Hello and welcome back!
If you’ve not done so already, please do go back and read the Part One of this post here.
It’s really important to understand where we are and WHY we are where we are, if we’re going to understand why creating a personal daily practice is so important and beneficial for us to do.
Now let’s keep exploring why living from a place of reactivity and disconnection is harming us, and then we can explore what it looks like to create a practice of connection that really DOES help us feel better and be better in the world.
Participating In The Harm
With all of that being said, I hope you can now see why it’s SO vital that we all take checking out of the noise, checking out of the information overwhelm, checking out of the perpetual narrative that we’re failing and need to be improving, seriously.
We aren’t going to find a place of peace if we continue to be plugged in at all times to the world around us and all the information that’s being used to keep us scared and reacting.
We have to start to take our power back, and the way we’re going to do that is by taking our ATTENTION back.
Now, this is not a call to check out of watching the news or to become totally unaware of what’s going on in the world.
This is not a call to bury your head in the sand to protect yourself from negativity in order to try to feel better.
Many so-called spiritual leaders have suggested that this is what we need to be doing - and while I can totally empathize with that instinct to just pull away and run away - this isn’t the solution that’s going to lead us where we want to go.
Because in the long run, we need a society of people who ARE informed to the degrees that are necessary for us to be calling for better systems, for powers to do better and for those who control the resources to be held to account when it comes to their actions and the impact those actions have on us - the actual population.
We need to be politically active, we need to be active in our communities and we need to see where our power to shift things lies - and this requires that we stay connected and informed in the ways that are actually HELPFUL.
This requires that we move into a state of RESPONSE and clear sight, that we move into a state of being able to ground into LONG TERM thinking and reasoning and that we get out of that constant spiral of self hate and rejection that triggers us into denial of reality and into participation with the systems of distraction.
You see, for most of us the MAIN power we have to create a better world, is to check OUT of the systems of over consumption and production.
The ROOT of so much of the chaos that is happening on our planet - the wars, the lack of equal distribution of resources, crime rates, pollution, environmental destruction and the feelings that we are alone and have no support systems can be found in our systems of hyper consumption and production that are perpetually putting us in a state of harm.
In order for the power structures to keep thriving, they need US the people to keep participating in buying things we don’t need, producing things that aren’t helpful, staying self obsessed so that we don’t pay attention to our communities and staying in a state of constantly fearing one another so that we don’t have communities to rely upon.
THAT’S how all this harm is being done. That’s a big part of why the world is so chaotic.
Those in power are profiting off of the masses over working, over consuming and fearing one another.
When we see this for what it is, it’s really difficult to see anything else.
When we can slow down and realize that THIS is what’s happening - that those who are struggling the most are struggling the most because their struggle is literally REQUIRED for those at the top of our systems to maintain their power - and when we realize that the more we consume what we don’t need, the more we produce what’s not helpful and the more we fixate on ourselves where community care is actually the answer the more we perpetuate this - we can start to understand why slowing down, connecting in, doing our inner work and then allowing ourselves to move from a different place is SO vital.
In order to create a new world, we need to reconnect with our humanity, and a huge part of this is going to be about connecting to a kind of spirituality that actually sustains us as well as a spirituality that grounds us in the world in a way that allows us to create positive change.
Why A Daily Practice Matters
As with anything in life, we need to understand that shifting how we see ourselves, shifting how we see the world, deprogramming ourselves from the messages of ‘not enough’ that are constant in our culture, working our way out of the perpetual fear and shame that our culture has us in and becoming people who not only feel more grounded in ourselves but who can BE more grounded out in the world is going to take practice.
There’s no ‘one way’ to do this, and there’s no quick way.
Again, the systems we are in are deeply pervasive and they are interwoven into pretty much every aspect of society and how we are trained to think, act, speak, feel and move.
We are conditioned to be in a state where we aren’t connected to our bodies or where we are constantly trying to fix, change and control them.
We are conditioned to be in a place where we ignore our emotions or write them off as problems to be fixed - things that are getting in the way of us being happy or being productive in the ways we need to be productive.
We are trained to be disconnected from our felt sensations - to override our feelings of discomfort, pain and recoil any time those feelings seem to contradict what we ‘should’ be doing, we’re trained to seek momentary pleasure and stimulation vs. long term pleasure and actual fulfillment and we’re trained to seek feeling comfort in the fact that we are succeeding or ‘fitting in’ vs. seeking these desired states in true self expression.
Most importantly, we are trained to see one another as a threat. We are trained to see people who are different from us as being wrong, bad, shameful or otherwise threatening to our safety, security and way of life. We are trained to see our communities as disposable and optional - with a deep bend towards hyper-individualism and this idea that we should all be thriving in our nuclear families or on our own.
All of this creates massive issues.
All of this dehumanization makes us feel insecure, makes us feel lost, makes us feel fragmented and causes us to again, RELY upon the systems that are causing us the most harm.
