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In this one-minute video, Phillip Moffitt gives a very clear explanation of what mindfulness is and how you will benefit from it.
Phillip refers to three things you can do to bring more clarity into your life and diminish the amount of suffering you experience. He explores these three things in the following videos:
– The Difference Between Pressure and Stress
– Experience vs. Interpretation
– Discovering the Clarity of a Responsive Mind
You can find instructions for starting a mindfulness meditation practice here.
A talk by Phillip Moffitt.
For further study, read Phillip Moffitt’s article on this topic “Don’t Blame the Messenger.”
Why do some people suffer from debilitating symptoms of stress while others who are under equal or greater pressure don’t? This is a question I’ve deliberated for the past 25 years as I’ve listened to countless meditation students tell me about the difficulties in their lives. I’ve learned consequently that there is a distinction between the pressure someone experiences due to the conditions in their life and stress, which is their mind’s reaction to that pressure. Although constant pressure can lead to physical and mental fatigue and even strain, stress, which is the result of anxiety and fear, is far more likely to endanger your physical and mental health. I’ve also observed that many people conflate pressure and stress; they automatically interpret any feeling of strong pressure as being inherently stressful. But this is a misperception. Understanding the difference between pressure and stress can create a greater sense of ease and well-being in your life.
Pressure is a natural response to the “weight” or “heaviness” of the demands in your life, which you experience in your body, particularly your nervous system. The feeling of pressure starts in the brain as it contemplates your situation; the brain then sends signals about whatever is happening to you to your autonomic nervous system, which manifest as body sensations, thoughts, and images in your mind. Pressure is like an internal messenger that is telling you, “Pay attention.” You experience the message as a demand; it is this demand that constitutes the felt sense of pressure in the body and mind.
Stress is a very different phenomenon. It is your mind’s fearful, anxious, and immediate reaction to the demands that you face. You may be reacting to demands that you are facing at this moment or ones that you anticipate will happen in the future. You may even be reacting to pressure you felt in the past that was so traumatizing that the memory of it triggers feelings of stress in the present. You may also be inflating how truly fearful the situation is or completely misperceiving what’s going on.
The reason stress can be harmful is because it provokes an exaggerated and inappropriate “fight or flight response.” Although the fight or flight response is designed to help us cope with threatening situations, it isn’t intended to be turned on for long periods of time. When it is, the flood of neurochemicals that are released in the process damage the heart, the glands, and the nervous system. Also, when we’re stressed, we tend to take up unhealthy habits in order to combat the stress, such as overeating or abusing alcohol or drugs.
Don’t get me wrong — too much pressure for too long a time period can also be debilitating and harmful, however your body and mind are built to cope with sustained pressure and to recover when the pressure is over. But when you are under stress for a long period of time, you are in danger of becoming imbalanced or sick. Your body and mind can handle periodic or brief episodes of stress but they are not equipped to cope with constant stress and the damage it causes.
If you tend to interpret many situations in which you feel pressure as being stressful, then you are in danger of getting caught in a vicious cycle of constantly feeling stressed. The first step in overcoming this reflexive reaction is to ask yourself, “Is this really stressful or am I simply feeling a lot of pressure?” You find the answer by assessing the particulars of the situation, clarifying what action is called for (while being realistic about what you are capable of doing), and accepting that there are times in life when you will feel pressure and the outcome is uncertain. (This is called clear comprehension in the Buddhist practice of mindfulness.) If it truly is a stressful situation and you are in danger or are unable to function, then you need to take whatever steps are necessary to assure your safety.
The second step is to be mindful of whether you are feeling stressed simply because you are under pressure. If so, you can remedy this in several ways:
The third step is to notice if a feeling of inadequacy, ambivalence, or ambiguity is causing your stress reaction. If so, explore these feelings — they are your teachers as well as your motivation.
The fourth step is to notice if you have a “story” or an identity of being stressed out and ask yourself, “In what way does feeling stressed all the time serve me? If I weren’t so stressed, what would I be feeling? What would I be dealing with?”
If you truly apply yourself to this mindful exploration of pressure and stress in your life, you will become much more mindful of what you are actually feeling. Moreover, once you have clarity regarding the distinction between pressure and stress, you may well discover that you have an increased capacity for handling pressure and are more skillful in dealing with it. You also become more adept at recognizing stress and seeing its destructive nature. In turn, you become more careful about putting yourself in stressful situations and are more likely to seek help in getting out of them.
To view a video of Phillip speaking on this topic, click here.
