a way that nourishes our well-being in the long-run. It’s about protecting the person we really want to be. Sometimes cultivating well-being involves some discomfort, and we can hold that discomfort with kindness too, while we take steps to heal.

It’s business-time

Sometimes when we acknowledge and fully meet our suffering, we recognize it’s time to make a change. If we can move toward changing habits with self-compassion, it’s more likely we’ll lay down a path we can travel over the long haul.

I have witnessed clients being exceptionally mean and self-critical — they think the best way to whip themselves into action is with increasing doses of guilt and shame.

It’s heartbreaking to see.

And it doesn’t work. What tends to happen instead is seasoned self-evasion. It becomes way too painful and scary to look at self truths because of the hateful meanie-backlash that will follow, so understandably, they don’t look, and they can’t acknowledge what is really happening, and they get stuck.

Being tender with ourselves creates a safety net for the truth. We can see what needs to change without worrying we’ll fall into a venomous pit of self-condemnation.Tuning in with support and kindness, we can look at ourselves more clearly, make conscious choices, and take constructive steps.

When we cultivate self-compassion, something wonderful tends to happen. We awaken the most durable kind of motivation. We are motivated by love, and with self-love comes the desire to care for ourselves as best we can. We want to change behaviors that are causing us harm, and love ourselves healthy.

It’s reassuring that loads of psychological research backs up what I have witnessed  over and over with my clients: those who are self-compassionate are more likely to take personal responsibility for slip-ups than self-flagellators, are more likely to remain motivated to make long-term changes, and are more able to accept the emotional discomfort that arises when transforming entrenched patterns.

Permission to be kind

Scientifically-backed, ultra-official, and certifiably-trustworthy permission granted. If you’re having a hard day, week (or month) — you are invited to be extra-caring to yourself.  You may remind yourself you’re not alone. And if you feel like it, groan out loud until you make yourself giggle. If you treat yourself with compassion, you really won’t want to groan forever.  Your self-tenderness will wake up the best motivating force of all — LOVE.

Many of you found me at our “Triumph” party to express your gratitude.  I’m writing in a “look-what-they-did,” very public manner, to thank each of you right back in a big, heartfelt, expansive, smiling, joyful way. Thank-you — with all of those qualities infused!

It’s been about week since you completed “40 days to Personal Revolution” and from what I’ve witnessed, you’re quaking with new found insights, connections, and deep truths.

I  have a hunch, too, (gleaned from the number of sparkling-sheeny eyes), that you’ve kneaded your hearts — through consistent daily practice — into ever softer, wiser, more receptive ones.

Epiphany-rejoicing of the best kind!

Your softness and sparkliness have inspired me to spend more time in stillness – on the yoga mat, sitting in meditation, reading good-heart-expanding-stuff, writing, and opening up to the present. I am equally roused to love more fully, hence my gratitude letter to you.

I’ve heard the third time is a charm, yet this was the second time  I co-guided this program with Scott, and it was revelatory!

Let me explain.

During my maiden voyage co-steering 40-days, I had this crazy confused idea that it was, at least, in part up to me, to ask a life-altering question, or say something, one thing, that would be, you know, the epic thing, to send you sailing toward your right life. (No pressure or anything.)

So, before each meeting, I dutifully scribbled sage teachings and brilliant guidance into the margins of my class outline, just in case the opportunity arose to blow open a soul or two, catalyzing a transformation toward a deeply fulfilling life.

Ok, everyone together now: Big guffaw! Still guffawing? Yeah, I am too.

Looking back, I can see that this came from a place of fear, rather than a place of faith. My attempt to over-control was a kind of forgetting. I had forgotten to trust the process, and have confidence in the practices.

This time around, I let go. I trusted the practices to do their thing.

My revelation: Have faith in the methods!

Over the past few years, a deep sense of confidence has arisen in me, from the recognition that if we slow down, look within, become more familiar with our minds, and care lovingly for our bodies, we are more able to face all of what life delivers with an inner well of strength and freedom. It can be a freaking crazy-storm of crappy circumstances in our outer life, yet with a healthy interior state, we always have a reservoir of peace.

Now, I am certain, as in no doubt about it, that no matter what might be swirling around in our outer life, there is always, at our core, a potential for flourishing.

I know, too, as in no doubt about it, that we’ll never find a fast-food outlet dishing up inner freedom. We have to practice our way toward a life full of meaning.

And oh, how all of you dedicated 40 day-ers practiced!

• You chose to arrive on your yoga mats, six days out of seven, inhabiting your bodies, attending to your breath, and tuning inward.

On the mat, in flow, you were invited to be still in motion. And yoga did its thing, as it tends to do: sensations rise and dissolve, emotions rise and dissolve, and thoughts are dropped, as the postures and the breath call for your focus. Again and again, you are invited to unhook from rambling thoughts, and allow and make space for visiting sensations and emotions.

• You chose to sit in meditation — twice a day for 40 days. This is a commitment in the world we live in, twittering with easy distractions and ways to escape.

I could write a Whitman-esque “Song of Meditation,” but you know the song already, because you practiced. You nod knowingly when reading the research about how meditating 20 minutes a day for 6 – 8 weeks strengthens the power of attention, reduces anxiety, and increases one’s general state of well-being. If you’ve meditated longer, perhaps you’ve found you can get disentangled from the mental static that perpetuates suffering, and find clarity and peace. This makes you happy and you can share that lovey-happy-goodness with others.

• You chose to give up food insta-stimulants and food insta-chill-axers, plus every possible food attachment you might have had!

Breaking your food routines helped you establish more mindfulness around eating. You were invited to notice areas in your diet where the force of habit had become strong. And you practiced eating and living in ways that were conscious and creative rather than habitual.

• You chose to engage in weekly meetings, at the end of a work-day, and brought your authenticity to your fellow 40 day-ers.

In showing up fully each week, you created a community where there is kindheartedness, support, openness, creativity, vulnerability (and shelter), play, strength, levity, and love.

