Fate leads the willing and drags along the reluctant.
Seneca
Learning to live life on life’s terms…
A central goal of Twelve Step Recovery
Trust the process…
From my morning meditation
One night, since I couldn’t sleep, I went up to the meditation hall and sat all through the night. I was just sitting with raw pain with almost no thoughts about it. Then something happened: I had a completely clear insight that my whole personality, my whole ego-structure, was based on not wanting to go to this groundless place. Everything I did, the way I smiled, the way I talked to people, the way I tried to please everybody — it was all to avoid feeling this way. I realised that our whole façade, the little song and dance we all do, is based on trying to avoid the groundlessness that permeates our lives.
Pema Chödrön
The Irish are a people of story tellers. My childhood was filled with wonderful stories, drawn mainly from Christian Scripture and the preceding Celtic Tradition. One of my favourites has always been „The Salmon of Knowledge“ — an ancient Irish legend.
It goes roughly as follows: „Long, long ago, (Gaelic: Fadó, fadó…) beside the River Boyne, there lived a renowned wise poet named Finnegas. For company, the elder had a young apprentice, Fionn mac Cumhaill, who had been sent by his family to absorb the wisdom of the old man and assist him by performing daily chores in and around the riverside hut which was their home. The old man enjoyed the company and grew to love his apprentice as a son.
For seven long years Finnegas waited and fished, hoping to catch a magical salmon. This was no ordinary fish. It was said that whoever ate it would gain all the wisdom in the world.
After several failed attempts, one day, at last, Finnegas caught the Salmon of Knowledge. He brought it home and instructed Fionn to cook it, warning him not to taste even a single bite.
As Fionn roasted the fish on a spit over the open fire, he noticed the scaly skin forming blisters. Of course, he wanted the fish not only to taste delicious but to be well presented, so he pressed his thumb on a blister to flatten it down. In doing so, he burned his thumb on the hot skin. Without thinking, he put his thumb into his mouth to sooth the pain. In that moment, all the wisdom of the salmon passed into him.
When Finnegas returned, he saw that something had changed. Fionn now had a look of deep understanding. The old poet realised the truth: the knowledge had gone to the boy. Finnegas was wise enough to accept, in that moment, that the wisdom was destined, not for him, but for the young boy. With a heavy heart, he embraced the boy, imparting a silent blessing for his journey ahead.
From that day on, whenever Fionn placed his thumb in his mouth, he could see the truth of any situation. This gift helped him become one of Ireland’s greatest heroes and leader of the Fianna, the legendary protectors of the land.“
This ancient story reminds us that fate has its way of choosing its own winding paths through the complexities of life. From this we can deduce that life cannot be managed, in the sense that we can dictate outcomes. It can, however, be navigated. It is our task to learn to navigate the vagaries, the ups and downs, the twists and turns, of our earthly existence.
Why do many of us find this so challenging? Because, as children growing up in emotional (and sometime physical) chaos, we held on for dear life to the illusion that we could somehow control outcomes. We began to play the game: „When I grow up,…. „
I now look upon this development with both awareness and compassion. Indeed, we owe our survival to the coping mechanisms, the survival strategies we developed in those formative first years of our lives. In the Positive Intelligence (PQ) Mental Fitness modality, we refer to these old survival patterns as „Saboteurs“.
We all have the same Primary Saboteur, the „Judge“. Otherwise known as the Inner Critic, this voice is swift to jump in and cut us (and/or others, and circumstances) to shreds.
I’m such an idiot!
What an evil person!
Life is a constant struggle!
Depending on our unique personality, our upbringing, and our social mold, we also have our personal array of Saboteur Accomplices who assist the Judge in keeping the old fear-based patterns (of feeling, thinking, and behaving) alive and active. The „Controller“ is one of mine. He tells me the lie that: „I am either in control, or out of control!“
Like all the Saboteur lies, this is black and white thinking, ignoring all the nuanced territory between those two extremes.
By becoming aware of the Saboteurs, new possibilities for healing and growth begin to open up. Try feeling the difference between the following two statements: „I’m not going to make it! „, and „My Judge says I’m not going to make it!“
The latter gives us something with which to work. We shift from „I am my thinking“ to „While I have my thinking, my thinking does not have me“. Then we can enter into a loving dance with our Saboteurs, acknowledge them for how they have served us so well in the past, get to know them better, and begin to turn down the volume of their voices from 10 to 2 or 1, so that they can no longer so easily hijack us.