Some years ago people used to wear a T-shirt printed with the slogan, “Life is difficult, and then you die.” I once asked a group of people at a yoga retreat what they thought when they read those words. One person found it funny; a way to laugh at the hard truth of life rather than be overwhelmed by it. Another read it as justification for taking what pleasure you could out of life, while still another saw it as cynical and nihilistic, an excuse to give up. Someone who was active in a spiritual group said it was a call to action much like the Buddha’s teaching of suffering contained in the Four Noble Truths.
I asked for their thoughts because I wanted to see if anyone would say it wasn’t true, which no one did. My own experience was that the slogan is composed of a half-truth and also a full truth, but one that obscures rather than clarifies. The half truth is that indeed “life is difficult,” but it is not just difficult, it is also incredibly wonderful, puzzling, and routine, all in an ever-changing cycle.
“Then we die” is also true, but stating the truth in this manner implies that death is simply a personal failure. To me death is not a failure but rather a necessary part of the life cycle of being incarnate. Imagine if plants didn’t die, or if the note of a piano didn’t fade into oblivion, or if a thought didn’t arise and pass. Life would come to a standstill; it would drown in its own accumulation. Therefore, rather than viewing life and death as separate, I see them as part of one continuous, mysterious experience of redemption and renewal. Spiritual practices provide a means to relate to this experience in its mystery and vastness.
Still, there remained in my mind the all-important issue that the words on the T-shirt implied: If life is difficult and brief, how do we cope? How do we find meaning or happiness? I had already repeatedly explored these questions using different spiritual traditions and later came to devote my life full-time to this inquiry. Though not always finding answers, my explorations slowly led to certain discoveries about what makes life a struggle.
One of these discoveries is the degree to which we make life difficult for ourselves by being violent or violating to the body and the mind in the routine of our daily lives. Through the way in which we schedule our time, push our bodies, and compare and judge ourselves against others, we repeatedly create an inner environment that is filled with violence. If you can understand that this is so, it may have a profound impact on your experience of life being difficult.
Initially, you may not identify some of your daily thoughts and decisions as moments of violence to self, but most likely they are. If someone was hitting you in your stomach, squeezing your neck, or not letting you breathe, you’d quickly call such behavior violent. Yet when these same painful sensory experiences arise in reaction to your own thoughts or actions, you fail to recognize your behavior as violent. In your daily life, have you not repeatedly experienced these bodily sensations or others like them?
Whenever I introduce the topic of violence against self in a Dharma talk, almost everyone squirms. No one wants to hear it. I will directly ask the question: Are you, in an obvious manner or in a series of subtle, covert actions, being violent with yourself? Usually people want to assure me that while they may work too hard at times, stay in an unhealthy relationship, eat too much, or sleep too little, they would not characterize their behavior as violent toward themselves. Yet, person after person, once they’ve closely examined their lives, experiences a moment of self-recognition that at first can be painful and embarrassing. This initial discomfort is often followed by a sense of liberation as new possibilities arise in their imaginations for how to live more peacefully.
Most people perpetrate this violence against self through mistakenly identifying with various thoughts that arise due to impersonal conditions coming together. The body and mind’s well-being are the innocent victims. Each individual has a unique pattern, but the common ground is that you relate to yourself in a manner that results in your life being more emotionally or physically violent than it need be.
You may have limited your understanding of self-violence to physical abuse or other blatant self-destructive behavior that calls for a 12-step program. The word “violence” may sound too harsh to you, but its dictionary meaning is “an exertion of extreme force to cause injury or abuse in the form of distortion or infringement.” The extreme force can be a mental act that then shows up in the body or an act that is done repeatedly to an extreme.
You can think of violence as any highly energetic form of relating to a person, including yourself, that is jarring, turbulent, and distorting. Can you identify any times in the last few days in which you treated yourself in a discordant, abrupt, or distorting manner?
The Trappist monk and spiritual author Thomas Merton once said, “To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything is itself to succumb to the violence of our times.” Obviously Merton wasn’t speaking about pathologically self-destructive behavior. Instead he was drawing our attention to the shadow side of normative, even seemingly positive, culturally approved behavior. He was referring to how we do great violence to ourselves simply in the manner in which we go about arranging our lives.
Gradually I’ve come to realize that violence against oneself is one of the great denials of our time. People are very willing to talk about the violence that the world does to them, but they’re much less willing to own the violence that they do to themselves. Violence against self can most easily be recognized in your experience of the body in daily life. You already know the general health problems that come about because of stress, sleep deprivation, and constant strain. You may not identify them as examples of violence to self, but anytime you make yourself sick or dysfunctional, it is an act of violence for which you need to take responsibility. We all know people who are overworked or have too much stress, which causes problems with the digestive system, heart, or other parts of the body, but who never label their behavior as violence to the self. But is there any description that is more apt?