I am tremendously grateful to all of you for reminding me to continue cultivating a way of being that is not so subject to patterns of habitual thinking. A way of being that is about growing in love, inner freedom and lightheartedness.

I appreciate you, and I celebrate you, your dedication to practice, and your personal revolution!

xoxoxoxo Love, Lauren

Methods which aim to master, reduce, challenge, eliminate, ignore, deny, or get rid of food cravings are not likely to work, and may even backfire!

While, we at the FCRS recognize food cravings are single-minded and tenacious, they don’t tend to back down when quarreled with. In fact, the more desperately you try to make the cravings go away, the more they may begin to bother you.

Psychologists call this cognitive ironic processing, or the “White Bear Principle,” — try not to think of something and the thing you are trying to get rid of gets more insistent, or tightens it’s grip. It’s like when you try to get a song out of your head, and on and on it sings.

So what do you do if the food cravings won’t leave? Do you have to give into them?

In this situation our minds tend to spit out two choices: “I have to get rid of this craving,” or “I have to eat this now.”

This FCRS bulletin is intended to present another possibility – - one that might be more helpful and empowering in the long run. This new approach is based on simple, but very powerful magical skills, borrowed from a school of psychology called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. We’ll also be getting a little help from our colleague, Severus Snape.

But first, four helpful facts about food cravings:

Fact one: Food cravings are strong or intense urges to eat a particular food, often “highly palatable” foods. These foods also tend to be high in fat and calories. Food cravings are distinguished from other urges to eat, such as those occurring in a true state of hunger, by their intensity and specificity. Intensity refers to the tendency for people to go out of their way to get their hands on the desired food. Specificity implies that only a certain food, or type of food will satisfy the craving.

Fact two: Food cravings are on the rise due to dark forces that conspire to bring cheap, tasty, delectable food to the corner nearest you. You live in what social scientists call an “obesogenic environment,” which simply means food that hijacks your brain to want-want-want is available pretty much everywhere.

Fact three: We are biologically wired and physiologically choreographed to want to seek out and eat calorie-dense foods. Dopamine releasing neurons rev up when a desired food is near, and powerfully promote more wanting. Eating the craved food results in a surge of natural opioids in your brain. These “pleasure chemicals,” are soothing, reduce pain, and produce an elated high. Skip a meal, and you’ll find evolution has put a gnawing pain in your gut to keep you alive. So you can’t just NOT eat.

Fact four: Strong emotional states, particularly sadness, boredom and stress are related to increases in food cravings. Humans tend to do things to avoid experiencing unpleasant emotions. We may not like having certain feelings and thoughts and sometimes we struggle with trying to make them go away. And one way some of us do that is to emotionally eat. This appears to work in the short term, bringing on a relief of tension and a rush of biochemical pleasure. In the long term, it sets a pattern of more weight gain AND increased persistence of the emotion we are trying to get rid of!

So given that food cravings are normal, natural and expected, what should you do when food cravings arise and you’d rather not act on them?

While we may feel wholly at the mercy of the dopamine neurons firing in our brain, we have an inherent and uniquely human ability which can make our cravings a heck of a lot less compelling: self-awareness.

“If you can get some space and distance from the craving,” says Professor Snape, “you can see that there are choices about how to respond. Just allowing the craving to exist can take away its insistence. Regardless of whatever you are craving, feeling, thinking, or experiencing internally, you have a choice over what action you choose to engage in.”

FCRS psychologists call this process of watching a craving, “urge surfing.” Like waves, your cravings rise, and then pass away. Eventually the cravings recede — you don’t have to act upon them, or push them away. The more willing you are to get on your board and ride the craving out, the less your cravings will hook you, and the more space you’ll have to make a choice that you’ll be content with in the long run.

Fortunately, Professor Snape came up with a handy acronym to help you remember how to practice these skills, so you can make choices that will help you head in a direction that enhances your life.

Naturally, the acronym is S-N-A-P-E

S: Set an intention. What do you value about learning how to manage your food cravings and eat healthier? What personal qualities do you want to cultivate in the process? Set your intention to grow those qualities — whether they be persistence, focus, courage, flexibility, self-kindness, freedom, gratitude or some other personal quality. Keep your intention at the forefront of your mind. While it might not always be easy to turn down the glazed donut twist, it feels good to cultivate the best parts of yourself!

N: Notice the craving. When a craving arises, simply notice it. Step back and see it from a distance, “I see myself having a craving for a cookie right now.” You might find it helpful to say something like, “Stepping back,” or “Watching my mind.”

A: Acknowledge the craving. The craving is here and you may not like it, or want it but you can open up to the reality that this is what you are experiencing in this moment. You may notice feelings in your body, and you can acknowledge those too, “Here’s a feeling of boredom,” “Here’s a feeling of insecurity.” Or you may notice judgments, “Hmm, I see my mind is busy with the same old judgments.” Whatever cravings or feelings or thoughts your mind churns out, they are okay and don’t have to be changed or extinguished.

P: Practice making space. While noticing and acknowledging, it’s normal to get hooked by a thought or a feeling, or get caught up in the intensity of a craving. Experientially, this feels like a tightening in your body. It’s like being locked in a crowded broom closet with the craving pressing on you. Imagine opening the closet and letting your cravings, thoughts and feelings roam amidst a wide open space. In time, they’ll recede.

The easiest and most direct way to do this is to bring focus to your breath and your posture. Roll back your shoulders, open up your chest, extend the crown of your head toward the ceiling, and take deep breaths into and around the strong cravings or feelings in your body. Keep breathing into the craving and you may notice, little by little, you are making more space around it. It can be helpful to say “Making space,” or “I don’t want this, but I can make space for it.”

