by Jamesscotthenson | Feb 18, 2017 | Blog
Regret is a dangerous thing.
It can lock us into a close relationship with the past,
which we cannot control, and it can center our focus on mistakes rather than
making change.
I get it, a mindful perspective tells us to stay in the
present and not concern ourselves with the past, and society tells us it’s kind
of cool to have no regrets. One of these is ideal but probably not practical,
and the other is selfish and stupid.
We all have regrets, because there are things we should have
done differently.
Regrets can be something we learn from or something that
consumes us and weighs us down. Learning something from them is always better.
When I look at the things I truly regret all of them are
related to other people. I’ve wasted a lot of time in my life, I’ve wrecked
some cars, I’ve made terrible financial and educational choices, I’ve seen Limp
Bizkit in concert and I thought Hyperion Bay was going to be a big hit, but the
only things that really stick with me are things involving others, so this is
where I’ve centered the changes I’ve tried to make.
But here’s the thing: regrets can prompt us to make changes,
but they can also give us an excuse wallow in how we feel and expect sympathy
for it.
If our regrets lock us down or cause us to feel sorry for
ourselves, aren’t we really just investing in more regrets down the road? Are
we really sorry for what we’ve done or are we still thinking about ourselves?
A lot of people have a hard time learning to apologize, and
that’s a good start, but too many of us stop there. I know that when I first started
acknowledging my mistakes and apologizing I was pretty sure I was a Buddha, but
that was only the first step. We have to get to a point where we stop doing the
things we are apologizing for in the first place and evolve as people.
Regret without change is useless. Apologizing without doing
something different is useless. Realizing you’ve made mistakes only to make
them again is useless.
We can’t expect other people to offer us sympathy for things
we have done to ourselves and other people, we just do something different and
move on. Regrets don’t make us cool or tragic, this isn’t a movie.
What are the things you wish you’d done differently?
What are the things you are doing now that you will regret
down the road?
What would happen if you changed them before you regretted
them?
by Jamesscotthenson | Feb 17, 2017 | Blog
I hear a lot of people say that they “should” be happy
because they have a great life. I hear a lot of people say that other people
“should” be happy because they have a great life.
We have this idea that a great life equals happiness.
But what goes into a great life?
I assume the standard answer would be wealth, a good
marriage, good family, a career you enjoy and find meaningful, a nice house,
the ability to travel or at least take time off. Maybe a good retirement,
living somewhere you like, good transportation, friends and being heard would
be important as well.
But look at all the people in the world who have these
things and are still miserable. The most obvious would the rich and famous that
populate our modern pantheon. People with such indescribable wealth that they
have no concept of what things cost or are worth, people who live in a very
tiny world because they can jump on a plane and go anywhere at any time. The
rich and famous have houses that are little towns unto themselves, have already
retired in many ways, and have a constant platform for voicing their ideas.
Many of them have friends and family and engage in meaningful causes, and many
of these same people seem to be miserable. You see this in their behavior and
broken relationships and trips to hospitals for “exhaustion”. It doesn’t have
to be the rich and famous either. Look at the wealthiest people you know and
you find misery and unhappiness has a home among them as well.
Sure, everything mentioned above goes a long way toward
making life easier, and there is nothing inherently wrong with wealth. The only
people who glamorize being poor are those who have never been poor or who have
some weird cosmic way of justifying the inequality that dominates our world.
The essential issue here is that things don’t make you
happy. The externals in life cannot bring you joy or peace or contentment for
very long because they aren’t ever really yours. They can be taken away at any
moment by any number of things. A stock market crash can take your retirement,
fire can take your home, another person can take your spouse. All the money,
all the fame, all the friends, they can all be gone in an instant.
So what should we focus on if we want to be happy?
The things we can control.
How we respond to the things we cannot control.
The kind of people we are.
How we treat others.
How we engage with the present moment.
These are things no one can take away from us, so we can be
secure in them.
Investing your happiness anywhere else is a recipe for
suffering because you will always know it can be taken from you.
Focus on what is really yours.
by Jamesscotthenson | Feb 16, 2017 | Blog
We’ve had a rough stretch of illness the last two weeks here
at the house. Max seems to have caught the brunt of it, but Barbara and I
haven’t felt well either. If I am not careful I can get frustrated with the
things illness keeps me from doing, and this can project onto the people around
me.
I don’t like to admit it, but not feeling well is part of
life. Illness is inevitable. We do get to choose how we respond to it though.
Whether it is from sickness or injury or allergies or
surgery or something else, there are going to be times you just don’t feel
well. Things like chronic illness or chronic pain complicate this, while a
terminal illness of some kind changes everyone’s focus completely.
