Every week I send out a love note filled with resources, musings, and inspiration about walking this path of yoga and liberation. Click here to subscribe!
We all have issues.
Every last one of us has areas in our life where we feel stuck, hurt, and insufficient. I used to think that I had A LOT of issues. Now more and more, however, I’m starting to see that my multiplicitous issues are really just a few issues repeating themselves. Instead of having 26 different issues, I can see now that I really only have about three or four. But those three or four like to show up dressed in a different costume each time.
Same old story, different day.
You *could* see this information as encouraging: I only have THREE issues!!!
Or it might feel more like: Oh God when will these same three issues GO AWAY???
And when you get stuck in that second train of thought, (“When will I ever move past this? I clearly suck at life and everything in general because I can’t seem to make progress on this one thing.”) you might start to feel like you’re broken. Like you’re damaged goods, irreparably disfigured by whatever hardship or trauma has brought you to this place. But I want to tell you:
You’re not broken. This is just the shape you are.
We all have issues. Whatever your particular issues are, remember that we’ve all got em. No one is unshaped by the experience of their life. Every last one of us has been sculpted by whatever shit we’ve been through. If you’re like me, there’s been a lot of shit, and it can amount to a big ole pile of shame.
When you feel ashamed of your issues, you can get stuck in a cycle of blame, deflection and defeat, continuously feeling bad about how bad you feel, rejecting your own self-judgement, and wallowing in self-pity.
Remind yourself: you can’t be “fixed” because *you’re not broken.*
This doesn’t mean you can’t keep working towards betterment. You can and you must carry forward on the path towards liberation. But there’s a difference between taking responsibility for how your issues affect your life and blaming yourself for your issues.
Seeing yourself as fundamentally whole means looking your imperfections in the face without flinching or turning away. It's a call to do some of the hardest work there is to do: choosing to meet yourself there with compassion and love. Let this be your mantra:
I'm not broken. This is just the shape I am.
Much love,
Bear
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