E: Engage in what’s happening around you. Notice what you can see, hear, or touch around you. Notice your head, neck, shoulders, arms, legs. Have a nice stretch or let out a big yawny-yawn. Continue to notice and ride the wave of your craving while simultaneously increasing your connection to the world around you. In this powerful state of awareness and engagement, you can make choices that are consistent with your health goals and values.

Presto, you’ve surfed your first wave! And if you’d like to become better at riding out cravings, watch your mind trying to dissuade you from practicing…

Look out for next month’s Food Craving Rescue Squad Bulletin in which we’ll give you some troubleshooting tips and another fun strategy discovered by some innovative neuroscientists!

“Our wisdom is all mixed up with what we call our neurosis. Our brilliance, our juiciness, our spiciness, is all mixed up with our craziness and our confusion, therefore it doesn’t do any good to try to get rid of our so-called negative aspects, because in that process we also get rid of our basic wonderfulness.”

My yoga teacher, Scott reads this teaching a lot — and my guess is, not just because it’s kind to remind us of our basic wonderfulness. I think he returns to this quote because it butts right up against our natural human instincts: HUH? It doesn’t do any good to get rid of our so-called negative aspects? What are you talking about?!! Getting rid of scary stuff is what we evolved to do!

The human instinct to move toward safety and pleasure and way-the-heck-away from danger and pain is hard-wired into our brains. And it would be pretty satisfying if we could spear all our negative aspects and burn them to ashes in a primeval fire. If only it worked.

Reflecting on this natural propensity to “get rid of,” I asked each of my boys Owen (10) and Lucas (7), “What would you do if a scary monster was lurking outside your house?

Their minds, no surprise, spit out solutions at warp speed.

Owen came up with these, without stopping for air:

• We could ambush it from a tree fort with rocks and pine cones,
• We could nail it with the Nerf Heavy Duty Pumper dart gun,
• Lucas could wiggle around and distract it while I snuck up from behind and hit it over the head with a baseball bat
• We could blare really loud, annoying music at it.

And on and on he went. His mind, like all of ours, is a birring-whirring solution-producing machine.

Lucas, Zen master, said we wouldn’t have to do anything unless the monster attacked us, because we should only protect ourselves in self-defense. He then came up with his own staggering list of defensive options including the giggle-inducing idea of using the Wuxi finger hold a la Kung Fu Panda.

Scary monster problem? SKADOOSH!

I noticed neither one of my kids said, “We could try to make friends with it.” Or “Maybe he’s not as scary as he looks,” or anything of that sort. Their immediate instinctive responses to “‘scary monster,” were protective.

And, it makes complete, self-protective sense that we would want to get rid of, or fix, or be done with negative aspects in our inner world much like we would get rid of monsters lurking outside our house.

Loneliness? Fear? Grief? Sadness? Disappointment? SKADOOSH!

But what if our efforts at avoiding, getting rid of, and fixing internal monsters not only don’t work, but bring us suffering and keep us stuck?

What if we spend so much energy and time fighting our emotions that we’ve got nothing left to do the stuff that really matters to us?

For instance, maybe we try to get rid of emotional emptiness by overeating. Then we at least feel full, or numb. Anything but empty. We live in service to  getting rid of emptiness. But the emptiness returns again and again, only it’s hungrier.

Maybe we attempt to banish anxiety by avoiding situations that might “trigger” more stress. We create artificial safety, but our lives get smaller.

Maybe we evade fear by procrastinating. We hide our imperfections, and in the process miss the chance to share our best stuff.

I’ve tried just about every emotional-avoidance maneuver at one time or another, and although I do get the highly sought after short-lived relief, the inner-emotional ICK is only temporarily mollified.

Within minutes or hours, the emotional ICK returns, somehow skewed, magnified, or more insistent by my attempts to evade it. “Mwah, hah, hah, I’m baa-acck!”

When I get all caught up in trying to control my internal space, I miss everything happening in the present. It’s like being on a hamster wheel, spinning-spinning-spinning, while I could be using that glycogen to do something I value instead.

In my experience, efforts to get rid of difficult emotions, thoughts, sensations, or urges lead to a life that gets constricted, smaller, airless.

If it doesn’t do any good to get rid of our so-called negative aspects, because in that process we also lose sight of our basic goodness, our brilliance, our juiciness, our spiciness then,

WHAT is the alternative ?!

For me that answer has been acceptance, or what I prefer to call willingness. (I don’t love the word acceptance, because it sounds too much like resignation to me, which it’s decidedly not. I like the word willingness which I borrowed from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. Willingness sounds to me like an active choice, which acceptance decidedly is.)

Acceptance or Willingness is opening up, making space and room for emotions and sensations, allowing what arises to be there.

Rather than trying to avoid or control my thoughts, memories, emotions or sensations, my practice now, is all about allowing the stuff I can’t change right in the moment to be there — while making oceans of space for it all to float around in.

Which isn’t to say fix it/get rid of/control strategies never help us in our quest for inner peace. Because in some ways they sort of can:

• When I clear out the clutter in my home & office, it’s more likely I will feel more peaceful and I can work better.
• When I keep my kitchen stocked with healthy choices, it’s more likely I’ll experience less cravings and this makes it easier to choose eating well.
• When I go for a run or to a yoga class, it’s more likely I will feel more open, receptive and grounded the rest of the day, which makes it easier to love better.

In a way, these external structures and rituals are control strategies that help me be more open and flexible internally. I have many rituals, big and small that help me cultivate qualities I like.

But sometimes I can go through all the rituals and structures, and still, I feel sad, or angry, or scared. That’s where acceptance is really, really helpful.

My yoga teachers often say, 99% experiential wisdom 1% philosophy. And acceptance/willingness is one of those concepts I’ve had to practice to “get.”

I made a list of some of the things I have learned about acceptance/willingness from my experience. In sharing my list, my hope is I might help you consider an alternative to the endless stuck-in-the-muck struggle of wanting things to be different than they are right now, this second.

