Simply stated, gratitude - resistance = JOY. This is not a three letter word to take lightly. Living in this state changes your physiology, your relationships and will have a significant impact on the quality of your life and longevity.
Have you considered how much of your suffering is caused by resisting what is, or chasing what isn’t?
Resisting what is…
I recall the first time I did an ice bath. I tensed all my muscles as I got into the cold water and waited for the bell to sound so I could get out. I did it for one reason - to please my ego. I did not enjoy it and it took me months before I even considered trying it again. By resisting everything about the experience, I suffered through it. After developing a breathwork practice, I tried again with a renewed sense of awareness. I felt the cold water on my skin, I breathed slowly, focusing on elongating my exhales with no destination or end goal in mind. I embraced the feeling of being uncomfortable and took solace in the experience of the present moment. I still had reservations up to the second before I entered, but the experience was vastly different because of my intention and presence. Similar to the ice bath experience, take the example of what happens when we experience pain. Pain isn’t in the feeling. Pain is in the resistance to the feeling. Without the resistance, the suffering dissipates.
Chasing what isn’t…
Happiness is a transient state of well-being that is realized when a destination or result is achieved. It often is dependent on external factors. When I first graduated university and entered the job force, I recall thinking I would be happy when I made ‘x’ amount of money or crossed off that elusive bucket list item. I mistakenly thought that reaching these milestones would be met with long-lasting feelings of happiness. Boy was I wrong. I was fortunate to reach these milestones only to realize the dopaminergic highs were fleeting and often followed with the question, ‘Now What?’. This subsequent disappointment helped me realize I had a yearning for something else, to cultivate JOY. Joy is the deeper emotion that comes from inner contentment independent of outer circumstances. Joy stays in your heart, aligns with your internal values, and weaves through your spirit. Experiencing joy holds you in a state of equanimity where good or bad things are accepted and appreciated for their gifts. We all carry the ingredients to cultivate joy. It satisfies your tastebuds like pineapple upside down cake. Damn straight. Sometimes we have to get what we want, only to realize it was nothing like what we thought.
The theme of the recent Rx for Renewal retreat was cultivating JOY. As Registered Psychotherapist and Presenter Laura Louise Perichetti mentioned during her workshop, gratitude is the gateway to cultivating JOY. As much as we hear about the importance of having a gratitude practice and why it is important, I never connected it to cultivating JOY. I always thought of gratitude as a nice to have, but now my heart knows it is an absolute necessity. Not only does it shift your suffering into acceptance, it transforms suffering into positive and expansive feelings. Gratitude instantly shifts your energy. It brings you into the present moment by connecting you to the purest feelings of love. I can’t help but use cliché terms, but feeling rather than reading them makes the message resonate with energy rather than typed letters on a page. If you have felt glimpses of it, you know precisely what I’m writing about.
Releasing resistance to new ideas
As mentioned, resistance can lead to suffering at the level of the soul. Less subtly, and more practically, releasing resistance to new ideas helps gain access to new information. Keeping an open mind requires checking existing biases and seeing how they may be forcing you to see only a segment of the big picture. I appreciate evidence-based information. As a pharmacist, it is imperative to lead with the best quality evidence before making recommendations to a patient. That being said, scientists are making discoveries all the time - often proving old ideas wrong. Being open-minded to listen and incorporate new information is crucial for growth.
Things I’ve recently changed my mind about:
Pink Himalayan salt → Celtic sea salt
Cardio only → Strength training + zone 2 biking to build my VO2 max
Drinking water before bed → glass of lemon water ready by my bedside for morning drink
Watching news → read Google News summary 1-2 times weekly
Multitasking → single-tasking
Audible → turning pages of a book
Keeping email open → timeblocking everything
Protein whenever I can → aiming for 1 gram per pound of body weight daily
Checking messages upon waking → first 30 minutes of my day being phone-free
What’s something you’ve recently changed your mind about?
What I’m coming back to..
After facilitating a recent breathwork journey at the Rx for Renewal Retreat, I have noticed myself going back to basic breathwork exercises to regain my balance. Practicing functional breathwork helps you focus. If we can take moments of our day to consciously focus our attention and decrease wandering thoughts, we can narrow down to single, targeted thoughts. Not only does this help with focus, but it helps us experience presence and that is progress.
Although we breathe with our lungs, we can still use other body parts to help us focus when breathing. Here is a simple, yet effective finger breathing technique to try out. It works well with kids too!
Sit in a comfortable position.
Put your left hand facing palm up on your lap.
As you breathe in through your nose, use your right hand to trace your thumb with one finger.
As you breathe out, trace your thumb in the downward direction.
Trace through all five fingers and continue until you feel more calm.
Action Items
Based on the definitions of happiness and joy discussed, contemplate where you are putting your energy. Are you spending resources trying to find happiness rather than joy? A five-minute writing exercise will yield some insights that you can circle back to. Every bit of change that you evolve into starts with awareness.
I have written about journaling in a previous post. Implementing a daily gratitude practice immediately shifts your energy and perspective from a contracted to expansive state. We all know why it is important but few commit to the daily practice. Start with a small step like thinking about one thing you are grateful for every day.
Try the finger breathing technique described. Use it as a tool to cultivate focus and presence whenever you need to regain your balance throughout the day.
If you want to use your breath to reach deeper levels of consciousness and meet yourself under your hood - consider attending the next in-person Rx for Renewal Breathwork Soul Session. It will be held on Friday, March 28th in Oakville. Register here.