EMPTY

Several weeks ago, I was sick. Physically, it was intense, but what’s actually been even more challenging has been the mental and emotional experience during and after the physical symptoms. The best way that I can describe it is a feeling of emptiness. I’ve felt insatiable, like a hungry ghost. A feeling of “What’s really the point of anything?”

My initial reaction was to try and run away from these feelings, distract myself until they hopefully went away. As per usual, that didn’t work. Then I started to try and lean into the emptiness, be with it, not try to change it or fix it, but merely allow it and observe it. Looking down the dark well of emptiness, shouting my curiosities into it, the following is some of what has been reflected back to me, so far…

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The usefulness of the vessel depends upon its emptiness.

The melody is pretty because of the notes that are not played.

The beautiful painting springs forth from the blank canvas.

It’s an adventure precisely because we don’t know what’s going to happen.

In order to be found, I must be lost.

In order to wake up, I must be asleep.

In order to know, I must not know.

In order to desire, there must be a void.

From silence, comes sound.

From stillness, comes movement.

From space, comes form.

From darkness, comes light.

From the end, comes the beginning.

From nothing, I can be anything.

From nowhere, I can go anywhere.

When I think I know, I stop the flow of knowing.

When I’m empty, I can be filled.

From meaninglessness, comes meaning.

From purposelessness, comes purpose.

From emptiness, comes fulfillment.

From nothing, comes everything.

Love, Wade.

PATIENCE

Patience is hard.

We want healing, results, success, change, peace, happiness, retribution and we want them NOW! 

We have a desire, need, expectation, and if things don’t seem to be going our way, we think something has gone wrong: a glitch in the Matrix has occurred, so to speak.

Impatience means we have deemed NOW not good enough, so we’re focused on the so-called “better” future to come. The problem is, if we’re always focused on the future, we’ll never experience the now. Therefore, even if the so-called “better” future were to arrive, we’ll miss it, because the only time the future can actually occur is NOW.

Impatience means we don’t believe that in the macro, everything is in order and working itself out at its own pace. We think the Universe needs our individual flesh and bone assistance in order to keep things on track.

What’s the source of our impatience? A lack of trust in life. 

When did we stop trusting life? Maybe when we were abused or neglected as children. Maybe once the symptoms of that abuse or neglect became evident. Maybe when our parents, teachers, peers, or society at large taught us to be afraid of life. This is, of course, quite an understandable reaction. Yet, how is not trusting life working for us? 

Of course, it’s easier to be patient when things are “going our way.” Yet we’re not actually being patient until it’s become increasingly difficult to remain patient. We’re not trusting in life until things are seemingly “not going our way.” 

Patience is an active daily PRACTICE: rooted in trust and surrender. 

How do we trust again? 

Meditate, daily. 

Then, look back on your life and notice how, when the time was right, although sometimes quite painful, everything has ultimately always worked itself out the way it needed to be. The proof of that lies in the fact that you are here, right now, reading this. 

How do we surrender? 

Rather than deny, own. 

Rather than move against, move with. 

Rather than fight, dance.

Love, Wade.

INTUITION

in·tu·i·tion

/ˌint(y)o͞oˈiSH(ə)n/

noun

1. the ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning.

When we were infants, toddlers, children, maybe even teenagers, we LIVED in our BODIES. We said or did something because it FELT right. If we didn’t say or do something, it was because it didn’t FEEL right. Then, slowly but surely, most of us were educated out of our bodies and into our MINDS. We were taught that our mind is the ultimate captain of the ship, the navigator; that intellect and logic are king. We were taught, implicitly or explicitly, that intuition, that feeling in the heart and gut, is akin to superstition, and namely, is NOT to be trusted. We were taught that what we can trust are the opinions of elders and experts, data, evidence, facts, reason, a good old pros and cons list and what has happened to us in the past. 

Now there can of course be merit found, at times, in some of the aforementioned resources. But what a lot of it tends to lead to, for one’s own experience, is a torturous amount of time and energy wasted in speculation. Speculation leads to confusion. Confusion leads to stagnation. Stagnation calls forth destruction. Why? The Universe operates on pure motion and change: a.k.a. evolution. So when stagnation occurs, corrective action is automatically taken. This is not a punishment of any kind; it is simply cause and effect. 

You have most likely had the following experiences:

A - A particular choice makes all the logical sense in the world, but it just doesn’t FEEL right. You discredit the feeling and take action on the logical choice. It doesn’t turn out well.

B - A particular choice doesn’t make logical sense, but something about it just FEELS right. You decide to take action based on the feeling. It turns out surprisingly well. 

C - A particular choice doesn’t make logical sense, but something about it just FEELS right. You confer with your intellect and speculate about it for days, weeks, months, or even years. Finally, you decide to take action on the original feeling. It doesn’t turn out well. You deduce that you cannot trust your intuition. 

Why did version C turn out this way?

