Hello Friends,
Thanksgiving is canceled this year. Well, just at my house.
My mother has the flu (!) and so all the aunts and cousins, grandparents, nephews and cousins who were expecting to arrive for Turkey and adult beverages this Thanksgiving were told that they had to find somewhere else to go to celebrate the special day.
I have to admit, for myself, the news carried a certain relief.
I’m glad my mother is taking the time she needs to feel better. And I’m relieved to simplify the holiday by having a smaller, more intimate gathering over the weekend. No offense, Aunt Pat.
I love my family. And Thanksgiving is usually fun. But sometimes you just don’t feel grateful. Sometimes, you’d just rather be pretty much anywhere else.
Many of us long for the holidays and look forward to them. But sometimes the holidays bring up a lot of stuff. Such as all the childhood pain that we’ve never completely dealt with. Unresolved feelings. Self criticism. Regrets and losses. Communication challenges. The loud silence of the stuff we never talk about.
And so some of us feel a twinge of dread, and right along side the joy. And we still long for the holidays and look forward to them, because that little child in each of us remains ever, eternally, hopeful.
But at the same time we dread the holidays a little (or a lot) and we rush about, or hide away, and avoid intimacy through them to keep ourselves from re-opening old wounds.
It’s just like in our Yoga practice: we rush over or avoid the exact parts we should slow down and make time for for, because, if we did, the real healing could begin to occur.
To make matters worse, we beat ourselves up and think “I really should feel grateful!” I really should feel grateful for all of those relatives who push my buttons the most. (As a matter of fact, we should, for a very specific reason, but that’s another topic.)
The point is, at times, we don’t. Sometimes, we don’t feel grateful. But we believe we should. Then we get all upset with ourselves.
There’s a line I love from Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth. Tolle is talking with a young woman who has been through some challenging things and feels very unhappy as a result. She wishes that the bad things had not happened to her. She believes that now she cannot be happy.
Tolle asks her to examine her feelings to discover whether she is most disturbed by actually feeling unhappy, or by feeling angry and resentful that she feels unhappy and wishing she didn’t feel unhappy.
He says, but if you don’t mind feeling unhappy, notice what happens to the feeling.
There’s a long pause there. Have you ever tried that?
Sometimes just accepting the feeling itself – whatever it is – and dropping the “should” out of the equation takes us a long way in the direction of joy.
It can bring a really big sigh of relief.
So, try this out. If you find yourself feeling ungrateful, start there. Notice that. Notice if you are harshing on yourself and beating yourself up for feeling ungrateful and telling yourself you “should” feel grateful.
Just take a minute to be with whatever you are feeling, in its purest form.
Then ask yourself, what happens to the feeling if I don’t mind feeling ungrateful (or whatever)?
You can write to me, if you like, and let me know what happens to you, when you do that: radiantenergyforlife@gmail.com
What happens to me is, I lighten up. in fact, noticing what happens when I don’t mind feeling the way I’m feeling usually makes me laugh.
Today I actually am grateful. I am grateful to you, for reading and sharing these thoughts. I think about you and I am inspired by you. (Notice if you can take that in.)
I’m grateful for my beautiful children. For the opportunity to write, and share my voice. Not everyone around the world has that privilege.
I’m grateful for all my friends, and for all the love that has come my way, and for the love I feel in my heart.
I’m grateful for my new horse baby. Can you believe it? Whimsical! You’ll definitely be hearing more about her in the weeks to come.
Sincere thanks to all of you! And Happy Thanksgiving!!!
Love,
Erin
p.s. In January 2015, I’ll be launching a new program, Living Joyfully 101. We’ll explore ways of moving beyond our blocks and into a life of more joy. We’ll look at the things that get in the way of living authentically, and we’ll work with some amazing tools for moving past those obstacles and into living the life you want.
If this sounds like good clean fun to you, click on radiantenergyforlife@gmail.com and put “101” in the subject line. I will make sure you are among the first to hear more details!
Happy Thanksgiving!