Celebration - It's A Great Day To Be Alive

I awoke at 3.38am this morning (in horror as I checked my iPhone) knowing I was awake and that this was the end of sleep. I have a full day of teaching ahead (it's 8.10am now) and I felt anxious, troubled - without an ability to say: "It is this." How many times have you awoken in this condition? Dreading the day ahead, wondering how to escape it? It has been awhile for me, but life has a wonderful habit of giving the lesson you need most, when you need it most. Time for me to learn more about me again. I did the only thing I know will help: recognise what I am doing. Use Alexander's three steps from UOS, starting with analysing the conditions of use present. In my case, that was about my anxiety: what are the thoughts supporting my anxiety? Still lying in bed, I pulled over a scrap of paper, rested it on the detective novel I had been tempted to read instead, and scratched out a list of every thought that was tumbling around behind my anxiety… I am running out of money. Softbank has taken over my iPhone. I am staying in a terrible room. I am not sleeping enough. I never get a break. My staff is unhappy with me. I didn't plan the salaries right. Once I'd finished my list, I didn't feel better, but in Alexandrian terms I had accomplished the first step in any process to change behaviour: analyse the conditions of use present. Thoughts are the primary movers. Heads don't push down without the encouragement of our beliefs. Next step was putting in place what I already know works: organise my co-ordination in the way that supports me focusing on the thoughts that are stressing me out. I've been sitting on a cushion most mornings for a decade now, so that part is easy. A few minutes spent doing what I have practised for years - freedom in form if not totally in mind. I love my crossed-legged meditation posture itself: immediate joy often accompanies this way of sitting, like turning on a current inside. I've habituated my system to adore this. However, just remembering my morning list bought a quick end to that! Back comes my anxiety. Despite my best effort to co-ordinate my sitting according to natural movement principles, it is not enough. Alexander's discovery gives me a fabulous tool to undo excessive and inappropriate tension, but powerfully held beliefs will trump that every time. That's my experience. Belief is a muscular activity projecting the life I am in right now. One by one, sitting in my meditation posture, I questioned my thoughts: I am exhausted. Really? At that moment I did not feel exhausted, so why am I saying to me that I am? Wait, listen. What new thought arrives? "I never get a break." Oh, so that's the issue that troubles me. Hmmm… I wonder at that idea - I never get a break. For the first time I genuinely smiled in relief. The truth I spontaneously discovered was - I always get a break. Right now I have two hours ahead of me. I will take 20 minutes in the morning class, then a leisurely lunch. I have no teaching in the evening - suddenly my day looked entirely different. What a discovery! Feeling lighter I looked down at my notes and this one jumped out at me: "I live in a terrible room." At that moment, I brought up images of rooms that people live in: in slums, in goals, in cardboard boxes on the street. Laughter and joy escaped my mouth: "I live in a wonderful room!" For a start I have it all to myself. Just then the air conditioner kicked on and I realised: "Wow. It is hot and humid outside, but in this wonderful room I can be so comfortable." Then I saw it, the real cause of celebration… My life is wonderful, not just this room. All the anxiety I had been having was holding me in denial to all that I had. Celebration is essential, this is what I am re-discovering: this is what hit me this morning. I have everything I need, and if truth be told, in this moment I have more than I need. There's food in the fridge if I want to eat it, there's a bed and time to lie down if I want it, I have all the money I need right now, and enough money extending towards an undefined moment which only exists in my anxiety mind. Who knows what my staff think of me? I certainly don't and I never will. Why worry about that? What do I think of them? That's what matters. To me. Now I am finally ready for my new day. I am celebrating my life, who I am in living, and the extraordinary people all around me who share a vision to bring Alexander's discovery within reach of everyone on the planet. It's a great day to be alive and doing what I do.