Consider emotions. What range of emotions do you feel on a day to day basis? Are you up, down, even? Interestingly enough like drugs, alcohol, sugar, etc., emotions are also addictive. We might wake up every day saying, “I will be at peace today, no matter what happens,” and somehow, we still seem to dive into that anger, that frustration, that righteousness that follows us around every day.
Stress is killing us. Heart disease, diabetes, cancer, obesity, and so many more diseases are finally being linked back to their ultimate cause, stress and the hormones associated with it. We are a stressed out society and are killing ourselves. We are treating our lives like we are constantly running from lions. I open my computer, see the headlines on any website, look at Facebook, watch the news, and there it is, drama. It’s one thing to react and do something. It is another to just react. Most of what we do when we hear about something tragic, wrong or dramatic is to just react to it, just emote over it, complain about it, stress over it. Most of the things we are stressing over are not even in our control to change, and so, our effort is lost in our complaining. Even when something is within our sphere of influence where we can do something, we often don’t know what to do, or aren’t brave enough to do anything, except be emotional over it.
Daily, I hear people whining and complaining about how awful things are, people are horrible, everyone sucks and life is unfair. What are they doing about any of it other than voicing their opinion on Facebook? Okay, sharing information on Facebook serves a purpose. When the other people on Facebook reading it actually are able to so something about what is being posted, then what is posted can serve a purpose. If all it does is inflame the masses against someone, that only pushes us all closer to death. That drama is what is killing our society. We spread horrible stories in order to evoke emotions to inspire people to do something, except that most of the time, it does not inspire anything but stressful emotions, and the spread of stories.
This addiction to emotions and the rollercoaster of news and drama is serious. We are constantly thinking about how dangerous our world is, our lives are, our relationships are. That inspires fear and doubt about ourselves, our safety, our place in the world. That fear and doubt cause our bodies to go into fight or flight mode. We lash out, we hide and get small, or simply run away. Then we go to bed and get up the next day and do it all again. Our bodies never even get a chance to recover from the stress of one day, when we expose it to more stress the next day.
We try to stop it. We try to meditate, be calm, practice mantras of peace, focus on the positive, but we are addicted to the drama. We need the drama. Scientifically, they have shown that a body that is in a state of stress as often as ours tend to be, can become addicted to those stress hormones like any other drug. It becomes our normal state. If we try to release it, shut it down, change it, it will feel uncomfortable, even painful. Then when we get a dose of drama, it spikes the adrenaline, and we are like, “Ahh, there it is. There is that comfortable feeling I know and love!”
Google, “Stop It” Therapy with Bob Newhart. It will make you laugh and tell you exactly what to do with this addiction. Stop it!! It is simple and yet the hardest thing to do.
Mindfulness is the first step. Become aware of when you are doing it. Notice when you are searching for drama, looking for something to be mad about, making shit up, surfing the net for drama-filled stories to get you going. We are in the habit of looking for something to make us upset, and we are most often not even aware we are doing it. Are you looking for ways to be peaceful or are you looking for things to be upset about? I am definitely someone who has spent a lot of time trying to point out what is wrong with everyone and everything. I have been on a journey to break that habit of who I was for a few years now. I have not gotten perfect at it by any means. I am at a mindful place. I notice when I am doing it. I notice my judgements. I notice my anger. I notice when I am starting to boil and looking for reinforcing thoughts and emotions to keep that boil on, and then I practice stopping it.
If we think the same thoughts every day, we will feel the same emotions every day. Our thoughts are mostly based on our past experiences. 90% of them are from our past. We live in the past, thinking of the past, and feeling like we did in the past. That makes our futures predictable. Think like the past, feel like the past, guess what your future will hold, more of the same. If you want to have a different life, you have to begin to think differently, feel differently, and have different experiences. You cannot do one of those. You have to do them all together. Dump the past. It’s done and gone. Do not project your past into your future. Leave the future open to possibilities and focus on right now. What can you do right now to be safe, happy, and at peace. Let go of the drama and the past and focus on thoughts that bring you joy and peace. I tell myself this every day when I begin being drawn back into drama, “I do not need to be upset about this. This is not about me and not mine to manage.”
Byron Katie says there are only three kinds of business. If you think from the first person, the businesses are these: My business, Other people’s business, and God’s business. If it is not my business, then I have no business thinking about it, being mad about it, or stressing over it. I wonder what would happen if we all started to simply stay focused on our own business, and instead of stressing over it and complaining about it, actually worked to do something about it, and let everyone else do the same, manage their own business. When we micromanage other people’s business, it causes us both stress. When we stress out because someone else should be doing something, it causes us both stress. When we choose to do something constructive to create a solution, we actually relieve our own stress and possible do something good for the world. When all we do is stress and complain about things, all we do is make the world more stressed. That stress is killing all of us. What will you do today? Whose business will you mind? What drama will you avoid? I hope to mind my own business. Trust me. I have plenty of it to manage. I don’t need to be attempting to manage other people’s. Today’s mantra, “Mind my own business, and act on it. Let other people and God manage their business their way. I don’t need to be mad or upset. I just need to do what I can do, and let the rest be as it will be.”
-Namaste