How to return to yourself and your desires. False targets. How to return to true life goals? Give up resistance
You are the ocean. You are infinity. No one will ever be able to know you, no one will be able to comprehend your secrets. Because you are movement. You will never be the same. You grow, you change, you fall in love, you become enchanted, you get disappointed, you get attached and then immediately leave - and so on all the time. Every new minute you are different, how can you take the wind into your hands? How can one comprehend it, understand it? Only a fool looks at a finger that points to the sky. Only a fool can say with certainty that he has figured you out. Because it is impossible to do this.
You are kind, gentle, caring, you will never pass by a kitten that will hide in a corner in the entrance. You are greedy, envious, evil. You can’t cross your path, you’ll hit backhand because you wanted to. We can’t teach you, we need to listen, we can’t listen to you, we need to advise. No one will ever know how to behave around you this moment. No one will ever understand what mood you are in right now. Because it is changeable, like the weather in the mountains. Because you are the wind, because you are the ocean. You are movement, you are speed, you are life itself. How can you predict life? You can only watch it, standing on the sidelines, you can admire it, it is impossible to retell it.
Now tell me that all this is not about you? Why don't you feel it? Let people call it mystery. But this is no mystery. And this quality does not belong to you alone, you are not unique in this. You are not mysterious or exclusive. We are all like that, just everyone. We are all rivers and oceans. We enter our inland waters kind and gentle, but we appear to the world as wayward and impudent evildoers. We are all separate oceans, we are constantly changing. And this is our charm, this is where our interest lies. We attract each other with our ocean, we hide in it. The ocean makes us flexible, we are not boring, we are able to change our minds and think differently. We can change, we can grow and develop.
But even in our ocean there are constant variables. They are our anchors. They prevent us from sailing into open waters. They keep us close to the shore. With them we see our horizon, with them we feel calm.
I will love you forever
Every person, well, just everyone, has someone whom he will love all his life. You might have crossed paths with this man for a short time. Compared to other novels, this one could only last a moment. In the context of the universe, it might just be a flash, but you will remember this flash for the rest of your life. You can marry someone else, smart and gentle. He will certainly try to make you happy every day. And you will certainly play along with him. You will give birth to two beautiful girls from him, they will be sweet and healthy. And all your friends will envy you, because even in our time, try to become so attached to a person, try to find someone for life, but it’s impossible.But you will still mentally return to another man from time to time. How is he doing? - you will think. Did he start a family, was he happy, did he manage to achieve everything he dreamed of? All these thoughts will wander through your head from time to time. Especially when it suddenly rains in summer or spring, when it unceremoniously drips into your cup of green tea. When you don’t get angry, but, on the contrary, take off your shoes and stretch your legs onto the next chair. You will watch the raindrops wash your feet, you will watch them gather together and flow down your ankles in rivulets. At this moment you will certainly think about something of your own. About something deeply personal. And it will be him. He is the man you will love all your life. You may not even see each other or communicate, but your feeling is your anchor. This man is your anchor. He holds you in the Universe, he shows you who you really are. It reminds you how you are capable of feeling. Even stronger, even deeper, even more tender.
Every woman has a man whom she will love all her life. Every man has a woman whom he will love all his life. And this is our strength. This is our reality.
What does that smell like? This smells like your happiness
Sometimes you sit and work, do tedious monotonous work, think that in the evening you need to buy food for the cat and cook lasagne for your husband for dinner. It wouldn’t hurt to get a haircut and make an appointment for a manicure, because, by the way, out of boredom you come up with a to-do list without stopping from work. And then!.. What is this?? What?? She! You hear it, this song, you hear it clearly. And... you suddenly want to cry. You are filled with some kind of light sadness, or something. Warm sweet sadness. You remember everything that happened to you while listening to this song. You remember every detail. And you suddenly want to cry, not to cry heart-rendingly, but to cry quietly. You seem to understand that this was happiness. And it will never happen again. It will be different, good, bright, limitless, but different, not the same.This music, which evokes an experience in us, is our anchor. He holds us for our most important moments. He does not allow us to float away from ourselves. And the great thing is that this anchor makes itself felt at unexpected moments. You will hear your music exactly when you need it most.
The same thing happens with smells. Have you noticed that smells control our memory? You may hear some familiar but forgotten smell, and suddenly such a bright picture will appear before your eyes! You will remember everything down to the smallest detail. Smells are also our anchors in the ocean. And everyone has their own set.
We may become attached to our childhood nickname. Even though few people know it, as we grow up we forget about it due to rare use. But then suddenly you find yourself in a situation where someone calls you by your long-forgotten childhood name. And you will perk up, as if you find yourself in a children's tree house, stuffed with dreams and global plans, with your diary full of secrets and aspirations, with your loves and first broken hearts.
We can hold on to our traumas and our own inabilities. This can also become our anchor. We can say that sometimes we don’t specifically try to correct our shortcomings so that we have something to hold on to. So that you can say: I told you that I can’t do this, I told you that I couldn’t do it, because I’m not like that.
Do we need all these anchors? Of course we do! Good and not so good, useful and stupid - they are all a manifestation of our authenticity. You can never show them, you can hide them. But you yourself will return to them more than once. Because every ocean needs an island. We have to stand on something from time to time. We have to start from something.
I have been asked several times to give clear recommendations, how to love yourself and stop focusing on the outside world. This is such an individual process for everyone that there are no and cannot be universal recipes. And yet.
1. We start every morning with pleasant thoughts. We don’t jump up at the first call of the alarm clock, but we smile at ourselves and ask ourselves: “What am I?”; "What am I?" Let's listen to our inner world, we feel ourselves. The answer will not come immediately, but it will definitely come.
2. We celebrate our strengths, not our weaknesses. Let's shine a ray of memory on our small victories. There is no past and no mistakes. It is we who habitually carry all the negativity behind our backs. Throw it away. Free yourself. If you once did such and such, then it was the best thing you could do at that moment. Respect your decision. If you are a woman, allow yourself not to be a loser, but to be weak.
