Following your true nature
This week brought a reminder (thank you Eve!) of the idea that when we follow our true natures, and work in harmony with them, things generally work a lot better for us. To do that which runs against our natures, can be dysfunctional and damaging. However, the question is, how do you figure out what your true nature is in the first place?
If I considered myself in terms of how I react to stuff, and my default emotional states, my true nature is anxiety and depression. This is because I am anxious and depressed. At the moment, I respond to most things with heady blends of panic and misery, such that this can feel like who I am. If I run based on my innate responses, all I get is more anxiety and depression. To tackle those, I have to find ways to work entirely counter to my own innate responses. I have to challenge my fear and push at its edges to move it. I have to seek things that reduce my distress. This means embracing the idea that anxiety and depression are responses, but not a manifestation of my true nature, and that, despite all short term evidence to the contrary, I might be someone else entirely.
If you aren’t living in tune with your true nature, then the surface of your life is not necessarily able to tell you what your true nature looks like or what you need in order to live well. Everything about us can be distorted by experience and a shoddy environment. Desires, dreams, hopes, aspirations, longings, feelings of need do not exist in a vacuum, but in the social, cultural context of our lives. If what we truly need is entirely at odds with our context, figuring this out can take a lot of effort. Going from the dysfunctional surface to seeing what is underneath, is incredibly difficult. Even believing there is some other ‘true nature’ to find, can be difficult.
The one thing I have learned in the last week or so is that I have to stop with the blame. This has everything to do with my back history, but my default when I am not happy, is to blame myself. I’ve been in a lot of situations where saying ‘this situation sucks’ was not an option. And so it became my lack of patience that was the problem. My inability to make the best of things. My unreasonable expectations. My inability to appreciate. My depressive and anxious tendencies. I spent years trying ever harder to be a more grateful, patient, pragmatic, optimistic, making the best of things person. The result was that I became ever smaller, ever more miserable and unable to function. When things go wrong, I assume I wasn’t trying hard enough, wasn’t grateful enough and so forth.
What I need to do is stop assuming the problem is me, and get a lot more willing to look outside myself for things that could be changed. Some of my situation has been decidedly shitty. That’s not me feeling sorry for myself, or trying to emotionally blackmail someone else, it’s a fair assessment and I am entitled to it. Only by being able to identify external things as sometimes needing to change, can I get out of a place of always feeling change needs to happen inside me. If I change my life, I might well feel better about it, and from there, the whole issue of finding and following my true nature becomes a good deal more viable.
Deep thanks to everyone who has offered kindness and support this week, and to everyone who has shared stories, experiences, insights and perspectives. Particular thanks to those who have been able to come up with actual solutions – in working out which of those might truly serve, I have made some significant headway, and all of those offers were greatly appreciated as options.
If I considered myself in terms of how I react to stuff, and my default emotional states, my true nature is anxiety and depression. This is because I am anxious and depressed. At the moment, I respond to most things with heady blends of panic and misery, such that this can feel like who I am. If I run based on my innate responses, all I get is more anxiety and depression. To tackle those, I have to find ways to work entirely counter to my own innate responses. I have to challenge my fear and push at its edges to move it. I have to seek things that reduce my distress. This means embracing the idea that anxiety and depression are responses, but not a manifestation of my true nature, and that, despite all short term evidence to the contrary, I might be someone else entirely.
If you aren’t living in tune with your true nature, then the surface of your life is not necessarily able to tell you what your true nature looks like or what you need in order to live well. Everything about us can be distorted by experience and a shoddy environment. Desires, dreams, hopes, aspirations, longings, feelings of need do not exist in a vacuum, but in the social, cultural context of our lives. If what we truly need is entirely at odds with our context, figuring this out can take a lot of effort. Going from the dysfunctional surface to seeing what is underneath, is incredibly difficult. Even believing there is some other ‘true nature’ to find, can be difficult.
The one thing I have learned in the last week or so is that I have to stop with the blame. This has everything to do with my back history, but my default when I am not happy, is to blame myself. I’ve been in a lot of situations where saying ‘this situation sucks’ was not an option. And so it became my lack of patience that was the problem. My inability to make the best of things. My unreasonable expectations. My inability to appreciate. My depressive and anxious tendencies. I spent years trying ever harder to be a more grateful, patient, pragmatic, optimistic, making the best of things person. The result was that I became ever smaller, ever more miserable and unable to function. When things go wrong, I assume I wasn’t trying hard enough, wasn’t grateful enough and so forth.
What I need to do is stop assuming the problem is me, and get a lot more willing to look outside myself for things that could be changed. Some of my situation has been decidedly shitty. That’s not me feeling sorry for myself, or trying to emotionally blackmail someone else, it’s a fair assessment and I am entitled to it. Only by being able to identify external things as sometimes needing to change, can I get out of a place of always feeling change needs to happen inside me. If I change my life, I might well feel better about it, and from there, the whole issue of finding and following my true nature becomes a good deal more viable.
Deep thanks to everyone who has offered kindness and support this week, and to everyone who has shared stories, experiences, insights and perspectives. Particular thanks to those who have been able to come up with actual solutions – in working out which of those might truly serve, I have made some significant headway, and all of those offers were greatly appreciated as options.
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