An Inside Job

Who is your enemy? Your scapegoat? Who (or what) do you blame when all doesn’t go as planned?  Is it your mother? Your father? Your spouse or kids? Your job or boss?  How about your God? Is he or she to blame for all that is not well in your world? Is it always someone or something else making you angry, tired, fat, sick, unhappy or unfulfilled?

We’ve all been there.  Ranting and raving at this or that that’s wreaking havoc in our lives.  Ticked off at the lack of balance and simply mad at the world. It may seem overly simplistic but what if, when we are in this blaming, frustrated, disheartened frame of mind, we just STOP. Stop for a moment. Stop the ranting. Stop the raving. And just breathe. Try this. Close your eyes. Focus on your breath – in and out. Be in the moment for as long as you can (even a minute or two of this can be centering).  Keep breathing . . . And then ask yourself: What do I need that I can give myself right now?  And then get ready to really listen (and honor your intuition’s request!).

Maybe it’s a walk outside. Or a healthy snack (Honeycrisp apple with organic peanut butter - yum!). Or listening to some soul-centering music. Maybe it’s a nap to recharge.  Calling a friend may be just what the doctor ordered. Or pulling a paper and pen out to write stream of consciousness for 15 minutes (a great parking lot for all the junk swirling around in our heads on any given day!). Perhaps it’s reading a book of daily affirmations and using those words when we get stuck on our external angst causers. The simple act of a hot bath or shower can literally wash away all kinds of extraneous dust (mental and physical!).

It happens to the best of us: getting lost in the busy distraction of looking outside of ourselves for answers we inherently possess . . . One of my favorite Ralph Waldo Emerson quotes I always return to echoes this truth: “That which we are searching for is what we’re searching with”. It’s inside of us – any answer, any key, any solution we have the courage within us to bravely forge.  We are invited daily to delve deep and to answer our own call. Because the answers are within: IF we stop and listen – really listen – and allow ourselves to lead.

The catch is this: if we don’t listen, trust ourselves, seek for ourselves the answers which only we can source, then we get to keep using the same old sad excuses and lines for our life’s overcast gloom.

“If only my boss wasn't such a control freak, I’d be much effective in my job.” 

“If only he would just know what I need, I’d be a lot more fulfilled in this relationship.”

“If only God had given me thinner thighs, I'd be able to embrace this one and only body of mine.”

“If only my kids didn’t drive me so crazy, I wouldn’t need three glasses of wine to blur the edges . . .”  

We’ve all done this at one point or another. Because it’s so much easier to make “it” about something outside ourselves rather than take a look at ourselves. It always boils back down to being about us. Given that truth, we need to take the bull by the horns and figure out what it is we need. Quit defining our reality by things outside of ourselves and go within. And if we can’t change our circumstances, we need to change our perspective. Because our happiness depends on it.

All of life is trying to wake each and every one of us up to our spiritual magnificence. Our reason for being. Maybe we’re not ready to embrace it and looking outside still seems easier than dealing with what’s within . . . So be it. But at some point, we’ll have to own it. Or it will eat us alive. Be it through addiction, loneliness, or any other emotional black hole of need we desperately try to fill from the outside in.

The deal is this: filling up from the outside in NEVER works. True fulfillment comes from the inside - from becoming quiet and still, figuring out what we really need, and then giving ourselves that (to the best of our ability).  When I’m in that place of not knowing and railing against everything and anything outside myself, there are two sure things that right my equilibrium: a walk outside in the fresh air and putting pen to paper.  Neither is hard or takes a huge amount of time. But it does go back to prioritizing myself in my daily to-do list and being committed to meeting my own needs (because if I don’t, who in the heck will???). For me, those two things feed my internal balance so I can adequately navigate all those external would-be potholes. Potholes that could wreck a day.  A week. Or even a life . . . if I let them.

We will be better for the world, and the world better for us, when we can quit blaming everything outside of us and dig deeper. And deeper still. Because happiness is an inside job made tangible by how we look at and define those hard parts in our own world and lives, how we fill in our own missing pieces.  How we meet our own needs.

Facing down our so-called enemies and scapegoats isn't easy. And it's probably not as much fun, as say, a root canal. But it is necessary.  And the pay-off is huge.

Ours to be had, true FULL-lfillment lives there.