3. We don’t put off life “for tomorrow”: we don’t accumulate beautiful things, we don’t save the best perfume. We take care of ourselves and do manicures just for ourselves, to like ourselves even more. Don't put off going to your favorite restaurant. "Tomorrow" may never come. We live and enjoy ourselves today.
4. We look for only the good in ourselves. If you are a woman, when you look in the mirror, pay attention to what you particularly like about yourself.
5. As often as possible during the day, evoke a state of internal abundance (warmth and goodness in your soul). To do this, remember the moments in your life when you felt good and comfortable with yourself, when you wanted to think and dream about something of your own. Not with someone, but alone with yourself. Perhaps in childhood or adolescence.
6. As often as possible, we ask ourselves questions: “Why do I need this?”; "Where am I going?"; "What do I want?"; What do I need?" We don’t adjust our lives to suit other people, we don’t live by other people’s desires and imposed needs.
7. No matter what happens during the day, we play our movie in the background: “How I live in the next six months without being tied to specific people.”
8. We slowly learn to concentrate on ourselves, on our inner state, and not on the outside world, and not to depend on the mood, attitude and opinions of others.
9. Slow down the pace of the hound. The driven horses are shot. We begin to walk, talk and eat slowly - to enjoy every minute of life. Only in a calm state can you understand something and figure something out.
10. We realize: everything that we currently have, we created for ourselves with our own hands. We can do it again the way we did it.
After 21 days, this lifestyle will become a habit and you will begin to enjoy yourself.
In Japan, in a village not far from the capital lived an old wise samurai.
One day, when he was teaching classes to his students, a young fighter, known for his rudeness and cruelty, approached him. His favorite technique was provocation: he infuriated his opponent and, blinded by rage, he accepted his challenge, made mistake after mistake and, as a result, lost the fight.
The young fighter began to insult the old man: he threw stones at him, spat and swore at him.
But the old man remained unperturbed and continued his studies. At the end of the day, the irritated and tired young fighter went home.
The disciples, surprised that the old man had endured so much insult, asked him:
- Why didn’t you challenge him to a fight? Are you really afraid of defeat?
The old samurai replied:
- If someone comes to you with a gift and you do not accept it, who will the gift belong to?
“To his former master,” answered one of the students.
- The same goes for envy, hatred and curses. Until you accept them, they belong to the one who brought them.
“We die from thinking too much. We are slowly killing ourselves by trying to think about everything around us. Think... Think... Think... You can never completely trust the human mind. It's a death trap," says actor and director Anthony Hopkins.
Our mind loves to think, and it seems that it does not know how and does not want to stop in time. To be honest, heads modern people fills with so many unnecessary and unnecessary thoughts that it is already beginning to resemble a global pandemic.
After conducting a thorough study, Michigan State University psychology professor Susan Nolen-Hoeksema found that, as a rule, young and middle-aged people overload their minds with unnecessary and harmful thoughts. About 73% of respondents aged 25-35 suffer from unnecessary thoughts. The researcher also points out that women (57%) are more susceptible to mental overload than men (43%).
Our mind is sometimes like a five-year-old child - it wants everything to be exactly the way it wants it, and it just doesn't know how to sit still. If you allow your mind to rush ahead at full speed even when you don't need it, it will only spin the flywheel of insanity until you realize that your mind has become a prison for yourself.
By learning to fill your mind with peace and focus on the things that really matter, instead of being distracted by small things. Then you gain clarity of thought, improve concentration and get rid of bad habit thinking too much about unnecessary things.
Below you will find 11 quotes to help you do just that.
1. You will never be free until you are freed from the prison of your own false thoughts.
2. Listen before you speak. Think before you act. Wait before you criticize. Before you pray, forgive. Try before you quit!
3. Stop thinking about everything that can go wrong - it’s better to admire in advance what can go right.
4. Extra thoughts are a sure way to create problems out of nowhere.
5. There is nothing in this world that can bother you more than your own thoughts.
6. Worrying in vain is like sitting in a rocking chair. Both help you occupy your time with something, but ultimately lead to nothing.
7. Don't try to think through all the possible options. You can't control everything around you. Relax.
8. Dear mind, stop thinking so much at night. I need to get some sleep.
9. Sometimes we deprive ourselves of happiness by “winding up” ourselves with harmful thoughts.
10. Don’t ruin your new day by thinking about problems left in the past. Let them remain there.
11. It is easier for a calm mind to hear the quiet voice of intuition behind the cry of fear.
How can you get rid of unnecessary thoughts that prevent you from focusing on the main thing? We can offer you three ways to do this:
1. Try to find unity with nature.
If you live and work away from nature, this method may help you more than any other. Try to regularly set aside time to be in nature.
Instead of going to a stuffy cafeteria during your lunch break, make yourself a home-cooked lunch and take it to the nearest park. Instead of spending your holiday at home on the couch, get out into the mountains.
All these activities little by little strengthen your connection with nature and its life force, helping to clear your mind of unnecessary obsessive thoughts.
Once you get out into nature, you can focus on the beauty of the trees, foliage... Look at the waterfall, appreciate the austere and pure majesty of the mountains... Plunge into it all headlong and relax.
2. Repeat peaceful words to yourself often.
Take a look at your thoughts. Right now. What do you see? Most likely, you will notice that most of your thoughts revolve around what you have to do today, or about how you were rude to you on the subway the day before yesterday, or even about the fact that you are not succeeding and you are not capable of anything. .
Don’t be upset - this situation, unfortunately, is quite common. There is so much negativity around us that it can sometimes be very difficult to constantly maintain a positive mindset. But remember, you can always neutralize negative thoughts by simply repeating positive and peaceful words to yourself.