One of the yamas, or moral restraints, in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra is ahimsa, the practice of nonviolence, and this includes nonviolence toward yourself. Of course, you may well want something in your life so much that you are willing to take a chance of hurting your body by driving it too hard. But usually a conscious, short-term exertion to reach a goal is not what causes violence to self. More often it is a matter of long-term disregard of the signals of imbalance. This disregard comes from repeatedly getting so caught in wanting or fearful mind-states that you’re unable to reflect on your own behavior. You may have a surface-level awareness of the distress you are feeling in your body, but you don’t sincerely respond to the discomfort. In such instances you are in a driven state, controlled by your mind’s imaginary creations rather than your inner values.
Inner development and maturity come from acknowledging to yourself that you are being violent with a human being; the fact that you happen to be the human being who is being hurt does not change the truth of the violence. From a spiritual perspective, it is never right to hurt any human being; including yourself; for selfish reasons or because of sloppy attention to the consequences of your actions. Understanding this is your first step in practicing ahimsa toward yourself.
It is often hard to make the distinction between the mind-states of fear and wanting and your inner values because there is such a strong tendency to identify these mind-states as “you.” But if you observe yourself, you will see that an endless number of mind-states arise each day independent of any intention on your part. The way to freedom from self-violence is to separate from these thoughts by getting to know your mind. This is the underlying purpose of yoga, mindfulness meditation, and selfless service, called karma yoga or seva.
Violence against self through the body can also occur in situations where you are ostensibly taking deliberate care of your body, such as in doing yoga. How many times in a yoga class do you get lost in your willfulness to get a pose right and actually add tension and strain to the body rather than freeing the tissue for movement? It is good to hold a pose longer or to work to get more lift in a backbend, but not if you tense or harden the body as part of the effort. The skin should stay soft even when the muscles underneath a particular area are engaged, the face should stay relaxed, and the breath be free of any holding. Even more importantly, the mind needs to stay soft and gentle; my teacher describes it as the “mind staying cool.” Practicing yoga in this manner can help you learn how to release the tendency toward violence to yourself in the rest of your life.
When you go to a hatha yoga class, if you don’t observe and work with all of the emotions and moods that arise, you are missing half the value. Watch yourself the next time you go to class: Do you get angry at your body? Do you load it with the frustrations of your day and then expect it to do what you want? See for yourself how every strong emotion; from frustration and fear to longing; is felt in the body as tension, pressure, heat, tingling, and so on. In turn, each of these bodily sensations can be released through the yoga, which will free the body from violence and usually quiets the mind. Once you learn to do this in yoga class you can utilize this awareness; at work, driving in traffic, or in difficult home situations; to release the body when the mind starts to feel pressure or anxiety. Moreover, the cultivation of a soft spaciousness of body and mind points to the true intention of yoga, which is liberation from our separateness. It is this fear of separateness that leads to self-violence.
As the Thomas Merton quote points out, if you abuse your time, you are participating in violence against self. This may be in the form of overscheduling to the point that you rob yourself of the experience of being alive. Or it may be in the form of allocating your time in a manner that doesn’t reflect your inner priorities. Both create a distortion or infringement of self through strain and turbulence. When you treat your time as though you are a machine; a doing machine; you are committing violence against the sacredness of life itself. Whenever I do Life Balance work with organizational leaders, I have them make a list of their values and prioritize them, then compare their priorities with how they actually spend their time. The disparity is usually shocking.
Another abuse of time that disturbs your well-being occurs if you succumb to the modern-day compulsion to avoid boredom at all costs. In our stimulation-based culture, there is near hysteria around constantly seeking fulfillment through activity, which leaves no time for the quietness of simply being present with yourself. Do you allow yourself time each day, or even weekly, to exist without an external purpose and without even background music or television? Empty time is vital to your well-being, and to deny yourself this nourishment is an act of violence.
You may ask why you continue to abuse your time and your body when you have the option to live more peacefully. Or you may say that you feel as though you have no choice but to be harsh toward yourself because your life situation is such a struggle. Under either circumstance you push the body and strain the mind violently because you are filled with the tension that comes with the feeling that there’s not enough of something in your life, whether it’s money, love, adventure, or confidence.
Feelings of inadequacy, vulnerability, longing, or not having enough are an inevitable part of the human experience. If you, like most people, have not found spiritual freedom, you cannot stop them from arising. But you can stop such feelings from controlling your life by changing how you perceive them. If you refuse to identify with these feelings, disown them as being neither you nor yours, thus seeing them simply as emotional states of mind that come and go, you will discover there is the possibility for some inner harmony even under difficult circumstances.
