This week’s Chopra Center series is all about helping to detoxify your life by letting go of everything negative and choosing to live in the moment. Why? Simply put, because not living as your true, authentic self takes so much time and energy away from living your best life – and who wouldn’t want to be living their best life every minute of every day? 😉
How do you know if you need to detoxify your life?
- Is your house/car/desk/shared space messy, buried under stacks of clothes/fast food bags/work/etc.?
- Are you finding that you can’t leave your stresses behind at the end of the day?
- Are you surrounded by people who honor, respect and uplift you or are you surrounded by negativity?
- Do you find that you like to gossip, judge, and complain more than you like to see the good in yourself and others?
- Are you often tired, out of balance, irritable, and sometimes even depressed?
Those are all signs you need to take a time out and re-evaluate your life. To help get us on the change train, the Chopra Center suggests that we begin to release all of these bad habits by sitting by ourselves, for at least five minutes each day, with the intention to let go via the seven-step process outlined below.
- Take responsibility – Emotions are so powerful that it is easy to believe that we have little control over them. When someone says something rude, we feel justified in reacting with an angry response. But understanding that you have choice in how you respond and interpret experiences is the key to healing the emotional body.
- Witness what you are feeling – Conditioning trains us to feel the same feelings over and over every time we experience the same situation. As soon as an emotion is triggered, we get tangled in our old response. To escape this painful cycle, we need to breathe into the feeling. By allowing yourself to experience the physical sensations without trying to change them, the charge of the emotion begins to dissipate.
- Label your feeling – Use simple words such as fear, anger, guilt, frustration, or sadness. Don’t use the language of victimization – betrayed, let down, hurt – any word that implies blame for someone else. By simply labeling your feeling, you avoid the temptation to rehash the long, complicated story. Every story is about the past. Your sensations and emotions are in the present.
- Express the feeling – When we resist or suppress emotions, they only become more toxic. Expressing a feeling leads to release and purification of the body and mind. The purpose of this step isn’t to express how much you hate or blame someone else but to experience release, clarity, and insight, causing the intense emotions to lose their grip on you and allowing your awareness to expand.
- Share your feeling – Choose someone you trust and share your feelings. You should now be able to share without blame and without trying to get the other person to take “your side.” The aim is to be heard and get a true reflection.
- Let go through ritual – You may want to write down what you’re letting go of on a piece of paper that you then burn or throw into the sea. It can be private or you can invite others to witness the release and help you remember its significance.
- Celebrate and move on – Honor your release by doing something nice for yourself. The celebration doesn’t have to be showy or elaborate. You could simply listen to your favorite music, buy yourself a special present or enjoy a delicious meal. You may want to invite others to share in the joy and gratitude.
Although there are seven steps and they may seem a little overwhelming at first, know that its main purpose is to help you let go and ultimately detoxify your life. So if you find you don’t need to do the last two, or don’t need to do them in order, etc. that’s ok. The main thing is that you are able to let go and move on to live in happiness and gratitude vs. negativity and regret.
What negativity will you finally let go of today? What joy will you allow into your life?
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