Navigating the Shift
Part 4
Connect with a Greater Force and
Cultivate Intentional Relationships:
A Mindfulness Approach
Zoom calls with buds will not cut it during these times… at least not exclusively. We need to bring in a few perspectives and tools to help us cope, to help us remain aligned, and to step into the call of service with full heart, equanimity and patience.
I believe we’re all being invited to a new level of service at this time. And I ask you: how are you suiting up for it? How are you stepping into that new role, that new level of relationship?
With the news flowing into your phone constantly (social platforms, email), with fight-or-flight activating in basically everyone you know, and with a real urgency right now to manage our anxiety and stress levels so that we can keep showing up to work (be it the virtual conference room, or the hospital… the Zoom classroom, or the kitchen), we need something more than conversations with our loved ones.
Attentional skill development, and adaptive mindset techniques, can enhance our toolbox at this time. Cultivating a way of seeing, a way of receiving support, and up-leveling our way of giving support, are essential right now. Let’s get into that in this training.
Being with my partner during this time (even, and especially, during sickness) was nothing short of magic. Truly. We were both on retreat, if you will. Exercising our attentional muscles, our ability to withstand pain, discomfort, all while infusing our moments with care, kindness, patience and hope.
Being together in sacred silence. In ritual. In an air of mutual love, respect, hope and fear.
Our relationship grew and evolved in ways that live beyond my imagination. I’m so grateful for him, and I’m more in love with him now than I was before he fell ill. What would maybe seem like a nightmare of a situation, is actually a gift born of this pandemic. I am in gratitude for what we went through, and how we showed up for each other through it all.
The 3 Ways to Nurture Community + Connection Today
Connecting with others.
Available in Navigating the Shift, Part 3
In a time of social distancing, we are now facing the concept of connection in entirely new ways. We’re connecting virtually with our family, friends, coworkers. This interpersonal landscape necessitates a new level of intention and approach. In this section, we’ll discuss:
[Journaling Exercise] Evaluate your Connections (and how you’re showing up in your relationships today)
The power of virtual group connection (and the surprising aspects of this connection that you may not have considered before…)
How to establish boundaries (so that your energy doesn’t get depleted, especially if you’re caring for an ill family member, lover, friend or patient).
Connecting with a
Greater Force
Whether you believe in a God, higher power, or hold no spiritual belief system in high regard, you can cultivate a relationship with a truth or entity that is greater than you, as a means of gleaning support through challenging times. Mindfulness meditation provides us with a portal to access a Greater Force or Higher Power. The present moment can provide us with much relief, and is far greater than any single human being. Practicing mindfulness can bring us into close proximity with this type of connection and support system, and allows our ‘higher self’ and insight/truth to arise within us.
Cultivating Intentional Partnership or Relations
in this Time of Crisis
I am so grateful that I was able to support my partner and help him get back to health. We were only together for 6 months when he fell ill with COVID-19, so, as you can imagine, stepping into this new, intense dynamic required us to pivot, to become vulnerability in new ways, It required me to commit in a whole new way, surrender, step into the role of nurse and caregiver (not just partner) and act with very high intention.
In this section, I dive into…
Accepting our new dynamic, without resistance.
What it means to “Know Your Role” and how to apply that in intimate partnership (or other roles).
How mindfulness meditation helped me cultivate enduring patience, love and compassion so that I could serve my partner from my highest self in the ways that he deserved to be supported.
Connecting with a
Greater Force
Mindfulness as a Portal to Presence
Having a belief in something supportive, and larger than me, something that exists outside of me that I cannot see or touch… holding that belief, surrendering to that force, and listening to that force during the crisis period in March 2020 offered me immense relief, hope and support.
Do you believe in God? Goddess? The power of the universe? Do you simply hold the enormity and energy of community, of a group of people, as your higher power? Do you take refuge in the present moment? Is the deafening sound of silence around you the voice of God(dess)?
No matter your spiritual inclinations (or absence of such), I invite you to consider how your relationship with a thing you cannot see or touch offers you solace during these times.
A force greater than you can be perceived as a collection of connection points. An adaptive relationship you’ve created space to see and cultivate that serves as the sustenance along your path.
It can serve as an elixir for wise thinking and action. It can present you with a feeling of support. A hand on your shoulder, when you are struggling. A guide post to remind you of your strength, of who you are, of what you’re capable of, when you’re feeling down, weak, exhausted.
Let me just say that when I speak of a force greater than you, I mean it very fluidly, and very expansively and inclusively. Is your God Jesus? Cool. Is it a tree in Big Sur. Cool. Is it the present moment? Cool. Is it something else? Cool. Is it your highest self? Badass.
