The solution to the problem is not found in the problem.

I had an anxious morning. I woke up feeling worried… you know that tightness in the stomach?

Are my kids ok?

Are they doing enough? (common parent summer fear)

How will things work out?

Am I eating well?

Am I a good friend?

Are my in-laws doing ok?

Am I writing enough?

Why haven’t I written a blog for some time?

On and on… and simultaneously looking for the solution..  what should I do? Worrying and fixing have been my staple breakfast diet. 

I know enough to know that this cycle never comes up with a solution, and never leads to peace.

I knew in my heart that I needed to let go of it all…. all of it. And what needed to be done would come back.

I knew that in this moment, life was surely not that complicated, it’s just our thoughts that make it so. In fact, the day looked pretty darn good.

I knew that racing thoughts are usually just a sign of an underlying emotion that needed to be felt. They point us towards something although they scramble to determine what it is. 

Worrying disguises itself as love. But fear is the opposite of love.

I knew any resolution would not come from thinking about things over and over again. Have you ever been trapped in a thought spiral trying to find the exit door?

Solutions don’t come from more thoughts fixating on the problem. They come from outside of that.

Eventually I took myself out after I finished trying to fix everyone by text. I ran up to the top of “my” mountain where the solutions lie… sometimes in the form of  ”just do nothing” or they disappear altogether.

It came very loud and clear:

Life is actually simple in this moment.

Stop making it so damn complicated.

Stop focusing on others as an excuse to not do what you want.

Just take the  next right step.

Mindfulness allows us space to zoom out and see the bigger picture, especially when the mind become stressed and narrow. 

Becoming mindful to your breath, this moment, the sky, the flower opens us up to endless possibilities outside of the problem. 

“Life isn’t as serious as my mind makes it out to be.”

Eckhart Tolle

You are far, far bigger than any problem you have ever had. And so far you have made it through 100% of them. 

 I realized profoundly that I was focussing on the external ie. other people, when what I was living, my life, was exactly where I needed to be…. not “out there”.

And that the so-called problems were actually thoughts in my head. Thoughts pass.

When we are “out there” uninvited, there’s no-one home to take care of our own house.

I looked around me and saw everyone else was just doing their own life.

Fixing is an addiction, and so is worry.

What are you avoiding by worrying about it?

Can you see that worrying will not lead you to the solution.. it’s something else completely different.

Worry brings more worry.

Fear brings more fear.

And so-called solutions that spring from fear are not solutions.

The opposite of fear is love.

Love provides all the endless solutions we need.

How can you step out of fear and just “take the next right step” in love?

The right solution comes every time. And often it comes in forgetting the “problem.”

Instantly the world became more vivid, each flower was unbelievably colourful, the breeze was warm, the sun was shining, as I picked up a tossed beer can and took the next step. This moment.

Life truly can be that simple. The problems are the problems and they will cross your path as they need to.

I ran home, wrote this blog and I’m hitting ‘send”.. imperfectly, in the moment, as life called me to the next right step.

The moment you are in is the only moment there is.

Take care everyone,

Madeleine