Love Yourself - A Lot Depends on It
Three main topics of discussion for today, and a little longer than usual. Take your time!
- Absorbing vs. Reflecting Energy
- I Love Myself
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Absorbing vs. Reflecting Energy
Here’s the quote again I’ve been loving for a few decades that somehow pierced my consciousness in two new ways this past week:
First, I’ve been aware of the large amounts of negative energy I absorb by keeping up with politics, Covid, the wars, and all the ways humanity is harming itself. Then it occurred to me, why not keep it from penetrating by reflecting back the pleasures I experience on the daily? I know, some may think playing around with energy is a child’s ruse, but I know energy is real. You and I both know how easily our moods can shift but being told something as simple as “I would never read your book.” (Yes, that happened to me in a workshop critique. It set me back for weeks, however irrational I knew my response was.) What is something short and simple that has diverted you for a little while? Maybe it was spilling a container of blueberries on the dog-hair covered floor? (LOL, yes, I did that, too.) Frustration is human, unavoidable, and yet manageable.Seriously though, what if we became as good or better at reflecting back to the world our experiences of pleasure as we are at absorbing other people’s pain? Social media amplifies suffering and the more empathic you are, the easier it is to take on that suffering. It’s draining, it closes us off from so much good in the world, it takes us into fields that are not ours to be plowed. What if we viewed our responsibility (to our friends, to our community, to the world itself) as giving back joy, creating harmony, sharing tenderness and understanding?What if we took our ability to experience pleasure seriously, so the universe could receive it?I feel profoundly powerful in writing this and hope you feel the potentiality of this! We can focus on creating the vibes we know can help, rather than getting in the weeds trying to solve every problem we encounter. We can trust that each human has interests and passions. If we are to stay here, collectively, our individuality will do the problem-solving based on our own personal, curious pleasures.The second part of this understanding helps me make sense of the vast amount of apparent unfairness and injustice in the world. Those things are magnified when I place my value judgments on top of them. In an opposite sense, I could question why anyone would want to suffer so enormously as to climb Mt. Everest. And yet, to those who do, it is a choice that brings joy along with unimaginable (for me) suffering! Or consider the Uruguayan rugby team whose plane crashed in the Andes in 1972, many of whom somehow survived for 72 days. (I’ve recently watched films about both of these events: Everest and Society of the Snow. I recommend both.)I spent so much of my life feeling guilty for having pleasures or what we call advantages. Many of these were out of my hands; many of these I worked hard to create for myself — though elements of the universe, of the divine, of other people, were all in the mix.Guilt is a dead end emotion in many cases, when it is not directly connected to making a mistake that deserves amends. Generic guilt is popular these days as the topic of privilege is so rampant. We can both work towards sharing that privilege with others but we can also become pleasure- and privilege-reflectors. Rather than keep all our pleasures to ourselves, we can put the vibration of pleasure out into the world and share it with others. We don’t have to know where it will land; we can hope that it fills a void somewhere near or far. Just as a butterfly flaps its wing, just as the dust in the sahara moves, we can intend to share the feel goods and let them do their good deeds.I told you last week about the pleasure of being in the bath and sending that out. I’m doing it at night, as I crawl into my cozy bed under the down comforter. I do it on my morning walks as the sun hits my face surrounded by deep cerulean skies. I do it when I sit to a tasty meal. I am doing it when every I can remember.Instead of absorbing the negative, we can reflect out the positive.
I Love Myself
Speaking of negativity, many (most?) of us have so much demeaning self-talk. “Human nature, unfortunately, is prone to negative self-talk.” Addressing negative self-talk is central to building a functional, dare I say, joyful mindset. A lot of my negative self-talk shows up in the form of judging others unkindly. It is almost second nature! Aware of this, I’ve adopted this saying of “I love myself.” It’s a truism that we can’t love others very well if we don’t first love ourselves. So when I catch myself being judgy, as I did this morning in yoga class, I replace it with a repetition of “I love myself.” I’ve done this for years now and so this mantra arrives with a smile and inner sweetness that is instantaneous. I laugh at my inability to fully prevent negative self-talk or judginess and choose to embrace my humanity.How did you feel reading that, "I love myself" sprinkled through last week's newsletter? How easy was it to acknowledge loving yourself? Was something sweet stirred inside you or did it provoke the critic to lash out? As we say, “Just notice!” Give it time. Put up a sticky note. I’ve no doubt said it to myself thousands of times and I don’t plan to stop.I learned about from my friend JT on Maui, who recommended this book when the times are tough:Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends on It
It’s the true personal story of Kamal Ravikant, a Silicon Valley investor.