What I’ve experienced about willingness:

• Willingness is a choice. I may not want or like what I am experiencing, but here it is, and I can be willing to have it.
• Willingness isn’t tolerance. Tolerance is gritting your teeth, white-knuckling, holding out as long as you can. Willingness is the act of opening and allowing things to be as they are in the moment.
• Willingness isn’t resignation. Or wallowing. It’s an active intentional choice to allow uncomfortable feelings, sensations, urges, or thoughts which arise to come and go without struggling with them, running away, or getting entangled in them.
• I can’t see what needs to change if I don’t look. Willingness opens me up to see things as they are, which helps me contact what is important and meaningful to me. Sometimes discomfort is a sign that I need to make changes in my work, my relationships, my health, my living space, or some other area of my life.
• Sometimes seeing things as they are is exquisitely painful. There may be a big gap between my immediate reality and the vision of how I want things to be. I can’t close the gap right this second or the next. Ouch.
• Willingness is easier when difficult mindy-stuff has lots of internal space in which to come and go. When I’m on the yoga mat, or sitting in meditation, or on a run, I can create some separation between who I am and what I am experiencing. Even the most intensely uncomfortable emotions become less urgent and softer when I give them an expanse of space to move in.
• All the time and energy that was caught up in fixing, getting rid of and controlling my internal space is freed up to do what matters to me. Instead of stopping and struggling and being stuck in place, I can live a vital, engaged life, inevitably touched with natural human pain and awkwardness.
• I don’t have to embrace everything all of the time. Sometimes it’s OK to temporarily avoid, escape or ignore. As long as my avoidance or escape isn’t keeping me rooted in stuckness. Escape hatches are useful now and then when I hide consciously and with the intention to restore and renew my energy.
• I am still practicing, practicing, practicing.

What about you?

Does the difficulty of making painful emotions go away make your life feel more difficult?

Looking to your experience, what have you learned about acceptance? Have you practiced acceptance, and found your life, however painful at times, opens up?

I’m thinking not only about what I long to spend time doing, but how I want to be in that time.

By being in time, I mean what qualities I want to bring to what I do, when I’m doing it.  I’m wanting qualities like presence, receptivity, love, acceptance, clarity, openness.

Amidst contemplating what helps me cultivate those inner states, a memory surged up from when I was nine years old. (*Which I know, has to be relevant or it wouldn’t have popped up so randomly and insistently.)

Must-be-related memory: It was the first day of sailing lessons, and my friends and I are clamoring into the sailing-room, waiting to find out which of the yacht club’s Blue Jays we would get to sail.

I am excited, anxious and really, really hoping they are going to tell us what we’re supposed to do if we capsize. Because I want to know what to do. And the instructors are smiling suspiciously, an inside joke written all over their faces. I feel hurt. I want to know what they are smiling about.

And then, surprise! From behind the instructor’s back comes a sponge, and a bottle of Soft Scrub.

Ohhhh, I get it…Instead of finding out which Blue Jay we were going to sail, we were waiting to find out which Blue Jay we would get to clean.

“Here you go,” grinned my instructor, “Now make it sea-worthy.”

Yes, relevance! Those sailing instructors were on to something!

Because for me, a colossal cleaning effort is like a massive soul scrub. Get the sailboat ship-shape, and you get the sailor ready for voyage.

When I clean out clutter, and open up space, my lungs seem to fill with more air, my mind has more openness and ease, and my heart is shinier.

House and garden-work, when I perform it in a big and intentional way, clears out inner gunk and cobwebs, moves stagnant energy, and helps me let go of no-longer-necessary-stuff.

After a good inner rinse, I seem to have more time. I can bring more clarity and meaning to the time I am in. (Note: This does NOT work when I approach housework begrudgingly, detachedly, or act all holier than it.)

Thank-you, memory! You made my mission clear.

It was time for a massive and mindful soul scrub, starting with my favorite de-cluttering tool-of-all-time, the Felco #7 garden pruner.

Two weeks later, my garden is ship-shape (pruned, weeded and poised to pop with spring growth), my closet is full of air and ease, and drawer by drawer, I’m properly stowing what’s left.

I’ve delivered 4 hefty bags to Good Will, recycled about 6 shopping bags worth of old papers, and…I sang sea-shanties all the while. (Nope, not kidding. ) And I’m not done yet. Note to self: Learn more sea shanties.

Inside, I am feeling readier and steadier for voyage. I am feeling more open, clear, and grounded.  (Like my plants! Pruned, weeded and poised to pop with spring growth.)

I’d really like to maintain this refreshing glowy-glow. So, inspired by Kelly, I made a list.

Here are some other things that give my soul a good scrub and open up time:

• Taking an intense yoga class with backbends, inversions and lots of core work (mmmm)
• Running in warm rain
• Cuddling my sons
• Sharpening an odd number of pencils with my electric pencil sharpener and arranging them just so in my pretty pencil cup
• Reading just about any poem by Mary Oliver
• Making a teary-happy connection with another human being
• Singing glam rock songs in my car

I’d bet you have your own list of soul-scrubbing, time-opening, invite-in-some-ease kinds of things.

I’m curious, what’s on your list? And is it time to get a sponge, a sloshy bucket, and give yourself a good inner rinse? (Singing sea shanties while scrub-a-dubbing highly recommended.)

And now I can do whatever I want.

I can sit still every morning, and open to what arises in my mind and body, with curiosity, and my best in-the-moment go at acceptance. Or not.

I can eat beautiful, fresh, whole foods. Or not.

I can consistently show up on my mat, and breathe and flow, and connect internally. Or not.

I can seek connection with yoga friends, giving them love and smiles, and receiving their love and smiles. Or not.

I have so many options before me that I can choose. Or not

And I see, ever more clearly, how these choices determine the quality of my lived experience.

Which brings me to the question I have been asked by friends:

“Oooooh, tell me Lauren, what did you get out of your 40 day experience?”

Oh, you mean, why was taking on the 20+ hours per week adventure of yogini/meditator/mindful eater worth every particle of space and moment of time it occupied?” I’m happy to share!