For instance, let’s assume you cannot change your work schedule, and it seems so overwhelming to you that you regularly get very tense and anxious about it. You can experience the schedule as much less violent by not thinking about it in its entirety except when you are in planning mode. The rest of the time you just do what the plan calls for, concentrating on the task in front of you without adding the thought, “Here I am with all this work and so much more to do this week.”
Said another way, don’t make a panoramic movie out of your difficult schedule such that you are constantly seeing yourself doing all that has to be done, as if it were going to be done all at once. Instead just do what has to be done right now, for that’s all you can do. It may sound like a simple thing to do, but it is very subtle and difficult, yet so liberating!
Another method you can use to cope with overscheduling is to notice each time you experience fear or wanting while thinking about all you have to do. Consciously label these feelings as fear and wanting in your mind and then see for yourself that they originate as impersonal mind-states, the way a storm forms due to weather conditions. The land that receives the storm does not own it, and the storm is not the land; it’s just a storm, which due to its own characteristics can cause damage. So it is with the stormy situations in your life where there is a tendency to both deny and take ownership of fear or wanting. This misperception leads you to believe you should be able to control them, which in turn causes the physical contractions and the mental anguish that constitute violence to self.
In seeking freedom from violence to self, practice noticing over and over again that you are constantly, and usually unconsciously, wanting things to be different than the way they are. You become a little dictator to yourself, sitting on a throne, arms crossed, pouting and demanding that things you like should stay the way they are forever and what you do not like should disappear immediately. This craving to hold on to what you like and to get rid of what you find difficult is considered the source of suffering in life and the origin of violence against self. By practicing living with things as they are, you will discover that while life may not be less painful, your experience of it is immeasurably better. Also, fully accepting what is true in the moment is the only firm place to begin to make changes in your life. Living in the moment is not a one-time commitment but something that has to be done again and again.
Nonviolence to self is a lifetime practice of which there are ever more subtle levels to discover. The more you are able to be with yourself in a nonviolent way, the less harm you will do to another. Be gentle with the body and mind; refuse to get caught in believing that things have to be a certain way in order for you to be happy.
At some point each day, softly close your eyes, relax your shoulders, let your mind settle on the breath without trying to control it. In the ensuing quietness, see for yourself how mysterious life is. Maybe we should create a new T-shirt, one that reads: “Life is interesting, and then I’m not sure what happens!”
A crucial skill for minimizing emotional chaos and sustaining clarity in your life is the ability to distinguish between your experience and your interpretation of your experience. Your experience is simply whatever is happening in the moment—a sound, a taste, a bodily sensation, an emotion, any kind of interaction, etc. Your interpretation is your mind’s reaction to that experience. One way to understand this difference is to picture that when you are directly experiencing a moment of life, you are within it; when you are interpreting it, you are outside it.
Interpretation occurs as the result of a combination of several factors. The mind has an automatic tendency to interpret an experience and create a story about it based on memories, past associations, and attitudes you have about yourself and others. It then selectively gathers data from within the experience to support its interpretation. It may seem to you that your mind is simply trying to figure out your experience, but really it’s screening for evidence to support the story it’s clinging to. However, this story is a delusion because your mind is being clouded by the strong emotions of the moment.
You can easily become committed to a particular interpretation to the point that it becomes a habit, a story that you repeat in similar or related circumstances. For example, “nobody wants to date me” is a story I often hear from both single men and women between the ages of forty and sixty. This belief is usually based on a very limited effort to make contact with potential partners that is undermined by unrealistic standards they have held since they were in their twenties. But when I point out that they’re more mature now and may need to change their criteria, I am often met with an exasperated look that says, “You don’t understand.” They cling to their interpretation of the problem rather than allowing the challenge to evoke the change and inner growth that is necessary given the arc of human life.
When confronted with a difficult experience, the untrained mind wants to be anywhere but in the present moment, where it perceives acute unpleasantness. The mind becomes anxious whenever it’s uncertain and reacts as if one’s survival is at stake. So rather than staying with the experience and determining the best possible way to relate to it, the mind jumps to creating a story that involves worrying about the future or judging oneself or others based on past experiences. This pattern of resistance to staying present in experience is an automatic response arising from the limbic brain as it detects threats. Ironically, the story imparts a false sense of knowing what’s going on and therefore can seem temporarily soothing.
When we start to interpret an experience, the thoughts generated by our reactive mind become our primary experience, as opposed to whatever is actually happening that needs our full attention and considered response. Usually we continue on with the activity, but our attention is split or less than complete. Is it any wonder that we don’t do our best under such conditions? And sometimes we just can’t continue the activity. For example, Scott, a Life Balance client, suffers from what he describes as “shutting down” at work. Although Scott is a high-performing manager, whenever his colleagues critique his ideas, his mind starts spinning and he has to wait for the episode to pass. He reports losing two or three hours a week due to being “triggered.” Scott interprets his peers’ feedback about his ideas as a personal attack.