Whenever you catch yourself feeling anxious or worried, try to immediately neutralize it with positive, calming words. Any, as long as they suit you. For example: “Peace. Love. Light. Life is good. To live well. Everything is fine with me".
While this method doesn't always give you complete peace of mind, it can quickly silence unnecessary thoughts, allowing your mind to shake off all distractions and focus on what is truly important at the moment.
Words are more than just sounds, they have so much meaning and power, so let them help you when you're feeling stressed.
3. Meditate.
You can find this advice both on the pages of a glossy magazine and on the Internet. And this is far from just that, because it is very effective.
When you meditate, you stop the flow of unnecessary and negative thoughts drumming through your consciousness every second, placing it in a place where calm and healing emptiness reigns.
While you certainly don't have to turn off your mind to fully meditate, many people find that it helps them slow down their thoughts and let go of all the little things they think about.
If solo meditation still doesn’t help you, and you just can’t stop thinking about unnecessary things, try controlled meditation and yoga. Both help you become fully aware of your own body and cope with daily challenges.
Publisher: Gaya - August 23, 2019
The Gratitude Matrix is a Field Arrangement Matrix that was created based on my article. It exists as one separate practical section of this article, created on the basis of the “Circle of Gratitude” and is intended for working through the energy of gratitude in the systemic field. The energy of gratitude is one of the most powerful transformative energies existing in the Universe. In order to see how it is manifested in you, you can use the Gratitude Matrix and the capabilities of the systemic arrangement method.
History of creation
In December 2015, I wrote an article, “12 Steps of Gratitude,” which I submitted for publication to Econet. Little did I know then that the article would be very popular and would resonate with more than half a million people from different parts of the planet. After I began to develop Field Constellation Matrices, as a separate highly effective constellation technology, I decided, based on the practice with Gratitude that was outlined in the article, to make a field Gratitude Matrix.
How to work with the matrix
The matrix consists of 13 squares, each of which has its own specific value. By becoming a square, a person gets into the aspect written in it and works it out in himself.
You can work with the Gratitude Matrix either alone or together. If you work alone, then you will need to go through all the squares alone.
If it’s just the two of you, then appoint your assistant to act as your deputy. To do this, go up to him, take his hands, look into his eyes, imagine that it is not he who is standing in front of you, but you. And tell him: “Please be me.” After this, enter it into the center of the matrix so that it ends up on a piece of paper with the inscription “I”. And you yourself stand on the first square and continue to work according to the algorithm described below.
Take 13 sheets of A4 paper. On twelve sheets of paper, write the names of the 12 steps of gratitude that you have to go through and number them. Place these sheets around the perimeter as shown in the picture on the floor. Place the 13th sheet in the center of the matrix and write “I” on it.
Stand in the center of the matrix, on a piece of paper with the inscription “I”. Slowly turn around your axis and look at each sheet. It expresses a certain quality of gratitude. Try to see how it is manifested in you. Listen to your feelings. How does it make you feel?! To what extent is this gratitude manifested in you or, on the contrary, not manifested?! Turn around slowly, don't rush. Try to get in touch with each of the qualities of gratitude that is written on the paper. To what extent is this gratitude expressed in you?! Your feelings may change. In some certain sectors of the circle you may feel a complete lack of gratitude, and in others you may have an inner feeling of warmth. Remember these feelings.
After you mentally go around all the squares, wait, listen to what you feel now, what your body feels?!
After this, stand on sheet No. 1. This will be your first step. It should say “Thank the Universe.” This will be your first step. Tell yourself: “Now I am my Gratitude to the universe.” Listen to what begins to happen to you. What feelings and emotions will you have? What thoughts will come to you? What images and pictures will begin to arise in your mind? Maybe you will see some specific people whom you have not thanked or who need your gratitude. Maybe you will see some unpleasant situation that you do not accept. Thank them, thank these people and these situations. Stand in this place until energy and information flow through you. Give thanks for everything. And at the end, when you feel full, say: “I thank the universe for...” List what exactly you thank it for. Give this gratitude its place in your heart.
After that, go to the next sheet No. 2. This will be your second step. Tell yourself: “Now I am my gratitude to my parents.” Imagine your mom and your dad. How do they make you feel? Maybe you will remember some situations related to them for which you should thank and forgive them. Thank them. Do not hurry. Feel it. This is one of the most important steps because it is only through our parents that we come into this world. If tears start flowing, cry, don’t hold them back. And give thanks from the bottom of your heart. After you complete your work, move on to the next step. Take the next step.
You may find it difficult to complete all 12 steps at once. Do not hurry. You can only go through one step and rest, and then move on to the next one. Choose your rhythm yourself. The goal is to eventually complete all 12 steps. Let this take more than one day.
After you have walked a full circle, all 12 steps, stand again in the center of the circle and again turn around your axis and look around the sheets. After you've gone through them all, how do you feel now?! Remember how you felt the first time you became the center of this circle and how you feel now? What has changed in you? How have you changed?
If, as you walk around the circle, you feel that you have not fully worked out one of the steps, you can take it again and start working on yourself again.
You can go back after a while and go through the 12 steps again and see the difference between how it was and how it is now.
Start every new day with words of gratitude. Thank the universe and your parents. When you go outside, look around. Who will you see there? Men or women, children or old people, friends or enemies? The one on whom your gaze falls, thank in his face those whom he personifies for you. Whose mirror is he for you now?!
And remember, there is no such thing as too much gratitude. Don't be stingy about showing it.
Publisher: Gaya - August 23, 2019
It's time to tell you a little story about life, gratitude and inner strength...
Once upon a time there lived a woman who spent her entire life - more than sixty years - in one small town. And although she had dreamed enthusiastically for decades about traveling and seeing the world, she did nothing to make her dream a reality.
