Three Ways to Reclaim Ease

WHY DO WE RESIST EASE?

Photo by Clyde RS on Unsplash

You are the sky.
Everything else is just the weather.
~ Pema Chodron

When we’re mired in struggle and things are feeling hard, or we’re overwhelmed, let this be your cry for ease.

Let’s explore how to reclaim ease, because in the midst of the “tricky” moment, ease feels inaccessible. And yet even when ease is present, we barely notice it, and it barely registers we’ve had, perpetuating our longing for ease.

Why ease?

For women swimming in lives full of all the things it’s ease they long for.

The elements of their lives are usually just right — the right people, work, at least they are on balance, but it’s just so much.

My clients use synonyms for ease like spaciousness, margin, whitespace, effortlessness; each of these terms making overt a longing for the experience of a little more breathing room in a life exceeding maximum capacity.

When pressing into this desire, it’s interesting how at first blush there is a curiosity about doing less to achieve ease, but underneath this seems to run a deeper longing for how they want to feel in in their full lives. It’s not the work that’s problematic, it’s the fact that they feel far from joy or fulfilment or….

Three Ways to Reclaim Ease

Are you ready to bring ease to the fore? Here’s where to start.

1) Notice the beliefs that impede ease.

I could write for days and days about how we live and work with deep rooted beliefs that put us at odds with the ease we long for.

We believe that success comes off the back of hard work and determination.

We believe that without pain, there is no gain.

We’re taught that anything we want is worth “fighting” for.

We’re taught that only the strong survive.

All of these beliefs offer us a partial truth; they point to the necessity of effort invested in what matters to us. Yet these beliefs leave little room for ease.

Because we’re also told that more is better, and bigger is better. We’re encouraged to resource ourselves from a place of scarcity in order to have the abundance we long for. But it bears a heavy cost.

The Practice:
Stay curious about the beliefs that drive you and your efforts.

Appreciate them yet be clear they are partial expressions of how to achieve success.

Make this an ongoing practice and stay awake to the beliefs the hold ease at arm’s length.

Aim to hold a set of beliefs that represent the fullest truth of how you want success to look like and feel like and end the glorification of “hard” work, burnout and self-sacrifice.

2) Look for where ease already exists.

You’ve felt ease before. When? Where?

What made ease possible?

Remember this experience and what it taught you.

The experience of ease is akin to the gift of space after a period on a sentence, or the space after a paragraph. If you’re only paying attention to the words on a page, you’ll miss all the whitespace and ease it offers.

Ease requires that you are present to the space around the words.

In exploring the meaning of the word ease we discover that it is the absence of difficulty or labor, and a void of pain or discomfort. Given our outdated beliefs tell us that success should be full of hard work and discomfort, can we really expect to notice or value ease?

The Practice
Can you welcome ease in your life like a long lost friend?

When you notice her, can you celebrate her presence?

Ease is around, and she’s quiet, calm and brings no fanfare.

She only aims to be noticed and appreciated.

Settle in with her and cozy up.

3) Reverse engineer a little ease.

Take a few moments to remember ease.

What does ease feel like (e.g. calm, expanded, light etc.)?

Check in with your body to notice how it responds to your recollection of ease (e.g. do your shoulders drop? does your belly soften? do you unclench your jaw?).

Having reclaimed ease, ask yourself what you can do to experience ease like this again.

Maybe a slower walk outside, close to nature reconnects you to ease?

Perhaps a short midday nap allows your body to find ease?

If you held a warm cup of tea in your hands, does this allow you to reclaim ease?

If you re-scheduled that sales meeting would it invite in ease?

In the relaxed state of ease we are more open to what’s possible and how we can create a new experience of ease.

Ease is more than possible.

I believe your longing for ease is wisdom tapping you on the shoulder.

This wisdom tells you that what you want and need is possible. That it’s essential.

When ease shows up it’s a reminder that it’s not all up to us to do or manage or control everything.

Create some room for your wisdom to speak and invite in some ease.