You too may have triggers that cause you to get lost in interpretation rather than staying present; you may even have a pattern of interpretation that shuts your mind down but have never realized it’s happening because you are so accustomed to it. For sure, there are so many different experiences vying for attention in any given moment that in order to deal with what seems like an overwhelming amount of stimuli the mind rushes to interpretation to gain a sense of control. In reality, though, interpretation creates a false impression of stability. As you start to become aware of your patterns of interpretation, be kind and nonjudgmental toward yourself. It’s not helpful to fall into self-blame or self-loathing, both of which are forms of interpretation.
You can begin to break the habit of automatically interpreting every experience by practicing anchoring your attention firmly within the experience. Notice any physical sensations and emotions that are arising and observe the state of your mind. Is it racing, agitated, fuzzy, or clear? For instance, if you feel that someone has not lived up to an agreement they made with you, rather than contracting into an interpretation of them or their motives, simply stay with the feeling of what it’s like to be let down by another. You might say to yourself, “I’m just going to be interested in this,” and then watch what
happens. Just be in the moment and let the experience form.
I realize that what I’m saying sounds easier to do than it often is, especially when the experience you’re having is going badly. Staying with the experience can seem impossible if you don’t know what to do or think, and it’s getting worse. But everything you’re noticing and feeling, even your resistance, becomes part of the direct experience. If the situation doesn’t feel safe, you obviously need to respond as skillfully as you’re able to avoid getting hurt. However, if you’re willing to let loose of controlling the experience, there is a greater possibility that you will intuitively find a more skillful way to respond than what your pattern of interpretation might dictate.
For instance, when you and your spouse are having a disagreement and she’s not being the way you want her to be, it can be confusing or threatening to you. It’s a disagreement you’ve had numerous times before, and so you jump to your usual interpretation, to reassure yourself. Sometimes that may work, but it’s unlikely, because what you’re really doing is recycling the experience. What would happen if you just noticed what you’re experiencing? “In this moment, I’m hearing her words. My heart is troubled. But my body feels comfortable. What else am I experiencing? I’m having this moment that’s
emotionally unpleasant. It’s so unpleasant that my mind is jumping to interpretation and it’s grabbing hold of it.” Could you just stay with that experience and see what unfolds? Sometimes we feel so compelled to respond to a situation that we rush to interpretation. But do we really have to? What would happen if we didn’t give in to the drama of the situation? Maybe if you paused your spouse would take advantage of the silence to say something unexpected that could shift how you respond and therefore establish a new way of relating to each other.
The next step toward breaking your habit of automatically interpreting every experience is to practice being mindful from moment to moment of the distinction between experience and interpretation. Begin to notice, “Is there a difference between my direct experience of what’s going on and how I’ve interpreted it?” You’ll need to practice noticing over and over again before you really start to know the difference. The more you’re able to distinguish experience from interpretation, the more you’ll be able to stay in the moment, the calmer you’ll be, and the more choices you’ll have for responding skillfully to whatever circumstances arise.
For example, you may have a habit of collapsing into interpretation whenever you receive any form of rejection. If so, first observe the thoughts that pop into your head. Then notice what you’re actually feeling, physically and emotionally, right at that moment, and ask yourself whether you can stand to be present with those sensations. Most of the time the answer will be yes. Finally, examine your ego. Does it feel demolished, insecure, or angry as a result of the rejection? Is your ego doing the interpreting? Have compassion for your ego and appreciate that it just received a blow, but don’t let its compensating interpretations define you in the moment. If you don’t buy into the interpretations, they will eventually cease.
Once you begin to recognize that interpretation is only your view of an experience, it becomes possible for you to begin to release your compulsion to interpret every moment. Ideally, your goal is to create a new habit, a new default setting for responding rather than reacting to all types of experiences. Establishing this new habit starts by staying with the experience. When you find that you’ve jumped to interpretation, just notice the difference. The noticing gradually becomes automatic. There are many activities in your life that you do automatically—driving, cooking, typing, etc.—and that you more or less notice without noticing. In the same way, you can develop the habit of automatically noticing the difference between your experience and your interpretation of the experience.
When you discover that you are interpreting rather than staying with your experience, you don’t have to stop doing it. I’m not saying that you must get rid of all interpretation, but I am encouraging you to learn to distinguish between experience and your interpretive reaction to it. As with any kind of mindfulness practice, being curious helps. Ask yourself: “What will happen if I practice noticing the difference between my experience and my interpretation of it?” “What does it feel like right now?” “How many times today can I notice? Twenty? Fifty?” Just be curious.