On the day she turned 65, she woke up in the morning and finally decided that now was the time! She sold all her possessions, except for some necessary things, packed them in a backpack and set off to travel the world. The first few days on the journey she was filled with wonder and awe. With every step, she felt that she was finally beginning to live the life she had dreamed of.
However, after a few weeks, she began to experience unpleasant sensations. She felt lost and missed the comfort of her old life. With every step, her legs became heavier and heavier, and her mood became worse and worse.
Finally, she stopped, took the backpack from her shoulders, placed it on the ground and sat down next to him. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She looked hopelessly at the long winding road that she had once thought led to amazing world. She felt discomfort and dissatisfaction. "I have nothing! I have nothing left in my life!” – she shouted.
By pure chance, a famous guru from a neighboring village was resting behind a pine tree, which was located not far from where the woman was sitting. He heard every word the woman screamed and decided he had to help her. Without thinking twice, he jumped out from behind a pine tree, grabbed her backpack and ran into the forest that grew along both sides of the road. The stunned woman, who was already in complete bewilderment, began to cry even more.
“That backpack was all I had,” she exclaimed. “And now he’s gone too.” There is nothing left in my life!”
After ten minutes of lamentations and tears, the woman finally pulled herself together, rose from the ground and slowly continued to walk along the road. Meanwhile, the guru quietly ran out of the forest and placed his backpack in the middle of the road.
When the woman's tears fell on the backpack, she could not believe her eyes - what she had just lost was again lying right in front of her. She smiled. "God bless! - she exclaimed. – I am so grateful to Him. Now I again have what I need to continue my journey..."
Remember...
In life, you will inevitably face periods of incredible disappointment and despair. In those difficult times, it will sometimes feel like you have lost everything, that nothing and no one can make you move further towards your dreams. But like the woman who stumbled upon a guru, we all carry backpacks of support that can take many forms - it could be an email or text message from someone we respect, an inspiring blog article, an insightful book, helpful advice from a neighbor, a community that provides help to those in need, and much more.
When life seems unbearable, when you feel overwhelmed and disappointed, it is important to remember the following...
1. Trust the path, even if you don't fully understand it.
2. Accept what is, let go of what was, and have faith in the journey ahead.
3. To start anything, use what you have. Do everything you can to achieve your goal, one step at a time.
4. There are blessings hidden in every obstacle you encounter along the way. Be willing to accept them with your heart and mind.
5. Recognize your backpack of support—external sources of hope and motivation—before a random guru (or someone with bad intentions) steals it from you, so you can finally stop taking what you have for granted.
6. Be present in the present moment and rely on your own mind and heart—the inner sources of hope and motivation—that are powerful enough to get you up off the ground and moving on, even when everything seems lost forever.
7. Laugh at your confusion, live mindfully in the moment and appreciate the lessons that life throws at you.
8. Don't compare yourself to others. Everyone has his own path.
9. Often things we didn't want or expect end up being exactly what we needed.
10. Accept that things don’t always end the way we want. Open yourself up to new opportunities and eventually you will find yourself in in the right place at the right time.
Whatever your circumstances, you always have what you need to take the next step.
As Epicurus said: “Do not spoil what you have by wanting what you do not have. Remember that once upon a time you only hoped to get what you have now.”
Live consciously. Stay in the present moment.
Keep moving forward.
Gradually, step by step.
Publisher: Gaya - August 23, 2019
Financial success and social recognition do not always mean that you are truly successful.
Let me guess what first comes to mind for a metropolitan resident when he hears the word “prosperity.” Financial success and quick result. But, in fact, this concept is broader and deeper. As a basis for reflection, let’s take the yoga philosophy of Bhajen, the founder of Kundalini yoga.
First of all, prosperity is our ability to consciously live the path, accept current events, and long-term enjoyment of the result. Your diversified development. Material, spiritual part, health, creativity, interpersonal relationships.
We have noticed that when we focus on one aspect of life, an imbalance occurs. For example, we spend a lot of time on success and forget about interpersonal relationships, respect for each other, boundaries, rules. We concentrate on a positive perception of reality - we are afraid to accept negative information, we abstract ourselves from it.
Now analyze, because imbalance in life is reflected not only in the body and mind, but also has an imprint on ongoing events. The practice of kundalini yoga is structured in such a way that by performing sequential kriyas, we eliminate the main tensions and break down energy blocks. This allows prana, breath, to flow inside the body in a new way, opening up an understanding of the main difficulties.
We become aware of what really worries us, what we are trying to escape from, redirecting our attention to more interesting and familiar aspects of existence. Thus, kundalini yoga teaches us to balance and synchronize ourselves to achieve prosperity and success in different areas of life. Which generally leads to ease, positivity and prosperity.
Let's look at 5 aspects of a prosperous person:
- Creative perception of reality - the ability to find a non-standard, unusual solution in any situation
- An easy approach to life, awareness of difficulties as an opportunity for development and expansion
- Full of energy and strength, at any time of the year. The ability not only to accept help and advice, but also to share your radiant energy
- Awareness of the potential and talent of your soul. Disclosure and development of all facets of personality
- A grateful attitude towards life. Feeling of unconditional love and happiness
Anna Avdeeva, psychologist, yoga and meditation teacher
Publisher: Gaya - August 23, 2019,
Everything you emit shapes your reality. Whether you like it or not. And words are no exception here. Words are thoughts expressed. But words cannot convey all the versatility of our thoughts, and sometimes its simple meaning. And this expressed distorted meaning, willy-nilly, begins to influence our own thoughts. Not only do your thoughts influence your words, but your words also influence your thoughts.
Try to eliminate unnecessary, low vibration words from your vocabulary and watch how your life changes! I suggest starting with these words:
1. "Debt." You don't owe anyone anything and no one owes you anything. Duty often replaces sincere feelings. Love because you love, not because you have to. Take care of someone because you want to, not because you “should.” Do something because you choose and want to do it, not because you “have to.” The more often you say this word, the more you limit yourself...
