Shore

"Actually, tonight might be too tight."

This message triggered a stubborn mental pattern that I have had since I was young, causing me to unknowingly react the same way I have so often done in the past — in my chill and easygoing way –“For someone antisocial you have a tight calendar ;) No stress, enjoy the evening!” 

But deep down, I could tell that something wasn't right.

As I sat with it and came back to what occurred during the day, I realized that I was feeling sad and frustrated, initially by Tara's response and preceding actions, but doubly by how I acted. This message (and our interaction up to that point) caused me to immediately feel not enough, and kicked up thoughts of being alone. So without really thinking, I responded in my typical "chill and easygoing" manner because I wanted to see her, ignoring my own feelings, emotions, and worst of all my own worth. My reply came from an ungrounded internal state, secretly laced with neediness and want. It wasn't real. It wasn't the real me.

But that's how we primarily experience life. Via our patterns. Different subconscious habits we learned as children to get what we wanted and avoid things that hurt or scared us. Then reinforced over the years as we faced similar experiences. That's life when you think about it.

Each and every day, moment by moment instantaneously and unknowingly, we are examining what is around us to determine if it's favorable or not. Maybe it's a conversation with a colleague or friend, what is around us as we walk down the street, sounds we hear, the smell in the air, how our work flows, what our mind is randomly telling us, or a message from someone we are interested in.

If these things are pleasurable or going smoothly, we are excited or at least content. If it's something not to our liking, we get nervous, annoyed, or depressed. In both scenarios, learned patterns from childhood and after teach us how we should respond. And that's what happened to me the other day.

"Actually, tonight might be too tight." Viewed objectively, her message wasn't something I needed to get worked up about. She was busy on a Tuesday. Instead of responding from a neutral, fresh, open mental space I responded more like an old robot running an outdated operating system — input A occurred: respond with output B.

"Our habits feel so deeply rooted in our psyche we think they are who we are. But they aren't!"

That's how our patterns drive much of our life, if not most of it. Completely clouding our thinking. Our habits feel so deeply rooted in our psyche we think they are who we are. But they aren't! This is such a basic but important truth that it's easily missed, and it bears repeating: our habits, patterns, and even perspectives aren't who we are, they are simply mental programs that were subconsciously installed when we were young and slowly fortified as we grew up. If we learn to work with our mind, and become aware of these programs, we can keep the ones we like, or ignore and delete the ones we don't like.

Unfortunately, we often never realize that there could be a different approach to a situation, a different perspective, an alternative path in life, or that we can even change these mental beliefs. It causes us to get into situations we later deeply regret — businesses, marriages, career choices, addictions. And even small things that add up — spending time with people who don't serve us, eating food we know isn't good for us, buying stuff we don't need, avoiding certain places, or not trying certain things.

Perhaps you are seeing how patterns aren't just patterns, but how they come to define every inch of our lives and who we think we are. Our own self-created matrix. I started businesses and avoided exploring certain hobbies or relationships because of outdated cognitive beliefs.

"Unfortunately, I must have lost thirty-plus years as a complete slave to these illusory patterns. But perfection isn't the goal, growth is."

In many ways, making the same mistake again with Tara hurt me more than the situation itself. Because I have so many daily practices and I have dedicated a huge chunk of my life to doing deep internal work, in the moment I felt so dumb, hopeless, and angry. I wanted to give up and crawl into a hole.

But almost as quickly as I went down the mental toilet, I picked myself up. While my practices didn't save me in the moment, this time, they helped me find my way back to shore swiftly. I remained relatively calm even when I felt at my worst. And I'm even writing about it right now. It isn't perfection, but it's progress!

I'm supremely thankful to my Vipassana meditation practice and various other techniques that have kept me fairly sane, and more and more aware of these mental behavior loops since I adopted them. Unfortunately, I must have lost thirty-plus years as a complete slave to these illusory patterns. But perfection isn't the goal, growth is.

So while the other day didn't go as I hoped, I know I'll be better prepared to respond from a more genuine and untethered place when a similar situation arises in the future. Tomorrow is a new day and I get to try again. And the day after too. And the day after that.

Wish me luck. And good luck to you too!

PS. Tara and I ended up meeting up another day, and I found my true voice along the way :)