The opportunity to practice in this way occurs many times throughout the day and requires persistence. You may be in a meeting, driving your car, talking on the phone to a friend, or having a heated discussion with your child and notice the difference between your experience and your interpretation of the experience. The more you get used to it, the more you will notice it. The more you notice it, the more you will tend to notice it.
There undoubtedly will be moments when you won’t be able to stay with your experience and you will become lost in interpretation, so it helps to reflect afterward. For instance, on your way home from work you might stop to pick up groceries for dinner. After leaving the store and driving halfway home, you realize that you forgot something. In that moment your mind becomes filled with frustration and you think, “My evening is shot. I either spend thirty minutes going back to the store or I heat up leftovers for dinner. Either way the family is going to be disappointed in me. How could I have forgotten? I’m so stupid!” At that moment you are being consumed by your interpretations and there’s no stopping it. However, once you’ve resolved what you’re going to do about dinner, you can then reflect back on what just happened. Imagine saying to yourself later, “So I forgot. I had this experience of forgetting, and then I had this interpretation of my experience. What was it like?”
You can also cultivate your ability to make this distinction by observing other people as they’re acting out their interpretation of an experience or telling you about something that happened in their life. You can tell the difference between what actually happened to them and how they’re interpreting it. I repeat: their interpretation isn’t wrong, necessarily—it’s just different from the real experience.
There are certainly times when you need to be able to respond to an event that’s unfolding in your life while simultaneously interpreting it. For instance, you need to be able to interpret the body signals and emotional vibes of others in order to be a good communicator. Likewise, you need to be able to recognize and interpret patterns in people’s behavior in order to be effective and anticipate change. Moreover, sometimes someone may harbor ill will or jealousy toward you or see you as a rival, in which case you need to take steps to protect yourself.
You can really harm yourself when your interpretation of your experience overrides your intentions and priorities. Charles, another Life Balance client, is a good example of what can happen when you base your actions on misguided thinking instead of your intentions and priorities. Charles was a high achiever who was chosen to represent his company in negotiations with another company about how the two companies might collaborate on a project. In preparation for the negotiations, I helped Charles identify some crucial points that needed to be included in the partnership agreement. However, when during the meeting his counterpart at the other company suggested the same agreement we had
defined, Charles responded by saying, “Let me think about it.” When he told me this afterward, I asked him why he hadn’t said yes on the spot. Charles replied that he didn’t want his counterpart to perceive him as being too quick to agree and therefore weak; he also thought that there might be a chance of getting an even better deal. I was dismayed because what mattered was getting this particular agreement settled, and he had it in hand. But Charles got lost in his interpretation of what the other person would think of him and his ideas about how he was supposed to act in such situations. Sure enough, when Charles later contacted the other negotiator to accept the offer, he was told, “Since we didn’t reach an agreement, I thought more about it myself and I no longer want to do it.” Charles was devastated, but he learned a valuable lesson.
Each year at Spirit Rock Meditation Center, I help teach a daylong course in meditation for beginners, which hundreds of people attend. When you first learn to meditate, it’s not unusual for your mind to decide that since you aren’t doing anything else this is the perfect time to deal with your most challenging problems. The mind, therefore, can become quite agitated, so the students are given an opportunity during the day to have a ten-minute individual interview with one of the teachers, to talk about their experiences. A few years ago, a woman who interviewed with me presented a long list of seemingly unsolvable problems. I listened attentively as she described her difficulties, and when she finished, I spoke to her about the importance of practicing loving-kindness toward herself. As for resolving her problems, I had no suggestions other than that she focus on the experience of them and not on her interpretation of them. Recently the woman showed up at my weekly meditation class and said, “You won’t remember me, but I am the woman you told to stay with my experience, not the interpretation.” I did not remember her name or face, but I did remember her interview. “Well,” she said, “those words were what I really needed. I now speak to all sorts of groups, and I tell them about that interview with you and give them the very same advice.” She had learned to show up for her life by being willing to be present for what was difficult in her life. The same can be true for you.
Here is a 5-minute video of Phillip Moffitt speaking about the importance of distinguishing between interpretation and experience.
Identifying your core values and then creating a few essential intentions that you are mindful of moment-to-moment in the midst of the chaos of daily life can help you stay in balance and clear-minded. Here is a worksheet we use with clients and in workshops that you can download and fill out to identify your own values and intentions.
You may find it helpful to read this short article before completing the worksheet: “Differentiating Goals, Intentions, and Values”.
You can enhance the degree of well-being you experience in your life by committing to and cultivating an attitude that focuses on your effort rather than on the results of that effort. We call this “as best I am able” practice. The goal of this practice is to align your values with your words or actions as you carry out the tasks of your day.
