Write for Good

by Laura Staley

Do you get attached to expectations, judgments, and desires rather than remain open to what unfolds right in front of you? Does your mind get attached to your wants, expecting them to be fulfilled on your timeline, in the exact way you want them? Then inevitably, something goes awry, and you can experience anger, maybe outrage, disappointment, and feelings of being out of control. You persist in making plans, arm wrestling for your agenda and God laughs.

Recently, I completed a class in which I learned to take down energetic walls I constantly place around me; to ask myself, “Is this mine?” anytime I notice I feel heavy

instead of light. The primary guidance in this class was to pay attention to what happens in my life. Instead of making demands like a person standing at a vending machine feeding quarters and pushing buttons for liked items to drop down into the bottom tray, I continue to learn to live in the flow.

What if you could be in a flow state with life?

Softening your hands rather than living with clutched hands and pursed lips might allow you to breathe into what researchers Nakamura and Cxikszentmihalyi have discovered is a flow state. Between beta and theta, there is the alpha wave of flow. While in this state of being, you merge with a delicious challenge. You love an activity, the task at hand, and know your developing skills can meet the degrees of difficulty. You experience a sense of autonomy and independence as you detach from selfconsciousness, otherwise known as your inner critic, and disentangle from a result. Responding to life circumstances in this manner allows you the freedom to merge with the moment. You can pay rapt attention to the actions you are taking, your deep breathing, the loss of worry about losing control which paradoxically might have you feeling more in control than you have ever been. Experiencing yourself inside the activity, you no longer observe or evaluate. You merge with the flow of experiences as your relationship to time shifts. You realize measurements of time are a construct suspended from your perspective and awareness.

This state of Being seems much like seasoned meditators who describe an ability to remain in a meditative state no matter what they are doing. Eating is a meditation. Speaking is a meditation. Laughing with friends is a meditation. Holding the hand of a dying friend is a meditation. Each moment unfolds into the next as conscious awareness allows life to happen.

The mind no longer blathers like some frenetic taskmaster. The mind surrenders to the silence inside and a love of living shows up in service to the actions at hand. Ideas bubble up or download from who knows where and who even really cares because they arrive in support of the movement, an unshakeable commitment, and likely, a meaningful contribution.

Rapt attention can be one of the greatest gifts one person gives another.

What if you could be in a flow state while conversing with your colleagues, hugging beloved ones, washing dishes after supper, petting your dog, or peeling an orange?

Life continues to be a mystery to be lived, not a problem to be solved. Your life is not a goal to be achieved and rewarded, nor a mistake to be punished and shamed. Experiencing your life remains the most precious gift of all.

Can you gently unwrap the nuanced moments… because isn't the mundane indeed miraculous? Living life in a state of flow allows you to experience a breadth and depth of a multi-sensory journey of Being, which infuses the doing with an enduring peacefulness, enthusiasm for simply animating this body, and savoring joie de vivre. Merging in the flow of your heart-led life choices becomes its own rich fulfillment.

The founder of Cherish Your World, Laura Staley passionately supports people thriving by guiding them to a holistic transformation of space, heart, and life. Laura is the published author of four books including Live Inspired which reveals the brave and deep work of selfdiscovery and her book of short writings and poetry Abundant Heart.