Dealing with disappointment (and a few other things!)

Hey you guys, it's Mary. I hope you're all having a good day today. It is Friday here in New York City, and if you happen to be able to join me live and you're seeing this as I'm recording it, that's awesome. If not, I appreciate you watching the recording. So if you do happen to jump on, just give me a little shout out by typing something in the comments. Or hitting one of the little emoticons so I know you're here. I wanted to talk with you for a few minutes about an emotion that I think many of us find challenging, and the reason why I'm bringing this up is because I experienced it yesterday and had some insights around it that I thought might be helpful to you. I think you might agree with me that one of the emotions that is really tough to deal with sometimes is disappointment. You know, we have something perhaps that we have wanted for ourselves or we thought was going to happen— hello there— and it didn't happen. And so we end up having this feeling— hi Mitsui, so nice to see you— we end up having this feeling of, oh gosh, you know, this, uh, This thing that I had wanted so badly didn't happen, and now, you know, nothing is going to work out the way that I want it to. And we can really have a lot of thoughts that bring with them some really distressing feelings. So I wanted to share something like that with you that happened for me yesterday and also let you in on a little secret about disappointment. Appointment and how to deal with it. So yesterday, as some of you may know, we are trying to— hi Liz, nice to see you— some of you may know that my husband and I are trying to sell our home here in the Bronx in New York City and make a move overseas. And we thought that we had— hi Greg— we thought that we had a buyer all lined up and everything was, you know, kind of progressing. Well, we found out yesterday that that was actually not going to happen, and we had been basically sort of in limbo for a month, you know, not showing the place to anyone else and really looking at this person— hey Greg, nice to see you— you know, looking at this person as the one who was going to buy our place and We had kind of started planning how things would go after we moved out and when that might be and, you know, making all these plans and things. So yesterday, you know, as I just mentioned, we found out that this was not going to happen and I went through a period of about at least an hour where I was very upset. I was feeling a lot of anger. I was feeling a lot of disappointment. It felt like a lot of the plans that I had made were just— had just fallen apart like a house of cards. And I'm wondering if any of you watching right now can relate to that, where, you know, you have this idea of what you want and you think it's going to happen, and then it doesn't, and it looks like everything that you had planned with that as the foundation just kind of dissolves right, right before your eyes. I mean, it's just a very uncomfortable feeling, would you agree? And so I found myself in that state of mind where I was just like, what am I gonna do now? You know, all the plans that we had just kind of went out the window. You know, this overwhelming sense of disappointment came over me, and I was like, what are we gonna do? You know, I just was very upset. And about 45 minutes or so into that frame of mind, I realized, oh my gosh, look what I am doing to myself. Like, it was almost like somebody just kind of tapped me on the shoulder and woke me up and was like, hey, Mary, You know, you're actually kind of creating this for yourself. This has nothing to do with this deal not coming through. That everything you are experiencing right now is in your own state of mind. You are only up against your own state of mind. You're not up against this circumstance that you're finding yourself in. And it was such a beautiful moment because it just like broke the spell. And all of a sudden I was like, wow, okay, so if I'm not up against this circumstance and the only thing I'm really facing is my state of mind, well, I don't have to worry about that because my state of mind is going to change in a few minutes now that I've seen this. I know that some new thought is going to come in and kind of replace it. And sure enough, that's what happened. After I saw what was going on, my thinking slowed down. I don't know how this happens, but I just know that it does. I kind of went back into that space of calm, and my husband and I had a conversation and said, okay, well, Now what should we do? So we thought of a couple of things that we could do to help us get back on track with selling this place. We also came up with some ideas of what to do if it takes a while, longer than we expected, you know, where we might have to go as an interim place to live if this doesn't happen. And all of a sudden it just didn't look so dire to me. And I remember having this thought, you know, isn't that interesting how an hour ago everything looked like a complete catastrophe to me? I was filled with disappointment. I was filled with, you know, fear about what was going to happen now because this didn't work out. And now, 60 minutes later, I'm seeing a completely new picture. And it was such a beautiful and stark example of what we're really talking about in this conversation about the 3 principles, that life looks to us the way thought looks to us. And we have the option to not listen