9:00AM
I’ve talked about this before, maybe yesterday, I can’t remember. I’m going to talk about it again because I think sometimes shedding new light on the same topic can bring different learnings.
I woke up after not having slept well and then finally said to myself: “More loving, less saving.”
I have a tendency to want to save people. I believe it, ironically, comes from caring about them, comes from loving them. But instead of focusing on loving them as they are, I see them suffering, care about them, and want to change them. It rarely works. It also drives me crazy.
Maybe what I want to highlight here is the aspect of more and less, to make this stand out from the previous entry on the same topic. I believe many things in life need to be balanced and that so often, we tend to emphasize one over the other. Back in 2012 when I started building iFeelio, I came up with a few more X, less Y phrases. More here, less there. More feel, less think. More me, less we. I believe all of those things are important, I just noticed that I have a tendency to fall into some more than others.
For example, the “more here, less there.” I tend to be focused on the future a lot and on things that happen at a distance, which can be great for planning and long-distance relationships and business opportunities. It can also help a lot when doing computer programming and imagining how a customer might interact with a design. At the same time, if I’m too stuck in “there,” then I can lose my sense of self, lose my sense of place, and feel disconnected from the present moment. It’s about balancing—about swaying back and forth between two opposites and finding the center.
So with “more loving, less saving,” it’s not about not “saving” people or helping people when they need help, it’s about also loving them for how they are. Side note: part of me likes the word “changing” instead of “saving.” More loving, less changing? Hmm, not sure, not so much.
I think the word saving implies that I’m trying to change the person because I think they will be worse if they don’t change, that it’s my responsibility to come in and change them. Same with the world. If I don’t save the world, it will fall apart, and I need to come save it (or any part of it). Save the whales, save the dolphins, etc.
I wonder, if we spent more time loving the whales and dolphins, appreciating them for how they are, would that then lead us to saving them?
I went for a slow walk this morning focused on more loving, less saving. I looked at the robin eating a worm. I felt at peace. It was raining. I didn’t think of climate change but how good it felt.
9:10AM