Because maintaining this 40-day commitment forced gently reminded me about choice. Discernment. And longing. And it invited me, again, to be willing to trust my own intuition. To captain my ship. And to trust my own answers to the big questions.

Questions like: How do I long to spend my time? What qualities do I long to bring into my life? What qualities do I long to give to the people in my life?

What allows me to flare up like flame and make big shadows that love can move in? (*Paraphrasing a Rilke poem)

And how the heck can I do all I yearn to do in a way that is sustainable, self-loving, and other-loving?

Because I tend to overextend. I’m scary-good at gritting my teeth and pushing through. Moremoremore is added until I have to start throwing things overboard. And I don’t want to be all gogogo if it means I’ll find my center has careened off to the left, or hurtled off to the right. If it means I’ll find my mind all tightly-wound, and my feet walking as if on slippery fishes. And I’d rather not hold my breath without reprieve.

I want to exhale. I’d like more yin to balance out the yang.

I’d like to create emotional balance and a deep sense of well-being. Consistently, resolutely. And to do that, I’ll need harbors to anchor in after long days out in the wind and the weather.

During this 40 day endeavor, I was squeezed by a giant time crunch. I said yes to many things: new clients, speaking engagements, copywriting projects, teaching opportunities, cool collaborations. Yes, yes, yes, I said.

And I’m a mom too, and a wife. A loving, fun, engaged mom and wife. Which involves saying yes every day. Because I like being there for my family. And this means being there-there, because when I’m not there-there, they notice. And I notice. And sometimes that’s o.k., but most of the time I would rather have containers around when I’m there-there for my family, and when I’m somewhere else. Half-way presence feels disconcerting.

And I want to say yes to other things too: my head-clearing runs, my yoga practice, my garden, living in a peaceful de-cluttered space, and occasionally being social with friends.

All those yes-es have been packed into not enough time and space. I’ve kept every commitment, by mapping them all out on a calendar, and summoning up energy from the deep. And by asking for help, and forgoing beloved sleep. And surrendering. Some good lessons in there. But I’ve also felt that dark sludge of resentment building.

And I came face-to-face with an embarrassing truth

Saying yes to all that stuff didn’t come from the most aligned place inside. I was saying yes because it was exciting to be wanted, all at once, in lots of different places. So I followed the calls –  here, there, and everywhere.

And then, on the yoga mat, I noticed my flame was making piddly shadows, leaving little space for love to move in. And the resentment was oozing its way in. (Oh, yoga, I love you so, for all you invite me to notice.)

Resentment sludge? ICK. Big wake-up call. Time to step back.

It’s still a new thing for me to step back and say, hang on, what do I want? I am so grateful to be practicing this, but there’s no denying it feels awkward. I’m stepping up to a new place and I feel more responsible, more vulnerable.

But now that the wisdom is there, there’s no turning back. And the resentment-gunk must go.

So, I’m asking myself: How can I grow Basic Goodness (the business) in a way that honors my needs? How can I do the work I feel I was meant to do without overextending? How can I create containers around my life-life and my work-life so everything ignites bright and makes big shadows for love to inhabit? All the while, heading in a valued direction?

Synchronicity

And as I was asking these questions, (synchronicity alert!) my new friend, Eileen, was building a sailboat. The sailboat is her metaphor for a way to manage time — a schedule that holds things, but not too tightly. It’s a way to intentionally choose how to spend time, but in a way that is not pant-pant-pant overextending or soul-squishing.

And well, this metaphor works for me. I know sailboats. I spent every childhood summer on a 30 foot sailboat with my family, sailing to pretty ports on the East Coast. So, I’m going to build one too. A metaphorical one, that is. I am going to practice (and practice some more) intentionally deciding how to spend my time in a way that sustains me and helps me love big.

Once I build my sailboat, and set sail, I’ll blog about it. And yes! I get to decide what I bring on my sailboat (my rituals will board first)….And oh, what I love about this metaphor too, is my sailboat will only sail so far before it’ll throw down an anchor in a lovely, tranquil harbor. I’m feeling more seaworthy already…

Please, tell me about you. Do you interact with time in an intentional way?  Do you rebel against structure, or do you love it? How do you find freedom and meaning in time? Where do you take refuge from the wind and the weather?

Pema Chodron says that the middle of a retreat—whether it’s a 7-day retreat or a 3-year retreat — when it seems like it’s going on forever and it will never, ever, EVER, be over, and you’re in the sticky muck of it — that’s where the treasures lie.

Hmmm, maybe when I was feeling all fond about middles, I was thinking about the middle of a slightly underbaked brownie. Or the middle of a beach vacation, mid-day, in the middle of a page-turning novel. Or someone else’s middle. Because Pema is a bonafide smarty-pants. And as she predicted, smack in the middle of this 40 day endeavor, things got sticky.

For three days, (day 23, 24 and 25 to be exact), in all the in-between spaces — when I wasn’t directly “getting stuff done,” — I was seized by a vague and looming sense of dread. And since there was no hatchet hanging over my head, this dread felt all wrong.

It was time to do some inner research. I started my investigation by tuning into the goings-on of my mind. And what I heard wasn’t the regular old mind-chatter. Instead, my brain was sending out dire warnings, as if my life depended on obeying them. “THERE’S NOT ENOUGH TIME!” It implored. “The sand is slipping through!” “Time is running out!” “You’ll never finish!” “And you’ll disappoint EVERYONE!” “You’ll be ALL ALONE!”

Ah. Gotcha. My reptilian bodyguard had slithered in and hijacked my mind.

Luckily, I know this guy well. And I know he’s just a big scaredy-lizard who gets all skittery and insistent when he senses my life might be in danger. (And he’s way-way-overprotective by design, so really, he can’t help it.)

