shyammonk

I imagine white flowers all over my body.  This helps reduce the stress i may have from tension in the body from some fast, busy work i may have been doing.

Stress goes down and all follows. On the long term. Gradual.

Like lowering the plank naturally moves down objects on it. As if all other problems are bored when stress is anyway giving up and going low.

from since i can remember, i have felt being controlled. like always having to see if i have followed the rules, been that which i am supposed to be, behaved like i am 'meant to'.

it was an imaginary never satisfying masochistic habit i may have developed from fear and belief of inadequacy. the roots are not yet clear to me, about which i don't bother. analysis seems like a masochistic past time anyway.

then after i took the turn to positive statements, body awareness, loving kindness, relaxing imagery, breathing, pacing myself etc… i started noticing the first time in life, how this external control idea is happening and how that is not needed.

then i could see it getting lesser. not as something that bothers me, but just observed and getting less important, while my sense of well being and freedom got better.

from any anxiety, from anything you want to desperately solve, remember that lowering stress naturally brings to surface the attitude and situations which make things better.

lowering stress seems to load templates, packages that cover the different interaction situations – internal and external. it comes as a pack – we don't bother to correct or implement the individual elements.

after all it is not my 'smartness' that keeps me alive. what is, is known, because this (finger pointed to me, my body) is a living being. because you are a living being, much before all the names and appearances and wishes.

when i look back, there seems to be only one thing to come back and practice towards each time – anything that gets the stress down, just this once, for three breaths.

and when we remember that there is only one main aim, it is easier for the mind to stop searching and comparing between options and settle with this understanding of just one.

here is a suggestive list, what works for me and which can be done in short stretches.

1. chanting
2. (imagine) breathing into the kidneys
3. be grateful, try remember and use thanking statements for everything that is taken for granted.
4. slow moving – tai chi works
5. visualizing flowers or anything that makes you comfortable and soft
6. breathing soft, without pushing the extremes
7. positive statements – language works
8. 'it is alright, let it be' – smile and breathe just this once. just three times.
9. try any that gives the logic machine rest, just for three breaths.

at any point in time there will be a lot of things you are not doing well or not doing enough.

the songs you haven't sung. the melodies you can't sing. so many things that you can't be.

come back each time to what you have control on, behind the dashboard of actions, where the leads are there for immediate action, this immediate moment of life.

come back to what you are doing well and forward from there. what you are feeling good and stay on course.

the problem with concentrating on the unsatisfied in an attempt to get better is, the unsatisfied will always remain so. the moment you touch it it gives you a stink.

the basic attitude of going for the unsatisfied as means of learning can change to seeing each time what is done better and being in that road further.

each time after practice, after working on something, remember to be in. to be with the done parts of things, which is the model of what can be further.

and remember – a little less will always do.

we know. we know what should go, how we should feel. but we don't.

we know we are disqualifying the negative, but still can't feel one's realistic capabilities, the peace of being enough as oneself.

the thoughts. those in words. they do have a lot effect. they are the handle as well, to the slippery innards.

i have no idea what these layers are. i wouldn't bother too much, they are better presented as by products while we live our life.

language does seem to have the effect, statements in mother tongue or second language has immediate effect of tension or release on my breath or stomach.

oh, how much i thought language was to be shunned – all the experiments with beyond lingual.

correcting vs relevant positive statements

took me some time to realize the difference between the two.

it is about what you focus on.

correcting, solving – this is what all of us anxious have been doing all the while, nothing new – a very practiced act. in fact the cognitive distortion of 'should statements' and being harsh with oneself is found as accessories in the correcting method.

correcting is also about solving locally. it gets you more and more tangled in the mire of reasoning without the global aim in vision. solving, yes, but practicing the same old worry and desperation habit where you also assert how unworthy you are.

habit matters. it is most often just a separation from the worry habit that we wish for. just a moment of break where one is no more bothered. local solving may not help us with this.

set your positive statements. where you want to be, how you want to feel.

also, correcting is sort of third party – a passive thing – as if there is life for the mind and you are an observer. while statements – deciding what you need and not – one is alive.

'to remember that oh, i am the one who is alive now – that is akin to enlightenment' told the zen master once while walking back in the evening when the sky was orange. it felt like mother and i slept on the sky.

daniel coleman reminds us that just like thoughts go on, emotions also go on all through the time. changing, swaying.

i noticed that we are probably reacting and taking too seriously when anger, fear, sadness are observed. same with happiness – clinging to pieces of it like rare commodity, trying to find the reasons for this rare occurrence, in an attempt to preserve and repeat.

remember – emotion streams go on. one just has to be aware of it. it is normal for all colors, clear, muddy, yellow, to keep moving slow or fast.

when one remembers it to be normal, things are fine. after all looks like we all just need the assurance that we are doing things that are normal. that we are alright.

fear. even if the fear is realized, still you exist. else you find that when you go ahead with the fear, nothing really happens to you and there is a release.

where you are standing has to be guarded – says the fear. when it is lost, still you are. so it was not your core.

fear could be the best thing to keep breaking where you stand and what is not your core, each time moving to the bigger wider possibility and reality that one maybe.

thank you fear. welcome fear. go into situations of fear, embarassment, confusion.

i am so scared. but it could be good.

We take for granted the new success. With time the prestigious exam, the doubled income, loving partner all becomes the standard, the floor. Then fret over again about what we don't have.

We also know that gratitude helps shake our memory and sorting, and each time we remember with thanks, we remember that what we take for granted was once not there and again a feeling of 'good and enough' is kept in place.

Looking back at journal entries, one remembers that many things taken for granted now, that have changed now for the better, where not so once. That in between looking for more, one can also relax and remember that things have changed for the better over time.