In their stead, we tune into the so-called Sage energies of Compassion, Explore, Innovate, Navigate, and Activate.
„Compassion“ is the next step after Awareness, in the overall process of shifting from fear to love. It is a combination of empathy and a sincere desire that troubles be overcome, to the benefit of all concerned.
„Explore“ allows us to step out of the frame and see the bigger picture.
„Navigate“ is the love of aligning our thoughts, emotions, and actions to our deeply held values.
„Innovate“ is the love of breaking new ground, of becoming.
„Activate“ is the skill of transforming insights and desires into new behaviours a love of making a difference.
We cannot think our way into a new way of living. We can only act out way into a new way of thinking. Neuroscience has confirmed this old adage, demonstrating how new behaviours and attitudes create new neural pathways and networks while the old ones, those related to the behaviours that no longer serve us, once they are relinquished, begin to wither and die.
Along side training the „Saboteur Interceptor“ and „Sage Enhancer“ muscles, the third piece is the capacity to shift from „Saboteur“ to „Sage“. In order to do this, we must be regulated, in the sense of regulation of the autonomic nervous system. We need to calm down and simply be.
Dysregulation is a classic symptom of people who have been exposed to chronic stress, especially in the first four formative years and beyond. It becomes hard-wired in our brains with associated chemical compounds anchored in every cell of the body. This explains why „we cannot think our way into recovery.“
In his wonderful book, „The Body Keeps the Score“ (2014), Bessel van der Kolk points out that the body holds on to the trauma, even when the thinking brain tries to forget. The fear, helplessness, and visceral sensations associated with the traumatic event(s) remain imprinted on our nervous system. The body, in essence, keeps the score, holding on to the trauma until it is adequately addressed, i.e., somatically.
When we are dysregulated, the „Saboteurs“ have the upper hand and access to „Sage“ is blocked.
The third muscle we need to train, therefore, is the „Mind Command“ muscle. This is achieved by learning „to be“ in silence and through short burst of body-awareness exercises throughout the day. Feeling the pressure points of the soles of our feet when walking, or noticing the different temperature of the air entering the nostrils and the air leaving our nostrils, are examples of such exercises.
PQ encourages us to incorporate such exercises at least once each hour as we go through our day. Over time, we become better at anticipating and intercepting the „Saboteurs“ before they get to hijack us, and then shifting to „Sage“ after the brief pause of calm. We can then select the Sage Power which would be most helpful to us at that given moment and then engage that power.
That brief pause of calm is what Pema Chödrön refers to above. That quote continues with: „By learning to stay, we become very familiar with this place (of calm), and gradually, gradually, it loses its threat. Instead of scratching, we stay present. We’re no longer invested in constantly trying to move away from insecurity. We think that facing our demons is reliving some traumatic event or discovering for sure that we’re worthless. But, in fact, it is just abiding with the uneasy, disquieting sensation of nowhere-to-run and finding that — guess what? — we don’t die; we don’t collapse. In fact, we feel profound relief and freedom…“
With the help of PQ and living the principles of the Twelve Steps, it has been possible to cultivate this place of calm. With that, my compulsion to control, to dictate fate, has begun to ebb. This recalls a further aspect of the story of the Salmon of Knowledge. On his return to the fire, Finnegas did not throw a tantrum and berate Fionn, as would have happened in my family of origin. Instead, he fully accepted that Fate had other things in mind than that which was on his radar.
Finnegas was in Sage mode. I felt that as a child, which made the story so much more beautiful and, indeed, a healing experience, every time the story was told.
As an Adult Child in recovery, I feel and know it now, through my own experience.
Today I often times find myself engaging in relationships, contributing to projects, and co-creating enterprises with the attitude that if it turns out well, that will be fine and if it doesn’t turn out as I imagine or desire, that will be fine too.
This equanimity is not to be confused with indifference or simply not caring. There are gifts and opportunities in every situation. Control, as a coping mechanism, no longer counts among the traits I wish to manifest. In its stead, I choose one or all of the five Sage Powers, usually beginning with „Explore“.
This relief from no longer trying to control the weather allows me to concentrate on learning to surf the waves. And — guess what? — I’m having a lot of fun doing just that!
