The Part of You Trying to Improve Might Be What Needs Improving
Journey to The Elusive Sweet Spot
Someone once asked a prolific self-help author the most important thing he does for peace of mind. He said to notice the space between thoughts, between words, between everything.
Perhaps he meant that’s when intuition speaks, when the ego pauses.
The author, Deepak Chopra, is hinting at something so easily missed yet all around us: space.
When we value space, a powerful thing happens, the shrewish ego is subdued and we can feel a sudden sense of clarity — even epiphany — in everyday moments.
Something else incredible happens, we stop pushing so hard for our goals, and suddenly they start to be reached effortlessly, gracefully.
Too often reaching for a goal messes up the goal itself. We get lost struggling, because we’re impatient.
This is the most obvious when we try to improve ourselves, like self-punishment we impose strict measures with time-based deadlines and wonder later why we jumped ship.
In other words, too often our ego is what tries to improve us, not the intuition.
It’s a Catch-22 that can only be resolved by letting intuition take over, which happens when we let go.
“Each time the goal is reached, it becomes Not So Much Fun, and we’re off to reach the next one, then the next one, then the next.” ― Benjamin Hoff, The Tao of Pooh
Goal Addiction
Focusing only on goals causes us to hurry to reach each goal, lessening the overall quality of the work.
If we slow things down a bit, we can naturally sink into the unfolding of each moment, the journey, the brilliant now. That’s the sweet spot of life.
“The masters accomplish everything by doing nothing.” — Tao Te Ching
This doesn’t imply we sit around idle all day, it just implies we’re not chasing our ego’s wants all over the place. Rather, we’re in a receptive flow state where in good things come to us that are meant to be.
When the good stuff arrives, or our natural course takes us to them, then the appropriate actions arise, but they are “in the flow” instead of from some compulsion or ego-craving.
Doing nothing implies allowing the flow of the universe to guide us, or as a spiritual person would put it: surrendering to the will of God.
Learning to love the “annoying” part
The rising action, that culmination toward the climax, is the fun part. That’s what a good writer knows how to extend, the ecstatic moment-by-moment build up. The same holds true for life.
Right here. Right now. That’s the sweet spot — not some distance goal in an unknown future.
You won the race to the egg. And you’re winning again when you learn to love the waiting…
Learning to love the in-between moments instead of wishing they’d hurry up, brightens life, like turning up the dimmer in a room. It brightens a conversation because you start to listen more…
The sweetness of life is made up of these in-between moments.
Some would even say, God is in every moment.
The cool part is, embracing the waiting makes the arrival sweeter. Because we didn’t get frazzled leading up to the event. You’ll be calm and totally in that moment too.
Pooh Bear in the Tao of Pooh drank the nectar of waiting like honey from the comb. He mentions how opened presents are “Not So Much Fun as they were while we were in the process of examining, lifting, shaking, thinking about, and opening them…”
Movie promoters love extending that “coming soon” time… Stock traders knows a stock often surges leading up to a big announcement, and often dips when the actual announcement arrives!
Even in spirituality, if we’re only awaiting the “next phase” after this life, we’re might miss the very reason we’re here in the first place.
So next time we’re trying to improve ourselves, perhaps just give yourself more space, more room to grow, luxuriate in your own uniqueness… Do try to do anything, just be spacious in everything and see what arises when the ego is on vacation.