For me, my Higher Power (or a force that’s greater than me) takes on multiple forms.
My Higher Power shows up in all sorts of places. It’s fucking weird, and cool, and ever-changing. I keep my eyes open to see and hear and feel where it’s coming from, in any given moment.
It’s an owl calling out in the night.
It’s the deafening sound of silence at dawn, held in a warm, still, damp summer air.
It’s the sensation of flow and alignment I feel when I’m in my life’s work, writing… That’s one way I perceive my Higher Power.
Higher Power also takes on this flavor…
It’s my highest self. The self I aspire to be, the person who embodies full alignment and is the manifestation of my entire soul’s mission here on this earthly plane.
It’s a culmination of admirable traits and values that I check into, and commit to, every single day. It’s comprised mostly of adjectives and adverbs.
I hand things over this higher self, this entity greater than myself, when said things become too heavy, cumbersome, or confusing for me to carry. When they start to bog me down, that’s my cue to offer them up to this force greater than me.
Things worth handing over include…
Obsession over something I did, or said.
Obsession over something someone else did, or didn’t do, that I desperately wish to change or control.
An open, lingering, heavy question of ‘Is my partner going to get better?’
When that shows up, I bring awareness to it, and hand that over to my Higher Power to hold with and for me.
Handing it over allows my load to lighten in that moment. It allows me to feel supported, like I’m not in this alone.
The Greater Force Unveiling:
I’m going to turn it over to you, now.
What’s your conception of a higher power? What’s it comprised of?
What’s your relationship with a high power, or a force that’s greater than you?
From 0-10, how would you rate yourself regarding this statement: “I have an easy time relinquishing control, surrendering the heavy load, and releasing the fears, uncertainty and anxiety-provoking things in my life.”
Lightening the Load Evaluation
JOURNALING PROMPT
Grab a journal! Grab a seat. Please complete the following statements and prompts in your journal. Invite some rest and awareness into your body, and bring a flavor of compassion and patience to yourself as you embark on this exercise.
3 things that are weighing me down and feel heavy in this moment include…
Out of those 3 things, the one that I’m ready to hand over, to relinquish control of, and to release out of me , is…
My version of a force greater than me, or a higher power, can be described as…
Cultivating Intentional Partnership in this Time of Crisis
Mindfulness Strategy:
Cultivate an attitude of acceptance in relation to your new dynamic.
The pandemic has impacted our relationships in a range of ways.
Maybe you’re separated from your partner (because you don’t live together), and you’re not in their proximity at all right now during social distancing. That can create a strain, a pressure on the relationship. It also creates conditions of necessity for new ways of connecting with each other. New ways of bonding, of supporting each other.
Or, maybe you’re with your partner now more than you have ever been before in your relationship. Perhaps you’re living under the same roof together, and you’re both working remotely from home (so now you’re literally seeing each other day and night). And, add this layer in: you’re only seeing each other (and no one else), because we’re in a time of social distancing. This can be a recipe for [FILL IN THE BLANK], depending on the coping strategies and wellness regimens you’re enacting individually and interpersonally.
Now throw illness into the mix.
Let’s consider my situation. My partner and I joined forces under one roof over 35 days ago, and it happened not because we live together, but because he fell ill and I offered to support him at his house until he recovered. He was having fevers, and I was like ‘I’m coming over! And I’m bringing all my supplements with me!!’
My baby was sick! And with that, I was called to step into new shoes in our relationship. Partner took a backseat, and the role of caregiver became my central role for over 14 days.
There’s the role change, and then there’s how I oriented toward that role change.
Let’s look at pain and suffering as a means of understanding this. You can have pain without suffering. According to Shinzen:
Pain X Equanimity = Purification
However, if you you go a different route of orientation, your experience of the same phenomenon of pain can be very different.
Pain X Resistance = Suffering
Relationship dynamics shifting can be uncomfortable. Perhaps we’re losing aspects of the relationship, even if temporarily, where we were getting specific needs or desires met by our partner. When there’s a role shift, especially with illness arising, perhaps some aspects of the relationship get replaced to meet that new demand. That can cause discomfort, which is a flavor of pain. This equation can be applied as such.
The Mindful Role Change Equation
New Role X Equanimity = Purification
Bringing equanimity to the new role means that you’re not pushing it away, and you’re not craving more of it. You’re hanging steady with it, allowing it to be just what it is and just what it needs to be. There’s even a neutral attitude toward this new role that you’re taking on. You’re paying attention to what it’s calling up in you, what it requires. You’re pouring curiosity into its contours. You’re aware of the change, and you’re also aware of the discomfort arising (the sadness around the loss, the discomfort of not getting all your needs met in the ways you’re used to), but you pause. You sit with that discomfort, lean into it and feel it in your body. You then hold steady, and you intentionally invite energy to holding and assuming the new role, rather than resisting it or craving something that isn’t there. You keep returning to the task at hand, with curiosity, with compassion, and you watch the sensations flow, change and pass.
