Opening to Change and Learning to Let Go

Opening to Change and Learning to Let Go

  • Change
    • Letting go is the only way of finding ease in change.
    • All change involves some loss.
    • Weathering change builds resistance.
    • Change is the truth of reality.  Embracing change = living in harmony with reality.
    • Denial of change = resistance = 2nd noble truth (cause of suffering = resisting suffering)
    • "No person steps twice in the same river; it's not the same river, and it's not the same person."
  • Letting Go
    1. Observe the ways we are holding on.
      • Holding on rigidifies us.  Tunnel vision.
    2. Tune into the suffering this is causing.
    3. Enlist the wisdom mind to hold either presence or absence of letting go.
      • There is more happiness in peace than in holding on.
    • Non-self is a tool of letting go ("this is not me, this is not mine")
    • Moments of mindfulness/awareness are moments of letting go.  Equanimity is a base of letting go.
    • What we are letting go of is impermanent, anyway.
      • Radical Impermanence
    • Letting go does not mean becoming a doormat - it means acting in line with our beliefs without attachment to outcomes.
    • We are all preparing for death.  Live life with no unfinished business, and you will not fear death.  Living in alignment with values = nothing to let go of.


    • Practices
      • Note things changing, and note when they are "gone."
        • This noting is what we do all the time in mindfulness practice; noticing stability, noticing constant change.
        • Say "gone" when something has passed; a breath, a sound, a day, an event.  Orienting to impermanence, change, the truth of reality.
      • Good mantra: "It's not about me"
      • Reflection: opening to all sides of change
        • Holding with open acceptance all aspects of change, and my relationship to it.  Includes the joy, the nervousness, the excitement, the loss, the gratitude.  All part of this ever-changing experience.
      • Ask yourself:
        • What am I holding on to?
        • What am I letting go?




    Notes from MARC Day of Mindfulness: "Opening to Change and Learning to Let Go," led by Diana Winston, October 6, 2018.

    Comments

    Post a Comment