Our days are filled with moments of choice where have an opportunity to exercise one of our fundamental human gifts: free will. When we choose life-giving actions, we are filled with goodness. When we choose depleting actions, we open the doorway to the next depleting action.
In Christianity, we could say that “original sin” points to that ill-fated moment when Eve exercises free will and chooses to eat the forbidden apple. In Judaism, we call the force that attempts to pull us off track “yatzar hara”, or the evil eye. In Buddhism, the spirit Mara is the tempter who tries to knock the Buddha off his path of enlightenment.
Let’s take this conversation about choice out of the language of “good” and “evil” and instead focus on “life-affirming” or “life-depleting.” Again, there are some actions that nourish the soul and others that take us away from the soul.
In Hebrew, the word chet is often translated as “sin”, but a more accurate translation is “missing the mark,” which, like an archer, are times when we veer off course. As imperfect, fallible humans, this can happen several times a day!
In The Seat of the Soul, Gary Zukav shares the analogy that our souls want to align with the Mother Ship, which we can think of as our inner North Star. When we’re in alignment, we feel connected, on track, nourished, safe, and we experience a sturdiness that helps us bend and sway in the changing winds of life without breaking.
Coming into alignment isn’t a one-time choice or a finish line that we arrive at from doing enough inner work. Rather, it’s a daily – even hourly – even a minute-by-minute practice! It’s the micromoments where we either make choices that nourish and align or deplete and set us off course.
And, like with food, there’s a cascade effect: healthy choices set into motion more healthy choices and unhealthy choices open the pandora’s box of unhealthy choices. That doesn’t mean we can’t course correct; we can and must. But we can make it easier or harder on ourselves to stay in alignment depending on the choices we make.
One Potent Moment
Let’s take a potent moment in the day: waking up. Many people wake up feeling off-kilter in some way. You may feel tired, anxious, or depressed. If you deny what you’re feeling or try to avoid it by reaching for your phone, you will amplify the negative. Neuropsychology now offers us the scientific studies to verify what we intuitively know: if you place your attention on what’s “negative”, the negative will grow. And, fortunately for the survival of our species, we’ve been wired toward the negativity bias, which means that a negative thought or awareness will register more easily than a positive one.
However, this no longer serves us the way it once did, and the good news is that we can hardwire our brains in the direction of noticing what’s working, what’s beautiful, what fills our hearts with joy. This is choice point: If our phone is within eyesight and arm’s reach, we’re likely going to reach for it. It’s our “yatzar hara” or Mara moment when the temptation is great to check and scroll. But, if we can resist the temptation and instead say a prayer of gratitude, or, better yet, sing a prayer of gratitude, we will notice a vibrational lift that connects us to a greater song that weaves through our world. It’s such a small moment, such a small choice, but it can have reverberating, rippling effects.
I imagine that every era has had its particular serpent that attempts to lead us astray or test our resolve to stay on course. In today’s era, one of our greatest temptresses is our screens. Given that for many people the phone, or even a watch, is now like an appendage, it can be very challenging to choose against this seduction. We might intend to begin the day with prayer or song, as shared above, but if the phone is on the bedside table, we’re likely to reach for it. We might want to course correct when we enter the kitchen with a plan to mindfully drink a cup of tea in silence, but there’s the computer with its allure of emails and the ever-present promise of a dopamine hit. It is no small feat to choose Self or soul instead of screens. We are being challenged!
Allies in Disguise
However, I am of the mind that the greater the challenge, the deeper the possibility to strengthen our muscle of choosing what makes us feel good. (Remember: we are already good, so we’re not choosing to “be good.”; we’re choosing to feel good.) The phone, the food that depletes (whatever that is for you), the alcohol, or whatever tempts us are allies in disguise, for every time we choose against the path that leads us away from soul and for the path of life, we become stronger inside.
Just like our psycho-emotional symptoms like anxiety, panic, and intrusive thoughts are messengers and allies in disguise, so the “serpents” that tempt us and lead us astray are also here for our growth. To view them as enemies will only push them into the shadowlands of psyche, which will give them more power. When we befriend them by naming and recognizing them as allies that push us toward wholeness, we reduce their power over us and instead are able to harness their power for our own good.
