Hello dearest one,

“That person hurt me! Don’t I have a right to be upset?”

That question has come up with every client I’ve worked with in the past 10 years. Whether it is the main problem, or one uncovered on the way to the main problem, it appears.

I have asked myself that question more frequently this year than I can remember in recent history. But ‘that person’ was not anyone I knew personally. And my ‘right to be upset’ was being mirrored on a global scale.

Breaking out from that prison of thought – external event causes internal reaction – is one of the most important elements of emotional freedom, which most people call happiness.

I share the details of my unraveling this issue below, with the intention that it be liberating for you, and in service to a more peaceful planet.

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I have no relationship to politics.

Well… that’s not strictly true.

My relationship to politics resembles my approach to a terrible car crash on the side of the road. They are both tragic, shocking and repulsive. And I CAN’T HELP BUT LOOK.

Not just glance, but stare hard. Crane my neck until it cramps so that I get maximum exposure.

I read a magnificently written article online several months ago about a reaction to something that happened at a Press Club dinner with President Obama. The writer so clearly and eloquently captured the country’s shock and backlash. I became more informed and aware as a consequence of reading that article.

Then I made the mistake of continuing to scroll down to read the comments. It was one of the worst car wrecks I have ever seen, overflowing with the most hateful, racist, sexist, xenophobic statements I could imagine.

It actually sent me into breakdown. It shattered my worldview about the inherent goodness of people. It opened the curtain to what lay behind my carefully crafted and curated life filled with conscious and creative souls.

I experience racism (frequently) in my worldly adventures, but it’s never loud enough to surprise me.

I also experience sexism, ageism and hatred.

For many, this may be a clear case of justifiable suffering. How could one not suffer here?

I sometimes get lost in that feeling. I certainly did after the article. I even sent a text to a good friend detailing my heartbreak and despair, like the pixelated proof of the terribleness of it all.

What I forgot, in that moment, was the nature of consciousness and our nervous systems. (Something I know a great deal about.)

The online comments of love and support did not hijack my attention the way the ugliness did. In the same way, the magically green color of the leaves on the spring day vanished as the backdrop to the twisted metal and terrified faces at the accident site.

It requires almost no effort to detail my suffering and its causes:

• The political discourse
• The shootings of black men
• My daughter’s disobedience
• My partner’s lack of attention
• My best friend’s apathy

I know (by the fact that you are reading this) that you know, as well as I do, that the cause-effect relationship between an event and the resultant emotion is not accurate. Here’s the hard truth:

The only cause of my suffering is my absorption by the event (to the exclusion of nearly everything else) and then my judgment of it as wrong.

In other words, I forge a sword in ‘This event/situation/person/idea/belief is wrong.” And then I stab myself with it.

• That accident shouldn’t have happened.
• My daughter should be obedient.
• Racism should not exist.

(Props to Byron Katie and The Work.)

Notice the common word – SHOULD. It’s a clear signal that meaning-making and judgment are happening.

Breaking the tie between event and suffering dissolves the whole dynamic.

In the language of my recent graduate studies in spiritual psychology:

Suffering lives in the land of “I’m upset because…” while freedom lies in the land of “The only thing causing my upset is my thoughts, and my declaration of wrongness.”

This is very high-level stuff. It’s something I’ve been working on intently and intensely for over two decades, and still I falter. I understand if it doesn’t yet make sense, or seems impossible. Let’s continue…

The ‘causes’ of upset are merely a black dot in the vast universe of light. If I am standing too close, then it consumes my entire awareness.

If I step back, then whatever surrounds the black dot comes into peripheral view. If I step back far enough, the black dot becomes imperceptible. It just blends into the broad tapestry of life, in the same way that markings create the singularity and beauty of marble.

(Props to Zen teacher Alex Mill for this visual.)

I can’t stress how powerful this one shift can be in the quality of your life, and in the amount of peace of mind you are able to bring to anything that happens.

What brought me through and out of the pain I was feeling was this understanding of perspective, and pitting my beliefs, no matter how strong, against the most objective version of reality available to me:

How close am I ‘standing’ to the issue?

How am I forming judgments based on my own point of view?

How much do I really know to be true?

What assumptions am I making?

These were particularly helpful in my reaction to the online comments:

Who is to say that all the forces at play have a purpose that is both benevolent and beyond my ability to comprehend it?

Who is to say that those brave souls I have labeled as victims don’t deserve my respect instead of my pity?

Who is to say that my recognition of these areas that disturb me aren’t a call for me to grow into the person who can affect change, without bringing more hatred and violence into the situation?

I cannot answer definitively either way. Which means that what I do with the ‘facts’ of the situation are completely at my discretion.

What YOU do with the facts of any situation are completely at YOUR discretion.

My heart still breaks for all those who suffer on this planet, for the injustices and inequalities and violence. Not getting caught up in my own judgment of situations and people allows me the freedom and mobility I need to make a difference.

It changes my fundamental question from “Why is there so much hatred?” to…

How can I elevate humanity instead of descending into the darkness?

How can you?