It occurred to me recently that every day we are presented with a multitude of decisions that ultimately boil down to one of two simple choices: Embrace or Escape. I also realized that we chose whether we embrace or escape based on two emotions: Fear or Love. More importantly, we are rather uneven and predictable in what we chose and this limits our expression and experience of ourselves and our lives.
This line of thinking was influenced no doubt by my recent exploration into Buddhist teachings particularly the work of Pema Chodron and her book When Things Fall Apart.
I have long held the belief that there is value in all our experiences and I try to embrace my life fully while encouraging others to do the same. But I began to wonder if I was embracing all of life or just living fully the good stuff and what that meant.
Choices. We are presented with so many every minute of every day. Certainly the choices we make shape our lives and can often be overwhelming. However, when you boil it down to the basic components and motivators things may become more clear.
In the largest sense we are faced with a decision in our lives to boldly embrace all the realities and opportunities or escape from many aspects of it and play it safe. It takes discipline to embrace all the experiences of life for that would include feeling all the pain and sorrow as fully as the joy and excitement, for most of us that does not sit well. In Buddhist teaching though the practice to embrace all of life is a worthy, valuable goal including the suffering that life contains. I agree, but it is not an easy or popular choice.
We tend to think suffering and pain are to be avoided at all cost and put a good deal of effort into doing so.
When I think of escaping and embracing I also think about those that chose to embrace and follow their dreams and goals. People who try new things and pursue a rich full life that is open minded and adventurous. People that embrace and accept all of who they are rather than rejecting or denying aspects of themselves. On the other hand, I consider escape to be the acts that tune us out such as alcohol or drugs, television or other activities that dull us or fill our time without really engaging us. To escape is simply the ways we deny, avoid, hold back or check out and we all have many methods to do this. It can be anything people use to avoid experience or being all that they are. For instance, my bad habit of over checking Facebook and email rather than write or work on a project is a method I use far too often to escape if only for a little while.
What informs these decisions also comes down to two things: Love and fear. So when we chose to embrace or escape we are motivated by one of these two emotions. We embrace life out of love. Love is expansive, positive, hopeful. We are open to people, experiences, information and to sharing of ourselves, risking boldly, feeling and living fully. Mostly this part comes easy to me. I have always loved to try new things, meet new people and learn about vast subjects. The older I get the more open I am to everything and the more I appreciate beauty in places I did not recognize it before.
Conversely, people chose to escape out of fear. It may be an attempt to protect ourselves from failure or suffering, to dull pain, pass the time safely, not be disappointed. We may just be in the habit of playing it safe in our routine because we never learned another way or have forgotten how we wanted to live, what we want to do or be. Many of us resist new experiences afraid we may not like it or reject people and things that are different, fearful of how they would impact our lives and beliefs.
In truth there are degrees of all of this and we each live a combination of embracing or escaping, loving or fearing every day.
I think it is vital to become aware of these basic components however so that we may make conscious choices that will shape the lives that we want.
In my own life I realized I tend to rush through the negative stuff using optimism and problem solving to focus on changing things that are unpleasant or not working as fast as possible rather than embracing the pain or discomfort and sitting with it for a while. I tend to do this with others as well offering comfort and reassurance to help people move forward out of the dark places that are painful or hard more quickly and easily. This is a common approach for most of us when we have difficult times; to buoy ourselves by looking for the bright side, and moving on. We pride ourselves on our resilience and ability to push on and try to help others do so quickly as well. Most of us are not comfortable with pain, our own or that of another so we recommend a drink, a prescription, stay busy, don’t dwell on it and so on. But I am beginning to think get over it and get on with it is not entirely the best way at least not immediately. I pride myself on being committed to living fully in many ways, so if that is true I must be willing to fully experience it all. Tough to do. But what might I miss as I hurry through? Is it fair that I pick and chose what I embrace fully and leave the hard stuff behind? Isn’t it the hard stuff in life that usually holds the most reward after all? I wonder...
How much time everyday am I escaping even in little ways, not being fully present, not really pursing what is important to me or showing up as my best self?
I want to examine this so that I can make the most of this precious life I have and squeeze out all the stuff that is available to me. As Socrates said, “ An unexamined life is not worth living”.
Just for a day or two become aware of the times you embrace life fully; accepting the challenges, feeling the emotion, giving your all and when you escape by rushing through something, avoiding it completely, or filling time with non meaningful fluff or maybe even checking out with alcohol, drugs or addictions.
How do you endeavor to live? Would you like to be one that embraces life making decisions to be fully engaged out of a loving open perspective or are you willing to let life slide by carefully keeping yourself distracted by escaping emotion that is unpleasant, playing it safe and holding yourself back?
The components are simple; embrace, escape, love, fear but the implications and results define who you are, the life you live, and the example you set. Chose wisely.
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