Of course, it may not be easy to immediately abandon the words we are accustomed to. Try, instead of “should,” say “it would be nice...”, “it would be great if...” or “I’ll be glad if you prefer this...”, etc.
2. “Guilt”, “guilty”. No one is to blame for anything. Including you. Stop blaming yourself and others for something. There are no mistakes or sins. There is only experience.
3. “To regret”, “pity”, “regret”. Listen even to these words. All they do is SIT. When you feel sorry for yourself, you feel like a victim, and that's what you end up being. When you feel sorry for others, you encourage them to be victims. Many people stoop to pity for someone, because this way they can feel “above” others or “good”. You can only feel sorry for a bug, but you sympathize with your loved ones. When you regret something, then, firstly, you miss the present moment, and secondly, you devalue your experience.
4. “Victim”, “sacrifice”. It seems like everyone already knows about the sacrifice. However, the second word is used much more often. “I donated...”, “donation.” Stop donating! Sacrifice does not lead to anything good. If you give something (not necessarily material) with a feeling of detachment from yourself, with a feeling of sacrifice, with a feeling of “what a hero I am!”, you carry low vibrations that have a detrimental effect on you and on the recipient of your “gift”.
From now on, don't donate anymore. “Give support” (to any charity or any projects you like). And why “donate” if you can “GIVE”?
5. "Compassion." It would seem that there is something wrong with this word. And look at him. When you SUFFER, you are also thrown into the abyss of another person’s suffering, not helping him in any way and increasing the “general suffering”. Don't be compassionate. Have sympathy! Do you feel the difference? Besides, many people can be compassionate, but have you tried to JOY?
6. “Try.” Another nasty word that allows you to remove responsibility for your life. Don't try, just do it and accomplish it!
Publisher: Gaya - August 23, 2019
About two years ago, I was pursuing a professional career that I had been building for almost twenty years. I worked for my company for thirteen years; throughout this time I was usually praised, given positive reviews, regular bonuses and promotions.
My personal life was less successful. I had to leave a painful relationship that was filled with criticism, pressure and conflict. This resulted in severe depression. I was taking medications that made it difficult for me to concentrate and gave me anxiety attacks. My manager made it clear to me that I was on probation, which had never happened to me in my entire career.
One of the few bright spots in my life has been the arts community, in which I have been very active over the past few years. I also applied for a volunteer position with a supervisory company, which meant a lot to me.
Although every day seemed like an incredible struggle, I tried to get things in order, perform better at my job responsibilities, switch to different medications, and continue to heal from the trauma of the relationship. I felt depressed, but did not lose control of the situation. I felt like I was at the peak of something.
It turns out that I was right, but this peak was not what I thought. I was informed that I did not receive the position. Through the grapevine, I learned that this was partly due to the fact that I was talking on Facebook about my feelings related to depression and recovery from trauma.
Due to "functional issues" due to my severe depression and anxiety, as well as organizational issues that had nothing to do with me, and despite the fact that I told my manager that I was being treated for depression, I was fired with job (ironically, it was a psychology-oriented media company run by a psychologist), and my colleagues escorted me out of the office with boxes of stuff. I was not even allowed to collect information about the professional contacts I had made and maintained. However, I continued to have symptoms of PTSD related to the abuse I had endured in a previous relationship. And then the relationship I entered into a year after the breakup ended, which in retrospect was not a good decision for me at the time. Although we remained friends, the breakup was very painful for me, compared to all the other problems.
I felt like I was forced to improve the City of Rejection; It was like everything I had worked for was destroyed and burned at the same time. My sense of self-esteem and competence suffered greatly. My identity as a successful, professional woman was crushed.
As a result of losing my job, I lost my health insurance, my ability to improve my mental health, and was forced to stop taking my medications. I couldn't pay the mortgage on the house I bought when I was still making decent money. For a year I tried to get back on my feet. I applied for Medi-cal, state program insurance, and began dealing with her mortgage company in an attempt to deal with the incredible frustration and bureaucracy.
I was determined not to give in to the pressure of my troubles, even though most of the time I was desperate to do so. I left the arts community, which I realized did not support me or my efforts, and cut off relationships with most people except those who I knew would always support and care about me. I felt like I couldn't trust anyone except the few people who were always there for me. I spent most of my time alone, worrying and worrying and dulling my feelings as much as possible.
All this happened about fifteen months ago. I still live in my house, work part-time, study, communicate on social networks, work with a business coach and am about to open my own marketing business in a new industry. This is the peak for which life was preparing me then, although I didn’t know it.
How to get back on your feet and create a new one the best way, when life literally pushes us out of the path we are on? Here are some tips...
Give yourself time to worry
This is really important. I needed time to process what had happened, to cry and be angry, and to talk to close friends about my feelings, and to work through feelings of betrayal in many ways. I couldn't afford therapy, so I just talked to myself when I was alone, which was often. After about nine months, I finally reached a point where I made a conscious decision to stop swimming in sadness and resentment.
Rumination is normal in this type of situation, although you will need to stop it over time. But first, get over all those terrible feelings and be your own best friend. Acknowledge them, know that they are normal, and be there for yourself during this difficult time. transition period. If you keep a diary: keep it. If you create: create. If you're walking: walk. Do whatever it takes to get yourself back together.
Remember that the situation will not always be like this
When I thought that I was losing everything that I had built for so long, I panicked. I felt like I was drowning and had nothing to grab onto. It was very scary and I had panic attacks in the middle of the night more than once. But as I continued to work towards achieving what I wanted, the situation calmed down and I was able to see that although the waters were choppy, I still could not drown in them.
The ship will right itself when the time comes. Think of it as a painful breakup. You (I hope) know that you will overcome sadness and all other difficult feelings. Practice nonjudgmental awareness of your thoughts and compassionately bring yourself back to the present when you begin to feel despair about the destruction of your life. What has been destroyed is the old way of being; strong feelings mean you are still alive.
