Mind Set Go

Thinking of the bravest things you have ever done probably brings you down many paths. Stop and think for a moment of those things or moments in your life that you would rate as brave.  Just take a moment to think!

I rate jumping out of a plane (although strapped to someone who knew what he was doing) as one such memory.  There are things I have done that other people would say are brave: bungying across the Oklahoma River or sliding down Sliding Rock, NC as a small child alone when no one else wanted to do it, having natural childbirths, enduring a cancer treatment regime labeled as one of the most difficult the hospital gave, facing a 22-hour operation.  Some would say regularly commuting to work on a motorcycle was brave… and the list goes on. 

However, looking at those things as “opportunities I have acted on” instead of “bravery” has given me a new perspective on life.  You see, those things listed above are things I think others might say are brave.  But what I really deem as the bravest thing I have ever done might surprise you!

I truly believe that the bravest thing I have ever done is: to be myself.  Not putting on airs and not pretending to be someone others think you should be takes exceptional bravery.  Who you say you are, what others say they think you are: those things don’t matter.  Letting go of that little voice you may have that guides you and chides you, takes bravery.  Those thoughts you churn out, perhaps almost every waking moment, not only don’t matter, but aren’t real.

I have a close friend who often says, “Let go, let Goddess.”  If, after reading that, you stopped for a moment to reflect on God versus Goddess in that statement, then you might want to stop to reflect on the images your mind creates as your perspective.  Do your own biases surprise you?

Jumping out of an airplane without fear didn’t take courage.  It took acceptance.  I had to accept and let go.  Accept that I wanted to do it and let go of reactions that really weren’t primally generated, but mentally-generated.  It was that simple.

Being myself is no different.  If you want to be yourself, to love and accept yourself, you have to let go of what you mentally generate as what defines you.  Are you truly defined by others?  I think not!  And when we define ourselves, that is not who and what we are either.

I keep saying who and what, but consider this for a moment.  When we define ourselves, that is not who we are and not what we are and also not how we are.  But can you for a moment consider defining yourself by how you are?

When we casually ask someone, “How are you?,” the response is always something about what someone feels.  “Oh great?  How are you?” or “Not well.”  Etc.  But consider that how you are has many facets.  How you are includes, are you kind; are you considerate; are you patient; are you respectful; are you angry; are you at peace; are you grateful; are you compassionate; are you compliant; are you confused?  You get the idea. 

You know, I do think memories matter.  And so, just how do we hold on to memories, knowing full well that what we remember is just that: what we remember.  We have senses which include the five basic ones we all think of first, but is memory a sense?  When we have gut instincts, what is driving that? 

I’ve been watching a thru-hiker on YouTube who goes by the name Fortune Adventures.  He hikes with, or despite, osteoporosis, by the way, in the memory of his daughter who passed away 20 years ago. On one particular night he was out doing his usual 20 to 30 miles a day on a hike from Georgia to Maine on the AT, but it wasn’t a usual day and night.  It was his daughter’s birthday.  It was an absolutely miserable day and night, weather-wise, too.  The shelter where he wound up that night, an enclosed shelter, is, in itself, odd on the AT; it was a night of freezing rain, a night of snow and a morning of degrees in the 20s F.  Yet he had a visitor.  A local man hiked up and visited him that night.  The story is for him to tell, but it conjured up feelings of why and how things sometimes happen.  Are those things synchronicity?   It’s hard to say.  But things like that do encourage many other people to rethink their logical explanations for everything. 

Do things happen for a reason as many people say, or do reasons happen for things?  (I know this is rambling, but I’m going to continue not really wondering whether anyone will read this much less find it interesting.)  I met several people these last two weeks who are mourning the loss of someone.  Life delivered them a blow, however expected death might be for humans who will all eventually succumb to it.  And then, left living, these people all struggle with so many feelings.  Should they dare to feel happiness when they are so, so sad?  Why did it happen that way and then, they wonder, how do I go on?  Although no one voiced it, many might ask why a God might take someone that way or that young. 

Bravery isn’t just about being yourself despite obstacles, but truly loving yourself even when you are the most alone.  When everything falls apart or seems the worst, a flower blooms or a seedling bursts its tiny miracle through the dirt and despair.  We don’t count our blessings in merits earned or heads turned.  That’s not what blessings are.  Letting go of fear takes many forms. 

Life provides the opportunities.  Opportunities to accept and understand that which we cannot even know the what’s and why’s and how’s about.  Something as primal as our breaths drummed on by the pulsations of our mighty hearts, even our bleeding hearts, compel us forward to marvel and behold the great majesty and the great mystery we call life.  It’s that pure and simple.  And it’s that utterly contaminated and complex when our minds are involved. Give yourself and others and your weary mind a break.  Be brave by just releasing to who and what and how you are, and then love that person and be kind to that person.  As I have said before, you truly do matter.