softening

Let's talk about softening.

I think I sometimes grip things too tightly: my expectations, the people I love, the memories I adore, the standards I hold myself to.

I want to loosen my grasp. I want to soften my mind. I want to look for points of tension and tenderise them.

When I hold things so ferociously, it is hard to see them for what they are. Often one holds onto something with ferocity if they are afraid of losing it, or of what will happen if they let go.

This is foolish.

Nothing is permenant. There is a strange beauty to that. The very fact that everything is fleeting should make one appreciate them more.

If you let fear cloud your mind, your capacity for gratitude is forsaken; you cannot appreciate what you fear, and you spoil something beautiful with grisly and unwholesome emotions.

Time is finite and every second is priceless. Wouldn't you rather look for the beauty rather than the pain?

When you soften, you unlock the capability to do this. When you stop trying to control things and stop fearing things you cannot control, you can now view them without bias.

You can begin to appreciate things while you have them. You can begin to appreciate yourself and the intricacies of your humanity. You can laugh at yourself. You can smile at adversity. You can console yourself in your darkest moments.

There is is this beautiful perspective I have recently witnessed my mind adopt, and it is a little ethereal to try and put into words but I shall try:

As I get older, and the more I experience coming of age (which I think we will all be forever "coming of age" until we take our last breath), the more I recognise the duality in all things.

Every experience can be made beautiful in some capacity. It goes beyond that. There is something here I cannot grab at. It evades me now, but I will eventually catch it. I think it is linked to softening. Perhaps if I practice this more, I will bring this incorporeal revelation into the light.