Free Article
Let Yourself Be Ok Too
I’ve written and talked a lot about letting everything be as it is. And in my work with clients, what I see over and over again is that sooner or later they find their way to letting everything around them be ok — whether it rains or is sunny, whether there’s traffic or a clear road to work, whether their friends and family are in a bad mood or on top of the world.
But letting themselves be ok is a deeper challenge. It’s a bigger step to allowing their own emotions to simply be whatever they are; allowing themselves to relax and even stop before achieving perfection; allowing — not just accepting, but truly, completely allowing — all of their perceived imperfections and supposed inadequacies to be ok exactly as they are.
After a lifetime of believing that hard work and effort will get you where you want to go, it’s difficult to stop working hard and exerting effort. You keep thinking, “There’s got to be a way — there’s a trick to it — if I just read one more book, meditate a little harder, chase joy a little faster, hold onto happiness a bit more tightly — then somehow, it will all start to make sense. I’ll feel great, life will align, I’ll find freedom — if I can just figure out what to do and how to do it.”
Even though you know it doesn’t work that way.
In taking each of those actions, you’re moving away from what you really want. Constantly seeking others’ interpretations and instructions doesn’t help you reach your own deep understanding of who and what you really are. Meditation is an unfolding, a relaxing — one client calls it her “morning mini-vacation.” Chasing, grasping, and seeking are all ways of arguing with what is, not allowing it, because you’re reaching for something other than what’s with you right now.
The idea here is to stop doing, striving, working, efforting. With that in mind, here are some pointers for different ways to notice where you’re struggling and find the relaxation that’s natural to you.
Allow Experience
Experiences have a beginning, a middle, and an end. When you try holding on to an experience, or to recreate a past experience, you squeeze the life out of it — and frustrate yourself, because it never works.
Relax, and allow this moment, this experience, this now, fully into your awareness.
Acknowledge Feelings
What are you feeling? Not what do you think you’re feeling, or what do you want to feel, or what should you feel: what are you feeling?
Sometimes just noticing that you feel weird or off-balance can help. One client wrote recently, “There’s real, deep value in being able to look at the itchy, skritchy feelings instead of ignoring or trying to suppress them.” In looking at those “itchy, skritchy feelings,” she relaxed and opened to a whole new level of understanding about herself.
Recognize Judgment
Notice that labeling a feeling or a situation as either bad or good is a judgment.
Whether it’s an experience, a feeling, a thought — whatever it is — your judgment about it is a way of holding on, anchoring yourself to it. If your judgment is “this is good,” then you want to keep it going, make it last, get more of it. If, on the other hand, your judgment is “this is bad,” then you push it away, suppress it, try to get rid of it. In either event, you’re arguing with what is, rather than allowing it all to be ok.
So just notice your judgments, because after all, they too are ok!
Inquire
What does it mean to allow yourself to be just as you are? What would it be like to simply be with your feelings? Who would you be if you opened to the wholeness that you already and always are, right now in this moment?
“If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you, but your own judgment of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgment now.” Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, 121-180, Stoic philosopher and Roman emperor from 161-180, also known as “The Wise.”
If you liked this article, you can
sign up to receive my regular newsletter!