Our intuition, our desires, have a window of relevance. The feeling contains a directive, which is “NOW.” In the case of version C, you stagnated in speculation, and by the time you decided to take action, the Universe had changed and the window of relevance for that particular action, for you, had closed. 

So what do we do? 

Meditate, daily. Meditation is a daily practice that affords us the opportunity to move beyond the intellect, unwind stresses from the physiology and therefore strengthen our connection to our intuition, which is our direct line to source. 

Tune in with what does and does not FEEL right. 

Surrender speculation. Do not wait. Take any action you can, now. 

Leap into the unknown. 

The direct result is complete support from the Universe. 

And if you do not like where you land, leap again. 

MORE OR LESS

The more I want, the less I have.

The more I long for, the less I’m here for.

The more I own, the more I’m owned.

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The more I think, the less I know.

The more I correct, the less I enjoy.

The more I fight, the less I win.

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The more I do, the less I am.

The faster I go, the less I have time.

The longer the list, the shorter the bliss.

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The more I’m busy, the less I produce.

The more I do, the more I miss.

The more I run, the more I stand still.

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Wade Robson

PERSPECTIVE

One of the great determiners of our experience of reality is our perspective. 

Change our perspective, change our experience of reality. 

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I only have enough money for the month!

Vs

I am grateful to have enough money for the month!

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I’m going through so much. 

Vs

I’m growing through so much. 

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The Universe is against me.

Vs

The Universe is pushing me to grow.

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Nobody understands me.

Vs

I haven’t yet found the most effective ways to express myself. 

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It’s not fair that I got hurt and can’t do what I love.

Vs

The Universe has created an opportunity for me to rest and reflect.

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I can’t be happy because of them.

Vs

Nobody is responsible for my happiness but I.

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I don’t have enough time.

Vs

I could learn to spend my time more intentionally.

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My heart is broken.

Vs

My heart is wounded and its healing will make me stronger.

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With my luck, it won’t work out.

Vs

Whatever happens will be evolutionary.

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Why me? (Said with angst and a sense of injustice)

Vs

Why me? (Said with curiosity and reverence)

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Life happens TO me.

Vs

Life happens FOR me. 

REMEDY

Emotional pain arrives and we often immediately start looking elsewhere for the remedy: Netflix, food, social media, other people, cleaning, alcohol, drugs, romance, work, money, stuff, you name it. We’re looking for a soothing salve that will quickly make the pain go away. Even though, if we are being honest, we have already gathered mountains of evidence for ourselves over the years that none of these external pain relievers work for very long. Still, this behavior remains quite enticing and addictive due to the fact that it seems to work so quickly and easily. Even if the pain relief is only for a short amount of time, it nevertheless feels like the better option than having to merely endure the pain.

So what’s the remedy for the unfortunately short duration of external pain relief? Our frequent answer is more and stronger doses of our quick fix of choice. So, we try this approach, and it maybe works for a while, yet at some point, its effectiveness starts to wane. At this point, we either find a new quick fix method altogether or we double down, up our dosage so high that we may even begin to cease feeling anything at all. However, our pain may be so terrifying, so great, that the lack of feeling anything at all still feels like the better option. Yet eventually, we may find ourselves so numb, isolated, unsure of the point anymore and wishing we could just feel something, anything. Sometimes we’ll even enact extreme or violent measures against others or against ourselves, in a desperate attempt to satiate that deep desire to feel something.

If we put our hand in the fire, we will undoubtedly feel the intense pain of being burned. Immediately, we will viscerally understand that unless we want to get burned, we should not put our hand in the fire. Conversely, if we had put our hand in the fire and felt no pain, we may have inadvertently allowed our hand to be utterly destroyed. This analogy points to a greater truth, that our health and well-being are not hindered by pain but are rather dependent upon our feeling of pain. Often, in order to know the thing we want to avoid feeling, we must first feel that very thing. Furthermore, it’s the acknowledging, accepting, embracing and feeling of the experience that we don’t want that can be the necessary component of moving towards the experience that we do want.

I ran from and tried to bury my pain for a long time: so long that I eventually started to feel completely emotionally numb. Then, once my nervous system reached emotional pain storage capacity, I broke open. The last 9 or so years have been a masterclass in learning to lean into the pain. The more we run, the bigger, faster and scarier the pain becomes. Yet the revelation is that although terrifying at times, when we can learn to slowly sit with, look at, listen to, describe and feel the pain, albeit painful, it’s often nowhere near as scary, excruciating and deadly as we imagined. The therapeutic technique SOMATIC EXPERIENCING can be quite helpful in this journey. 

I find it akin to a child who is throwing a tantrum; once we can stop, tune in, acknowledge, and resonate with the child, she may start to feel more safe, less needy and eventually calm down. Our pain is like that child that needs to be seen and heard. Eventually, the time comes when we must heed that call.

The good news is: pain, anxiety, and fear—the so-called “problem”—are not actually the “problem” at all, but rather an essential ingredient of the solution. Ironically enough, nothing heals like pain.

Love, Wade.