Lesson 5 // Open Mind
RE LEARN
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Before you begin: let’s take a few deep, grounding breaths. Place one hand on your heart and the other on your stomach, close your eyes, breathe in deep, hold, direct your awareness to your heart, and release. Repeat until you feel centered and relaxed.
We all have ways of thinking, convictions, and beliefs that we consciously and unconsciously ascribe to - these inherently limit us, if we want to seek truth and be open to all that life has to offer. To be open like this requires that we be flexible to change, accept when we’re wrong or our views are limiting, and be willing to continually renew and readjust our ways of thinking, convictions, and beliefs in the direction of truth. We all have ignorance, biases, and prejudices. But if we are dedicated to having an open mind, we are able to face, understand, let go of, and expand past our limitations. The more we do this, the more our windows of understanding and experiencing the world and others become clearer and clearer.
Life is difficult, challenging, uncomfortable, and painful. Hard as we may try to avoid this very fact of life, we cannot. Trying to avoid pain, discomfort, and challenges, big and small, means trying to avoid life itself. And life itself is also vastly beautiful, expansive, energizing, and fascinating. The truth is we cannot have one side of life without the other. If we want to live our lives fully, making the most of them and experiencing all life has to offer, then we have to be open to all of life. Through pain we know joy, through challenge we know strength and ease, through discomfort we know peace. We can decide to be fully awake to all that life offers us, the "good" and the "bad" because we know life is too precious, too valuable, too incredible to not experience in entirety. This is what it means to be open.
And openness, to life itself, begins with an openness in our mind, with our conscious and subconscious thoughts, beliefs, and patterns. An open mind allows us to approach life accepting the multiplicity of life, along with the inevitable changes and challenges. We open our hearts; we can embrace everything as a teacher and an opportunity to learn and evolve. We can sit with discomfort, befriend it as the teacher it is, and curiously explore the lessons and reflection it offers us.
You may consider yourself to be closed minded, or you may consider yourself to be open minded. You may prefer the comforts of remaining within your comfort zone, or you may push yourself out of your comfort zone every day. Either way, we naturally seek convenience and comfort. But life is inherently uncertain, inconvenient, and uncomfortable at times. When our mindset is closed (as depicted in the left side of graphic above under “instead of”), we are limiting ourselves. We may try to avoid difficulties and uncertainty in the pursuit of convenience and comfort. We may be carrying beliefs and perceptions that keep us in the loop of closed thinking. Either way, when we have a closed mind, we miss out on everything that lies outside our temporary limits and comfort zone. Everyone's comfort zone looks and feels different, with different edges and limits. When we are challenged to expand our comfort zone beyond its current boundary, we transcend to a more open experience than the one before. We will inevitably face another challenge that pushes us to the new edge; we continue to have opportunities to open and expand. The same goes for everyone: all that we dream of, all the most profound and touching experiences, and some of the truest joys of being human are all outside of our comfort zone. We are both our greatest asset and our greatest limit. Overcoming the ways we limit ourselves begins with our mindset by overcoming the ways our thoughts, beliefs, and ideas close ourselves off to the limitless possibilities for our lives and who we are capable of being.
With our awareness we can notice when we are thinking from a closed mind, and we can shift this towards openness (as depicted in the right side of the graphic above under “try”). We can have a more open mind about certain things and a more closed mind about other things, so our awareness helps us be objective and discerning enough to hold ourselves accountable. How we speak, to others and ourselves, also is an indicator of when our mindset is more closed or open and the areas in which we tend to express closed thinking and open thinking. Sometimes we need to actually hear ourselves in order for it to click with our awareness. That's okay! When our awareness notices an expressed idea or sentiment that is closed (whether it's a thought or belief or what we express with our speech), we can shift our mind and our thinking.
For example:
Comparison is an example of thinking that closes us off to the vast possibilities of ourselves; “comparison is the thief of joy” - Theodore Roosevelt. If I notice I tend to compare myself to people I think are "successful" and when I compare myself to them I think or express something like, "I can't do that because of x, y, z," or “I’m not where they are so I’m not successful,” I can use my awareness to explore that closed belief (conscious and subconscious). Through objective reflection, I can notice the ways in which comparison limits the actions I am willing to take in the direction of my goals and dreams. After exploring where that sentiment originates, I can begin to shift it. Like the graphic above suggests, in this instance, I can remind myself that, “Everyone starts somewhere,” and ask myself, "What am I missing to do that?" or “What is success to me? How do I define success, rather than accepting society’s definition of success?” As I answer these questions, I find the weeds and fertile grounds within, from which I can move forward and expand. I will come to see that my thoughts and beliefs are what’s keeping me closed off from doing that or understanding my current success based on my definition.
Hint: the fruitful answers to these questions have you (or rather “I”) as the subject.
When we are open, which begins with an open mind, we do not resist. We are not stuck or stagnant. When we are open, we can flow in our naturally dynamic nature with life. We have a choice when it comes to how we approach life. By choosing to accept the dynamic nature of life at the macro and micro level, rather than wishing it to be how we think it should be, we free ourselves to embrace life in entirety. That is when we can learn and evolve from all as our teacher and continually expand our horizons of possibility and experience; that is a magical thing.
Life is ever changing; we can change with it or we can remain stuck by our resistance, limits, and close-mindedness. Shifting towards openness begins with awareness. When we know clearly and compassionately what and how we resist or keep ourselves closed, we can choose to open to a more expansive perspective in those situations. In those moments, when we open ourselves to that perspective, we can see lessons waiting to be learned and actions to be taken.
As we learned from Lao Tzu in Thoughts to Words, our destiny begins in our mind, with our thoughts. Our openness to life begins by cultivating an open mind. As children we were born open. As we grew older our cultures and experiences may have consciously and subconsciously directed us to close. That's no problem because with our practice of awareness we will notice the ways in which we have all closed and we can bring objective understanding and compassion to those instances and choose to open once more by taking action supported by our practices. As The Little Prince reminds us, "All grown-ups were once children... but only a few of them remember it." It is simply a matter of remembering. Our awareness directs us towards openness when that is where we point our compass. Having compassion and curiosity allow us to explore internally and externally beyond our comfort zones to tap into an experience far more expansive and lucid.
REFLECT
Answer the following questions in your notebook, a piece of paper, or record yourself talking through your answers on your phone and read over or listen to your answers when you’re done.
Dig Deep. Be honest. Be compassionate. Be objective. Take responsibility and accountability. It is of no help for us to be judgmental of ourselves or direct blame elsewhere. You got this!
1. How might closed thinking or beliefs have closed me off to experiencing life in entirety? What role does resistance play in these instances?
2. How can my practice of awareness help me shift my mindset to be more open? How will practicing awareness and continually opening my mindset shift my experiences and life? How will it feel to move through life with an ever-open mindset and the ability to recalibrate myself to this mindset when I need?
3. When do I tend to resist change and challenge? How might an open mindset help me in these instances?
4. When do I tend to stay in my comfort zone? When do I push myself beyond my comfort zone?
5. How might I benefit from moving outside my comfort zone more? Think about a time you exhibited an open mindset and moved beyond your comfort zone: What approach did I take that made me open rather than close? How can I encourage myself, in those closed moments, to move outside my comfort zone even, and especially, when it feels difficult?
6. Look back at the “Open Mindset'“ graphic in the "RE LEARN" section: What are some instances or current situations where I think or speak in a closed way like some of the examples on the graphic? What could I think or say that exhibits and aligns me with an open mindset instead? How might the outcome change if I use my awareness and reflection to shift towards openness?
7. How will continually opening my mind help me to better relate to and understand others, especially those I might not immediately think I can relate to? How does this help our world?
RE DO
Think about where you are currently stuck or stagnate.
Write an explanation of the situation.
Take a deep breath.
Align yourself with an open mindset and bring your awareness to the situation. Answer these questions objectively and compassionately:
What are the thoughts, story, and beliefs around this that keep me closed and stuck?
What else can I see about this situation when I align myself to openness and limitless possibilities?
Based on my awareness and reflection, what changes with my thinking, story, and perspective as I shift towards openness?
How do I feel as I bring awareness and openness to this situation?
Take a deep breath. Reread what you wrote down.
Now, Take a deep breath. Answer these questions:
How can I use openness to release myself from being stuck and stagnant? How does this look as a continual process (as opposed to a one-time exercise)?
What do I need to do to act in alignment with this awareness and knowing? How do I need to show up for myself and act differently?
Do one of those actions now. It doesn’t need to be a huge leap. Small daily action is more sustainable and attainable. This is just as important. We can know but it is what we do with what we know that makes a difference. This is how we challenge ourselves to get out of our comfort zones and initiate change. If you struggle to get the momentum going, count, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and after 5 just act, don’t overthink it, just do.
*When you find yourself returning to a closed mindset, not taking action, or staying in your comfort zone, look at what you’ve written down. Realign with how you will feel when you take different action that is in alignment with your awareness and openness. Whenever you need to, reanswer those questions above. Focus on creating, building, and keeping momentum. If you need to, brainstorm new paths of action and even smaller steps to take so you can do something now, in the moment.
In Your Day-to-Day
Being open begins in your mind with your thoughts, beliefs, and perceptions
If you want to be open, be flexible to change; face, understand, let go of, and expand beyond your limits
To live fully means you are open to all of life, the “good” and the “bad” because you can’t have one without the other
Use your awareness to notice when you’re operating from a closed mindset and then objectively and compassionately explore, understand, and shift your thinking
Being open allows you to flow with life’s dynamic nature; it is your nature to be open - as a kid you were and you can always tap into, nurture, and increase this openness
Realign yourself with an open mindset (through the questions in RE DO) whenever you feel yourself resisting, stuck, or closed-minded in a situation