Oakville Zen Meditation
Taking our sadness for a ride
Sadness is a frequent emotion to endure. When severe and persistent it may become depression.
Sometimes there is a good reason for being sad but, most often there is no reason at all.
We can wake up sad or happy w/o any obvious reason.
If somebody near you is sad, there is little you can do to change her/his mood. Trying to help will probably goes nowhere because it could just frustrate you both.
So, what to do when sadness is controlling your mind?
3 options:
1 You know the cause of your sadness and you can fix it: If so, rush for it.
2 You know the origin but there is no solution.
3 You don’t know the cause.
For the last 2 ones there is only one approach and it is the same for any unsolvable negative emotion meaning: “taking it for a ride”.
Recognize, accept and observe that you are sad in a mindful way that is don’t expect anything else such as analyzing your sadness.
It does not mean that you resign yourself to a life of recurrent sadness. This means that you acknowledge your current negative experience of sadness and say: “It is Okay”
Than, Excuse yourself from being unhappy. It means: self-compassion and self-forgiveness.
You are not super-woman or super-man.
Finally: decide to spend quality time with your sadness as long as necessary. It will not getting worse.
“Taking your sadness for a ride” means just that: you are horse backing and the horse is sadness. If you are planning to take your sadness for an horse backing ride can give your horse a name: heartbreak, shittylife, loneliness, disease. You can call it John, Mary, boss, friend, weather, etc. When you give it a name, you will see your sadness as a visitor, a guest of your psyche.
You can treat it with respect and courtesy.
When you take sadness out for a walk you see beauty on your walk but don’t expect this beauty to make you happy or getting a break from your sadness. It is just beauty seen with sadness.
Take your sadness to yoga, shopping, meditation, Take it to therapy, exercise with it, feed it when you eat, fall asleep with it. Horse backing is, in fact, having a date with your horse.
Do the same with your sadness.
When you are spending quality time with your sadness, be careful about how you treat yourself and the people in your life. Sadness often invites anger and anger looks for ways to express itself.
If being with your sadness causes you to hurt people around you then apologize.
If your sadness causes you to hurt yourself, then apologize and forgive yourself.
If you treat your sadness in a mindful way with patience, kindness and compassion, it will leave. When it leaves, say goodbye. Thank it for the lessons it taught you.
Like most negative feelings sadness will come and go during our all life.
You might as well make a comfortable place for it when it strikes and be ready for the next horse backing.
Thank you all