1. Ask yourself if you truly want to make this practice a core attitude in your daily life, and if so, what it means to you.
2. Engage in this practice each morning by stating to yourself, “I intend to treat each part of this day as an offering by living it as best I am able.”
3. Throughout the day practice being mindful of your attitude as you do your various activities.
4. Remind yourself throughout the day that you intend for all your words and actions to arise from an attitude of “as best I am able.”
5. Notice when your attitude is one of judging yourself for not doing your best, and cons]ciously remind yourself, “Even in these circumstances, I wish to do the best I’m able.”
6. Be mindful of those times when you actually speak or act from this attitude, and acknowledge to yourself that you have lived out your commitment.
7. When others demand that you meet their expectations, respond by saying that you are doing the bst you are able to do. Beware of making a false claim, and don’t fall into the trap of using hindsight to redefine your best effort.
1. Notice what your mind does when something good is happening to you. Is it able to stay fully present and really receive the joy of it? Or do you start thinking about how the experience could be even better or how you could have more of the source of your happiness? Or do you start thinking about something else that’s unpleasant? When you catch your mind acting in this manner, go back to experiencing the happiness with gratitude.
2. Begin to familiarize yourself with each of the three kinds of happiness that are discussed in the article “Three Kinds of Happiness.” Can you find examples both past and present of each kind of happiness in your own life? Be particularly interested in distinguishing between happiness based on conditions and happiness that comes from being in a good mood.
3. Observe those moments in your life when happiness is replaced by suffering. They may be small moments of happiness, such as finding a parking space or enjoying a good meal, or something greater. But notice that when your happiness is based on conditions it always disappears or changes. Next observe that at times your happiness is so buoyant it is not affected by unpleasant conditions that arise. Begin to observe that these states of mind also don’t last. Be interested in what causes them to disappear.
4. You are most likely able to get a foretaste of absolute happiness during meditation practice or immediately afterward. Your mind will be characterized by stillness and spaciousness in which painful body sensations or thoughts concerning difficult situations in your life may arise, yet they don’t disturb your mind. Although this foretaste may be brief, notice that your mind doesn’t object to how life is in such moments.
5. Begin to place more attention on those times when you’re happy, and deliberately pay less attention to those times when you’re discontent. Notice if you’re more compassionate toward others when you’re happy and if your heart is more open such that you see more clearly what is suffering and what is not.
As anyone who has ever studied with me will tell you, I emphasize how to apply mindfulness in daily life. Recently I have been focusing on how to use mindfulness to self-soothe during times of difficulty. We’ve all experienced how unsettling and uncertain life can be and how easily we can be knocked off center at any moment. When we’re not in balance, we can become defined by whatever’s happening and get caught in what I call “reactive mind.” But through the skillful application of mindfulness we can learn to self-soothe whenever life delivers us a blow and soon regain our balance. When we lack the ability to self-soothe, we resort to using less skillful strategies to deal with difficulty such as escaping into fantasy, or overindulging in drugs, alcohol, or food, which usually prolongs our suffering.
Self-soothing begins with softening into your experience and then applying mindfulness to recognize that “this moment is like this.” From within the spaciousness that this softening creates, you can start to investigate the experience and gain access to insight. Specifically, there are three phases to the self-soothing process:
Calm yourself using whatever strategy works best for you. Examples of how you might do this include focusing on your breath or your feet touching earth. One person I know holds one hand with the other and imagines that the universe is embracing her; another calms herself by looking up at the sky. Next, name what’s going on and acknowledge that you’re upset. Can you identify the aspect of yourself that is upset? Allow the part of you that knows you’re upset to comfort the part that’s upset with compassion and loving-kindness.
Once you’ve returned to equilibrium, reconnect with your intentions. As you begin to remember your intentions, you become less and less defined by the difficult experience. You have more clarity of mind; although it may not be clear to you what to do, you remember what you’re about. I call this “self-remembering.”
Lastly, as your clarity returns and you re-engage with life from your intentions, begin to redirect your attention. What dharma insights can you apply to this difficult situation? For instance, you might reflect on the impersonal nature of life. Although you are having a personal experience, it is just causes and conditions that are creating this experience. This too is going to change because everything changes. Life is hard; therefore, it’s not a mistake that your life is hard in this moment. This insight alone can be a source of great comfort.
Did you know that naming the type of decision you’re trying to make will help bring clarity to the process? Our Lead Strategist, Phillip Moffitt, guides us through the five different kinds of decisions we’re faced with (often every day!), and how we can skillfully handle a decision whether it brings up joyful anticipation or uncertainty.
All of your options are good, for instance choosing between two good job offers or between spending time with your family vs. taking a personal retreat.