Know that things won't be the same as before, and that's a good thing.
I immediately instinctively understood one thing. I realized that I didn't want to do what I had been doing for almost twenty years, and I certainly didn't want anyone to ever have as much influence on me as my old company, my ex, or the arts community. .
I spent (and still spend) a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to do next and how I could keep control of my life in my hands and not give it to anyone else.
Consider your interests: what really lights up your life? Now is your chance to do it! Try not to be led astray by worries about the impossibility of your dreams. There are ways to do what you want to do. Use brainstorming techniques, talk to sympathetic people who know you well, ask yourself questions, keep track of what you like to do and who you want to be around.
Choose your expressions carefully
When all this happened, I realized that I didn't want to imagine or think of myself as someone who had just lost everything. I told people who asked me what I did for a living that I was in business even before it was true, and often consoled myself that I was strong enough to move past bad relationships.
Think of inspiring ways to describe your new reality and use them even when you are mentally talking to yourself. Feelings of sadness, anxiety, irritation, stress and regret are normal. But you need to create a connection between yourself and your new future. Using the language of growth and new possibilities will help you when it comes time to take steps to move forward.
I needed to work to pay the bills and I wasn't getting work. professional level I was trying to get a job, so after four months of waking up at 4 am with anxious thoughts about money, I posted on Facebook about all my abilities and a friend offered me a job. I'm very grateful and although it's not something I've done before, I'm still able to use my skills, learn new things and it's given me some breathing space to get my life settled again.
Even if you don't feel the same need for work as I do, you may still need a new community or new friends. It's important to realize what you've been doing isn't working and to take new paths rather than just doing what you've done before.
There are so many opportunities to meet new people online and in communities. Identify people who can help you get on your feet and reach out to them. And remember to maintain relationships with people who encourage you, treat you kindly, and empathize with you.
Make self-care your top priority.
Whenever possible, be sure to take good care of yourself. Get enough sleep. Move. Take time to rest and relax and enjoy the things you love. Sleep during the day. Spend time with people who encourage you rather than frustrate you.
I finally allowed myself to admit one thing: I was burning myself out and subjecting myself to severe stress at his old job, which likely contributed to his depression. Now that I understand this, when moving forward I am not interested in new life, in which stress will accompany me every day, as well as a job in which goals will constantly be pushed back. This is an important realization when considering ways to make money.
Ask for help
I am very lucky to have family and friends around me who have helped and continue to help me in many ways, including financially. I was able to get back on medication that works by talking to a family friend who is a doctor and who agreed to see me for free. This was very important for my recovery. If it weren't for my support network, I would still be depressed and probably would have lost my home.
I hope you have people who can support you. In addition, you also have other resources, be it a group of former students from your college, a local job center, the library, or friends who are connected to others who could help you.
Think about what you need to get where you want to go and ask the people around you for help. There is nothing wrong with needing the help of others. A drowning man does not push away the lifebuoy that is thrown into the water!
Learn from your experience
Although I've been in a lot of painful situations in my life, I don't think I've ever had such a terrible year. Part of my recovery was filtering through the events that happened to determine what went wrong with them, including my role in those situations. When we make sense of our experiences, we recover faster. When we feel like we have no control over a situation, we feel depressed and hopeless.
,A mind-blowing story. But that's how it is.
For some reason, it is considered right and good to accustom children to hygiene of their bodies; this is natural. When a child or an adult has an unwashed face, they say to him: “Your eyes are sour,” or: “Girlfriend, is your mascara running?” It’s normal to say that – it’s correct and generally accepted. Moreover, for some reason people consider it natural to clean their homes and wash their clothes.
For some reason, when something spills on the floor, people say: “Take a rag and wipe it before it dries.”
Do you understand the meaning of the phrase: “Wipe it before it dries?” For some reason, people realize that dried dirt is more difficult to wipe off; they do not utter the crazy phrase: “Don’t touch it while it’s fresh, time will sort it out.” For some reason, in this case, people understand that it is better to clean fresh, that stuck and dried coffee does not disappear from the floor over time, at best, it transfers to slippers, at worst, it begins to cling to additional dirt. For some reason people understand this very well.
Why do people say: “Time heals?” It doesn't heal anything, it just dries up the dirt and makes it harder to wipe off.
Someone tell me why it is customary to treat the garbage of consciousness differently? It is not customary to take care of the hygienic skills of your consciousness at all. At all.
In the best case, people attend some kind of training, which is reminiscent of trying to pour a box of perfume on themselves at once, and for some reason it is believed that the more expensive the perfume, the better the effect. But the fact that a synthetic air freshener is sprayed in a dirty room will not make the room cleaner; it is advisable to wash and ventilate it, and then the air freshener will not be needed.
My teacher in bodily practices, Vladimir Nikitin, once said that the body trains continuously and if a person spends an hour a day training, and the rest of the time does not live in his body, he will not see a living and healthy body, at best a trained one, not it is known why and for what purposes.
But it’s exactly the same with consciousness. It, like our body and our home, needs certain hygienic skills, and even better, training, and even better, living. And it’s really good when a person learns to continuously process the discomfort of his consciousness at the moment of its occurrence, as soon as something spills, and not wait until it dries up, or someone will come and clean it up. This is the difficulty of working with consciousness. If you can hire someone to clean the house, then mental cleaning, even with someone’s help, requires your own effort.
Just like when standing next to a person, after a couple of minutes it becomes clear how long he hasn’t washed, so when communicating with any person - after a couple of minutes it becomes clear how much he tidies up in his mind: this one clearly hasn’t washed since birth, this one likes to water himself with different perfumes, this one went to a real bathhouse a couple of times, and this one knows how not to get dirty at all. Master.
