There is an interesting way that you can reframe negative events,
Things that go against expectation.
The basic idea is you ask yourself,
What do I now get?
What does this new situation give me that in another time or another place I would want?
So let's use a couple of examples to explain this.
If my son wakes up early,
It can be frustrating because he's interrupting my morning routine.
I might not get to do the meditation,
The exercise and all of the self-care that I like to do each day.
So that's frustrating.
It's annoying.
But what do I get?
Well,
If I embrace the moment,
If I sort of lean into it,
I get to spend time with my son.
I get to have connection.
I get to have that loving,
Paternal experience that at some later stage I may not have.
So although the initial expectations that I had for my morning may be wrecked,
I now get something else,
Something potentially more beautiful.
If I only have the force of will to let go of those expectations and lean into reality as it is now.
The same is true for feelings of loneliness.
If you find that your friends and family are away and you're on your own,
It's easy to feel quite lonely.
It's easy to feel just abandoned,
To want to distract yourself with music or podcasts or books or any of those sort of things.
But what do you get?
Well,
You get to spend time alone.
And you know from experience that there are times that that's exactly what you want,
That that's what you're craving.
That there are too many people around you,
That the world just feels too noisy and that you would like some time alone to rest,
To recoup,
To recover.
So whether you're feeling lonely or not lonely,
Whether you are alone or not alone,
You can look at the situation that you have and think to yourself,
Well,
What do I get from this situation?
If you find yourself with an hour alone to kill,
What can you do with it?
If you find yourself with unexpected guests,
Great,
Embrace it.
Have that social experience because there'll be times when you wish you could have that social experience and it's just not available to you.
Physical pain and emotional anguish is a hard one to rectify with this approach,
But it can be done.
Because let's say you're injured,
You may not be able to do what you normally do,
But there will be other things that you can do.
Let's say you've broken your foot,
You might not be able to run anymore.
But the time that you did spend running could now be spent practicing guitar,
Reading books,
Stretching other parts of your body.
You could be doing things that you don't usually have the time to commit to because you would otherwise be using that foot for different activities.
Now don't get me wrong,
Of course you'd prefer not to be injured,
Of course you'd prefer not to have those issues.
But what do you get from this situation?
You get time,
You get the ability to detach and to step back and to re-evaluate what you're doing in your life.
You get to potentially try a new hobby or try other forms of self-care that you don't usually have the time to,
That you would otherwise not get.
Given the current state of the world,
With all of the different limitations and restrictions and things that are happening,
This could be a good approach to start looking at.
What do you get now that you haven't had access to before?
What does the world and the situation and your reality right now allow you to do that you otherwise wouldn't have time for,
That you otherwise wouldn't prioritize?
What is the gift that you've been given?
You just need to detach a little bit and take a look because there will be one there for you to find.
This talk was taken from the book,
Mindfulness,
A guidebook to the present moment.