We forget how it was once. We even can't really remember how fast some things changed for the better. That it does not really take ages or never, as we usually think when thinking of making an emotional change, a habit or benefiting skill.

What is now good was not so before, one allowed it to change for the better. Pat oneself on the back before going on worrying for what is to change next or how it will take long or never. Somehow our memories are not very intact in that department. Noting down the milestones can be useful for this releaving mental shake down and resorting.

The three year old is controlled, admonished for his own good, for the processes to be in order.

But when the child takes the king form, the baby sitters and caretakers smiles and steps back.

The king form and the child form.

Sreeranganathan (SR) never killed anyone, but was officially in trouble since he was 12 years old.

First in correctional centre for minors, then with other grown up fun lovers. SR's penchant for expressing exceptional violence reserved his seat in the solitary confinement cell during much of his stay inside.

Now 33 years old, SR asked Srirangi, his neighbor if he could take her children to school that day.

And Srirangi replied thus :

"Yes, if you can buy Madhavan (boy, 5 years) a pencil, yellow in color and Neeratha (girl, 9 years) a red plastic hair slide."

Off they went. After looking up at SR's face, like looking at the face of the Sun on the top of a coconut tree in the noon sky, the kids even took his hand.

It is said that the solitary confinement cell he used to be in was a 8 feet cubic room with the floor slanting towards the door. Food was slipped in through a slot under the door, and the room had no other opening once the door was closed. Everything else, be creative and make yourself comfortable.

Kanakam ran a small junk shop along with her son in the street through which the three had to pass to go to the school. As the three passed the gate, Srirangi phoned up Kanakam. Though she felt everything will be fine, a net of caution wouldn't go astray.

Well, this is a happy story. . Apparently within 1 minute into the walk, Neeratha was asking about the scar on SR's face. And SR later told me later that he had never seen such angels before.

From solitary confinement to being friends with small angels. All it takes sometimes is :

"You get this, IF you …"

Let us get right into the matter. The following four are the main parts of the process that helped me understand, get to terms with and thereby subside a combination of not very optimal mental attitudes / core behaviours.

Crippling anxiety was the most disturbing which i got at peace with and continues to. But the practice has changed the way i understand myself and my mind.

Peace talks

Each time a sadness or anxiety starts, it starts with a related talk. Substitute the anxiety and depression talks with peace talks.

Peace talks start with recognizing Cognitive Distortion

1. magnification of situations, others,
2. disqualifying the positives, my abilities, my history of getting things done
3. filtering to see only the criticising difficult to please and face world, completely neglecting all the good kind people who have helped me and made my life beautiful
4. all or nothing about the world, about results of actions
5. black and white thinking about the world, about satisfaction from actions, about people
6. over generalization about the world
7. fortune teller error – about the outcomes, about life awaiting
8. labeling oneself and situations as abnormal, anxious, enemy situation etc
9. emotional reasoning – if i am anxious there is reason for that. if i am feeling sad, there is valid reason for that.

etc… our cute little Cognitive Distortions … Welcome them in, thank you. "i put you there knowingly or unconsciously or because i did not understand well the situations and how to respond. thank you, now you can rest."

Now we can find the reality – just enough reality to know that none of them are completely correct

Appointment with anxiety

"Worry, we will do it at 4pm"

I would not have believed the effect of acknowledging worry and giving a time (which you may keep or not) if I did not try it

Decision to not worry – for a (very) short time span

"Just don't worry or complain or wish for changes – for one day." this was the advice from a good anxiety book.

I had to shorten the time span to : "Don't complain or worry for 20 minutes."

Worry is what we have had for a long time – the constant clutter we want to get away from. We worry about worrying, solving the worry. Reasoning that worry means we need to worry about it …

Decide not to complain and worry for just a short time – whatever time span you feel comfortable.

Body – Back to life size, Reference

Mapping the fears as tensions on the body immediately makes overwhelming anxieties life size.

One comes back to the reality that it is just in my body, here now. Changes need not be made anywhere else. Changes don't need anything outside of me. They are just tensions in our body.

Once upon a time, they were left there because of real or interpreted threats. Defences to shame, embarrassment, punishments, unpleasant results. Shame and embarrassment are told to be the master male emotions – it could be there in varying degrees in most men, it is said.

Here now, are they valid. They are felt because they remain as tension habits of muscles in our body. So direct your focus to the direct reason – our body, the tense muscles.

In the beginning we may give ourselves all sort of reasons why not to come back to the body, especially if the tensions are really unpleasant when acknowledged.

Soon though you will start realizing that you have reopened the path to here now reality.

I don't want to generalize, because it can have shades of the Cognitive Distortion – Over Generalization.

One potato rotten. Another potato fine, upto the standard for this particular person or group, to make curry with.

Definitely all potatoes are not rotten then. A curry is possible.

This is the understanding that will save you from Over Generalization. It is up to oneself to accept if this reality is needed.

It is Over Generalization to think all potatoes are rotten, when some effort will clearly show that at least one potato qualifies by the same standard as Not Rotten.

Up to us whether we care about that reality or not.

If you choose to be in a boxing ring, follow those rules – set ones and physical ones if you want to avoid certain results. If you are playing chess, those rules.

Up to us : "Do i want to accept this reality."

Just one thing – if you need to rationalize a lot to accept something as reality, probably it is not worth it. Accepting the opposite and moving on  may be better. Understanding cognitive distortions and changing the scripts helps with this.

Humans – body does not like some food – that is its reality. Same with mind too. All is not OK if you don't want certain results.

Reality or practicality or …

living ones life – choosing which results one wants.

However you may try to feel that you are not the driver and someone else is there, it is still you even if you think you are leaving the steering wheel…