Today we have a special guest, Shel Atkins. Our paths crossed at the first yoga studio I taught at back in 2009 and then again at Queens University of Charlotte, where we were both getting our degrees. Shel is not only one of my dearest friends (with the best sense of humor- her sister calls her Charlotte’s best kept secret and I can confirm), but she is also a gorgeous writer. I asked her to contribute to this 30-day challenge and I’m so glad she said yes. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did!
Dear Shel,
May I please have a word with your subconscious? I’d like to suggest you stop looking at everything in your life as something that needs improving or needs some type of renaissance. Your first thoughts of the morning are kind of like the dreaded mammogram you have coming up next week. Instead of scanning the boobies, your brain scans all aspects of your life looking for what needs fixing. I’d like to challenge you instead to turn your first thoughts toward gratitude. Isn’t the idea that perhaps it’s okay to be okay simply mind-blowing? That acceptance of what IS might just be the path to self-actualization and a life of wonderment?
Your body may never look like you’ve always wanted it to, but it’s a damn good body. Your family may not be perfect, but it’s a damn good family. Your career isn’t where you want it to be, but every day you get closer to where you want to be just by being true to yourself. Could the real effort be learning acceptance, the very opposite of all your habitual striving, worrying, and judgement?
Remember that musician, Claude Harding, you met at last year’s Charlotte Shout event, In the Light and Under the Skin? He said something so simple and profound, that you wrote it in your little notebook and asked if you could someday quote him on it. He said, “We are killing ourselves trying to analyze ourselves instead of just being ourselves.” You weren’t sure you completely agreed with him because some people really do need to analyze their behavior and fix some shit, but you recognized that perhaps for you, this relentless examination of self and surroundings could be detrimental.
Later that night, you recognized a theme when you read this passage by Eckhart Tolle:
“To offer no resistance to life is to be in a state of grace, ease, and lightness. This state is then no longer dependent upon things being in a certain way, good or bad. It seems almost paradoxical, yet when your inner dependency on form is gone, the general conditions of your life, the outer forms, tend to improve greatly. Things, people, or conditions that you thought you needed for your happiness now come to you with no struggle or effort on your part, and you are free to enjoy and appreciate them – while they last. All those things, of course, will still pass away, cycles will come and go, but with dependency gone, there is no fear of loss anymore. Life flows with ease.”
This was a delightful revelation considering early life experiences and a generational abandonment wound made you a hypervigilant over-analyzer. However, it slipped through your fingers like silk when you realized how hard it is hold onto this philosophy while in the presence of others – others not yet skilled in steadying their own boats when stormy weather rolls in. Now, you must try to offer no resistance to life and remain in a state of grace while those around you climb onto the rollercoaster you are trying desperately to not to ride. Enlightened concepts exist well in a vacuum.
A baby-step is needed and I think perhaps gratitude is the answer. Annoying in its simplicity, yes, but worth a try. The second you start to worry about your health, your retirement, your marriage, your children, your parents, or judge your changing menopausal body, stop and take an inventory of what’s good. Tell yourself you’re one day closer to your dream job than you were yesterday and that you deserve it. Tell your body it's a good body and thank it for being resilient and healthy. Go ahead and thank your angels that cancer will never return to your body.
Talking about gratitude is not exciting and there’s nothing new under the sun, but what if you think of it as a type of anti-anxiety meditation, a hip, new modality of therapy, and a cheap form of self-care? That tracks, right? I can sense your overwhelm and I know your attention span is short so I will leave you with this; Dostoevsky said, “To think too much is a disease.” Think less and be grateful.
In loving collusion,
Your higher self
You can read more of Shel’s work on her Substack
. Thank you for hanging with me through this challenge. Truly. I am grateful you are here.
Whew! This is good!!! It is easy for me to read your letters and wonder why you are trying to fix everything about your life when I think it is so beautiful, nomadic, free. But this letter made me see myself, too!! Why not just be? Be content where I am, stop worrying, stop trying to fix everything and be grateful for it all! Does it even need fixing?!?! The thought feels like such a relief, a release. I think to do it will be much harder but I am sure going to try!
Big Shel fan! She is the reason we met.