Part of the problem with illness is that we regard it as out
of the ordinary or wrong. We think it should be different. I automatically view
illness in myself as a weakness or an indication that I made a mistake
somewhere during the week. I often view it as me being a baby or just
complaining. This often causes me to push a little harder that I should and
extend how long I am sick.
Not a great response.
If illness enters our life due to poor choices on our part,
then we can address the things that are within our control.
Our diet, sleep, a clean environment, stress, the quality of
our relationships. These all have an impact on our health, and we can have an
impact on them.
Here’s the problem though: you can be on the ball with all
of these things, you can have a perfect, disciplined life, and you will still
get sick (you will still die too, by the way). These are the moments we have to
simply sit back and accept what we cannot control. We have to set aside the
ideas for what we wanted to do and what our plans were and give our body what
it needs. We have the choice to resist this, but it will only keep us sick
longer, or just make it all worse.
Illness is an inevitability in life. You will get sick or
injured at some point.
Can you do this without judgment?
Can you accept how you feel no matter what, and allow it be
there as long as it needs to?
Can you drop comparisons and simply exist in what is?
Here’s hoping for a healthy week for everyone, thank you for
reading.
by Jamesscotthenson | Feb 15, 2017 | Blog
Whenever I learn about something, I tend to soak myself in
it until I have absorbed as much as I can before moving on. With
something like mindfulness, we could soak ourselves for the rest of our
lives and still have room for growth. In this Sunday Round-Up we will look at
some of the more unexpected resources for mindfulness I’ve found over the
years.
Lone Wolf and
Cub: Definitely not for everyone, this 26 book series is a crash
course in focus, remaining unswayed, being present and on the relationship
between mindfulness and how one lives (or dies). It has some of the best
depictions of mindfulness in the midst of chaos that are out there, all while
being the greatest revenge story of all time.
The Last
Samurai: Yeah, yeah, I know, this film catches a lot of flak for
casting Tom Cruise as the last samurai, even though that isn’t what it is
actually about. This, of course, doesn’t measure up to great Kurosawa movies
and no one will ever be better than Mifune, but it has wonderful moments that
depict mindfulness and what being in the moment is. Worth watching, even if you
are a movie snob. I really like this movie.
Siddhartha by
Hermann Hesse: A book worth reading every year. It’s hard to say
anything about a book this good.
Inside Out:
This blew me away. A profound look at emotions, memories and what impact they
have on us when we are not aware of what is going on.
The Matrix:
Yes, these movies got worse as they went and they are distinctly 90’s by now,
but the core idea holds: we don’t see realty as it is, but as the mind
perceives it. I’m not sure mindfulness will help you see the giant robot octopi
that need our body heat, but we may all be better off without that.
The Imperial
Radch Trilogy by Ann Leckie: I don’t want to say too much about
these books because they are relatively new and maybe someone wants to read
them, but the idea of one’s consciousness being spread over multiple bodies
gives us a lot to work with. A great series.
Vipassana by
Macklemore: I’m not really a fan, but this song is incredible.
Amelie:
The power of simple acts of kindness, and how what we do (and what we avoid)
tells us more about ourselves than others.
Spring,
Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring: This whole movie is a meditation.
These are just a few ideas. Literally everything we read,
hear, see and do can be an exercise in a mindful existence if we let it.
It’s a beautiful world, everything is calling us to be
present.
by Jamesscotthenson | Feb 14, 2017 | Blog
One of the easiest ways I’ve found to be mindful is to adopt
the belief that everything is sacred.
Literally everything.
If something is sacred it becomes a lot harder to disrespect
or dismiss or disregard it.
We don’t neglect it or toss it aside or brush past it.
We put it where it belongs, we take care of it, we treat it
with respect.
This can apply to all sorts of things.
Literally everything.
Put the TV remote on the table where it goes instead of
throwing it across the room.
Put your clothes up instead of leaving them in the dryer.
Shut the door instead of slamming it.
Wash the bird poop off your car.
Vacuum the carpet.
Clean the bathroom.
All the while, remembering that these things are all sacred.
Everything is.
Even people.
Even what people say.
Listen to the words they speak because they are sacred too.
Answer their questions with love and kindness.
Help them with what they ask, and ask them honest,
intentional questions.
Value their experience, the emotions, their struggles and
dreams.
Just give them a hug.
Even the people closest to you, the ones you see every day.
The ones we take for granted.
Let everything be sacred.
Even yourself.
Your experience.
Be kind to yourself, cut yourself some slack.
Take care of yourself.
You don’t even have to believe that everything is sacred for
this work, just behave as if it were true.
It is hard to neglect anything we regard as sacred, so let
everything in the present be sacred.
Be intentional.
Be kind.
Be compassionate.
Slow down.
It’s all sacred.
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