We’re all looking for the secret to a happy life. Sometimes, we think that means that we need to take a little break for a while. If we could just take a vacation or a go on a retreat to a beautiful spa or isolated cabin and get away from the rigors of our job, the demands of our family, or even just the pressures of normal life, then we’d come back refreshed and ready to take on the world. Right?
Along this same vein, one of my family members recently said to me that he wanted to go to a Buddhist monastery for a while. Implied was that he would be a changed person when he came back. But here’s the thing: all that stuff that he wants to leave behind – the work, the pressure, the rude people he encounters– that will all still be there when he gets back.
Because even if you did go to a magical monastery, a Shangri La for your emotions, when you came back, you’d still be right in the middle of your old life. And would you have learned, during that brief stay, to be able to weather any storm, take any criticism, deal with any tantrum, argument, or natural human emotion? Probably not.
In actuality, his Buddhist monastery isn’t in Tibet. It’s in the bar where he works. It’s in the people that he meets on the elevator. It’s in the relationships he has with others, all day, every day.
The Work is Always Here
The same is true for the rest of us, too. The secret to happiness is not on some far off mountain top, or in studying with the shamans of Mongolia (though I still want to do that!), it’s right here, in the day to day. It’s in the ways that we handle the job that we don’t like, it’s in the deadlines that seem oppressive, it’s in the mother/father/spouse/child/inlaw/friend/coworker/boss/client/neighbor relationships that we have. That’s where our true work lies.
We may not want that to be true. We may still want to escape, and we may have even found ways to do that in our daily lives (like alcohol, drugs, shopping, and food) but beneath all of those numbing mechanisms, we know that our real work lies in being sane, present, and thankful in each moment, even when shit seems out of control.
It’s just that it always seems so hard, right? Yesterday, my seven year old, Jack, asked me to fill up water balloons for him, when all that I wanted to do in that moment was sit on my butt and read a book. And then he wanted to learn how to tie the water balloons off by himself , and by the seventh balloon, I was totally running out of patience and said, “Here, just let me do it.” To which Jack said, “Why are you getting so frustrated?”
The Secret of the Pause:
How much differently things would have turned out if I’d taken a moment before I’d spoken to look at my own emotions. Before I let my thoughts turn into angry words, I could have made use of a very powerful tool. (And if I could do this every time…the Newman household would be a lot sunnier!)
The tool is called the Pause. It’s that moment before the angry words come out, the moment before we allow our angry/sad/frustrated/annoyed thoughts to continue on in the way that they were going. The Pause is where we can hear the thought and realize that we don’t have to go along with it, no matter what it is.
The Pause allows us to check in with ourselves, to give clarity to the moment for what it is, accepting whatever feeling is coming up and then letting it go. Just simply noticing and bringing awareness to the situation is sometimes all that we need. For instance, if I’d taken a moment to notice and acknowledge my own emotions with Jack, I could have paused and then said something like “Jack, I’d really like to teach this to you. But right now, would it be okay if I just tied the balloons off and then we can work on tying a few more together a little bit later tonight?”
Sometimes, we might have to walk away (if possible) from the situation in order to regain our sense of clarity and neutrality. A friend of mine sends love to the other person in her mind. Some people offer gratitude to the situation, no matter what it is. (“Thank you for this and for all that it’s teaching me.”) Any of these seem to work, as long as we are noticing our own emotion and not allowing it to rule our speech.
“But Erin”, you might say, “you just don’t understand this other person or this situation that I’m in. How can I pause when they’re always driving me crazy with their requests, always messing things up that I just explained, always rude/angry/annoying/dumb/impossible to work with/demanding, etc. I just don’t understand why they’re always doing the things that they do.”
Only Ever About You
And in those statements lies the work. No matter who is driving you crazy right now, or even why, it doesn’t really matter. Here’s the hard part, the thing that I struggle with frequently, too: it is never, ever, ever about the other person. As I wrote about in another blog, it is only ever about you and your behavior. Only ever about you being able to notice your own emotion (in the pause) and then react from that better place.
What’s really cool about this, though, is that when you start to be truly present in each moment, when you’re able to use the pause before speaking, then you won’t have as much need for a retreat in the mountains because you’ll be more at peace with your “real” life – the life you were meant to be living. You can be happier, no matter what’s going on around you. And if you do go to some fabulous place, you’ll be able to enjoy the seitan and sautéed sunflowers that much more.
