We live in a time where “it is a dog-eat-dog world”, is thrown around everywhere, is that level of rivalry a healthy form of competition?
Where do we draw the line of helpful vs hurtful competition?
Have you ever found yourself in an environment, with a high level of competition, and metrics to be hit and you just feel like you’re completely in a ringer? No matter what you do, it all comes down to performing. To hit those targets.
Now, this is a hallmark of a productive environment, or it can be. Like with all things it does come down to how the environment is motivated and what the whole ethos is. Now I feel like being in a fast-paced environment, hitting targets, and performing in general can be really important.
A definite thing to remember is balance, as opposed to the all too popular place of imbalance.
If we feel like we are always needing to strive and improve, we may be missing out on the beauty and simplicity of life. Of the proverbial being part of the human being. We can be consumed with the need to do and perform, to hit those KPIs.
What I personally found is when I fall into this space, that I seem to lose a lot of my potential and really my capability of being. Through this process of life, I find that there is a consistent need to check-in. To check my own progress with my goals, figure out where I wrote them, and if I am even somewhat still aware of them.
A seeming luxury, but really it is the bare necessity that we owe ourselves. It is our responsibility to use our bodies and emotions as the guidance system that we can allow them to be. Really that they are.
Psychedelic where now?!
I know, I know, I know. You are here to learn about psychedelics and what they can do for you. This is one of the main things they enable us to do. Remember our multi-sensory system and what they do for us. Honestly, it comes down to what they are.
Information enters our system as raw data, which is translated through our senses. Our relationship to our senses is what helps to create the way that we are feeling, drawn to our external reality.
Words that bubble to the surface of my mind are, the way we have and continue to draw our reality from the inspiration we have and continue to receive. Through this receiving, we continue to make changes and adjustments, all toward better serving our space and time.
Essentially, we consistently look for ways we can move closer toward our goals. Proportional to how often we are aligning with our goals, or more easily checking in on our alignment, through our feeling body, and the intuitive guidance we receive and how we are feeling in the moment.
Why such a focus on feelings? Are you saying I need to be smarter?!
Never! However, the reason we choose to focus on feelings, is that while the mind is, and can be incredibly intelligent, the body always keeps score. Almost more than we realize. The body has been awake to the information we have processed and lived, moving longer than our brains do. We store memories of trauma, hurts, and successes, but the body is the one that takes that piece in. It biochemically creates marks internally, of everything.
So when we are living, the best way to live is to live with the body in mind. To ensure that you are maintaining yourself as wholly within your now present moment. The easiest and most grounding thing is pain.
Now I like to keep it a bit more balanced and easygoing than, “Oh, I need to rend myself into the abyss of blackness, just to keep a handle on this mortal coil”.
No need for such dramedy.
So emotions are energy in motion.
This energy is electrical in nature, perceived as light, and then translated via our senses. Our nervous system is the wiring through which this electricity passes and forms our experience.
How do I healthily integrate pain? You know without the massive abyss schpiel?
Feel.
It really comes down to feeling, allowing yourself to feel whatever is happening in your moment. Not the past or future.
Everything you need will come up and allow you to realize what it is that you need to focus on, where all your hurts are. What they look like and how to best address them.
I challenge you to sit with any feeling, for as long as you can, repeatedly.
There is a subtle difference between this and wallowing, here you are experimenting to see what happens, to allow the changing scape of life to move through you.
Effortlessly and simply.
There may be pain, but the suffering is then a choice you can choose to experience.
Or allow it to arise and pass away.
Practice helps.
Immensely.
So B-Ball in the back with the boys good or bad?
Okay, so here it comes down to the individuals' intentions. Having healthy competition comes down to recognizing what the other does, what their strengths are, and how it is that makes you feel. It is not to devalidate yourself, your expression, or your capability. In fact, it is designed to help you elevate your potential and where you choose to exist.
Obviously, within this, it is important to remember that you are constantly choosing and becoming. So give yourself some credit for what it is you have done, and your earnest effort to where you want to go. This may take some time, but working in a way that allows you to proactively move forward, is a key point and part of learning how to better make progress.
Pro-activity begins in the mind, in a real way it is a mental game. So if the people you surround yourself with are there as reflections and reflectors to guide you to better potentials and realities, then that will happen.
Now, I remember asking a friend a few years ago, “How did you curate so many cool friends?”. He replied, “I didn’t curate them.”. Which brings it all home so beautifully. Life is constantly serving you what you need. The trick is to retrain yourself to reframe your experience so that you may begin to recognize and realize this. It is a long journey, hence it is best to start today, wherever you are, and do whatever you can.
Action steps? What units will the test be on?!
Look at the relationships in your life, big and small.
Look at how these feed you.
Do you find yourself complacent?
Happy to exist at the level you currently are at?
Or do you find that you are inspired by those around you, that they are able to point you to even better parts of yourself?
Quite simply, this is a compass.
You want the relationship you have toward your relationships, to be one that is constantly allowing you to elevate toward your highest potential.
The beautiful truth is we are really incapable of even beginning to conceive or convert our potential just yet.
We are only just beginning to understand a small fraction of it, no matter how much you feel you have done.
Incredibly exciting, I know.
The Fantastical Fungi
So this is where psychedelics and mushrooms enter.
We live, for the most part, in a world where it is often, “Dog eat dog”.
This means we generally apply this motto and perception toward ourselves as well.
What psychedelics help us do, simply and effectively, is to turn the attention back inward, lovingly.
This lets us defuse the internal situation, sit at peace with all the pieces, and allow ourselves to more easily be at peace.
Turning the mess of the mind and life into pieces of a puzzle, that fit together into a sublime jigsaw.
Start where you are, use what you have, and do what you can.
