Opting in for the cheaper airbnb
I remember a turning point for me when I was traveling around Asia. I was doing the digital nomad thing and was feeling smug about making some profits from bitcoin. At one point I had a high standard for what hotels and airbnbs I would stay at — they needed to have a pool, gym, sauna, be by the beach, have a king size bed, and morning yoga. All of the places I wanted to stay were around $200 a night.
I remember one night frantically scrolling through listings, trying to find the perfect place. I was supposed to be having fun traveling. I was supposed to be letting go, but I was clearly holding on. I had a moment where I paused and realized how frantic and needy and clingy my mind had become. I’d fabricated some story — that I needed X to be happy — and realized that in doing so I was in fact creating my own suffering (which was totally my choice).
I distinctly remember saying “screw this!” and just dropping the whole thing. I didn’t need to stay in fancy places to be happy. It was a big relief. Then I found the cheapest airbnb I could find that didn’t look run-down for $30 a night. Even though the place didn’t have all the glamorous amenities (just coffee), I was so happy staying there, and subsequently at cheaper places afterwards, because I no longer had this standard to hold myself to. I could just be free and curious to explore the area I was staying in and the surroundings.
Letting go of hand-me down ideas
Cultures that are the happiest don’t make happiness into a goal. The ‘pursuit of happiness’ is not their country’s motto. When traveling through Laos, which is about 70% Buddhist, I saw the big smiling faces of farmers, shop owners and kids playing soccer. They had very little in material possessions, but were spiritually rich.
Where did I get the idea that staying in a nice airbnb would make me happy? It was partly due to the options society had presented me in the form of an online marketplace that touted cool, sexy locations. My mind proliferated with thoughts on the ‘perfect’ location and spun up stories and images of how I would feel at that location. And yet I found the options overwhelming thanks to the ridiculous number of listings (aka the paradox of choice).
Most ideas are not even our own, and yet we hold on to them with the stubbornness of a fortress under siege. In fact, none of these ideas are “ours” because we can’t actually possess anything; we only get attached to them and think they are ours. These ideas usually control us. This is what the Buddha was talking about in the 2nd Noble Truth, which is that our suffering comes from our craving and aversion to people, ideas, and things. It’s not about letting go of the world, but our attachment to those things as our source of happiness.
Mini-nirvana and the sacred pause
In mindfulness meditation, there is a beautiful moment that motivates many people to continue their practice. It’s when they’ve gotten caught up, sucked in and enveloped in a train of thought. And then, instead of their habitual pattern of letting the thoughts churn on, their mind automatically just drops it. The body relaxes. The mind remembers to go back to the breath. They smile. This sense of freedom is called ‘mini-nirvana’ by some. Do this thousands of times and it becomes automatic in your daily life.
A strategy to move towards this automatic letting go is what Jack Kornfield calls the sacred pause. It’s one way to initiate this letting go process. It’s that moment where you stop what you are doing before you take the next habitual action and ask yourself, “why am I doing this, really?” or “what am I actually feeling right now?” It’s what saved me when I was caught up in my frantic scrolling for airbnbs. I took that pause and after sitting with it for some time I was able to cut through the delusion. This opened up an internal sense of freedom, one that was available to me all along, and a different course of action.
The next step: sitting with body/feelings
The sacred pause is only the starting point. In order to actually Let Go of the attachment, it requires tuning into the felt-sense of this experience. This is because we experience our emotions in our bodies. The Finland study famously showed that specific emotions map to certain areas of our bodies. Our thoughts are experienced in our heads, but tie back to our emotions in loops (emotions create thoughts, and vice versa). So in order to Let Go of your thoughts — perhaps counterintuitively — you have to get in touch with your body.
Eugene Gendlin was an influential psychotherapist who developed his theory around the “felt-sense,” that vague and pre-verbal sensation that hints at your emotional state. For example, butterflies in your stomach, tightness in your chest or a sinking feeling in your stomach. These are precursors to emotions (our interpretation of the felt-sense) and are bodily clues to what’s going on internally/externally.
A remarkable finding that Gendlin had was that therapy was at least 50% more effective when clients were in touch with a strong felt-sense in their bodies. When they were able to do this, it was easier to put feelings into words, process and let go. We know today that mindful awareness of the body reduces activity in the amygdala and allows for faster emotional processing. In other words, if you aren’t in touch with the body, you’re missing a big part of the picture.
Letting go, in glorious detail
So, practically speaking what does this look like? Let’s take the example of my airbnb story. What happened is that I first recognized that I was going in circles and was miserable. I didn’t talk to a therapist or punch any walls. Instead, I sat with this uncomfortable feeling of “I can’t find the perfect airbnb” and watched as my mind raced in a flurry of thoughts ranging from impatience to intense desire to anger to guilt. I acknowledged these thoughts and feelings without trying to push them away. (“Okay, I am feeling angry now.”)
I then tuned into what I was feeling in my body. Tightness in my head and stomach, tension and heat in my shoulders, clenched jaw, and a racing heart. I sat with it for a few minutes, without taking any action, and tried not to feed the story line too much. Of course my mind would jump around and get sucked into the story but I would bring my attention back to the body. I stayed with the feelings of my body with an attitude of non-judgmental observation, attention and as much balance as I could muster.
Eventually, behind some of my strong emotions, a little space opened up. The reason space opens up is because our feelings are never permanent. When we simply sit there and watch and allow them to run their course, without adding further fuel to the fire by reacting (engaging with thoughts/ story line), then the fire starts to die down and our feelings change. Within that space, there was an opening or expansion, and I had a moment of clarity in the form of a question like, “what do I really want?” This turned to a conversation and ideas started to pop into my head for alternatives.
I followed that thread and that led me to the realization that I just wanted to explore and have fun, and that staying at a nice place wasn’t necessary. There was a sense of hope, or curiosity that started to emerge, and that started to relieve some of the heat and tension in my body. I felt like I now had a choice and was no longer stuck in this one-tracked mind of needing a fancy place to stay. This then further gave me a physical feeling of lightness and relief, which was a lot more pleasant than how I felt before, and signaled to me that I was on the right track.
Uncomfortable but worth it
The whole process of letting go isn’t necessarily pleasant at first. In fact, it’s usually highly uncomfortable and even down right agonizing. We spend a lot of time running away from our feelings and chasing the same old rabbits. Sometimes when we don’t like the feeling we numb ourselves with food/alcohol, other times we binge watch or binge shop (or pay for fancy airbnbs), and other times we just rush even faster and keep ourselves busy so we don’t have to acknowledge the fear, uncertainty, doubt, confusion, and sadness underneath.
However, when we stop and take the counterintuitive approach to pause and then sit with the discomfort in our body, this lets us start to confront what we have been avoiding. There isn’t a need for fancy solutions or complex mental juggling here — nor do you need to read 100 self-help books — because your body holds the answers. This full-body knowing opens up a gateway to our own inner freedom and intuition that is available to us at anytime. All it requires is patience and attention to what is going on inside.