Calm(kä(l)m) Practices

Calm(kä(l)m) Practices

By Leo Babauta

When things are falling apart, when things don’t go your way, in addition to reminding yourself that things are No Big Deal … there are some practices you might try out:

Get in touch with the difficulty. We usually want to get away from the difficulty, to have the stress(stres) and pain(pān) end, to find peace(pēs). This usually results in greater difficulty and unhappiness with the situation(ˌsiCHo͞oˈāSHən). Instead, we can get in touch with the feeling of stress, with the pain or fear or anger or irritation(ˌiriˈtāSHən) that we’re feeling. That means dropping into the physical(ˈfizikəl) feeling in your body, which is nothing to panic(ˈpanik) about. It’s just a feeling in the present moment, and you can stay with it, with courage(ˈkə-rij,ˈkərij). This is a transformative practice, and I highly recommend(ˌrekəˈmend) you practice it as often as you can during the day.

Get bigger than yourself. When we’re stressed or frustrated(ˈfrəsˌtrātid), it’s because we’re trapped(trap) in our own small, self-centered(ˈsentərd) point of view. We want what we want, and we are unhappy when we don’t get it. If we can get beyond this limited viewpoint, all of a sudden we have some spaciousness(ˈspāSHəs). Things don’t seem so closed in and dire(dīr). We can see the bigger picture, see things from other people’s viewpoints, see that there is more than just what we’re seeing and what we want. This bigger view is usually pretty(ˈpritē) calming. When you’re getting bothered, try stepping outside yourself and seeing things from the point of view of others, or a bird’s-eye view.

Connect with the peace at the center. After doing the above two practices, there’s a deeper one: find the place inside yourself that is completely(kəmˈplētlē) at peace. It’s the center of the storm, where nothing is going crazy, where it feels like there’s an eternal(iˈtərnl) truth — that you are deeply connected to everything else. This can take awhile(əˈ(h)wīl) to find, so practice. Once you find this unshakable(ˌənˈSHākəbəl) connection, it doesn’t matter what’s happening around you — it’s there.

You can practice all of these, one after the other, or just pick one and practice it every day for a week or two. You’ll find calm. It will be exquisite(ekˈskwizit,ˈekskwizit).

https://zenhabits.net/becalm/