“So you know all about me?” asked the boy. “Yes,” said the horse. “And you still love me?”  “We love you all the more.” 

–Charlie Mackesy, “The Boy, The Mole, The Fox, and The Horse”

Stories…

One of the fascinating things about fear is the stories it weaves, which creates the world we live in. Change the story and you can change your world.

A story I’ve been working on letting go for some time now is the story that ‘I’m responsible to make other people happy.’  I know this story was passed down through generations in my family, as well as in the surrounding culture I grew up in. I received a lot of positive feedback on how I was friends with everyone and a “joy” to be around because I was nice to most people around me.

Now, being kind and loving towards others, I believe is a wonderful way to live. The thing is, my niceness wasn’t usually coming from a place of love. It was coming more from fear. I worried a lot about how others would perceive me or how my actions would affect others. I made huge efforts to be inclusive at the expense of my own time and energy.  A perfectionist  mindset led to stressing over small details that no one else was aware of or even noticed.

Constant worry and over-exertion on my time and energy has fueled a pattern of over-doing and then crashing. It would leave me emotionally drained to the point of not having anything left to give for awhile.  This pattern helped to maintain the story that to feel valuable, others around me would need to be happy. If they weren’t, it was because of something I had done or not done.  That image was exhausting to keep up. So, inevitably, I would crash with exhaustion again and again. I was ignorant (avidya) to the truth of ‘who I am’, so this image (asmita) was what I believed defined ‘who I am.’ 

Kleshas, Afflictions of the Mind

Patanjali Yoga Sutras lists avidya and asmita as the first two of five kleshas – afflictions of the mind – that create suffering.  Identifying with this story, led to likes or attachments (raga) and dislikes or aversions (dvesha) for this identity. I was strongly attached to positive feedback that others would give me when I’d made them happy. This led to me doing more and more. I’d feel obligated to do things, thinking someone would be happy with me, yet I really didn’t like doing those things.  I’d feel resentful if I didn’t receive thanks or appreciation.

I would let go of my own self-care to serve others. As a mental health therapist, in the beginning of my career, this type of behavior dove me head first into burnout quickly. I switched jobs but didn’t change my behaviors and ended up even more burned out within a couple of years. 

I am grateful for this now because this was the catalyst for me to make some serious changes if I wanted to stay in this line of work.

Changing the Story

It was hard to make changes and it’s been a process…which continues today.  Ultimately, the big question is ‘Who is Twyla if she doesn’t help others.’  This is the last klesha, abhinivesha, which is about fear, ultimately the ego’s fear of death of its identities or stories.

The most significant change has been around my own perception of making others happy.  That story is one that is a complete fantasy. I have absolutely, positively no control or responsibility over another person’s mood or mind state. (Maybe for a moment, but not in the long run).  By taking on that responsibility, I enabled others to avoid taking responsibility in creating a positive mind state themselves.

I am only responsible for myself and my own mind state. Going outside of myself to make others happy was also enabling me to avoid myself and how I was judging myself to be deficient.  When I was in my first yoga teacher training, I started to wake up to the possibility of the new story, “I am enough,” which felt more authentic and true.

I work every day towards the story that “I am enough as I am.”  I know when I am in this reality that I feel open and expansive, yet grounded and confident.  It just feels right. It feels closer to the state of love that I long to live from as much as possible.

5 Ways to Cultivate a Loving Story

So from this journey towards living from love, here’s a handful of things that have helped me so far:

1. For one year, I practiced living the saying, “I’m 100% responsible for my life.” (Please don’t confuse this with ‘I’m responsible for what happens outside of myself’. Life happens. Shit happens. What I’m responsible for are my responses and how I meet what is happening in the moment.

2. Learning to take time to pause and say, ‘No,’ more often so I could say, “Yes,” to myself.  One concrete way to start this was committing to one self-care activity I would do weekly, or several times a week, that was non-negotiable. If someone asked me for help or there was a pull to work later, the answer was, “No,” I’m not available. I had a set appointment with myself that was important.

3. Self-awareness practices. For me, Yoga has provided me with the tools to keep gaining more and more self-awareness. I have developed the habit of being more interested in my reactions rather than others’ reactions.  Self-awareness allows the cultivation of an attitude of curiosity about ourselves.  My reactions are my responsibility, so I needed to become aware of them in order to understand myself better. Slow, mindful asana (yoga poses) practice that incorporates interoceptive awareness, Pranayama (breathing techniques) practice, Dharana and Dhyana (Meditation) practices, and noticing my thoughts have been key in gaining self-awareness. You have to spend time with yourself to get to know yourself!

4. Finding my way back to gratitude…no matter the situation.  Being thankful for this life and the opportunity to learn and grow in every moment. 

5. Connecting to a greater meaning or purpose.  Again, Yoga has helped me immensely with this. So does spending time in nature. All I have to do is step outside my front door and connect to the tree in my yard, flowers in my garden, watch the insects doing their thing, and see the magnificence of nature that does it’s thing regardless of what’s going on in my life. It’s immediately humbling. It reminds me that the worries I might be ruminating over aren’t really that important in the whole grand scheme of things.

I want to emphasize that these five things weren’t something that changed my life in a month. Rather, they’ve been intentions I’ve been committed to keep coming back to and practice over time. They have created long-lasting lifestyle changes for me and that’s why they’ve worked…and continue to work.

The most current change I’ve made so I can keep helping others from a more loving place is through my business, Samya Yoga Healing. I left working a 9-5 job about a year ago, allowing myself more time to keep taking care of myself so I can hold space for others on their journey of healing, growing and connecting more to self-love.

The more I am honest and loving towards myself, the more I can be to others. I am forever grateful for the people in my life who have held loving space for me to find love for myself. I could not have found my without allowing others to help me when I couldn’t do it for myself.

Namaste.