The Spiritual Practice of Pausing
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” – Viktor E. Frankl
A great deal of our capacity to choose our response or action hinges on the power of the pause. Left to our habitual minds, we’re likely to choose our default response, which may be the one that leads us off course. But when we can pause, we can ask, “What will serve me in this moment?” Without the pause, we’re victims to our urges. The pause, so small, so subtle, is, in fact, one of our most powerful tools for inner freedom. Like everything else that goes against the habitual grain, pausing is also a practice.
When we pause, we notice. And when we notice, we open to the possibility of seeing the wonderment of this moment, which might lead us to praise or gratitude, which then leads us back into the flow of reciprocity, the web of belonging where we are held and safe.
Every Moment Contains a Choice
What might this look like in daily life? Let’s say you live in New York City and you need to get to work in the morning. You have a choice to walk or take the subway. You choose to walk, which means waking up fifteen minutes earlier. That’s the first choice.
Then you have a choice to walk through the park, which takes a bit longer, or walk on city streets. You choose to walk through the park. That’s the second choice.
Once in the park, you notice the wildlife – birds, squirrels, chipmunks, rabbits – and marvel that there are so many animals in the middle of the city. You pause to marvel. This is the third choice.
You keep walking, and you notice a spray of white wildflowers leaning over a fallen log covered in moss. You’ve primed yourself to notice, and the beauty stops you in your tracks. Such a master artist you are, our Creator! Look at this display of beauty in my path! And you praise, “Thank you for this beauty. Thank you for the miracle of this earth.” This is the fourth choice.
The choice to wake up a few minutes earlier led to a cascade of positive choices. You have been filled up by awe, beauty, and gratitude (not to mention the aliveness of moving your body and getting fresh air), and you can feel the sweet goodness of these waters nourishing you throughout the day. Whatever uncertainties arise, you have set yourself up to handle them with more clarity and grace.
I’m currently going through the throws of an OCD spiral and “pausing” makes me scared I’ll learn something in my mind that I don’t want to learn. I’ve had OCD for as long as I can remember, but the most challenging themes as of lately are ROCD and SO-OCD. I’ve done ERP and my intrusive thoughts have subsided, but have come back in the last couple of months. I’m unsure what to do. I’m scared if I pause, I’ll learn that I’m in the wrong relationship. I love my husband dearly, but am scared I’ll learn my sexual orientation doesn’t align with our relationship and that I will have to leave him. At times it feels like I want to leave, but that often feels like I want to leave because it might make my fears of uncertainty go away for a little bit. I’m trying to figure out what healthy choices I should be making to help me grow as a person. With ERP, I’ve been advised to say, “Maybe I’m gay, maybe I’m not. Maybe I’m in the wrong relationship, maybe I’m not. I can handle uncertainty”. And that feels uncomfortable and hard to handle at times. I know that’s the point, but I wonder if there’s other things I can do to help myself and my relationship. Any advice?
I encourage you to read through this collection and consider the course for relationship anxiety/ROCD:
https://conscious-transitions.com/relationship-anxiety-collections/
Hi Sarah,
I’m in a similar situation, I have been struggling with many forms of OCD for a long time as well, including ROCD and SO-OCD. These are actually my main themes currently – they go together really well isn’t it – they had been lingering in the back of my mind for a while over the month of November and I did not really pay attention to it until they spiked last week… I’ve been brought back to the lands of anxiety and had almost forgotten how bad and how dark it feels.
It is hard to find ground again when we are in the middle of it and it feels so isolating, but we are never truly alone. There are countless others who share these fears, and I know our minds try to convince us that we are different from others, our specific situation is different and what may be true for others might not be true for us… I often go back to Sheryl’s blog because it reminds me that I’m not alone, and this thought helps me take a tiny step back, sometimes just small enough to allow myself to take a breath, and little by little I can find a moment of clarity and start to examine what is really going on in my mind.
