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anxiety

Let it Be

Let the wind blow through your hair. Don’t worry if it gets tangled and wild.

Let the rain get you wet. Don’t care if it seeps into your shoes.

Let yourself be late. Don’t frazzle about what you can’t change.

Let yourself mispronounce a word. Don’t judge yourself for your mistakes.

Let your tears roll down your cheeks. Don’t hold back from what you feel.

Let yourself snort when you laugh. Don’t worry about who is looking.

Let yourself get some mustard across your face. Don’t be embarrassed at such simple things.

Let your life be. Let yourself be. As things are. As you are. This doesn’t mean cross your arms and do nothing while life passes you by, it means don’t resist what is, but rather, make the best of it.

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Be Here First. You’ll Get There.

“Worry a little bit every day and in a lifetime you will lose a couple of years. If something is wrong, fix it if you can. But train yourself not to worry. Worry never fixes anything.” – Mary Hemingway

Resisting your here and now because you want to be there and then will only create in you more emotional pain. You can eliminate additional, self-caused pain by accepting where you are in time as well as disidentifying from negative thought patterns.

There are times when our present circumstances are annoying. Of course you’d rather be in some future, more pleasant moment, because THEN you won’t be dealing with whatever drama is currently present. Totally understandable. Nevertheless, wanting to escape the present moment only adds to the already uncomfortable situation. For example, you have a job interview to get to but you miss the train so you’re probably going to be late. “FML” status, right? It doesn’t have to be.

Thinking to yourself over and over “I should have left earlier” or “I wish I was on the train” or “I will never get the job now” or “Why can’t I ever get anything right” or “Ugh, if only I never stopped for coffee” or “Ugh, where is the next train!!!??” or whatever other thought of this nature, will only add to the negative feelings you are already experiencing.

So what to do?
Be here now.
Be present with your situation without mentally projecting future outcomes and without blaming yourself or criticizing what is. This doesn’t mean become passive about your life and allow the world to just stomp over you. No. Quite contrary! When you allow yourself to accept whatever the moment is presenting you with, you approach your circumstances in a more peaceful, level headed manner. Instead of adding negative commentary to your already unwanted circumstance, you simply accept that this is where you are right now but it doesn’t define you. Missing the train is your present circumstance, and that’s it. There is no further need to add fuel to this fire with unpleasant thoughts. You accept that you are waiting for the next train and if there is anything else you can do about it, like take a cab for instance, you go ahead and do that. You do what you can do, and if there is nothing else you can do, you allow yourself to experience the truth of your moment without resisting what you can’t control. Breathe. Look around you and admire something beautiful. Take this moment to read or write. Take this moment to appreciate life and find something to be grateful for. If nothing comes up, allow yourself to just be present, breathing, being alive. Becoming frazzled will not solve your problems, instead, it will create additional pain in your life.

The mind will want to project all your worries and fears, but it’s only trying to protect you. It goes into “OMG, I am freaking out” mode because your mind wants your success and so it’s only natural for it to come up with reasons as to why missing the train was a horrible, horrible thing. Thank your mind. It is a tool that is only here to help you! Tell your mind that you appreciate it worrying about your well being and success and that you are going to relax now and breathe.

If anxious thoughts keep coming up, focus on your breath. Don’t attach to them and become identified with them as your ultimate reality. Remember, your mind is only trying to help. Let the thoughts pass like a cloud. Realize that you are not your thoughts. Breathe.
You’re ok.
Be here in this moment.
And from here, surely you will get there.
It starts with here. It starts with this moment.

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Start Where You Are

If you are anything like me, then you already want to be at the finish line when you haven’t even started the race.

There are moments in my life where I feel stuck because I haven’t yet completed my goals – or even worse, I haven’t even started. I feel like I am getting older and have no time to achieve anything because I should already have started, I should already have finished. Thinking that I am “too old” to start has limited me time and time again. It has made me unable to commit to anything meaningful to me because I feel like I should already be at the end, not at the beginning. I keep thinking that I should already have “arrived” where I want to be in my professional life, and because I should already have arrived, then it’s too late to start. I realize, however, that this sort of belief is extremely limiting to me and keeps me from making real moves towards what I would like to accomplish.

The truth is that there is no wrong time to start. There is only here and now, and that is always an enough of a place to begin anything. As long as I am alive, I can move in the direction I wish – even if it takes tiny steps. Tiny steps in the right direction lead to large shifts over time.
So the best place to start is right where I am, as I am.

I realize that beating myself up for not being where I want to be does not serve my best interest. In fact, it only helps to sink me further into non-action and makes me feel horrible about myself.
If I want to lose 10 pounds, for instance, beating myself up for not already being 10 pounds lighter does not serve me in any positive way, it only discourages me. I must simply acknowledge where I am and from here, take steps to where I want to be without calling myself “a lazy fat-ass” in the process. Calling myself mean names and telling myself I am lazy, isn’t helping me. It isn’t making me feel any better and it isn’t motivating me to achieve my goal. Rather than being mean to myself I can, instead, tell myself “I acknowledge that I haven’t been very active, but that’s okay because starting NOW, I am active.”

Whatever change we wish to make in our lives is possible. Whatever you were doing yesterday, whether it be committing to the wrong career, relationship or diet, starting today you can move into the direction of where you actually want to be. You can start making changes today without beating yourself up for yesterday. Yesterday is gone, today – NOW, offers you new opportunities to begin a path that is in line with what you truly wish to achieve. If you are reading this, then you are alive – and as long as you are alive then there is still time for you to move towards your goals. Start where you are and with what you have. I know that it is tempting to want to be at the finish line – and you will be – as long as you start just as you are, today.

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Life is Now

I used to think that once I got my own place, found the right person, finished school and got the right job, life would start.

I set goals for myself and once I achieve them I quickly turn to myself and say “Ok! Now what?”
I finished school… Ok. Now what?
I found a partner whom I love… Ok. Now what?
I have a nice apartment… Ok. Now what?

There is always this sense of having to do more. Get more. Accomplish more.

Accomplishing my tasks gives me a sense of fulfillment, which is great, but this sense only lasts temporarily and soon enough I am asking myself “now what?” again.

Then I finally realized something profound. I realized that life is here. Life is now.

Life does not start when I accomplish something; It starts when I take my first breath and it will end when I take my last.

I have arrived. I am here and this moment is my life.

I don’t need anything else. I am complete.
In this moment I am whole. There is nothing that I can accomplish to make me more complete because everything that I am, I am when I just breath.

I realized that I am not my name. I am not my car. I am not my house. I am not my possessions. I am not my education. I am not my achievements.
All these things play their function in our world — but when I derive my sense of self from them, I will always feel at lack. I will always feel the need to accomplish more because anything external to me is subject to time and change.
When I rest in the knowledge that “I AM” and my being is sufficient, I no longer need to seek fulfillment in things or in titles because I already am fulfilled.

My life can express itself through different experiences, but it’s not the experiences that define my life. My life defines itself through its presence.

Sometimes I still get lost and captured by identifying myself with the external world and achieving in order to feel at ease and accomplished – but the more I practice just being present the more I realize I am whole now.

I am free now.
I am at peace now.
I am enough now.
Life will not start when I achieve a goal – life IS and will continue to BE here and now.

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