Don't pick up the mobile phone... and open to your experience.
17/02/14 Focusing
It is hard not to reach for my mobile when I feel that inner urge.... “must check my emails, must look at such and such”. In our pockets we have whole worlds awaiting our interest. Even before smart phones, I used to do this and the phones had made it all the more compelling. In all honesty I love my gadgets and to some part of me it is like I am living in the future of my childhood....
And yet something is amiss.
I notice something else, that whenever I feel uncomfortable I so often reach for the phone. Like many of us do. So when I saw this clip from an interview with us comedian Louis CK, I was struck by his honesty and insight into this...
Louis C.K. Hates Cell Phones
He really points to an important point. Can we actually bear to have our experience in a more direct way? Can we allow in the feelings we have been keeping at bay all day or week... Or longer?
It is interesting that he says after he cried that happiness came, it's like allowing the suffering to be met and felt, allowed the happiness or joy. Isn't it like that? But so often I just reach for the phone.
It might not be a phone for you. It might be a book, or the computer or food. It does not matter. And just because we have a phone or read books or eat food, it does not mean we are running away. It's all about what is driving us. Who is it in us making the hand reach for the phone? And what is our relationship to it?
Well, I imagine there is something in us doing that, and in all likelihood it does not want us to experience something... For a reason to be respected. Or it wants something for me, and again it needs respect.
So, the next time I feel that discomfort and reach for the phone, I'll be curious and see who is there beneath the surface. Maybe I'll cry, who knows? but for sure it will take me closer to what is going on.
And yet something is amiss.
I notice something else, that whenever I feel uncomfortable I so often reach for the phone. Like many of us do. So when I saw this clip from an interview with us comedian Louis CK, I was struck by his honesty and insight into this...
Louis C.K. Hates Cell Phones
He really points to an important point. Can we actually bear to have our experience in a more direct way? Can we allow in the feelings we have been keeping at bay all day or week... Or longer?
It is interesting that he says after he cried that happiness came, it's like allowing the suffering to be met and felt, allowed the happiness or joy. Isn't it like that? But so often I just reach for the phone.
It might not be a phone for you. It might be a book, or the computer or food. It does not matter. And just because we have a phone or read books or eat food, it does not mean we are running away. It's all about what is driving us. Who is it in us making the hand reach for the phone? And what is our relationship to it?
Well, I imagine there is something in us doing that, and in all likelihood it does not want us to experience something... For a reason to be respected. Or it wants something for me, and again it needs respect.
So, the next time I feel that discomfort and reach for the phone, I'll be curious and see who is there beneath the surface. Maybe I'll cry, who knows? but for sure it will take me closer to what is going on.
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