It makes us turn to self help and self improvement when really what we need is community connection. It makes us seek self help and self improvement when really what we need is to take a step back from over doing and over producing. It makes us consume things we don’t need to numb the pain we’re in. It makes us strive to do and be more as a way of feeling empowered.
It drives us directly in the WRONG direction most of the time - because again we’re moving from reactivity and disconnection vs from true wisdom, awareness and intelligence.
It pushes us to be in a state of constant distraction and RUSH and THIS is really, really harming us.
When we choose to make a daily practice out of slowing down and connecting to something deeper, we really are going to shift all of this.
Not overnight.
Not right away.
It’s not going to look or feel profound right out of the gate and in fact it may even feel really uncomfortable and like a waste of time.
Our systems are likely so used to being over-stimulated and we’re so used to reaching for all the noise to distract and numb us as well as to give us a feeling of being empowered and aware - that slowing down is likely going to feel wrong, unsafe, uncomfortable and agitating for a while.
This is part of the reason why so few people do it - our bodies are, in a way, addicted to the constant drama and trauma of our systems. We’re afraid of missing out and of being still because it brings up SO much when we slow down and connect in.
Which is part of the reason why doing this work is so important - we NEED to be taking time to reconnect to our feelings, to notice our feelings, to be in our bodies and to learn how to be centered so that we stop being so easily pulled, distracted and bated by the perpetual incoming of stimulation from the world.
This decision to slow down and tune in WILL feel off at first, and it WILL lead to a lot of discomfort and unfamiliar territory - and that’s ok. I promise you that when you stick with it, when you do it consistently, when you make time for this over time, it WILL start to feel good and it WILL start to make you more grounded in your life in general.
As cliche as this sounds, slowing down is the key to the change we need to see on the planet and it’s the key that most of us are missing in terms of figuring out how to make our own individual lives better.
When you choose to slow down, you’re going to start to come into contact with your humanity, and then you’re going to start to come into contact with something greater than yourself - slowly - and this is going to be how you take yourself out of the perpetual drama and into a totally new way of being.
It will be work and it will be uncomfortable - but it will also SHOW you, through time, exactly WHY doing this matters - it will change your experience of life in ways that this article can’t begin to explain - and that’s the point. You won’t need an explanation, because you’ll have an experience.
The world NEEDS you to slow down, to check out and get grounded - and that’s why daily practice is KEY.
Developing Your Own Daily Practice
So with all of that, I want you to know that establishing a daily routine that helps you to connect to something greater than the noise out there, that helps you disengage from what you need and helps to move you out of reactivity and into intelligent response doesn’t have to be complicated.
You don’t have to get up at 4 am every day for a 2 hour meditation or go to the jungle and take plant medicines.
You don’t need to spend any money, you don’t need to buy a new journal or a new meditation chair (unless you want to!)
You don’t need to commit to anything fancy or even change out of your pj's.
All that’s required for this, is that you take some time every day to simply do whatever works for YOU to help you connect with your body, your breath, your feelings.
That helps you start to center on the idea that there is more to life than all the fear, and that you are enough as you are.
That helps you remember that there is GOODNESS in the world and that not everything is negative.
That helps you remember that the people around you are important, that humanity is important and that community connection and care are actually the way forward out of this big mess we’re in.
This can literally look like taking 10 minutes to pay attention to your breath and body before you get out of your bed.
This can look like putting on a 5 minute meditation on youtube to follow along with.
This can look like doing an orientation exercise that helps ground you into reality every night before you go to bed.
This can look like taking 10 minutes to journal about your thoughts and feelings during your lunch-break.
This can look like going outside and putting your feet on the earth.
This can look like just sitting and staring out the window, allowing yourself to SENSE instead of THINK.
This can look like practicing coming into your OBSERVER self and just watching your thoughts, feelings and emotions vs. reacting or responding to them.
This can look like doing a gentle stretch before you eat your dinner.
This can look like reading a few passages from a book that inspires you or makes you feel centered and connected to something greater than yourself.
This is all it takes.
Again, I want you to know just how powerful and profound doing these things on a daily basis can be - but I can’t tell you that.
You’re going to have to practice it to find out for yourself.
Becoming the kind of person who can feel good in this life and who can create positive change STARTS with THIS work.
This may sound really simple and really ineffective when we compare it to the massive issues we face on this planet today.
But the truth is, this is where it all starts.
THIS is where you’re going to gain the power to know what you need to do in your life to make your own world better and the world around you better.
THIS slowing down, taking yourself back from the noise and connecting to your humanity WILL change the course of your life.
If you let it.
But you have to let it - by practicing with consistency and patience.
Don’t take my word for it.
Give it a try for yourself.
Choose something you can stick to for 6 weeks, and see what happens.
Give it this amount of time.
I promise that by the end of the 6 weeks, you will notice a change that will be just enough to keep you on the path.
A path that will eventually shift, morph and transform - so don’t worry about what it looks like.
Just start.
10 minutes a day of whatever works for you.
Six weeks.
Let this be an invitation into the unknown that will open you up to something very profound and important.
<3
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