Tag: emotionalbaggage

It’s only heavy if you lift it (7-20-22)

This week we are going to kick off a series about words and phrases that have struck a chord with me.  We’ll start with a story I recently heard from a Tim Ferriss podcast with Jack Kornfield.  The story is about heaviness and lifting things.

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in Thailand, India, and Burma before coming back to the US to co-found the Insight Meditation Society.  During the podcast, Jack shared a story from his monk days about being on a walk with his fellow monks by a field.  As they were on their walk, one of the elder monks saw a large rock in the middle of the field and noticed the farmers all working around it.  The elder monk asked his fellow monks, “Do you think that rock is heavy?”  They responded, “Yes.  It’s huge.  It’s extremely heavy.”  The elder monk replied, “Only if you lift it.”  The monk was making the point that just because the rock was there, did NOT mean you had to engage with it.  Just because the rock was there, did NOT mean you had to move it.  It’s only heavy if you CHOOSE to take on that burden.  The farmers were working around the rock, instead of trying to lift and move it.

What does this have to do with work?  Like farming, there are thing we will need to do in order to prosper in our jobs.  However, just because we have things we must do, we do NOT have to pick up all the extra weight just because it’s lying around work.  The rock is only heavy IF you try to lift it.  I do NOT have to pick up the additional emotional baggage.  I do NOT have to pick up weight of additional stress.  I do NOT need to carry the weight of unrealistic expectations.  I can choose to leave all this extra weight where it is.  In full transparency, I’m not good at this.  This is not easy for me.  As I look at where I am now, I’m carrying weight for work, and I know I’m allowing myself to carry a bunch of additional weight that I don’t need to hold.  It’s exhausting.  I’ll have to find a way to let go of all of that.

The challenge: Will you be intentional about the weight you carry? 

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Training with Ankle Weights and Emotional Baggage (5-19-21)

Happy Wednesday,

Last week was about taking the time to process emotions.  This week is about training with ankle weights and putting down emotional baggage.

Let’s pretend for a moment that you were training for a race and you decided to wear ankle weights.  The idea is that training with this additional weight will make you stronger.  When race day finally comes, you take off the ankle weights, because you know that carrying around that extra weight will hinder your performance in the competition.  Without the ankle weights, you feel lighter and you are able to take advantage of your newfound strength and speed you gained from training with that extra weight.

What does this analogy have to do with anything?  The analogy is about using the extra ankle weights to gain strength, and then leaving that weight behind as you move forward stronger than before.  What if we did the same thing with the emotional weight we carry?  I don’t know about you, but I sometimes find myself getting overly attached to emotional baggage.  I’ll take strong feelings like anger, sadness, and bitterness and get trapped in loops where the situation and the emotions play in my head over and over and over again.  I’ll become fixated and trapped in this vicious cycle.  I’ll carry this emotional weight with me, day in and day out, never putting it down.  Eventually, this extra emotional weight takes a toll on me, sapping my emotional, mental, and physical strength. 

We don’t have to constantly carry this emotional weight.  We can choose to put this weight down.  On my best days, I feel the emotions from whatever I’m going through, process them, and then take my learnings from them.  After I’ve gained learnings and strength from them, I set the emotional baggage down.  I release the loop, so it stops playing.  I step out of the trapped vicious cycle.  With the weight released, I take the learnings from that experience and move forward stronger than ever.  This all sounds great, but this isn’t easy.  I struggle with this a lot, and every time I struggle with this is another good reminder I’m human.  If you struggle with putting down your emotional baggage you are not alone. 

The challenge- How can you take the strength from your emotions with you, while leaving the baggage behind?

In case you’re curious, here are the things I’ve found that help me put down the emotional baggage the best.

  • Writing- There is something about getting the thoughts down on paper that helps release them.  It doesn’t matter if it’s a poem, story, or simply listing feelings.  I’ve found that writing with a pen works better than typing on a keyboard.  There’s something about my thoughts flowing better through ink.  Blogging is part of this too.  There’s something about releasing thoughts to the universe.  There’s also something when someone says, “Oh, yeah I feel that.” Baggage doesn’t seem so heavy if it’s not only you carrying something like it. 
  • Doing something physical- Lifting, running, and walking.  I’ve also found that mowing helps me find peace, maybe it’s the white noise from the push mower.  I’ve listened to podcasts lately that talk about physical activity being a key to complete emotional cycle.  Plus there are all the other benefits of exercise.
  • Grounding myself in the present to let go of the past- Just taking the time to stop and pay attention to what is around me sometimes is enough to snap me out of a repetitive loop. 

I stand in solidarity against injustice and in support of humanity.

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry