“This too shall pass.” – Did your Grandma ever say that to you? Or your mom? Or an Aunt? Or a wise friend? I can’t list everyone that has ever said it to me but I feel like I grew up hearing it and I never really knew what it meant. Until now. Now I think I have a pretty solid understanding of not just the phrase but of the sentiment behind it. For me it means – “Some shit sux balls. And it’s not always fair. And some of the things we have to deal with feel like they are going to break us. But, if you just hang on really really tight and you keep putting one foot in front of the other and you fake it till ya make it. Sooner or later the crisis will be over and you can breathe again.”

This weeks exercise in Five Good Minutes: 100 Morning Practices To Help You Stay Calm & Focused All Day Long is about teaching yourself to calm down and remember that the crisis will end. Sometimes when all hell is breaking loose it’s easy to get caught up and feel like THIS is how it’s going to be FOREVER. Getting stuck in that thought process just makes hard times harder. It’s important to be able to control your thoughts and remind yourself that things will be better soon. The book teaches us do this using a step by step process:

• Reflect on a time when things were bad and you felt like the sadness and anxiety would never end.
• Spend a few minutes visualizing a button that you can press to remind yourself that the moment is short and will end soon.
• Recall a time when stress that you thought would never end finally, eventually eased up and then left the building.
• The next time you feel like stress and anxiety are taking over imagine yourself pushing the temporary button and think about the fact that the difficult times always pass.

The book goes on to say “Keep your temporary button with you at all times. When stress unleashes, tell yourself, “This will pass, as do all unbearable moments in life. This won’t last forever, and soon I will be on a fresh new path.”

It’s really as simple as that. Reminding yourself that “This too shall pass” works wonders, allowing you to put your energy into working through the stressful time instead of worrying that these feelings will be around forever.

Currently, I am working my way through Five Good Minutes: 100 Morning Practices To Help You Stay Calm & Focused All Day Long (Amazon Affiliate Link – That means if you click the link and purchase the book, Amakua Market gets a commission AND as always 10% of our profits are donated to social causes and charities). This book offers 100 morning meditations that are geared to help you stay calm and focused all day. Let me know in the comments section what you think about this series.

Category: Elizabeth Chavez - Photography, Embracing the chaos, Lovin Life