We’ve all got our own version of the scaredy-lizard. It’s located in the deepest layer of our brain, wrapped around the base of our brainstem. Our lizard is our primitive reptilian brain — named so, because this neural structure first evolved in in early vertebrates. And it exists solely to govern our survival behaviors. As humans evolved, other parts of the brain were formed, such as the limbic system which deals with emotions, and the cerebral part which controls logical thinking and reasoning.During a state of fear or stress, our reptilian brain overrides our more evolved thinking mind, and broadcasts a barrage of fear signals. Our brain activity is diverted away from the conscious thinking and feeling brain toward our subconscious lizard brain.

What this means is when we are experiencing fear, our ability for creative or logical thought declines. Our brain messages are now all about survival: fight or flight, right or wrong, good or bad. There’s not enough time.

The signs that scaly guy had taken up his protective stance were right there, in front of my nose! Because when he’s busy puffing up his chest, I start misplacing things. This time, It started when I misplaced my black Manduka yoga mat, which is pretty hard to do. (Have you ever seen one of those? They are thick, and bulky, and weigh a whopping 6.5 pounds.)

Oh, and the list grew. Water bottle, check! New water bottle that replaced lost one, check! Cell-phone, check! iPod shuffle, check! It was as if I was following some kind of  reverse-productivity un-do list.

Huh? Isn’t all this mindfulness stuff supposed to help me be more mindful in the spaces in-between?  Not if puffed-up scaredy-lizard has anything to say about it. Fortunately, I’ve learned how to pacify him with a couple of ninja-like mind-moves.

Ninja mind-move #1: Just the facts, ma’am.

I’ve learned to give the lizard the observable facts. Most of our lizards are tamed by veritable facts — sans the jump to assumptions, stories, or conclusions about what those facts mean. Just. The. Facts.

My time commitments and to-do’s were growing, and going with the flow apparently wasn’t cool by the little lizard in charge of keeping me alive. He wanted to see the week’s schedule — every to-do item — laid out. So, I added up the hours I’d spend this week on my 40 day endeavor. There would be time spent in yoga, meditation, reading the weekly assignment, journaling, attending the group meeting, traveling to and fro, and taking the mandatory post-sweat-fest shower. All tallied up, 21 hours. Then I showed him where the hours would fit on the schedule.

21 hours! You’d think that would freak him out. But his eyes were getting glaze-y.

On top of that, I had 10 client appointments for the week. And my Thursday class to teach. And my sweet boys to pick up from school every day at 3 PM. And the Valentines project. So I showed him where all those things would fit too. And as I was droning on, it got awfully quiet.

Turns out facts are like I.V. valium for my lizard, because he was, for the time being, sedated. And I had my mind back. I was feeling mighty triumphant. Free. Motivated. It was 9:33 a.m., and I had a full morning planned, starting with “write blog post.”

And then, the phone rang. And ninja mind-move #2 was soon to be revealed.

“Hello, this is Anna. Owen is here, and he says he’s not feeling well. And honestly, he doesn’t look well…Could you come pick him up?”

My work day had just started. I had a lot of “getting stuff done” on the schedule.

But in that moment, I wasn’t thinking about that. I was imagining my Owen, on the couch in the school office, pale and icky-feeling, waiting for ME.

And all-at-once, I was deluged with love. The love was so big, so immediate, so whole. When I looked around for the lizard, he was gone. GONE. Vanished.

Lizard-pacifying ninja mind-move #2: Love.

Turns out my lizard can’t hijack my mind when it’s flooded with love. Because at that moment, time was not lacking. Nothing was lacking. I was tugged into the here and now by the clear, sweet love I have for my son.

And, wow, who knew? Cool-lizard vanishing trick!  Just immerse the scaly guy in love. POOF!

Yes! I unearthed some treasures in the muck of the middle…

For one, when my to-do’s and commitments grow, and my overprotective friend gets worried, I can help him (and free up my mind) by mapping out the course. You know, just a bit. It doesn’t  have to be all hairpin-uncertainty when facts are there for the taking. And when the course suddenly changes, I can grab the eraser, and map it out again.

And perhaps the loveliest treasure: in a great, powerful lizard-vanishing hi-ya to fear,  I can draw my mind’s attention to love, anytime. It’s right here.

Oh, sure, I know the lizard will wriggle his way in and hijack my thinking mind again and again, because he takes his job seriously. Ensuring my survival is no small thing. But maybe, the next time, I can greet him a day or two sooner, with a few less items on my un-do list. And maybe, through experimentation, I could learn a couple more lizard-pacifying techniques.

Please, tell me, what are your lizard-pacifying moves? I want to try them out!

And please share, what treasures have you unearthed in the muck of the middle? I love hearing about found treasure!

Let me explain…

Along with 11 other unshrinking souls, I’ve committed to practice 40 days of vinyasa yoga, meditation, and conscious eating.

Today is day 15. And I’m entering new territory.

The steady practice part is not an unknown. I’ve practiced 3 days a week, for years. And I have experience with meditation. And I’m also mindful, most of the time, of what and how I eat.

What’s new then?

It’s this hard-to-explain surrendering to, and accessing of a deeper energy. I mean, way-down-in-the-energy-well-deep.

I have oodles upon oodles of surface energy. Energy, that without some kind of outlet, starts looking (and feeling) high-strung, jumpy, and v-e-r-y restless.

Lack of movement transforms me into a less cute version of Sheriff “Bing-bing-bing!” Richochet rabbit. Bouncing off walls. (But without the redeeming heroics.)

And so, I find ways to move.

Typically, I arrive on my yoga mat brimming with copious, swirly-whirling, spiraling energy. And then, bounded by the borders of my mat, and open to the spaciousness in the studio, I flow, and ground, and surf my physical edge, long enough for the whirls to both dissipate and settle.

…that is until the swhirlies build up again.

I run on most days I don’t practice yoga. But still, the energy persistently rises, and spirals and hums.