New Role X Resistance = Suffering
In this equation, you’re being called to fill a new role, and you’re feeling threatened, fearful, angry. You’re not having it. You’re feeling resistance, and you’re acting from that place: you’re taking on the new tasks with resentment. Maybe you’re verbally lashing out at your partner. After all, you’ve had to give up something you appreciate and love about your relationship. You’re having a hard time being with the discomfort of this change, and it’s expressing itself in your words, actions (and not just your feelings). This may cause riffs in your partnership. Arguments. Amplified bad feelings. More resistance. Tears.
You see, when you go this route, the discomfort of change - the pain - amplifies. It coagulates and expands. You’re tensing up around it, you’re pushing it away (rather than being with it and processing it using mindfulness techniques). It grows, rather than shrinks, and coagulates into suffering.
Here’s a mindfulness approach to processing your role changes in your partnership:
Bring awareness to it.
Acknowledge the changes that are needed in the relationship at this time.
Acknowledge the thoughts, images and feelings that arise from this acknowledgement.
Bring awareness to any craving or aversion that arises. Identify if any of these sensations are pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.
Apply concentration, clarity and equanimity to what’s arising.
Now that you have awareness of the See, Hear and Feel information that’s arising from the new circumstances, pour your attention into each of these sense gates, one at a time. Observe their contours, not their content.
Accept the relationship changes and your new role.
The process of applying concentration, clarity and equanimity to what’s arising, allows you to be with the discomfort that’s arising, in a way that’s manageable. You can bite off little pieces of it, and process it in parts. This allows you to step into a space of acceptance. You can be with this change, because you have the tools to be with discomfort. You can even access pleasure in your new role, if you use your attention in this mindful way. Remember: Pain X Equanimity = Purification. This discomfort is giving you an opportunity to build concentration, clarity, and equanimity, which allows you to build a more resilient relationship with pain, and access insights from it (like the insight of impermanence, of flow, etc). This is not only an opportunity SERVE in a big way and support our people. It’s an opportunity to accelerate your development of the by products of mindfulness.
2 Mindfulness Techniques for Cultivating Love, Compassion, and Patience
Below are two guided meditations as well as information for you to use to help you not only cultivate a heart-felt way of being in the world, but it also allows you to familiarize with the Mind State of lovingkindness so that you can very easily shift gears and tap into it (especially when fear, anxiety, anger, sadness and discomfort arise!)
What is Nurture Positivity technique set?
Nurture Positivity is a Unified Mindfulness technique-set comprised of a set of techniques that allow you to intentionally cultivate lovingkindness, compassion, forgiveness and feelings to support you in achieving specific goals, or make behavior change, or adopt/lose a habit. Unlike the Appreciation techniques in mindfulness (where you observe what’s happening in your sense gates in the present moment), this is about creating sensations using thoughts (mantra), intentional imagery, and even calling in specific body sensations that are particularly loving, compassion-soaked and pleasant.
Why are Nurture Positivity techniques important for Intentional Partnership?
Supports with resilience
This mindfulness approach allows you to orient toward your partner (or anyone you’re supporting) with a heightened heart-openness. This cannot be overestimated.
When you’re being tested - your patience, your energy level, your compassion, your love…
… when you’re losing sleep, applying cold compresses to your partner 10 hours a day, and through the night to bring down their fever…
… when you’re making all the meals for your loved one or family
… when you’re too drained to even watch TV or talk on the phone with people you love…
This technique IS the refuge.
It was my go-to during the crisis and by Day 9-14, this is the one I used whenever I was taking my partner’s temperature, applying compresses, soothing him while he was trembling, and gently urging him to drink electrolyte beverages.
Using Nurture Positivity techniques while supporting him literally kept filling my well with just a little more compassion, just a little more love. I felt renewed every time I did it, and I was able to pour that love and compassion into every action I took to support him.
Helps you develop a relationship with positive emotion
This technique allows us to have positive emotions like joy and enthusiasm and cultivate a familiarity with what that feels like.
We often go on auto pilot into negative mode (especially if we’re sitting at home in the middle of a crisis or in the midst of a pandemic). This is simply a proactive way for you to create a positive emotional landscape in the body. A place you can go to, a place you can take refuge in, whenever you want to. All you have to do is tune into a certain type of intentional attention.
