Questioning Emotional Resistance
How much do we really need the resistance that we carry around in our day-to-day lives?
Questioning the usefulness of some of our mental/emotional habits can be a quick way to expose what no longer needs our support....
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Transcribed Version
The reason for a great deal of discomfort that people can experience emotionally is not only because of a negative state such as depression or anxiety or frustration or anger or something like that, but the idea that it shouldn't be there, that it's wrong.
I think on some level, we all feel like it's possible to live freely and happily and live from a very abundant and peaceful energy, and so when we're out of that energy it can be annoying because we intuitively feel like there's something better to experience and we're missing out on it.
And experiences in life can make us believe that a person or a circumstance or situation that feels out of our control is the reason for us being out of that good energy, that good, peaceful, joyful or abundant energy that's beneath the resistance and the mental noise.
To help with that it can be useful to notice that you don't actually know for certain how you should be feeling right now.
So if you feel angry, maybe there's nothing wrong with that. If you feel depressed, maybe there's not actually something wrong with that. If you feel anxious, maybe there’s not something wrong with that.
Maybe the discomfort is a sign that you're not thinking from your truest place. Maybe it's a sign that you're disconnected from the truest part of yourself, and yet the emotions or the thoughts in themselves aren't actually wrong.
The idea that they shouldn't be there is an extra idea that makes them feel even more heavy. You don't have to give any feeling extra attention or try to do anything with it, but you can notice the resistance you have against it, the resistance you have against feeling a certain way.
And if the resistance is noticed, you can probably also notice that the resistance doesn't get rid of the uncomfortable feeling. It’s an attempt to fix it, it’s an attempt to get rid of discomfort, it’s an attempt to take you back towards safety, or a pleasant experience, a lack of pain.
But the resistance doesn't actually help with that. It's more of a futile attempt that adds another layer to any discomfort you're experiencing.
Is resistance necessary? Is resistance against yourself necessary?
We get trained to think that “of course it is”, because if our actions don't fall in line with what other people think is correct, especially when we're young, then usually we are shown resistance from other people, so we accidentally become trained in resisting ourselves if we do anything that we think is not correct. Or we just got to resist ourselves habitually everyday throughout the day.
But is the resistance necessary?
If you feel no resistance within yourself, then you probably don't need to listen to this. If you feel slight resistance is still there, it's ok, it's ok to resist as much as you want. You're completely free to. But do you need it?
Sometimes resistance can be so ingrained that we don't even notice it is resistance. It has just become a normal part of life, or it can feel like a discomfort that we can't get rid of. And if that’s your experience, there is probably still some surface resistance that you can experiment with relaxing…
The feeling of giving yourself a break, the feeling of letting yourself off the hook, and maybe noticing the protests that come from the mind with that – if you don't resist yourself, if you let yourself off the hook, if you're kind to yourself, if you're nice to yourself – our conditioning can say:
“Then you'll become complacent.”
“Then you won't work hard enough.”
“Then you won't get where you want to be.”
...or anything else that can seem to threaten your best possible life outcome.
We are so well trained in believing in the value of pain. “No pain no gain. Going through pain to get the good stuff.”
Of course you can push through pain and struggle to get somewhere else. But is self-created pain and resistance really necessary? Does it actually separate you from something much more intelligent within yourself? Something that’s ready to guide you more efficiently and fuel you much more abundantly than separate sense of self that's always in a state of resistance…
Do you need resistance?
Do you need as much resistance as you might be currently experiencing yourself? If the answer is ‘yes’ then carry on.
If the answer is ‘no’, even if the answer is ‘you don't need quite so much resistance in yourself’ - then that's all you need to really recognise. You don't need to try to stop resisting or try to get rid of resistance.
When you notice something is futile, it naturally starts to fall away by itself because our unconscious belief and support of it is no longer so active.
Experiment with being nice to yourself, resisting yourself less, and then seeing if you're actually any worse off. You might find that whenever you feel better, everything else flows much easier.
Thanks for listening,
Adam Oakley
Inner Peace Now > Inner Peace Now Podcast > Do You Need Resistance?