November is a very “gray” month for me as it happens to include the anniversaries of one of my most cherished days but also of the most “grief-filled” day of my life. Where I live, the light really declines and it gets really darker outside (and inside !) and I know that in the back of my mind there is also the awareness of the year coming to an end soon (and my birthday approaching with it). It feels like everything is getting busier, as if we had to wrap things up before the new year, and I often find myself moving too quickly, not taking enough time to feel my feelings. It feels even scarier to pause because everything gets overwhelming so quickly. It takes a lot of courage to slow down in these moments but I can promise you that the thoughts can actually quiet down a bit and we can gradually start to find our way back to a part of ourselves that is more grounded, even if it is just for a moment. It compounds and the next moment might get easier and the next one after that, just like Sheryl wrote 🙂
I hope this can bring you some comfort in these difficult times. Sending love, and hopefully some light xx
Hi Sarah, I’m sorry you’re going through so much pain. If it helps, I look at it like this. The ‘pause’ is essentially the choice about where to direct your attention. You have the choice about whether to focus on the intrusive thought, or to focus on something else that gives you joy, whatever that is. I know it’s incredibly difficult, I’ve been right where you are now. The pause isn’t an invitation to sit and ‘decode’ your thoughts; it’s more the choice about whether to just leave them be and not to water them with your attention.
I know this is all very tough and complicated. In my experience, the more attention I give to things I choose to value – my art, my work, my wife – the less the thoughts have any meaning. This is something ERP, in and of itself, doesn’t really touch on. I hope this helps somewhat.
You may want to look into I-CBT for OCD, it can be life changing! In contrast to ERP, which hinges on tolerating the distress, (so helpful but not everything) I-CBT helps you get to the feared self aspects of OCD and can take the wind out of the sails of OCD at the root. The I-CBT website is full of free resources if you’re interested. Be well 💗
I took a look, and it looks interesting. Seems to put a really useful angle on things.
Hi Sarah,
I just want to say you’re not alone as I’ve suffered and still do with those themes. I find they come about when I’m going through a change, feel like I’m stuck in a rut or I’m going through something like grief (it rarely flared up for me this year when I had a miscarriage). I have found that in the past “confessing” my thoughts to my partner hasn’t helped. I normally just say I’m going through ocd and anxiety. Sometimes I will stop and say what is underneath this thought, like Sheryl has said before, and put my hand on my heart and tears will form. Sometimes I don’t know why and sometimes I do but I have found that the energy somehow moves through me and the thoughts lose some of their power. I am actually starting therapy for OCD again and I’m a bit scared because I’ve done therapy for it before and it makes me worried the thoughts are actually true. These themes can also feel so isolating, as I never talk to my friends about them because I feel embarrassed and that it’s not “normal,” so there’s shame attached to it. Anyway try to give yourself some compassion as it’s not an easy thing to go through and it’s really difficult.
As always Sheryl, this article arrives at the right time. So so hard to make these decisions (especially around screens for me) but I know that if I make the right choice, I feel so much better. A very timely reminder coming into the busy season when anxiety often spikes. Thank you and happy holidays.
I’m so glad it was helpful, Jackie.
Sheryl, having read your posts weekly for the majority of the last 7 or so years, I’d say this is one of your finest pieces, thank you! I especially appreciated the terrain-locating of the concept from within different religious perspectives of side-stepping one’s betterment / path towards the positive/good. As a New Yorker, I find myself curiously wondering about the logistics of which of the two major parks one might walk through to find work on the other side, and the specific communities of people who could do that, and in it, I hear the point about chiseling choices one literal moment or step at a time. Thank you.
Thank you for this beautiful reflection and response! Gratefully received 🙏🏽
I especially like this: “the good news is that we can hardwire our brains in the direction of noticing what’s working, what’s beautiful, what fills our hearts with joy.”
So much OCD treatment completely neglects this. I read a comment on Instagram that stated “my job as your therapist isn’t to help you feel good, it’s to help you see that you’re strong enough to feel bad.” Whilst I know there is some truth in this, it just seems to me like a problematic framing. We need strength, yes, but I don’t think submitting to unnecessary suffering does us any favours either!
YES! And, as we talked about in the Gathering Gold episode on Adding Good Things, the more goodness and strength we have, the easier it is to tolerate the hard.