I know I’m not alone here. And I’m positively certain there are lots of people who are born with a wired, restless energy that far, far exceeds mine. I imagine they are the human-mountain-goats who climb Mt. Everest, the ultra-marathoners who really can’t stop running, the explorers who are endlessly roaming and expanding their reach, the Olympians.

Maybe they are the dedicated meditators too.

Anyway, the point. Or the place this is going.

The part where the rabbit learns how to chill.

The type of yoga I do is very physically demanding. Like, #*&-kickingly so. And although I’ve practiced heavily during weekend retreats, I’ve never practiced days upon days in a row.

Every part of me is sore. Achingly, ow-ingly, sore. And my energy is settling. Or more like, past-tense, settled. And it’s staying that way between classes.

So, instead of arriving on my mat with superabundant surface energy to burn, my body feels quieter, steadier.

Every single pose feels foreign in some way or another.

I’ve figured out that resistance makes the edge of the poses harder. So I practice relaxing, and breathing, and finding space.

Every now and then, the instinct to struggle pops up and hijacks my attention, and again, I breathe through the opposition. I soften and lengthen, and then here’s the surprise, the “wall” gives. It moves and shifts.

I think what I’m doing (or not doing) is a kind of surrendering, a yielding. It’s most definitely not a crumpling or caving. Because a different energy is there — floating upward from a deeper source. Buoying me. Helping me stay.

And so I trust, and the “edge” of the pose moves, just like that. Gently, ease-ily, like water.

*Internal note to self: No bing-y bounding necessary to make stuff move.

And this has got me thinking…how many times do we come up against obstacles off of our mats, in our real-world lives and fight, freeze or flee?

Maybe we force and flail our way through a challenge, flinging ourselves into our future. Or we resist, holding on for dear-life, clinging to our past. Or maybe some us just run for the hills.

(Me? Flailer and flinger, more than I’d like to admit.)

Or, how many times do we just assume the situation will be the same as it was the day before? Our commute will suck, our kids won’t cooperate, the  tasks ahead of us will be insurmountable, and that person at work will be the same old grump. So, we enter the situations in the same way as before. We don’t allow the space around our hearts for things to be different.

What would it be like to drop the way we always do things? To flow with what is happening now. To be like water, and press on with ease and grace — over, around, above, and through. I think they call it the path of least resistance. Or flowing downstream.

And I wonder, how can this experience be translated into life off-the-mat?

It would mean less internal freaking out when challenged. Not worrying so much about what’s next. Trusting that I’ve got what it takes. Less force, more grace. Dropping predictions and overly thought-out schemes. Allowing for fluidity and surprise.

And for all that to be possible, I’ll need to trust in that deep, buoying, fluent energy.

I’m not sure how this is going to go yet. Especially the allowing for fluidity and surprise part. That involves a whole lot of letting go. But I think this is the whole point of the 40 day challenge — to open us up to new ways of doing (or undoing) and being.

I’m curious — what is your experience with letting go of struggle? With graceful persistence? With dropping your certainty to make room for surprise?

Are you able as Rumi exhorts, to “feel the motions of tenderness around you, the buoyancy” ?

Tell me! I’d love to know!

And ick, that’s just not the way I like my relationships with people to be. Not if I can help it.

So, about the gallant apology. The most refreshing part of it all was she really wasn’t expecting my forgiveness. She was doing what felt right and true for herself. She was completely clear about where she went wrong, why she went wrong, how regretful she was, and what she intended to do differently in the future.  She even asked me what might help repair things.

And I got it. As she shared her genuine regret, I felt for her. I wanted to somehow wipe out her burden of wrong-doing, shake the etch-a-sketch, and clear away the regretful scribbles. And as I was listening, and receiving, and understanding *whoosh* the forgiveness came rushing upward in my chest, without pause or hesitancy.

And she got it. In that moment, we stood there, hearts humming, eyes moist, spirits uplifted. And it was like everything was new again, and fresh and hopeful.

I felt a kind of lightness and sweetness and dignity welling up. And oddly, I wanted to move. Move any which way — wiggle, hop, wave my hands in the air, run in circles, stretch my heart wide–do something with that fresh, uproarious, noble energy. But that might have stolen the moment, so I reached out for a hug instead. (While wiggling with dignity on the inside.)

The rest of the day, I carried that goodness and dignity within me, and I imagine she carried it too. Afterall, she was honest and courageous and generous, and how can that not feel good?

And sometime during that day, I started thinking about how true forgiveness feels. How it’s like a fresh snowfall, blanketing the world in sparkling grace and possibility.

I wondered, why can’t we forgive ourselves with the same suppleness with which we forgive others?

Is it because the self-apology comes first? Do we think an apology to ourselves has to be some guilt-ridden slog through the muck of self-loathing?  That we have walk on our knees, a hundred miles through the desert, repenting? (Thank-you, Mary Oliver for that imagery.)

Or do we see self-forgiveness as a cop-out, a way to take ourselves off the hook, and shirk responsibility?

What if we could just forgive ourselves for being human? For not knowing? For being on our way?

What if we could take a rosy-glasses-off, clear look at what we regret, but do so with self-compassion and generosity?

In this way, self-forgiveness wouldn’t be a squeamish avoidance of the truth, nor would it be a punitive, “Oh, I’ll forgive myself, but not until I’ve made myself pay.”

One of my favorite teachers, Pema Chodron, an expert in self-forgiveness, encourages us to recognize our missteps and to be willing to take a clear-eyed look at what we do. She urges us to go ahead, and feel the clean knife-like pain of regret/remorse/embarrassment–but only for two minutes (or less)–and then, in the spirit of not sinking into the muck, let go. Let it pierce you to the heart, she says, and then, let go. Allow for a fresh start.

Anne Lamott refers to forgiveness as “giving up all hope of having had a different past.“ I love this. Past over. Accountability realized. Pain felt. Now, give up. Meet yourself where you are, she says, right here. Even if where you are feels sort of crappy.  Because at the very least that acceptance gives you a chance to get untangled from the struggle.

