Day 76 of 365 - Settling
The word 'settle' came up this morning in one of my daily inspirational messages which I receive. It is a word, which in its different forms has a variety of meanings. In this morning's message, it referred to settling down one's nervous system.
I think we can all relate, especially during busy times, such as the holiday season, to the need to settle down from our ramped up activities. It's also an expression, often hollered, at rambunctious children, to 'settle down!', which is ironic because yelling is not settling.
But today, I feel like exploring settling a bit more because it is a word which can push buttons for me. I think it's interesting when things come into our awareness in unexpected ways to help us learn something about ourselves, or bring more clarity to a situation.
It is common parlance in the life coaching, self-help and therapy fields to ask us to examine what we are 'settling for' in different areas of our lives. This can certainly be a very valuable exercise, and to be fair to coaches and therapists, is to be expected since we are coming to them to help us figure out something. Sometimes we need a fire lit under us to create movement in a stuck area.
My personal emotional reaction to that phrase is a gut level anxiety or fear with me telling myself something like this. "Your life will never change, get better, be what you want it to be, unless you make immediate drastic changes, and if you don't you are a failure!" Thank you, negative self-talk... That's an extreme story I tell myself when faced with what feels like a threat to my security.
Author Dawna Markova describes that when we are at a new threshold in life we approach the unknown with stories. She calls the gloom and doom stories rut stories because they confirm we are as we have always been. She calls the more optimistic stories river stories, because they carry us toward new possibilities.
Another author and artist I love, known as SARK, frequently talks about living in the 'messy middle'. This is a place which is neither one extreme nor the other, and where we naturally want to be. We are conditioned by our culture to live in extremes and it becomes a habit to remain there. The middle way allows for either/or and both in shades of gray. And life truly is mostly like that, isn't it? We can be both scared about change and excited at the same time.
Since we are coming up to the end of the year and I am also, by age, moving officially next year into my senior stage of life, I've been pondering more about both how my life has unfolded so far and what I might expect of myself in the coming years. I expect this is something I will continue exploring in future posts.
Given the time of year, I can't resist quoting today from Clement Moore's story as I close. "And mama in her kerchief, and I, in my cap, had just settled down for a long winter's nap." That's a comforting kind of settling, and I think I will go and have my 'meditation nap' now. That can bring clarity too and does settle the nervous system.
I think we can all relate, especially during busy times, such as the holiday season, to the need to settle down from our ramped up activities. It's also an expression, often hollered, at rambunctious children, to 'settle down!', which is ironic because yelling is not settling.
But today, I feel like exploring settling a bit more because it is a word which can push buttons for me. I think it's interesting when things come into our awareness in unexpected ways to help us learn something about ourselves, or bring more clarity to a situation.
It is common parlance in the life coaching, self-help and therapy fields to ask us to examine what we are 'settling for' in different areas of our lives. This can certainly be a very valuable exercise, and to be fair to coaches and therapists, is to be expected since we are coming to them to help us figure out something. Sometimes we need a fire lit under us to create movement in a stuck area.
My personal emotional reaction to that phrase is a gut level anxiety or fear with me telling myself something like this. "Your life will never change, get better, be what you want it to be, unless you make immediate drastic changes, and if you don't you are a failure!" Thank you, negative self-talk... That's an extreme story I tell myself when faced with what feels like a threat to my security.
Author Dawna Markova describes that when we are at a new threshold in life we approach the unknown with stories. She calls the gloom and doom stories rut stories because they confirm we are as we have always been. She calls the more optimistic stories river stories, because they carry us toward new possibilities.
Another author and artist I love, known as SARK, frequently talks about living in the 'messy middle'. This is a place which is neither one extreme nor the other, and where we naturally want to be. We are conditioned by our culture to live in extremes and it becomes a habit to remain there. The middle way allows for either/or and both in shades of gray. And life truly is mostly like that, isn't it? We can be both scared about change and excited at the same time.
Since we are coming up to the end of the year and I am also, by age, moving officially next year into my senior stage of life, I've been pondering more about both how my life has unfolded so far and what I might expect of myself in the coming years. I expect this is something I will continue exploring in future posts.
Given the time of year, I can't resist quoting today from Clement Moore's story as I close. "And mama in her kerchief, and I, in my cap, had just settled down for a long winter's nap." That's a comforting kind of settling, and I think I will go and have my 'meditation nap' now. That can bring clarity too and does settle the nervous system.
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