Adaptability & The Holiday Season
Adaptability - one of the hallmarks of progress
This coming season of holidays and time with family can be a wonderful time of shared experience, the annual family gathering, but those intimate family dynamics can also sometimes bring up challenges and really test our patience. This is also a time of year when social engagements increase and we have the opportunity to spend more time connecting with friends, family and colleagues. One thing that may help us move more gracefully through the coming weeks, is leaning into our ability to adapt.
Meditation is known to increase our adaptive response and fills our bank with adaptation energy - the energy required to adapt to a change in expectation. There are no stressful situations, there are only events and our response to them. The more adaptation energy we have, the more likely we will be able to respond with calm, clarity and creativity. So the best chance for a frictionless holiday season is to keep up with your regular meditation! If you find your adapatation energy is running low, then its a good time to sneak off for a meditation, and a little "you time".
Sometimes, naturally the event may be such that it requires more adaptation energy than we have, or there have been a series of events and we find our adaptation energy is running low, and this will elicit a stress response. This happens, we can't expect ourselves to never have a reaction. The important thing is how quickly do we recover from it. Perhaps a wave of anger or irritation moves through us, can we allow that sensation to be there but not verbalise in response to it? If we have snapped, can we let that anger go and come back anew to the situation to see what a more constructive way forward may be?
Often, meditators report that they are the ones who are the most adaptable in situations among family, friends or colleagues and sometimes feel that they "shouldn't always have to be the one to 'give in' " - but naturally, this often falls upon those who have less "need to be right" or to prove a point. When we are stressed, then we "need" others to adapt to us, our wants, our needs, "our way" in order to feel ok. Meditators find increasingly over time that they are more able to let things go, to adapt, to give up that last piece of Christmas cake they had been looking forward to - and that's ok. We can be more generous with our time and adaptability when we feel calmer and more stable inside in our inner fulfilment. If you find yourself thinking "but what about me", "I'm always the one" etc, you can shine the light of awareness on the voice that's saying that, the small part of you - the intellect, or ego as some call it - which has to have its needs met, which sees things in terms of loss/gain, and has something to defend. The basis of all that is, is that deep inner state of calm which exists in all of us. When we see others needing the world to adapt to them, we can think on them with the compassion that we once felt like that too, or that they must be experiencing a lot of stress. In every moment, we can seek unity rather than division, even if those around us cannot do the same.
You may find it challenging to keep up with your practise with a change in schedule and the influx of social engagements and family gatherings. I would suggest getting creative with when to fit your meditations in and plan ahead each day, but most importantly, be adaptable even with that - if family pop in for the afternoon and you miss your meditation spot, then there's no need to beat yourself up, or to go to extremes thinking "well I've missed a couple, I may as well give up now and start again in the new year". Simply relax and enjoy the family time, meditate when you can - and when you miss one or two, just simply sit and close your eyes at the next opportunity - you'll feel better for it. Even if you haven't meditated for a few weeks, just see what a couple of meditations can do for you tomorrow, and over the coming days. You may just find that you enjoy that family time all the more, and you have more energy for it.
Love and Jai Guru Deva*
Georgia x
*victory of light over darkness
