Focus leads your eyes and your thoughts

I had an extraordinary experience recently.  I woke up one morning feeling quite miserable.  Misery is the only way I can describe it ( depression is very different).  I was puzzled.  There was nothing, so far as I could see, to be miserable about.  I found myself viewing incidents in my life, sort of scanning my entire life, seeking a moment of joy that I might be able to latch onto and carry into my present moment – looking for something to replace my misery.  Every moment of my life was viewed through the same filter. As far as I could see or feel anything, every single moment of my life was utterly devoid of any joy. There was nothing easy and there was certainly no fun!

I stayed with this feeling, allowing it to just be there without any analysis, although I remained very confused by it.

Later in the day, I walked over to the cabin where I work, and as I walked by the flow form in the garden, in the space of a heartbeat, everything changed.  From feeling so miserable, I suddenly felt ecstatically happy.  I replayed the same life events from earlier in the day – now I was really happy through all of them!  Misery had become joy.  Nothing else had changed.

I was surprised.  It was true, then, that it didn’t matter what happened in my outside world because all that joy ( or misery) was inside me all the time, just waiting to be experienced.

Something changed – it shifted.

This happens a lot in AT work.  There is something you don’t like…but if you allow it to simply be there, without judgement or emotional reaction, then suddenly there is a change to something else, something different.  If you don’t like that either, then repeat the process.  Play with it.

Paying attention, giving time and energy to something you don’t like, only encourages it to persist.  If you don’t like it, don’t feed it – no focus, thought time, emotional reaction.  Deprived of nourishment, it will lose its power over you, and often, it will completely disappear.

In 2016, we have seen many deaths reported in the media.  Many of us have also been personally touched by the deaths of friends, family, people who have touched our lives for however brief a moment.  What I have seen in those close to me has been their incredible moment by moment pure joy in the actual living of life.  I have learned a lot from their courage, tenacity and sheer love of life.  Those who are leaving life show us what it is to live.

We don’t live in a perfect world and it never will be perfect – it’s just not designed that way.  But we can change our focus on life to make our own personal world much easier, safer and more fun.  As Leonard Cohen wrote:

There is a Crack in Everything

That’s how the Light gets in.

So, as we all begin 2017, a year which beckons us to embrace a new view of our life, focus on what you like and let your light flicker through any cracks there may be.  Your focus on fun and joy, or at best away from what you do not like, will encourage even more light to come through. May 2017 give you new beginnings!

Susan