Everything everything
If you read these posts you'll have noticed me talking a lot about creating regular moments of rest (separate from sleep, without distraction) to recover from expending our energy in everyday life. If you do manage to do this, at least sometimes - do less, say no to things that deplete you, use your energy skillfully, unclutter your life a little - what's next?
The space that opens up can sometimes pose a question about our lives. Is it enough? Are we doing enough? Do things need to change? Is that all there is? Or even if there is no space, we can get a glimpse of other people's lives and feel envy about how perfect we (wrongly) perceive others' lives are.
I got one of these recently when I saw a young couple nervously going in the gate of a lovely big house near our flat. The couple kind of looked a bit like me and my partner five years ago, but unlike us they could afford to buy a FAT house, and maybe it was all these factors that spiked my jealousy and made me have ugly thoughts - it’s not fair, why should they get that and not me, etc.
It’s easy to do at Christmas too (ultimate consumerist moment), or in school holidays when the gossipy part of ourselves notes who goes skiing or to the Maldives and we feel slightly sorry for ourselves even though we know we are very very lucky compared to so many people. We can feel envious and insecure about a million things and it's just being human, but it grows easily if we feed it by focusing on everything we don’t have.
We create a scarcity mindset, but the good news is it's fairly easily reversed by regularly counting the things you’re grateful for. A gratitude practice might sound cheesy but it’s one of those quick things that I really think is transformative, making you more content and secure in yourself and what you have really quickly. It helps to create an abundance mindset, the sense that your life is overflowing with good things.
It’s quick to do last thing at night or when you’re walking somewhere. At first it might feel hard to get to more than around 5-10 things but sometimes it’s hard to count them all. Peeking in at your child while they’re sleeping soundly. Being in the warm while the cold wind rattles outside. A kind friend. Someone making you laugh and laugh. An old jumper you love. The same tree. Right now. The way your body has carried you thus far and kept you alive and maybe kept someone else alive too.
It doesn’t mean you won’t have disappointments, regrets, frustration or pain - you can feel them too and let them be whatever they are to you. There’s all that and it lives in you as it should, and so does the good stuff, as it should.
Your list will be personal to you and it will shift throughout your life and you will always have it, it never has to leave you. You can hold it close to you or you can lock it away and never think of it.
How does it change your life when you consider the good things frequently? How does it shift how the bad things feel, if at all?
Maybe you already do this - let me know how it helps you. Or perhaps you want to try, and if you do I’d love to know how you get on.