Sunday 3 August 2014

Becoming Mindful Instead Of Mindless








Labelling our negative feelings is often a mindless attempt to keep ourselves separate or  protected from those emotions. I have noticed that I am more inclined to label negative emotions.
When things are getting me down and I label the emotion as depression it often hangs around and I can stay mindlessly stuck in feeling sorry for myself , sometimes this leads to thoughts of blaming those around me for my feelings, or more often in my case blaming my self. Sometimes this leads to analysing why I'm  feeling this particular way , what if questions arise, my mind spins on and on, I am on an automatic spin.
 None of this helps, and eventually I wake up from these futile attempts and STOP.
 I recognise what happening and finally look beyond the labels and wake up.
  I become mindful of the sensations in my body.  Instead of a blanket statement like I'm depressed, I begin to look at more subtle feelings . Maybe I'm frustrated about my work, disappointed about something that has not worked out, upset about  how I handled some issue.  Allowing myself to notice what lies under the label gives me the opportunity to be softer with myself and to release those feelings of disapproval.
 Letting Go of disapproving of myself seems to really shift my 'bodymind' from that low energy state to one of more possibilities. Things no longer seem so dim and I can see  some breaks in the cloud,  I can even begin to see that the 'depression' was actually a wake up call . It was showing me some issues that I had been pushing down and avoiding and without those feelings of depression I wouldn't  have faced those issues.
My point is labels are just labels and unless we are willing to look deeply into what lies under the label we can stay stuck.
  Usually what is here right now is quite fine, often what upsets us is either something from our past that has been triggered, or some fear about our future.
 Looking deeply, mindfully  into what is here now , what is below the label  and letting go opens us to our unlimited potential for growth and wisdom.
  Bringing ourselves back into the present moment  and noticing what is actually here now relaxes our 'bodymind' allowing us to realise that we are actually fine right now and allows our  life opens up again.






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