How do you want to relate to yourself when you're having an experience you don't like having?

[this is a long one]

Last week I was driving home from the grocery store when a thought popped into my head about how my husband was going to react to something I had purchased.

I noticed a pleasant flutter in my heart, expansion in my chest, the desire to take a deep breath and sigh (which I did), and warmth.

I smiled. A whole-lit-up-face grin. I even looked at myself in the rearview window and reveled in it.

Later the same day, I was reading Maria Semple's new book Go Gentle when this passage jumped out at me:

"It’s not enough to be happy. You have to be aware of it, and enjoy being happy. It’s a subtle distinction, but it’s the difference between living and being truly alive. In that moment, I made a point of immensely enjoying my happiness." ~ main character Adora Hazzard

Oh hello.

That's exactly what I was doing: enjoying the sensation(s) of happiness. I was more than aware of them; I had turned toward them. I let them be a whole experience.

There are three things to know about these kinds of experiences:

#1 they are an example of what "healing" can look like

#2 they are part of what I call "intentional identity;" an identity based on what you value, that you can turn towards and lean into as an alternative to the shame-based identities you (and I) inherited and carry.

#3 intentional identity based on your values are the foundation of your boundaries

Compare and contrast that in-the-car experience with this one:

A few nights ago I was having a hard time falling asleep despite "doing all the right things." I noticed the incessant need to twich my restless leg, the tenseness in my face and shoulders, an alertness in my system. I started doing all my breathing and relaxation techniques...nada.

I was aware of all of it...and then I became aware that trying to fix it was disconnecting me from myself.

So I decided to let my body talk to me without trying to fix it. I eventually fell asleep but it wasn't at all satisfying.

This too is an example of what "healing" can look like.

[this is not to say that practicing relaxation and breathing techniques is not helpful or healing...
I love me some box breathing for relaxation!]

~~~

Here’s the disappointing part: "doing the work" and "healing" isn't linear and it doesn’t make you perfect or "good."

It makes you aware. Which in and of itself is more than many will ever experience.

Being aware changes the way you relate to yourself whether you're grinning at yourself in the mirror because you feel all googly or you're having a shitty night's sleep.

Or, in the words of a client: when you're fuckstrated and snarktastic.

I recently heard someone say "awareness sounds like an upgrade until you realize it just means you now watch yourself being a mess in slow motion, with full commentary, while knowing better, changing nothing."

Awareness is a massive first step. It's why "Notice" is the first of the Six Ns.

We notice our discomfort, our shame, our guilt, our grief, our rage. We notice what's creating it. We notice how it feels in our bodies. What urges it stirs. What habits it lives in. How our bodies literally respond as if they were a hedgehog curling in on itself after being poked.

When we notice, we create a space for something else. An opportunity.

In that space we have two choices: turn away and disconnect or turn towards and connect.

When we turn towards what we notice...when we connect with that's alive in us in any given moment...we're ALIVE. Even when it's uncomfortable. Even when it's restless leg. Or anxiety. Or shame.

But we've only ever been taught, in all the ways that teaching happens, to turn away and disconnect.

And because we've been taught that – to partition off the parts of ourselves our mothers didn't like and the emotions that were inconvenient – we don't know who we are.

So let's break it down a little:

First we notice. Become aware.

Then we turn towards what we notice and relate to the parts of us that are having whatever the experience is.

There's a back-and-forth, not just monitoring/surveilling/inspecting/fixing ourselves.

It's a shift from:

“I need to understand what’s happening in my body so I can change it."

to:

“I’m learning to relate differently to where my body is right now.”

It reminds me of the secret verse in Paul Simon's song The Boxer:

Now the years are rolling by me,
They are rocking evenly,
I am older than I once was
And younger than I'll be,
That's not unusual.
No, it isn't strange,
After changes upon changes
We are more or less the same,
After changes we are more or less the same

There's so much relief in that, I think, because when you've unshamed the need to change, everything changes even when you don't.