Self Compassion When Life Is Hard: Mindful Hiking with Sean

Hello again. So it's the end of a long day of hiking. The 50-pound backpack up and down these mountains of Yosemite. I didn't really sleep much, didn't eat very well, drove for 12 hours yesterday. My body hurts. I've twisted my knee and my ankle, probably swollen right now. It's very unpleasant. This is where the mind gets so tricky. Because it's so easy for our minds to judge the unpleasantness as being bad or wrong or something that we need to resist. I should not be feeling this. Can't wait for this experience to be over. I want to be feeling something different. For me, I start dreaming about golf courses and like spas and like waterfalls. Speaking of the waterfalls in Yosemite are a little dry right now in early October. My mind can be very quick to judge all this unpleasant experience in my body as being bad or wrong, or not good, or that it should be different, or I should be in better shape, or whatever. This is a day of physical training, carrying a 50-pound backpack, getting stronger. Perhaps more importantly, it's a day of mental training, emotional training. Can I be with these reactions of the mind, these judgments of the mind? Notice these judgments of good, bad, right or wrong, should be different. Can I notice these emotions that are unpleasant and allow them to be here? Explore them with caring curiosity. Oh yeah, look, my mind is saying this is not good. This is what my reactions are. This is how I want to check out of this experience through distraction and resistance. And so the training, which is what we do in meditation, hopefully every day, is to witness the reactions and the how the mind is operating through these patterns that we've developed. The patterns aren't right or wrong, good or bad, they're just patterns. And can we soften the patterning and practice opening to what's here without judging it to be bad or wrong, without fantasizing too much anyway? And can we surrender ourselves to feel, oh yeah, unpleasantness? It's real, it is what it is, but it doesn't need to be wrong. It's just a part of what it means to hike a long way under these conditions. I felt it is. Can we offer ourselves the same kind of care we would offer our loved ones who are going through a tough time? Oh yeah, it's okay. It's okay to feel that way. It's understandable, it's normal, it's not gonna last forever. You're not alone. Other people would feel the same way too. And can we just feel a little bit cared for? Can we find maybe some pleasantness in the situation or perspective? Oh well. I thought a squirrel was coming after me. That these feelings and sensations aren't all of who I am. There's so much more. There's areas of the body that feel okay, that feel energized. I'm able to have my mental capacity for making good steps, keep going, drinking six liters of water, and to not over-identify with the suffering. If you're going through a tough time, if you're climbing a hill, a mountain that feels like it's really hard, it's okay. You can allow yourself to feel what you feel without judging it to be bad or wrong. And just feel the journey, however it is, with a simple sense of care. And once in a while, we walk up to a beautiful view, and we get to see where we've been and where we're going and appreciate how far we've come. All right, my friends. I love you. Take good care.