Resistance

I didn’t want to write a blog today.  I was resisting it.  I sat down to write anyway and - big surprise - couldn’t come up with anything to write about.  “Well great!  I wasn’t feeling like doing this anyway and now I’m stuck!”  More resistance.

My focus scattered.  I could hardly stick with an idea for more than a sentence or two.  Finally I realized my resistance.  Resistance is a powerfully attractive force.  That might sound counter-intuitive, but according to Newton’s 3rd Law, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  The more I resist something, or try to push it away, the more it must push back against me.  That is the equal and opposite reaction.  I was resisting writing my blog post and I couldn’t come up with a topic.   

Luckily, I know the universal antidote for resistance.  Acceptance!  Accepting what is, rather than resisting it, frees you up.  Acceptance doesn’t mean surrender, it doesn’t mean being stuck.  Acceptance means that you get neutral about what is happening in your experience.  I had to let my frustration with not wanting to blog, but feeling I have to, go.  I had to let my frustration with not being able to find a topic go.  I had to recognize what my experience was and make it okay.  It’s okay that I don’t feel like blogging and it’s okay if I can’t come up with a topic.  Acceptance brings neutrality and neutrality means no resistance.   If I’m not trying to push the experience away, the experience isn’t matching my force and staying stuck.  

As soon as I became neutral, everything cleared up.  “Wow, look at that resistance and what it did!  I’ve probably written about resistance before, but it is certainly present for me right now, so let's do it!”  The topic became clear, my focus became solid, the blog flowed.  

Now, I get that writing a blog post is a pretty simple thing.  Life often holds experiences around which it is much harder to find neutrality, but the principle remains solid.  As long as I am making my experience “wrong” and resisting it, I am holding myself bound to the very thing I’m resisting.  As soon as I am able to say, “Okay.  This is what is in my experience.  I accept that I am experiencing this,” and come into neutrality about it, the tension will begin to subside and I’ll be able to see what is mine to do to move myself out of that particular experience and into one that is more of what I want.  

Start by practicing with the easy things, like blog posts or errands or chores.  Get a feeling for what happens to your emotions, energy, and focus when you come to neutrality and use those experiences to build your skill.  Like anything, the more you do it, the easier it becomes.