to what our thoughts are saying. You know, once we realize that we are experiencing thought and not a circumstance, it starts to become much more optional to not listen to what those thoughts are saying. And the other thing that's really cool is that when you realize that you're not responding to circumstance, that you're responding to thought, you realize that any circumstance can come up and it's okay. Like, you're never going to be a victim of circumstance then. So, like, I could have looked at this situation and really continued to be in that sort of victim mode, like, oh, if only this had happened, you know, we could do blah blah blah, you know. But instead I saw, now I'm not a victim of this circumstance, I'm listening to some thinking right now, and that's, that's all that I'm doing. The other thing I find really fascinating about the whole topic of disappointment is how we can make an assumption that we know how things are supposed to be, and we also make an assumption that we know how things should go. So we kind of make this assumption that I know how life should be, I know how life should look, I know what the steps should be to get from A to Z. You know, we, we have this notion that somehow we in our personal thinking know how things are supposed to look for us. And that I also find kind of fascinating. If you can kind of pull the camera back and watch yourself, you know, here you are, this human being having this experience, and in your small personal thinking, you know exactly how things should be navigated, when in fact We're all actually in the flow of life, and if we could kind of recognize that more of the time, we'd realize that we don't have to keep kind of flailing our arms around and, and trying to fight the current, that we can relax into what life brings. Hi Candy! And we can relax into what life brings us and have a much more enjoyable and stress-free life. So when I saw this again for the umpteenth time yesterday, I realized, okay, well, this is what life has given to us. It, it has given us, um, something we didn't expect. And let's see where we go, you know, if we can simply embrace this and say this is how, um, what the situation is and not really worry about how we're experiencing this situation. Let's see what we can create from there. Hi, Deborah. You know, I was mentioning to somebody yesterday during a coaching call that there's a really interesting book that is not a 3 Principles book, but it has a lot of the principles in it called The Surrender Experiment. I believe the author's last name is Singer. And one of the things that I took away from reading that book came to mind yesterday when I was having this experience of being disappointed, which is that, you know, if, if I can see that life isn't happening to me, that I am part of life, that life is me, then the way that I seem to want to direct it starts to become a lot less important. I actually did an audio recording on my blog, The Daily Principles, about this idea that what if it actually isn't my life? What if it's Life with a capital L and I am part of that Life and whatever is happening is simply part of that Life? That really helps me to look at situations like I was in yesterday and realize that it's not life going against me or something like that. It's simply life happening, and that I don't have to listen to thinking that tells me I should be disappointed, or thinking that tells me that everything's going wrong. That's not something that I have to to do. There's no obligation there. Instead, I can— yeah, thanks, Greg— you know, that I can step back from that and see, you know, this is simply life with a capital L, and I can relax into anything that happens. You know, my sense of self, my security, my well-being, none of that is dependent on any circumstance. You know, here I am thinking that I need to sell my apartment by a certain date in a certain way and all of that, when in fact, if I were in a homeless shelter, I would still have well-being, I would still have security, I would still have freedom, I would still have all of that because it's what we're all made of. That's not dependent on any circumstance. And it's why You know, things like disappointment, while they may be uncomfortable to experience in the moment, they're not telling us anything real. It's simply momentary, transient thought, and it's telling us nothing that we really need to pay attention to. So this was just a beautiful lesson for me, and I, I have to say that when I go through an experience like that when I have a really powerful emotion. Before I understood the principles, I really thought that that powerful emotion like disappointment was telling me something about myself, you know, about my self-worth or about my life. It was indicating that things weren't going right and maybe I had to hold on tighter and try to steer the ship a little bit better. Now it looks very different to me. Now those kinds of feelings look like thought most of the time when I catch them like I did yesterday. Eventually, I catch on to the fact that those thoughts and feelings are not a reflection of my life or the quality of my life or the quality of myself. They're simply momentary thoughts that look real to me, but they're not telling me anything I really need to listen to. They're not true. So I hope that this has been a little bit helpful in terms of looking at disappointment in a different way and understanding that, you