When the body is not disturbed by hunger, thirst, pain, or illness, and when the mind is not disturbed by threat, frustration, or rejection, then most people settle into their resting state, which is our “home base” – our fundamental nature as human beings.
Your body and mind want to come home: that’s where energy is conserved for the marathon of life. Try this practice to help yourself come home more naturally.
When you give more to yourself, you have more to offer others.
It’s normal to feel shocked, frozen, frightened, or outraged. But here are four fundamental strengths to help us feel and function better in difficult times.
Everyone longs to be seen, known, to have our hopes and fears acknowledged. Can you see behind the mask a person wears?
Life shows us generosity in a magnitude of ways including our senses and the natural world. The best thing we can do is to receive generosity.
Say Thanks – it’s a small moment with big ripples. What do you feel when someone thanks you for something? For a comment in a meeting, a task done at home, an extra step taken, an encouraging word.
What do you do when the bottom falls out? Take heart. By “taking heart,” I mean several related things: Sensing your heart and chest, finding encouragement in what is good both around you and inside you, resting in your own warmth, compassion, and
Humans are vulnerable to being alarmed, manipulated, and even intimidated by threats, both real ones and “paper tigers.” Understanding how your brain became so vigilant and wary, and so easily hijacked by alarm, is the first step toward gaining more control over that ancient circuitry and is less rattled or distracted by exaggerated, manageable, or false alarms.
Understanding facial expression gives us a chance to feel connected to others. Try to open to and receive the faces of others.
Good lifts the heart and can turn passing experiences into lasting resources. Recognize the relative stability of good things. Enjoy it all. The more we recognize impermanence, the more we can take refuge in the good that lasts.
What’s your “Vitamin C?” “Vitamin C” is. Daily life is full of opportunities to notice or create experiences of inner strength, a psychological resource. Take it into yourself, making it a part of you.
Are you too quick with doubt, limitations, cost analyses, reasons why not? If you pour cold water over your hopes and dreams, you’ll never know the warmth and light that might spread if you’d let them catch fire.
When things are difficult, we often add a lot of unnecessary frustration, anxiety, and self-criticism by resisting the difficulty of them – often with an underlying attitude of “it shouldn’t be this way.” Find more peace by accepting difficulty instead of getting aggravated by it.
Blasting another person with anger is like throwing hot coals with bare hands: both people get burned. Speak calmly and from your heart, even when wronged.
Try to influence your mind with positive and loving thoughts, when you wake.