What seems like a benevolent decision can sometimes indicate a deeper, hidden conflict you’re avoiding acknowledging because it’s too unpleasant. Ask yourself, “Am I creating options for myself in order to escape facing a deeper issue?”
You don’t have a preference for any of your choices, yet you can’t make the decision. This paralysis is usually a sign of a hidden conflict that’s trying to express itself through the decision. Sometimes the conflict is with another person.
The skillful way to handle a neutral decision is to be compassionate with yourself and be mindful of how the decision feels in your body right now. Oftentimes, the answer will reveal itself.
There are gains and losses inherent in all of your options, and it’s not clear which is the wisest course, such as the choice between committing to a relationship vs. keeping your independence; whichever choice you make, you have to give up something you desire.
Beware of trying to have your cake and eat it too. Likewise be careful of fantasy decision-making, such as telling yourself that although the person you’re dating isn’t really right for you, making a commitment will change him into a new person.
All of your options have unpleasant consequences, for example deciding whether to keep silent or speak out about a lie one of your co-workers has told, which will affect workplace morale. There’s not a good outcome no matter what you decide, so it’s a really hard choice to make.
In this circumstance, listen to your heart: Which choice will be the easiest for you to live with, despite what’s likely to be unpleasant external conditions?
The consequences of the decision are unclear, such as whether to have a risky operation or an experimental medical procedure. It’s a tough decision to make because you really don’t know how it’s going to play out.
It’s best not to make such a decision until you absolutely have to, and then clearly state to yourself the full consequences of making the choice vs. staying with your current situation. People often underestimate the risks and downside of the unknown and exaggerate the negative aspects of the status quo.
Learn how to make skillful decisions
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To everything (turn, turn, turn)
There is a season (turn, turn, turn)
And a time to every purpose, under heaven
The Byrds
In the work I do as a Change & Transition Strategist and workshop leader, it’s become apparent to me how modern life encourages a blurring of the seasons (outer and inner); those rhythms and plot points that in ancient times were easy to see and surrender to. The production of food, and light to facilitate that production, and countless other creations being the most obvious examples. But now, light through the darkest of nights prevails, and it’s always summer somewhere to behold. Our seasons now run together.
When one sees and feels life in this more modern way, the natural rhythms of life get thrown off, the compass spins, and true north goes missing. Where are we? Where should we be?
The Moffitt Method℠ has something to say about this.
I often begin working with clients by asking them how they would like their life to feel two, three, or perhaps five years on? We have to be able to imagine what we want (before we can reach for it), and we have to separate why we want it from the many voices that have already encouraged us to want it. I strongly believe that living a fulfilling life entails in a substantial way living it in alignment with our values.
Part of the process of navigating change and transition begins with the development of clarity around our values. From there, we can minimize and eventually eliminate the things that aren’t in alignment with our values, as well as add the things that promote those values. A key point in Changes & Transitions Workshops and individual sessions entails helping participants uncover clarity about their values as distinct from what they ‘think’ they should find valuable. We are all products of our conditioning, and the values we hold may be too limiting or even outdated. They may be the values we ’inherited’ from family, society, gender orientation, race, economic status, and such, and as such, may not incorporate, or may in fact subordinate some of the values we actually hold deep down, or have matured into.
Part of a Changes & Transitions Workshop or individual strategy session involves learning and acknowledging the season you are in and comparing that to your goals and the models social science puts forth based on certain ages and cycles in life. Having a map is of course not the terrain, but it can offer a clear direction to take based on our goals. Change & Transition Strategy work helps us clarify those goals, based on our current and ever evolving values, while also helping us identify the attitudes and beliefs that may be in conflict with our best intentions.
In one of my recent workshops, a student in his late 40’s found himself at a crossroad based on achieving his work, financial, and familial goals. He could carry on, as all the external forces (and outside opinions) in his life pointed to, or he could answer the call to change something he could feel but was afraid to articulate, because it would mean change. It didn’t make sense. His life was quite good and stable. Through the weekend course he was able to embrace the fear that comes naturally with accepting the call to change, realign his feelings and actions with his updated values, and have a real reckoning with the season he was in (late 40’s), which fostered the courage to make a tremendous change and transition. He uprooted everything and moved back to his native culture (Jordan) and reported a tremendous sense of joy, vitality, and renewed purpose.
The Moffitt Method℠ offers a template as well as encouragement for what can and should be engaged and transformed (think “transitioned”) at any age. If nothing else, what could be more valuable?
We can know ourselves in ever deepening ways, and act appropriately on that knowing, especially if we know our season. As The Byrds sang and expressed so beautifully….
A time to build up, a time to break down
A time to dance, a time to mourn
A time you may embrace, a time to refrain from embracing
I swear it’s not too late.
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