And might this untangling free us up for the what-next?

It seems to me, that being mired in self-contempt keeps us stuck, entwined with struggle, and nowhere near the what-next.  And that self-forgiveness, opens up some wiggle room…if not a fresh snowfall of possibility.

So maybe the next time we eat the plate of cookies, again, or procrastinate getting that valued thing done, again, or skip our beloved yoga class, again, we can agree to pass on the self-imposed mental flagellation. Maybe we can acknowledge we get confused, we are practicing, and ultimately, we are good.

And if, like me, you sometimes have a tough time arriving at self-forgiveness, maybe you can try something I learned from my teacher, Martha Beck. She suggests we make lists of things we’ve done right. Generous lists. Long lists. Lists that might start with  “raising a healthy cat,  posting on Facebook, not stealing many cars.” Keep going, she says, and we’ll eventually reach self-forgiveness–however grudgingly.

I’ve tried this. It works, and it makes me chuckle, everytime.

And oh, here’s what has to be one of the greatest forgiveness quotes ever, from Mark Twain, which, because it’s so beautiful, might inspire you to give self-forgiveness a whirl.

“Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.”

Mmmm, I just love that.

What are your experiences with self-forgiveness? Do you want to practice with me?

If only to get a whiff of that sweet violet fragrance?

Yawn. Getting all ready for life can be so boring.

It was time to un-do the drone, empty, and begin again.

My yoga practice continues to teach me the benefits of arriving empty-handed but aware, light-hearted, and open to receive whatever arises.

I didn’t really get Lao Tzu’s teaching, “Empty yourself of everything,” until I practiced it in meditation, and in my yoga classes. Dropping everything, allows whatever is there, in the present moment, to be discovered.

Sometimes, while practicing, I receive delightful and unexpected gifts — a great big love, or a teary-eyed gratitude whooshes upward. Sometimes, old shadowy griefs rise to the surface, pause a while, and then, are exhaled along with my breath. (Making room for something fresh.)

It’s so different than thinking up the right answer, planning my way through a pose just-in-case, or anticipating what comes next so I’ll be ready. When I do that, I miss all the possibility in the present.

I will not be writing up my crafted reply today. Because it was scripted, dull, and unimaginative. And I’d rather write about smiling. Because that’s where things went when I stopped planning.

The other day, I was in Barnes and Noble with my boys. While they were occupied with Japanese manga, the Winter 2009 issue of The Buddhist Review Tricyle threw itself off the shelf and hit me in the head. (Ok, not really, but metaphorically.) On the bottom of the cover, it said, “DOING NOTHING CAN MAKE YOU WISE.” And since, lately, I have been doing a whole lot of something, I was intrigued. You’ve got to admit, that sounds pretty promising, hmm?

I flipped it open, and landed on a full page quote from the Dalai Lama about smiles. Smiling ensued. And, I’ve been smiling since. (No, not 24/7, that might be a little trippy. But, a whole lot more.)

I’m noticing smiles, appreciating smiles, practicing smiles, and generally receiving all sorts of weird-unexplained smiley gifts. So, I thought I’d share said quote, along with a favorite poem, which although I’ve read dozens of times, never fails to produce a genuine smile. My hope is to engender more smiling.

Here’s the quote:

“I love friends, I want more friends. I love smiles. That is a fact. How to develop smiles? There are a variety of smiles. Some smiles are sarcastic. Some smiles are artificial–diplomatic smiles. These smiles do not produce satisfaction, but rather fear or suspicion. But a genuine smile gives us hope, freshness. If we want a genuine smile, then first we must produce the basis for a smile to come. On every level of human life, compassion is the key thing.” –His Holiness the Dalai Lama

And here’s a poem by Billy Collins, who as a poet, never seems to lose his sense of wonder. It’s kind of long, but totally worth it. Promise.

Shoveling Snow With the Buddha, by Billy Collins

In the usual iconography of the temple or the local Wok
you would never see him doing such a thing,
tossing the dry snow over a mountain
of his bare, round shoulder,
his hair tied in a knot,
a model of concentration.

Sitting is more his speed, if that is the word
for what he does, or does not do.

Even the season is wrong for him.
In all his manifestations, is it not warm or slightly humid?
Is this not implied by his serene expression,
that smile so wide it wraps itself around the waist of the universe?

But here we are, working our way down the driveway,
one shovelful at a time.
We toss the light powder into the clear air.
We feel the cold mist on our faces.
And with every heave we disappear
and become lost to each other
in these sudden clouds of our own making,
these fountain-bursts of snow.

This is so much better than a sermon in church,
I say out loud, but Buddha keeps on shoveling.
This is the true religion, the religion of snow,
and sunlight and winter geese barking in the sky,
I say, but he is too busy to hear me.

He has thrown himself into shoveling snow
as if it were the purpose of existence,
as if the sign of a perfect life were a clear driveway
you could back the car down easily
and drive off into the vanities of the world
with a broken heater fan and a song on the radio.

All morning long we work side by side,
me with my commentary
and he inside his generous pocket of silence,
until the hour is nearly noon
and the snow is piled high all around us;
then, I hear him speak.

After this, he asks,
can we go inside and play cards?

Certainly, I reply, and I will heat some milk
and bring cups of hot chocolate to the table
while you shuffle the deck.
and our boots stand dripping by the door.

Aaah, says the Buddha, lifting his eyes
and leaning for a moment on his shovel
before he drives the thin blade again
deep into the glittering white snow.

Did you smile?

I hope so.

Today, I’m going to fold a small mountain of  laundry with the Buddha.  I know, perhaps not quite as poetic as shoveling snow, but we’ll make it work.

And my intention for now (until something more urgent hits me in the head) is to be ready to go wherever things are going. To trust what comes up. To allow for unanticipated gifts.

What comes up for you when trust your imagination? When you show up empty-handed and awake? When you allow yourself to be surprised?