There exists a chasmic difference between dealing with discomfort that you willingly choose to participate in and dealing with discomfort that is forced upon you. Choice changes everything. But, for something that’s so substantial, it’s really hard to notice.
How many of you have heard the phrases, “growth only happens outside your comfort zone” and “get comfortable with being uncomfortable”? I can see you nodding. Okay, cool.
There’s something about this time of year that just makes everything seem like enough. The holidays push us closer and closer until we’re finally there, at the heart of it all. It can make the decision for us, if we let it. Because that’s what enough is. It isn’t a thing. It isn’t a place. It’s not a person. I don’t even think it’s a feeling. Enough is a decision. It’s an intellectual process that produces contentedness.
Enough is on the tips of our tongues during the holidays, even if we can’t bring ourselves to acknowledge it. Something in us is stirred to the point of actually enjoying exactly what is happening, right here, right now. But it gets stuck in our chest, or choked down in our throats. Rare are the times we let that feeling actually escape our lips.
Not having expectations doesn’t really work for me. Because then I expect to have no expectations. And trying not to have any expectations feels a lot like, well, having expectations.
There’s levels to it.
What we’re really driving at when we say “don’t have any expectations” is two-fold. We’re looking to turn down the pressure we put on ourselves by setting a high bar. And we’re trying to avoid being disappointed when we inevitably feel like we aren’t living up to that bar.
High expectations are like a pressure-cooker. The reactions are stronger in both directions. It’s volatile. Everything starts bouncing off the walls ramming into each other. The lid starts teetering and BOOM!
So how do we deflate some of that pressure? One of my favorite things to do when I can feel the clench of pressure is to say what I’m expecting of myself out loud. Perfection? Seems reasonable! Smooth sailing? Yup! The ridiculousness becomes easily apparent. Realize it.
You have to have an open attitude while working with this stuff. If you try to go from having high expectations to trying to having no expectations, you best buckle up for a bumpy ride my friend. I don’t think lowering your expectations at all, especially to zero, is the best idea.
The option that I’ve found more helpful is focusing on bouncing back quicker from the disappointment. And that’s where the self-compassion floor comes in. I try to smother myself with it because it literally makes me feel like I can do anything. It’s an atmosphere. A warm light. It’s like having another layer of skin just outside your body. It’s not a reaction, it’s an orientation. Not love myself in the “feel good about myself way” but love myself in the “feel whatever you feel way, it’s okay” way.
Those high expectations keep you pushing. But the soft cushiony landing prevents you from getting bogged down when you miss.
Someone must have turned the gravity up again. Cause man, this is all getting so heavy.
Do we have free will? Or is everything we do planned out in advance by some omnipresent force? This question drives at the heart of what it means to be human. Your answer subtly guides every decision.
I think most of us tend to believe that we have control over the majority of our lives. It’s hard not to. Proven psychological phenomenon, such as the Dunning-Kruger effect, and the illusion of control bias, give credence to this very human condition. We think we have more control than we actually do, and we think we’re better than average.
We’ve all heard the term “fake it till you make it” . On the personal and professional levels it usually is ill intentioned. It’s perceived as arrogant and with disdain for “the rules”.
However, on the emotional level, “fake it till you make it “can be empowering advice. The catch is, you have to listen, pay attention and honor the in’s and out’s of your existing emotions as they are. I’m not suggesting this maxim as a way to disregard, suppress, or fix emotions. I’m more suggesting it as a way to get in touch with our innate maneuverability in that little window of space between emotion and response.
Life is one big shout for someone to watch us while we do a 360° spin into a pool. The entirety of our actions, and the thoughts that drive them, revolve around this basic need. Look at what I can do! Listen to what I have to say! Where are you? Are you with me?
We’ve never felt more lonely as a society. And the effects of that have been devastating. So what do we do? More empathy. More listening. More willingness to share the bad stuff. More perspective. More paying attention. A resounding yes to all of the above. We need to do more of all that stuff.
The only constant is change. This truth begs the question, do we have any control over that change? If the answer is yes, and I think it is, then doesn’t that mean we can change how we change?
I’m really good at identifying what needs to be changed. And I’m pretty good at figuring out what to change to. Where things get messy, is that whole middle part, where, ya know, I actually make the change.
Five days after my CML diagnosis I put up a picture on Instagram announcing what had happened. I wrapped up the caption with “I’m going to battle and fight this thing with all that I’ve got”. Looking back on that now, I part cringe, part laugh, and part want to bear hug that version of myself. He had no idea what those words even meant.
September is blood cancer awareness month. Who knew? So make sure to get your yearly physicals. Know the signs and symptoms. And if you’re unsure about something, it’s best to get it checked out. I believed I was the pinnacle of health right until the doctor said the words “you have leukemia”.
We’re narrative creatures, believing stories over facts. We think these stories go in straight lines. This caused that, which resulted in this. We crave these clean-cut explanations like the air we breathe. Reasoning our ways into our nice clearly defined roles. But sometimes gigantic holes get blown through these neat storylines and leave us grasping at anything that makes us feel secure again.
This is when we reach for an ugly byproduct of this narrative based reasoning, blame. Blame is one of the primary tools we deploy in order to keep these agreeable story lines going. Blame makes us feel safe. Blame manipulates us into thinking we have to understand it all.
