The Seduction of Trying

Our minds are so used to trying. We try to be more positive, so we won’t be so unhappy but discover we forget to be positive. We try various diets and workout programs so that we will finally have the body we think will make us happy, only to discover that we fall off the wagon. We try to get more education so we can make more money so that we can finally be happy, only to experience a sense of dismay that all of this getting, leaves us feeling empty. We try to get on top of our to do list so that we can finally relax and yet the list keeps on getting longer. We try desperately to find our soulmate, only to have our relationships become unsatisfactory and even painful.

We are addicted to trying because we believe if we try really hard, then finally everything will be okay. And yet has this ever brought you the deep peace you long for? It is startling to realize that the most popular genre on the New York Times bestseller list is how to books. But if they really worked, we wouldn’t be such an overweight, medicated and consumer-oriented society.

The more you get to know about how much you try, the more you see that trying is partnered with judgment. In other words, trying comes with effort and the harder you try, the more the mind has a running commentary about how you aren’t doing it right enough or good enough. If you doubt this remember the last time that you were in charge of a project at work or had to share something difficult with a loved one or you were asked to learn something new on the computer. The mind is constantly jockeying for position as it plans and compares and judges. Trying just keeps you caught in your mind, cut off from your heart.

Trying is so seductive and it promises so much but have you noticed that when you do accomplish something, the mind just comes up with something else that you have to try to get or be? That is the endless world of trying. You may not even see how much you try until you are caught in a big wave of trying and you notice your sweaty palms or difficulty in catching a breath or the tight knot in your stomach or tension headaches. It is very powerful to recognize that trying tightens you.

You may think what I am saying is that trying is not okay. There’s nothing wrong with trying for this is just what minds do but to believe trying will finally bring you freedom is like opening a beautifully wrapped present and finding nothing inside. So I am not suggesting don’t try. Trying to not try is just more trying. Discovering how to unhook from the heartache of endless trying is all about getting to know how deeply your mind believes it has to do life and do life right and seeing that all this trying has never brought you the deep and lasting peace you long for.

What are the antidotes to trying? The first is, “This moment is enough.” I invite you for a moment to close your eyes and access a long slow out breath and then say to yourself, “This moment is enough!” One of two things will happen. The first is you relax into this moment and rediscover that life is an intelligent flow and connecting with it as it is showing up in this moment, rather than always trying to make it different, is where deep and lasting peace resides.

Or your mind resisted this. If it couldn’t let go into the enoughness of this moment, watch what stories your mind came up with so that you can get to know how your mind tries.

The second antidote is, “In this moment I am enough!” There is a good chance that it will be harder to let this in because we have been so deeply trained to believe that we are not okay as we are. The invitation is to say it a number of times so, slowly, this truth can begin to permeate your whole being. You are enough! No, you are not perfect, and you are a work in progress. But if that progress gets caught in the land of trying, it’s so easy to get lost in the idea that you are not enough. Chasing the illusion that you need to be better or different than who you are, becomes a very painful way to live.

One of the most courageous and healing things you can do for yourself and for the planet is to add moments into your life where you’re not trying to get anyplace else. Instead, you open in this moment, into the magical mystery that is life and know it is enough and you are enough! You may go right back into the land of trying because that is your conditioning. But even small moments of enoughness matter!