The other day a conversation arose around the idea of how we can be unshakeable in life.
Unshakeable … what does that even mean?
My understanding of that word is that no matter what is happening in life, I can stay in my body and not jump into either fear of the future or reactivate past stories – both of which tend to trigger lots of emotions and make my heart fluttery and unstable. I am sure you know what I am talking about!
When you can stay in your body, you have more of an opportunity to separate yourself from the people, events and situations that life offers up in rapid succession and put your attention on what is actually important, expansive, nourishing and uplifting for you.
It’s like watching a movie.
You can sit back and watch the stories unfold and notice what draws you in, what gets your attention.
Or:
You can watch the movie and with every new scene, jump up and involve yourself into the action by offering your opinion, give advice or wanting to change it into something else, redirecting the scene.
What do you tend to do?
The latter option feels exhausting just writing it down. Do you agree?
And yet, here we are, getting triggered and reactive here, there and everywhere.
So, what to do about it?
Knowing that there are many ways to approach this, I’ll share with you some of my ideas how to become more and more unshakeable.
- Boundaries and containment
You have to have a sense of awareness that there is a ‘me’ over here in it’s own contained energetic space and a ‘them’ or ‘that’ out there in the endless space around you.
Strengthening your sense of containment helps with setting boundaries between your own energetic space and everything else. However you imagine, feel or know that boundary, it has to be flexible, see through and allow things to move in and out. You can see it having the consistency of human cell, a bubble or balloon.
It’s not a protective shield, but more like a responsive membrane. Within it, you can cultivate your own energy, not leak it out all the time. It allows you to move from reactive to being more present to life. Imagine feeling like you can sit back within your space and from that more relaxed place notice what you want to engage with in the “outer world”. A side benefit of this boundary is that people will perceive you as a more magnetic person. And who does not want that?
- Disentanglement
Once you have established an idea of YOUR energetic space, notice if anything or anyone else is in there with you. We all habitually allow certain people and life aspects to live there with us. We assume it makes us closer, particularly when we care about them. However, in reality, we tend to get entangled and at some point it begins to backfire.
You can imagine the idea of entanglement as a bunch of tree roots in your space: some are yours, and some belong to other people or situations. When someone else wiggles a root, you will feel it and react – unconsciously, automatically. Usually it’s not very supportive, it distracts and may create a whole gamut of feelings. It may pull you out into doing and over-giving, into will and logic.
So imagine moving people out of your energetic space, cleanly separating the roots and envision them in their own cells or bubbles. Healthy cells have liquid or gas between them, so use that imagery in relation to others. They are mobile, they can ‘park’ beside you when you put your attention on them, but not attach or come in. Then they can move away when the interaction is complete.
Do you notice how good it feels just to entertain the thought to have your space to yourself?
Once they are out, they cannot shake you anymore!
- No stories
Notice when you get rerouted into a story that explains why something is happening, why you feel this way, why you cannot move forward with something, how past wrongs and hurts affect you now.
Stories can be treacherous as they often connect to a ”poor me” or martyr aspect in yourself and once you hook in, it’s difficult to get out from underneath. Stories shake you up, because they arise as a response to feelings and then sweep you up into the mind chatter and you know what happens once you are in there.
To become unshakeable, relax the stories and just allow the feelings. The feelings will pass when you sit with them, often in a matter of minutes. That includes sadness, anger and any of the heavy artillery. We are often afraid of them, afraid that they will take us out in some form. What actually happens, when we sit with a feeling, it will take us inside ourselves, into a deep and expansive place, into more peace and presence.
Are you ready to try out some of these ideas?
What would shift in your life if you felt unshakeable more often?
What would you do, have and be?
Sit with that … and let me know.
If you find some challenges in creating this change in perspective for yourself, let’s have a conversation and explore how I can support you in making this happen.