Eckhart Tolle suggests an experiment: stop resisting unhappiness and say "I'm unhappy, I don't mind being unhappy." He questions whether the feeling can survive without resistance, noting that surrender works for some people but not others.
Let's say you're unhappy. Of course, it's often connected with certain mind activity, but at other times it may just be that the unhappiness lives in you as an emotional field. You could try, say, I'm unhappy, I don't mind being unhappy, it's fine. I'm unhappy, so let me be unhappy. That sounds really weird. So let me be unhappy, I don't mind, I'm just unhappy. Now the question is, can the unhappiness survive in a state of complete surrender? Or does the unhappiness, in order to survive, need resistance? There's something wrong with me, there's something wrong with life, there's something wrong somewhere. You need some resistance. And if you— I don't mind being unhappy, I'm just suggesting it as an experiment. It works. I've had feedback from people. For some people, it actually works very well, and for others it doesn't.
Why alcohol feels like relief, and what it is really giving you | Eckhart Tolle
