Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 657 of the Wildly Successful Lifestyle podcast! I’m Heidi and as always it’s so good to be with you. We’re growing together with each episode and that’s so fun, because it’s one of my favorite things to do…..and I’m guessing it is for you too…So of course I’m glad you’re here!
Now I want to start with….I used to roll my eyes when people would talk about meditation and how beneficial it is to your life. I’m starting this episode that way because I wanted to mention a meditation I had recently and I also want you to know I get it if you want to roll your eyes.
Ok, we got that out of the way, because I wanted to mention that My meditation practice has had a profound effect on my life and it’s one that is never ending. I use the way app, for me it’s life changing. In a few of my recent meditations, compassion has been the topic. I have often told myself that I don’t think I’m compassionate. Which isn’t a nice thing to say about yourself but because we’ve been deep in compassion talk I realized I’m actually extremely compassionate, I’m less empathetic but very compassionate. Compassion means you wish well for others, wish them to be free from suffering, empathy is more you jump in the suffering with them and that is not something I want to do and there’s nothing wrong with that because it can be a little dangerous if you get too into someone else’s pain, you can start feeling that same pain and now you’re not a help anymore you’re actually needing it yourself. Compassion is wishing well while also caring for yourself. And now I understand that to be very healthy. You can disagree with me on that but that’s how I think of it. But not only can we have compassion for others we can also have compassion for ourselves and that is where I realized I need to grow.
It was a little funny, during one of these compassion meditations the guide said that it’s very common for people to have low grade suffering and they may not even realize it but they are living life with a low grade suffering always kind of present. And when that meditation started I thought oh well that’s so sad. That would be awful. And then we got into the meditation and I realized oh I actually have some of that and I didn’t even realize it.
Sometimes that Low level suffering has been there so long you no longer even notice it. So Past hurts just Lingering. That bully from 3rd grade. The ex boyfriend from 20 years ago, who told you that you weren’t good enough. The religious leader who disappointed you. It could be anything that lingers and even though it’s long over you’re still suffering because it hurt and you haven’t forgotten it, maybe it’s a mistake you made that when you think about it you suffer.
There are times when I think about things I’ve done, mistakes I’ve made in the past and there will be real pain in my heart, shame and guilt well up immediately and I realized that was low grade suffering lingering in the background.
Compassion for yourself allows you to be free of that suffering.
. Years ago I read a quote from Jordan Peterson and it has never left me. He said “Forgive yourself for the things you did when you were in survival mode”. In other words have compassion for yourself, and allow yourself to be free from that suffering.
That’s what we practiced during meditation. Freeing ourself from Suffering at a low level.
First of all acknowledging that it’s there and secondly having compassion for yourself so that you can say “May I be free of that”because we don’t have to live like that, with low grade suffering, we can free ourselves from that.
And while you’re freeing yourself from suffering…stop borrowing tomorrow’s troubles today. I was having a conversation with my big sister about my niece, the one I don’t get to see because of religion, I love her, used to spend a lot of time with her but she’s grown up in the last 8 years and I haven’t been there for that so she has a boyfriend and it’s serious and they get married young in this religion, so I asked my big sister what we’re the odds we get invited to the wedding? We laughed because I don’t think the odds are good but what good does it do me to worry about that right now? I told her well I won’t borrow tomorrow’s troubles today. And we left it there. It felt good to leave it there.
You know the older I get and the more time I spend meditating and thinking, the more I realize that my life is really really really good. The most pain I have is inflicted on myself with my shame or rumination of the past or the worries about what could possibly happen in the future. The more I allow myself to just be present and live in the moment, the happier I am.
The more I have compassion for myself the less low grade suffering I have and the same is true for you.
My challenge to you this week is to sit for a minute and quietly acknowledge any low grade suffering you have lingering and have enough compassion for yourself to say “May I be free of that”. Love yourself enough to be free of that. You deserve to live a really really good life, the more you let go of or forgive the past and the less you borrow tomorrow’s trouble the happier you will be. I want that for all of us.
Share this with three people who deserve compassion, you already know that’s everybody. And follow the show and give me a 5 star review if this episode landed for you. I love you guys, I’ll talk to you in a few days.