know, life with a capital L is happening and we are in that life and nothing is dependent on any outcome and our self-worth and our value and our security and our freedom That's all our birthright. So we need look no to no circumstance or situation to give us that. We already have it. And that to me is one of the most beautiful gifts of this understanding, is knowing that we have everything and we are everything already, no matter what might be happening in our circumstances. So thank you so much for being with me live if you're here live, or for watching the recording. And I would love to hear your thoughts and comments. Oh, Vicki says, I'm so confused about adult attachment needs versus this sense of completeness. Vicki, what I think you're asking is, you know, is this idea of being attached to an outcome, or even being attached, quote unquote, to another person. And what I've come to see, it's been especially clear over the past year for me, is that no matter what the outcome is of something, it has no effect on me, the real me with a capital M. You know, one of the most poignant examples I have of this is, is that showed me that circumstances really have and outcomes really have no connection to our experience of life was a friend of mine a couple of years ago was diagnosed with cancer, and it was a very kind of serious diagnosis that she had. And I saw her a couple of months into her treatment, and physically she was looking a little bit rough, but she was glowing behind all of that. She was just glowing. And I was like, wow, what's going on? She's like, You know, cancer has been the best thing that's ever happened to me. And I paused and I was like, what? And she's like, yeah, you know, it's just been the best thing. And I said, well, don't you ever feel sorry for yourself? And she's like, yeah, you know, I have thinking like that, but I just kind of ignore it because, you know, it really doesn't have anything to do with me. This cancer doesn't have anything to do with me. And, and instead it's kind of allowed me to what life is really all about, you know. It's made me appreciate things more. Um, hi Ronella, sorry I can't read very well today. And, uh, and she said, you know, really it's been a beautiful experience, you know. And I said, didn't you feel any disappointment when the doctor gave you that news? And she said, yeah, but not for very long, you know. And I said, well— and I just kind of probed with her. I said, well, are you worried about, you you know, the outcome of your treatment and how it'll go? And she's like, not really. She said, I'm really enjoying myself now. I'm, I, you know, she's like, chemo and treatment, all this part of my life, and, and it's okay. And I'm really enjoying myself for the first time in my life. And I was like, wow, what an amazing example of seeing that, you know, an outcome or a situation has nothing to do with our experience at all. It's all based on whether we happen to be listening to whatever thinking we have going on in the moment and understanding that we have freedom, we are freedom, we are security, that that isn't dependent on anything. Mitsui, do you have any thoughts on fighting for your rights versus deciding that we need not to be disappointed, angry with the result? Yeah, interesting. The way I see that is probably a little bit different from what you're asking, so I'll try to answer that the best I can, is that to me, the whole idea of fighting for something seems really backwards from being helpful. When I am in a state of being worked up about something, I'm not acting from a place of clarity. You know, if you look at The history of the world, the history of the world is about fighting for things, right? And you can kind of see where that's gotten us. It hasn't gotten us very far. And as I see it, there's a very different way of making progress, of, you know, of maybe making progress towards equality or whatever the, the issue might be. And that is recognizing that when we are in a state of feeling like we've got to fight for something We are not operating from a place of clarity. We're not operating from a place of understanding. And when we're able to see that those thoughts are not coming from a situation but are actually coming from us and we're kind of creating that ourselves, then we're able to kind of drop down into that state of clarity and have really meaningful dialogue with someone, let's say. And so when, when we see a result that looks like something we don't like, if we continue to see ourselves as a victim of that result instead of recognizing that that result has no effect on who we are and what we are, you know, it's when we recognize the the reality, which is no result or no circumstance affects me, who I am, that's when we can really make progress on, on big issues. Hi Susan. Oh, I'm glad that was helpful, Vicki. Mitsui, if that didn't answer your question, you know, type another comment. But it seems to me that if we dwell on things like disappointment, if we dwell on things like like somebody has wronged me. You know, if we really look toward people and circumstances out there as the cause of our feelings and our state, we will continue to unfortunately make the mistakes that we keep making in humanity. So You know, the way to really effect change and to really help ourselves is to recognize that we are never the victim of anything and that anything we are experiencing is coming from