You know those nagging, annoying little memories – those recollections, often tinged with regret or annoyance or embarrassment, that sometimes pop up unannounced?
Well, I think they’re valuable. More specifically, the lessons and understandings from them, plus the energy we invest in keeping these memories alive.
So what can you do about them? How do you keep the lesson and get the energy back?
And what’s this got to do with your odyssey?
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What just happened? A visit to the MindSpa Garden, weeding
There’s a lovely metaphor for dealing with less-than-delightful thinking, memories and so on: it’s like taking out the weeds in your garden.
Except, weeds are not useless. There’s plenty of good stuff in weeds, just not how we currently see them. It’s like getting nutritious tea from nettles, or fixing nitrogen in the soil with clover. You don’t have to love the weeds, but you can still make good use of them.
How? Good question.
I love this definition of an odyssey I found in the Encyclopedia Britannica:
a long journey full of adventures;
a series of experiences that give knowledge or understanding to someone.
From this, we can create our own little adventure and figure out what to do with these less-than-delightful recollections and turn them into a knowledge and understanding.
So…
Let’s take a 30 minute meditative and hypnotic audio adventure and head to the MindSpa, to the garden within.
Take some time to tidy up the garden, notice what needs tending, plant some seeds – hopes, dreams, plans – for the future.
When you notice those annoying, less-than-delightful weeds, take ‘em and put them in the compost so you can get the good stuff out of them.
Which brings me to the next part: how do you break down ‘weeds’ in the mind?
One way is to use questions. Not the kind of questions we usually ask, like ‘Why me?’ or ‘How could I have been so stupid?’
Instead, find something more valuable, something to dig in and get the good stuff, the learnings.
One simple alternative is just ‘I wonder what a more valuable question is here’
We covered a few questions in the recording and maybe you’ve got some ideas already.
Once you’ve turned the weeds into nutritious compost, what do you do with it?
Use it to nurture the things you love, want to grow.
What would you do with compost? What do you want to nourish and grow in the coming weeks and months?