A Round Up of the Benefits of Nurture Positivity techniques
Every moment can become subtle service. More heart openness. More compassion. You will approach the world and your person from this open hearted place. It just emanates from you. This is a form of subtle service to others who encounter you.
By practicing this technique, you’re practicing LEANING into positive sensations. This results in experiencing more fulfillment out of positive emotions. They become more intense or more rich, the more you practice.
This will no doubt penetrate your thoughts, relationships, how you feel daily. Not only that, but your emotional landscape will rise in quality over time. Get ready for more joy on the REGULAR.
BONUS: Alternating the mindfulness techniques of cultivation of positive thoughts and sensations (i.e. Nurture Positivity), with the appreciation of and observation of what’s arising in present time awareness (i.e. Appreciation), works to optimize your overall growth on the mindfulness path. Pandemic or not, this commitment to BOTH aspects of the practice is key as you cultivate a regular mindfulness practice.
Guided Meditations
Guided Meditation #1
This mindfulness meditation is part of the Nurture Positivity technique-set in Unified Mindfulness, and it allows us to cultivate and soak our attention into the See (visual space), Hear (auditory space) and Feel (physical and emotionally physical space) to create love and compassion somatically.
Unlike some mindfulness techniques where you are observing what’s arising in the present moment, this technique is about inducing or creating a feeling and Mind state of love, compassion, and positivity. Give yourself permission to receive the positivity that may arise, and soak into it.
This guided meditation is designed to promote an embodiment of the intentions of love and health. Enjoy!!
Please email me at jess@themindfulnest.co or DM me @jess.lipman! Let me know how this guided meditation goes for you. Any insights arise? What was your experience? I’d love to hear! I’m happy to provide 1:1 coaching via email to support you.
Guided Meditation #2
This Nurture Positivity mindfulness technique is designed to send positive intentions toward others. Maybe it’s your partner, loved one, a family member or friend who could use support. Maybe you focus on a patient or client you’re supporting.
Before you sit down for this meditation, decide on the person you’d like to send positive and healing intentions to.
This meditation has the potential to support you in familiarizing yourself with the flavors of compassion and love that allow you to show up in your relationships with heightened skillfulness.
When you cultivate your heart, you are cultivating your ability to be more patient with someone when they’re struggling, to be more accepting of where they’re at right now at this time in their life, and to bring a curiosity and care to the relationship. This ultimately provides your partner, friend, loved one or patient with the container of feeling seen, heard and supported.
HOMEWORK:
1.
The Greater Force Unveiling
Evaluate your perception of a higher power or a force that’s greater than you, journaling in response to the questions provided in this section.
Required time: 5-20 minutes
2.
Lightening the Load Evaluation
Complete this journaling exercise to develop clarity around your relationship with releasing burdens, worries, stress, while also identifying the things that are weighing on you most during this time.
Required time: 10-15 minutes
3.
Evaluate how your partnership and your role has changed.
Review the Mindful Role Change Equation and see where you fall within that framework.
Review the mindful process for accepting a new role or a change in your relationship.
Journal about what roles you’ve been called to adopt and step into during this shifting time. Use the Mindful Process and Equation to determine the sensations arising around those changes and how you’re orienting toward them.
Required time: Minimum 20-30 minutes
4. Meditate, using the two guided meditations in this training.
Feel free to download the meditations and listen on iTunes or another platform of your preference!
Required time:
10 minutes : Love and Healing for Self [Guided Meditation]
16 minutes: Love and Health for Others [Guided Meditation]
Part 4 in the BOOKS!
This training activates the heart in a BIG way. I hope this supports you in cultivating your relationship in intentional ways.
Not only that, but I hope it supports you in registering the changes that you and your interpersonal dynamics are incurring during this pandemic (and during any volatile time!) We have an opportunity to leverage mindfulness to support us in stepping into new roles, to leaning into discomfort of change, with full heart, compassion, patience and resilience. Our relationships can benefit tremendously from this, and our ability to withstand pain and discomfort only increases and strengthens. You’re doing GREAT.
I cannot wait to hear from you! If you have any questions, feedback, insights arising, or if you’d like my feedback on your journaling process with today’s prompts as well as your experience with the guided mindfulness meditations, please email me at jess@themindfulnest.co!
I’m so happy to support you and answer any questions that come up for you. I’m grateful to be able to hold this container for you, and I honor all that you’re doing and all that is unfolding from you during the Navigating the Shift series.
Change can be hard, but mindfulness eases the process and allows us to be with our lives fully. It allows us to be with our people fully, and hold steady with an enduring heart.
We heal in community.
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