Making Friends With Yourself

This is a lovely, short piece of compassionate wisdom from Pema Chodron, Buddhist nun and wise elder: 

"The Three Commitments are three levels of working with groundlessness.

Underlying them all is the basic instruction to make friends with yourself—to be honest with yourself and kind.

This begins with the willingness to stay present whenever you experience uneasiness. As these feelings arise, rather than running away, you lean into them. Instead of trying to get rid of thoughts and feelings, you become curious about them.

As you become accustomed to experiencing sensation free of interpretation, you will come to understand that contacting the fundamental ambiguity of being human provides a precious opportunity—the opportunity to be with life just as it is, the opportunity to experience the freedom of life without a story line."

This is great advice, and sometimes hard to do. I know. Right now in my life I am experiencing tremendous feelings of loss and groundlessness. And, I know some small things I can do to help myself in those moments:
  * I try to be curious about the feelings and emotions that are arising
  * I stay present with the sensations in my body as these feelings arise
  * sometimes the sensations in my body signal the dis-ease I am only slightly 
    aware of
  * I do something to ground myself: stand by a favorite tree, sit outside, walk
    on the grass with bare feet
  * breathe deeply
  * sometimes I cry or feel the sadness arising and just let it be

What can you do for yourself the next time you want to run away from what you are experiencing? Make a list and try those things first and see if, over time, managing the feelings become easier. Less scary. More do-able. Kinder.

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