Yesterday I felt reactive, stressed out, lacking in energy and in general waning to run away from the day ahead, figuring out ways how to avoid things. All my creative power focused wrongly. Here is what I experimented with then and it turned my day around to a quite a different experience.
3 Questions to stay present from the book “THINK LIKE A MONK” by Jay Shetty.
First I stopped my negative outburst of crises thinking after I have noticed my feelings of stress building up. Sounds obvious, but it is not J Then I asked the following 3 questions and answered them:
1/ What is missing from this moment?
2/ What is unpleasant about today?
3/ What would you change?
Here is my answers:
1/ Being hugged, heart connection with a loving person
2/ Going from my home to the city center to buy the present, spending 2 hours in traffic and wasting my precious Saturday, then going for a lunch with who knows how many people, probably sitting near some that I really don-t know (the introvert nightmare) etc. etc. etc.
3/ I would like to accept how I feel right now, I would like to embrace my anxiety and frustration
I would like to find the best way to get present and run away with whatever is happening today, not running into negative narrative, drama, boredom or escapistic behaviors like swooshing social media constantly. I would like to actually put effort in dressing up, putting some make up instead of no make up and traditional almost pijama look. I would like to put on my curiosity hat and see what the day will bring me. I would also like to add something beautiful to that present receiver and the group of close people who will come to celebrate together.
After having written it down, I reflected back on how I felt, how my inner world has just changed? And it I has. I felt decrease in tension, I felt the excitement of the new creative challenge as my thoughts reframed the day task.
And the results at the end of the day?
Shopping 1h vs 2 planned. Smart parking, shortest route and then no waiting. Present became a super cool surprise for the 18 year old, who especially loved the Halloween accessories as ad ons to the main gift. Only 12 people showed up, all of them I knew and loved talking to. So I spenTthe most loving, hearts connected 4 hours in a blink, without even thinking of using some lame excuse to leave earlier than anyone. Instead of a negative experience, the whole day actually was A wonderful one!
Your answers to these questions probably would have been different. As it can be seen, I am driven by creative challenge and putting in extra effort to see if I can make it. However, if you ever choose to try it out, I would love to know if it helped you as it helped me.