When someone next to me starts complaining about someone else, I have a standard response: “I’d love to hear your story about what you personally did to make things different.” Is there someone's wise phrase: “If you are not part of the solution, then you are part of the problem.”
Do you feel the difference between: “Let’s get my daughter dirty together” and “Help me clean up, otherwise I’m already up to my ears”? I don’t want to participate in the first process, but I can answer the second: “Keep my favorite shampoo, brother. It even helps against fleas, not only against cockroaches.”
I am not very happy with the slogans of politicians who promise to bring everyone to clean water and at the same time do not promise their own sincerity and honesty. When a dirty and unwashed cleaning lady promises to clean everything around, it is obvious that she will get even more dirty. Can you imagine what it would be like in parliaments if people could smell each other’s thoughts? Security guards and cleaners would refuse to go to work.
American psychologist Peter Lawrence argued that the presence of chronic psychosomatic illness — sure sign professional incompetence.
I described in the book a client with bronchial asthma who worked as a prosecutor. At the very first meeting, he discovered that his bronchial asthma was a lot of stopped aggression, and that in order to heal, he should learn to consciously and intelligently handle this energy. His work as a prosecutor was compensation for his unhealed grievances. His whole life, all his relationships are built in such a way as to serve this garbage in his mind. To use a housing metaphor, it looks like instead of wiping up a dried stain on the floor, this person placed all the furniture in his house around that stain. After the first meeting, the asthmatic prosecutor consulted with his wife and decided to remain as he is and not “ruin his life.” And continue to “ruin other people’s lives” while trying to compensate for my illness.
There are no bad people in this world, there are simply no mental hygiene skills. Incredibly, in the twenty-first century there are still people who believe that diseases of the body, troubles in life and garbage in the mind are three different processes unrelated to each other. Scientists, educated people.
When we visited the Indians, I noticed an amazing expression of sympathy and compassion on their faces. “Why are you looking at us like that?” - I asked the Indians. “You come to us very dirty,” they replied. What do you say to this? Sad.
In my opinion, there is a minimum set of hygienic mental skills. Ability to handle basic waste. Skills to do something with basic negative judgments, such as: envy, jealousy, resentment, disappointment, hatred, anger, desire for addiction, conflicts. This is the same minimum hygiene kit as washing your face, brushing your teeth and shaving your armpits. Elementary list- not even an average level and definitely not aerobatics. Without this minimum set, any consciousness sooner or later becomes a trash heap. Instead of just tidying up their relationships, people tend to throw away old ones and start new ones - clean ones. But the garbage of old relationships does not disappear because of this!!! Nowhere.
Would you let your children go to school if all the teachers dressed and smelled like homeless people? But the overwhelming majority of teachers do not possess these basic skills of mental hygiene. I allowed my son at school to answer the question: “Why didn’t you learn?” answer what he really thinks. And one of the male teachers met his son one-on-one in the hallway and said: “I hate you!” Hug and cry for this teacher.
After basic skills, it would be good to develop the means of working with difficult moments in your life. And anyone who knows how to grow flowers from garbage and helps others in this skill brings the most tangible benefit.
Once the three of us were sitting with a famous Master and his wife. The Master’s wife and I had an obvious sympathy. “Aren’t you afraid that something will happen between us?” - I asked him jokingly? “So I will live out my jealousy,” the Master answered without blinking an eye. This is the answer of a person who controls his consciousness. He did not say: “I will consider you a bastard,” or: “I will kill my wife.” He said: “I will work with my consciousness.” That's why he is a Master. “Heal yourself and thousands around you will be healed.”
It is truly an incomprehensible mystery to me why the civilized world does not like mental hygiene so much. I have only one version: an insane fear of losing something. Even if it has long since become obsolete and become garbage. It is very similar to the behavior of older people, who, the more they are afraid of death, the more difficult it is to part with all sorts of rubbish. Any full-fledged work with consciousness implies transformation, albeit small, but dying. The husk falls off, the real remains. In a culture that is frantically and unconsciously afraid of death, they hold on to the husks so much that they lose the real thing. Death great cleaning lady. She cleans everything up.
A woman once came to me with a ready-made receipt: “I voluntarily ask Dr. Gusev to hit me in the heart and save me from my unhappy love for my ex-husband. For what happens to me after this blow, I ask you not to blame Dr. Gusev.”
Working with her went in exactly the opposite direction. That the love in her heart for her ex-husband is alive and real, but all her grievances and claims are, alas, already dying. And she has a good choice - to kill her heart so that it does not hurt, or to let go of her unfulfilled hopes in peace so that they do not hurt her heart. Of course, hopes are always more valuable.
I once met a woman whom I asked if she would prefer: for her husband to die, but remain faithful to her, or cheat, but remain alive. “Of course, to die,” she answered without hesitation. And this is called love?! Would I like to be loved “to the death”?
“We shouldn’t bend under the changing world - Let it bend under us better...” Andrei Makarevich once sang the motto of an entire generation, and inevitably became very stooped. Why do you think?
Arnie Mindell has the exact opposite phrase: “Either you become flexible and agile, or the world will find a way to destroy you: it doesn’t matter what it’s called - a disease or a car accident.” My observations about life suggest that Mindell should be trusted more.
Only. The simplest basic skills. Only occasionally do I mention something transcendental: growing the flowers of consciousness.
The garbage that is repressed from consciousness does not disappear anywhere. It accumulates in the biosphere. Civilized humanity does not yet believe in this. But it is so. Just as someone else may slip on a banana peel thrown past an urn, so the energies displaced from consciousness do not disappear anywhere, they either begin to be reflected in the body in the form of diseases, or splash out into the biosphere in the form of garbage, which is now anyone can get into trouble. If he does not know how to take care of the hygiene of his mind.
