Leaning In
“External things are not the problem. It’s your assessment of them, which you can erase right now”.
-Marcus Aurelius
“It’s crazy how you can get yourself in a mess sometimes and not even be able to think about it with any sense and yet not be able to think about anything else”.
-Stanley Kubrick
Lately I have been experiencing a phenomenon that could be likened to a recurring nightmare.
Though, the even less fun part is that I’m awake. Around 2am each morning, my brain flips a switch. Instead of falling asleep, I watch, wide awake, while my brain replays some of the most unpleasant interactions that I’ve had in the past year. This pattern has left me exhausted and, frankly, angry at myself.
I feel like we often get trapped in the frustration of unwanted thoughts, feelings, and even memories. After all, if we can acknowledge that our thoughts are separate from and outside of us, shouldn’t we be able to control them? Shouldn’t we be able to banish out any uninvited, burdensome thoughts at will?
Take a moment to look back at the first quote I included at the top of this page. That is what has been getting to me. It would be great to be able to think like Marcus Aurelius in this case, wouldn’t it? I’ve tried, as I’m sure many of you have, to look at my unwelcome thoughts, acknowledge their uselessness, and move on with my day. Now, instead of being angry at myself for something I perceive to be a weakness, I am trying to embrace the idea that perhaps it is just humanness.
Now, let’s pause a moment and look back at the second quote. The phrase that stood out to me most was, “and not even be able to think about it with any sense”. Sometimes our logic, our “sense”, is not enough to pull us out of a frustrating situation, and that feels scary. Take, for example, a memory that surfaces about a time you felt you wronged someone. You didn’t actively conjure up this memory and had no plans to ruminate on it. That is, until your brain put it in front of you. And so, you spiral into thinking, “I must be a bad person, because I made a mistake in the past. And I can never undo it”. Logically, you know this isn’t true. You can reason that you are not defined by this one mistake and have grown since then. Even so, that logic does not settle the feeling of regret and worry in your gut.
When what we know to be true and what we feel to be true do not align, we can quickly spiral. If we’re honest, we never want to feel like we lack control of ourselves. That includes our thoughts. Admitting when we don’t have control is hard, and leaning into it is even harder.
I invite you to shift your focus from frustration, lack of control, and sense to the emotions being brought to the surface. We all know well that not all emotions feel good, and that it is important to not dwell excessively on the unpleasant ones. So, what is it that causes these feelings to be so poignant? Well, you have a human heart. We are creatures who feel deeply. And, while that is not always pleasant, it is good. Instead of beating yourself up for a past instance when you were not your best, remember this—you feel deeply about it because you care. Because you have grown. Because you are made up of a million complex moments, and past pains are just blips in that collection. Now I certainly don’t encourage you to get stuck constantly analyzing your intrusive thoughts. But I do think it is worth a pause to acknowledge that we are both logical and emotional beings. That truth, I feel, is one worth leaning into.