I was recently watching an amazon show called ‘Undone’ in which I heard the line “be like the sky”. The advice in the show was ‘to let emotions go through you – but don’t let them become you!’ It really stuck with me.  It’s amazing how the sky just holds everything that comes in it – clouds, sun, thunder storms, stars! The sky doesn’t reject some things and want some things more. It never says ‘oh this cloud is not good enough to stay in me’ :D. It’s vastness and all-inclusiveness is inspiring. It can hold all the diversity in itself!

So yesterday, I had the opportunity to practice being like the sky! I got an infection and my throat was hurting, head was paining, and stomach was feeling upset. I tried to look at it as a new opportunity to practice everything I’ve been working on!(Mindfulness, Ease & non-judgement) Every time I felt the uncomfortable sensations of my throbbing forehead and found myself getting a little irritated – I would tell myself, ‘be like the sky’. My awareness is large enough and spacious enough to include even these uncomfortable sensations of an itchy throat and body ache. They don’t have to go. They can stay here, and I can just watch them. What would it be like to have an all-inclusive awareness that allows everything in it to ‘just be’?  

It worked! I found my resistance to this sickness reducing. I found that I can let the sickness just be. While I did take medicine and do a salt water gargle and everything to help cure it, my approach towards it wasn’t to make it go away in a hurry. I was reminding myself again and again – be like the sky 😊
Often times, when I am sick there is an additional layer of suffering that gets added cause I am angry, irritated, upset or troubled with the state of things and the way my body feels. I often find myself thinking about how this ‘stupid viral’ ruined all the plans I had for the next few days. But in my experience, this resistance, this aversion to the sickness doesn’t really help and most of the time increases the discomfort in that moment. So I made a conscious effort to choose a different approach this time!

It is the natural tendency of the mind to hold onto everything that is pleasant and push away things that are unpleasant. But do we sometimes have the ability to just be like the sky and let things flow through us? I think so!
It’s not always easy to do it and it requires repeated effort and intention setting. I also recognize that a daily meditation practice, where you are constantly training your mind to be with everything that comes up – including all difficult thoughts, emotions and painful sensations does help in building this skill! I am glad I heard the line on the show. I think it’s something I am going to visit more often. Every time I find myself in some uncomfortable scenario- emotionally or physically I will try to remember – “be like the sky” 😊