What Meryl Streep and Dwayne Johnson Taught Me About Being Awoke
Well, hi there!
Hopefully you came here from my newsletter. In it I promised to give you some practices on how to come more present and find more peace. I lied. Just do drugs and drunk.
KIDDING. I tried all of that. It doesn’t work.
Having spent many years studying this work in the vain attempt to heal myself which turned out not to be so vain but damn useful, I’m come to experience what it means to be awake.
It sucks. At first. Because then you see all the crap you’ve been doing that’s been holding you back. But then you start to get what you have control over which is one thing and one thing only - your connection to yourself or your unconscious connection to all ‘out there’.
I’ve always loved this idea that we’re meant to ‘in the world but not of the world.’ For years I had no idea what the hell that meant, but the more I meditated and the more I turned my attention inward the more clear I got on how it feels to go about in the world but not keep reacting to what is happening in the world.
Try these fun little tricks to keep you awake, focused and aware. PS> These simple processes will be annoying at first until you start to reap their rewards so breath in the beginning kids…just breath.
Look away from the TV - when you’re watching TV or your phone or laptop look away and at your surroundings. The building, the bookcase, the homeless person (you really should give them money). Take your focus off this thing that is absorbing your attention and filling your mind with useless thoughts. Do this as well when at the movies. You’ll be amazed when you turn back to the screen how much more aware you are as to how much crap you're actually watching.
Look at the sky - I know how dumb this sounds. But just a momentary glance at the sky brings around a sense of the largeness inside of you. It chills you out. Most of us are never aware of how absorbed we are in the outside world at the deficit of the inner world and this matters because the outer world is madness wherein the inner world as least has good furniture.
Make those fucking lists of gratitude - Now, look. I know you won’t do this and that’s fine. But you really should if for no other reason than it makes you realize how much you are a complaining moron (I say that with love). There is no logical reason to complain since complaining will send you down a spiral where your precious status of being a class A victim will be reinforced and we all know where that leads. So list in the morning what you’re grateful for. If for no other reason then giving those around you who love you one less reason to want to clobber you and your ranting social media posts. Barbra, are you listening?
Be still for 3 minutes each day and just focus on what’s in front of you - I’ve had loads of people tell me they can’t be still for 3 minutes and that’s normally because they did a lot of cocaine at one point in their lives, so I do get it and I deeply sympathize, But as someone who used to have panic attack more often than most people pee, I can tell you with great assurance being still and facing the self-perpetuated torande inside of you is the only way you’ll ever inch your way closer to freedom.
I’ll tell you more in the coming days. Such as how to stop drinking and taking drugs, both of which I’ve done n numerous occasion to calm down and why taking a break from substances s pretty much the whole enchilada in finding happiness.
Until then make positive choices and don’t do a coffee enema. They don’t work and they’re expensive.