I want my past and present to flow through me like water + the future to come to me easily.
Fluid yesterday and today.
Fluid tomorrow.
There was a time when effortless flow and deep, rich breaths of acceptance
were mythical creatures. Alluring, gorgeous, and totally unattainable.
I can remember the sometimes fearful constriction of:
5 years old
9
14.
21.
28.
and 30 years old.
There was obsessive attachment, relentless recapitulation of my past, endless brooding
over the future and bottomless denial of the present moment. I thought I should be thinner.
Braver, smarter, wealthier. My hair should be less red, my parents could have given me more, ‘this and that’ shouldn’t have happened, or should have. Why did no one bail me out of debt? Why wasn’t my apartment bigger? Why was I in an apartment anyway and not a house?
Where was my prince charming? When was my career going to finally come together?
And so on.
And so on.
Yet, somewhere around the age of 31 there was shift.
Cracks in the edifice of my psyche gave off small but significant rays of soulful light.
Ohhhhhh! The battle is not on the outside. It‘s on the inside.
A fresh stab of yearning emerged.
Why such faith in fear, I questioned?
Why be so mean to myself?
I wanted to carefully, closely examine my own underpinnings.
How did I arrive at this place of merciless progress and perfection?
It was as if an electrical current propelled me forward,
fueling the fire to make peace with past + present disappointments and betrayals.
In the seven intervening years, I’ve learned that we don’t always have the wisdom at the time we struggle. We worry. We lack faith in a higher order.
Only later do our choices make sense to us.
Only then can we begin to explain their emotional texture.
Only in hindsight can we see our fears and worries were unwarranted,
that insecurities and doubts were just illusions and that we should have taken a risk
or dared something new sooner.
I’ve come to the conclusion that re-living pain, excessive worry about what “might happen” and punishing myself into shape – mentally as well as physically – isn’t particularly useful to my happiness, growth or creative expression.
Nope, not in the least.
I’ve tried that, and quite frankly it stunts my growth as well as my joy. In short, it sucks.
Instead I’m betting on the fact that my fears ARE illusions and that taking a risk will run in my favor. And if it doesn’t, I simply trust it wasn’t meant to be and I let go.
The years lived in my skin have taught me that I don’t need to hold on to anything.
So I don’t.
And ease and freedom meet me there.
I hold everything in my life in an open palm.
I love it, nurture it + show gratitude for it. And then, just like that, it is gone. I refuse to ‘white knuckle it’, pin it down, tell him or her or “the moment” it must stay and explain itself to me. Undoubtedly, it would (and has) been ripped from my clutches and that is far, far worse than graciously letting the moment flow where it’s intended.
So
let go and dare sooner.
And the most delicious perk of all?
Traveling lighter helps us shine even brighter.
+++++++++++++++
Dr. Dowling has spent years helping people live richer, more joyful lives. She has seen firsthand the magical pairing of psychology and life coaching, which allows people to access their happiest selves.
View Dr. Dowling's articles on Mindbodygreen
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