From Elaina: I’ve been reading What’s in the Way is the Way by Mary O’Malley. One of the topics that struck me in this book is about how impermanent each moment is. Life spoiler alert here…there is only one way out. The impermanence isn’t just our lives, our friends and family, but in actuality, every moment. Every joy, every sorry, every pain is fleeting.
We are so resistant to the thought of pain that we obsess over it. We tend to overthink it before it even arrives. Think about when your stomach is upset. We sit there and beg to not throw up. We cry. Get anxious about it. Eventually, there is no holding it back and out everything comes. Immediately we feel better. We do that about so many of our discomforts and pains. What if we could lean into them? What if we recognized that the pain will not last? We could avoid all the aggravation we have over anticipated pain. Pain will ebb and flow in our lives. Resisting it will not allow us to avoid it.
Now, think about a joyful time in your life. Everything was going great! How many of us try to hold onto it so tightly that we miss being in the moment with it? I know I’ve had times that I was so consumed that the joy would be fleeting, that I didn’t fully bask in it.
Every moment we have, good and bad, is here for but a moment. Let’s get rid of our illusion of “controlling” the moment. Let’s sit with it and experience what it’s trying to teach us.
Get More Happy 