Do you run your life or does your life run you?

Before the Storm

Have you ever thought about monitoring yourself for let’s say 24 hours and see how you process the way you feel? Or if you actually do process what you really feel? I had this epiphany one morning while I was greeting my colleagues in the elevator while walking into my office. I was feeling awful, a bit of physical pain combined with sadness, the sadness you get in one of these days. But I didn’t say anything about it to none of the people surrounding me even though some of them are people I hang out with. I walked down the corridor, shielding myself with the confident walk, the neutral-expressive face as if I didn’t have anything in my mind but to start the day; inside me I was shattered.

Then strangely enough my mother who lives in another town calls me. I say strangely enough because she never calls in that time of the day. She heard my flat voice on the phone and said: “What’s wrong honey?” The moment I heard this phrase, it’s as if the gates of my soul were flooded and all of a sudden I started to tell her everything that bothered me, how I truly feel, how sad I was, how I didn’t have the desire to leave the bed that day, how much anger do certain people make me feel and on and on and on. She heard me patiently and at the end of my perpetual monologue, she said “Do you feel better now?”

I was. Way better. It was as if I had removed a huge block of concrete from within me. I could even perceive the environment around me better. I was more attentive to things around, colors and smells and vibrations. It felt like I had a paralysis and now I could move again. This hit me so much I decided to “monitor’’ myself for a couple of days. I decided to be mindful about things that bother me and I leave them pass unnoticed. Or feelings I do have but tend to avoid accepting them, because then I would have to deal with them. I also decided to search for all these emotional shelters I use to hide when I am feeling negative.

The Awakening

So, the next morning I didn’t leave the house in this robotic way of “bag, keys, elevator, car, parking, office” but I was mindful about all the surroundings. What I noticed was:

1. The moment I should exit the house in the morning is the most frustrating thing since I am already late and not ready yet. I am literally striving to get out and start the day– it turns out I have accepted this modus operandi and every morning I am striving without me noticing – but the stress puts a layer of concrete within me;
2. The route I have chosen to go to work seems to be the shortest one, but meanwhile traffic is terrible there, drivers are crazy and by the time I have arrived in the office I am already burned out; I have also accepted that and went through that route every day even if it was damaging my soul;
3. The moment I got in the office, I was already frustrated and troubled inside. And meanwhile I was swallowing these feelings and try to work it out like everything is fine, and hiding myself behind being “busy”

I mentioned only 3 cases, but I can make a list of 15 if I want to; tiny aspects of our everyday life with are not right but we accept them because we’re used to them now. I understood that the block of concrete within me was built in front of my eyes but I was not seeing it as I was in autopilot mode. I understood that my days looked like Groundhog Day not because things are not going my way but because I chose so; I had become comfortable running in maze.

It is painful, being run by an automatic self. Certainly, it is a human feature to automatize and simplify things (hence, not paying attention) so that we don’t spend cognitive capacity in every single task. But times and again we should pause and reflect; we will be amazed by the place we will find ourselves to. The Italians have a fantastic saying “Dolce far’ niente” which means “the sweet thing of doing nothing”. While we are in this modern hype of being extremely “busy” looks like the proper way of life, pausing, doing nothing, reflecting and enjoying simple pleasure of life will give us the power to live an intentional, examined life; it will give us the ability to make life happen according to our nature of mind and soul and not let life happen to us as a random combination of the general public mind. Only by being intentional and mindful we will get our power back. As Socrates very well put it:

The unexamined life is not worth living

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Disclaimer: All images used in the article are taken from www.pixabay.com