In this case, terrorism can be defined as “the persistent belief of humanity that blunt violence helps resolve any conflict.” Anyone who believes in this is a terrorist, even if he does not run through the streets covered in explosives, but only terrorizes his household. In my picture of the world, a child is turned into a terrorist in the first grade of school when he is forced, instead of interested. And so with all general social phenomena such as: crime, corruption, poverty, unemployment, etc.
Anyone who keeps their mind clean creates a healthier space around themselves. The most difficult task in this world is not to lie to yourself. And then all of humanity will catch up.
Publisher: Gaya - August 23, 2019Anne Lindbergh
Gift of the sea. How to return to yourself and live simply
GIFT FROM THE SEA
Introduction by Reeve Lindbergh
Published by permission of Pantheon Books, an imprint of The Knopf Doubleday Group, a division of Random House, LLC.
© Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1955, 1975, 1983
© Jon Lindbergh, Land M. Lindbergh, Scott Morrow Lindbergh, and Reeve Lindbergh, 2003
© Reeve Lindbergh, foreword, 2005
© Translation into Russian, publication in Russian, design. Mann, Ivanov and Ferber LLC, 2014
All rights reserved. No part of the electronic version of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, including posting on the Internet or corporate networks, for private or public use without the written permission of the copyright owner.
Legal support for the publishing house is provided by the Vegas-Lex law firm.
© The electronic version of the book was prepared by liters company (www.litres.ru)* * *
This book is well complemented by:
Meditation for health
A practical guide to pain relief and stress reduction
Vidyamala Burgh and Danny Penman
In search of happiness
How to enjoy life every day
Martin Seligman
Vocation
How to Find What You Were Made for and Live in Your Element
Ken Robinson
12 seasons
or Everything that mattered this year
Yana Frank
The Muse and the Beast
How to organize creative work
Yana Frank
Preface
Gift of the Sea was first published fifty years ago, in 1955, and I feel like I’ve read it at least fifty times since then. I'm not exaggerating. I’m ashamed to admit, but I first opened this book when I was twenty, but then I re-read it at least once a year, and sometimes more often.
I have read Gift of the Sea no matter the time of year at every point in my life. And not once have I doubted the relevance of this book, the wisdom it carries.
Mom wrote this work in a small house near the beach of Captiva Island, which is located off the Florida coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Many people are interested in this house, but our friends from Florida told me that it has long been destroyed.
But despite this, I recently went to Captiva Island for a week, taking with me a copy of “Gift of the Sea,” which my mother signed back in 1955: “For Reeve.” I went there not in search of the writer's house, but in search of the writer herself.
Mom is no longer alive. And after the division of everything that previous generations of the family owned between members of the current generation, after ceremonial receptions dedicated to the history of the family, and the publication of revelations related to our personal lives by numerous relatives, I again sought her help. To move on with my life, I needed her wisdom and her support. And, as expected, she did not let me down.
No matter what page you open “Gift of the Sea” on, you will feel that the author is telling you: live and breathe slowly. Whatever life circumstances, a book helps you calm down and gives you the opportunity to temporarily be transported to another, serene world.
The very flow of the narrative, its rhythm, it seems to me, resembles the light, inevitable movement of the sea. I don’t know whether my mother chose this style consciously or whether it was a natural result of the fact that at the time of writing this book she lived on the ocean shore. Be that as it may, after reading even a few pages, I relax and feel like part of the sea current - another piece of debris that is smoothly rocked by the oceanic rhythms of the Universe.
But this book carries more than just peace and a call for a calm life to the rhythm of sea waves and measured words. There is incredible power behind it all. Every time I am amazed again and again by the power of Gift of the Sea. I don’t remember my mother being so strong, or maybe I just didn’t notice, taking this quality of hers for granted.
I remember that she always seemed small and fragile to me. I remember her intelligence and delicacy. But when I reread “Gift of the Sea”, this illusion of fragility disappears and the truth is revealed to me. How could I forget? She raised five children after the tragic loss of her firstborn in 1932. She became the first American woman to earn a first-class glider pilot's license (1930), as well as the first woman to awarded a medal Hubbard (1934). She won the National Book Award in 1938 for The Wind Rises, and throughout her life Mom remained one of the most popular and widely read authors in the country.
At sixty-five she skied with me in Vermont, at seventy she hiked trails in the Swiss Alps, and at seventy-five she climbed into the Haleakala crater on the Hawaiian island of Maui and spent the night there with her children and friends. I remember how I peered into the huge black dome of the night sky dotted with stars when my mother showed us the navigation star circle: Capella, Castor, Pollux, Procyon and Sirius. Once upon a time, she, an aviation pioneer, learned to determine the course in the dark precisely by these stars...
But above all, Gift from the Sea, it seems to me, allows readers to feel an unusual freedom. It is difficult to describe, to define in words, but it is precisely this freedom that is the reason that the book continues to be loved and read after so many years. I'm talking about the freedom that comes from our choice to remain open to life, no matter what surprises it throws at us: sorrows and joys, triumphs and falls, suffering and peace, and, of course, constant change. My mother made the same choice.
By honestly reflecting on her life, trying to achieve harmony with herself, and taking active action in response to what is happening “here and now,” my mother found the freedom that we should find too. She wrote “Gift of the Sea” and opened a new path in life for herself and others. And I am pleased to know that this edition of the book will allow a new generation of readers to follow this path.
Reeve Lindbergh, St. Johnsbury, March 2005
I started writing this book for myself - to understand my own world, own life, in personal and business relationships. And since I think better with a pencil in my hands, in some completely natural way I began to write down my thoughts. Transferred to paper, they became clearer, and I had the feeling that my life experience significantly different from other people's experiences. It seemed to me that not all women are in search of a new life model. Observing the lives of other women from the outside, I thought that they coped with everything with amazing ease, much better than I did. With a feeling of envy and admiration, I watched the ideality of their measured days. It seemed to me that they had no problems and that they had long ago found answers to all their questions. And I decided that my reasoning was interesting and useful only to myself.