within. Then we drop into our state of what I call reality, because this is who we are, is we're these beautifully capable, intelligent, creative beings. And then real change can happen. So that starts individually. That starts with the simple example I gave about yesterday and recognizing that my disappointment didn't come from the fact that this buyer of our apartment backed out. It came from momentary thought I was having, and as soon as I saw that, new solutions became apparent to me. Vicky, I have background in psychology, so finding it hard to reconcile my spiritual self-understanding with my psychological self. So you're confused right now. Well, maybe one thing that could help, Vicky, is seeing that there is no separation there. You know, the way things look to me through this understanding of the principles is that You know, we are beings that have limitless potential and limitless opportunity, limitless intelligence, limitless creativity, and we're also in a physical form. And in this physical form, we're enjoying the power of thought and consciousness to give us this incredibly rich experience of being alive and being in this person that we are. And to me, it's a beautiful picture in my mind of a limitless being that's also having an amazing experience of being alive. So I don't personally see any separation anywhere. To me, it's all part of the same experience. It's part of the same being. You know, I used to very much identify myself with the thoughts that I had. I really looked to my thinking as if it were me. And so, like, using this example of being disappointed, in the past I would have gone down the road of thinking, Gosh, Mary, you're so stupid. Why didn't you do XYZ to make sure this didn't happen? And you're always doing things like that. You know, why are you so gullible? Why are you— you know, that's what I would have been doing in the past. I would have gone down that road and seen myself as all of that thinking that I was having yesterday. And instead, I saw, oh, that isn't me. That's simply some thinking I was having that looked really real to me for a while, but that isn't me. I am not my thoughts. You know, I love the title of Michael Neal's latest book, The Space Within, and in the book I think the quote is, you know, we are the space where thoughts arise. So I can have disappointing thoughts, I can have you know, berating thoughts. But those thoughts are not me. I am the space in which they are appearing. But I love the word space because space is kind of a limitless idea. It's an infinite place. It's not confined by anything. And so I guess that's what I'm saying where I don't see myself in a psychological sense anymore. That no longer makes sense to me. So I don't know if that was helpful, Vicki. Maybe it got you more confused, but feel free to post some more comments and let me know. So I think I'll close out this video by saying that We can have very, very powerful emotions like disappointment, but that doesn't mean that they are telling us anything important. They are simply a transient expression of thought that we're having, but they don't mean anything. Oh, Vicki, I'm glad that was helpful. Speak to— do humans have needs, or are we complete autonomous beings, or both? Oh, that's really an interesting question. Let's see if I can answer that in about 60 seconds. Um, well, obviously we have certain needs for food and etc. Those kinds of things are built into this human form. Uh, and, uh, beyond that, you know, other than sort of the physical, uh, needs that, that everyone has, it seems to me that The only other thing that I would label as a need is connection, that we are naturally— I'm going to come up with a funny word— we're naturally connectable beings when we understand what's happening up in our heads is not who we are. So that's one of the beautiful things about this understanding. And one reason why I love having conversations with people, especially one-to-one conversations or in small groups, because we have the ability to very easily be in that space that I mentioned. That space that is us is a transformative space, and I do believe that we we need to connect with one another in that space, from that space to that space. And it's very easy to do that when we understand that that spaciousness is who we actually are, that we are not this noisy, staticky thinking in our heads. So I guess that's how I would answer that question. So please feel free to keep commenting. I will check back here and see what everybody has said. This has been a wonderful conversation for me to have with all of you, and, and I intend to do a lot more of these live videos in here. My life has been a little topsy-turvy lately, just kind of schedule-wise, but I'm finding myself with more time to spend in here now. Mitsui, oh, thank you so much. Yeah, we are the space. And definitely, you know, if you haven't read that book of Michael's, the new one, The Space Within, I highly recommend it. I got a lot out of what he's saying in there and looking at myself from that perspective. Puneet, you can view this from the start once I hang up. In answer to your question. So thank you everybody for being here. I'm going to jump off now and, and take a brisk walk around my neighborhood and enjoy the, the fall leaves that are starting to appear here in New York. And I hope you're all having a wonderful day. Thank you so much for joining me, and I will talk to you again soon. Bye!