Mantrasthat acknowledge both life’s triumphs and life’s messiness can be powerful tools to facilitate this inner transformation.
Here are six that I have learned over the years and employ regularly:
1.
“I am in agreement with life, and I resist nothing.”
I had the pleasure of spending this New Year’s Eve with musician Karen Drucker.
I said, “I am in agreement with life, and I resist nothing.”
She promptly wrote a mantra that we chanted.
This was an important moment for me.
Suffice it to say, everything in me wanted to resist them.
This mantra helped me heal my grieving heart.
“Soften into the pain.”
Of course, when contractions hit, the natural impulse is to resist the pain.
But as all mothers know, when you resist the contraction, it hurts even more.
When life hurts, soften into the pain.
“Be curious.”
A lot of weird mystical stuff has happened to me over the past few years.
I was extremely confused, but then Rachel Naomi Remen invited me to “Be curious.”
This is the mantra that changed my life.
There’s a certain humility in its words.
The phrase suggests that we can’t possibly understand the mysteries of life, and that’s OK.
I was stunned silent.
“Cave early.”
I learned the life-changing mantra, “Cave early” from Martha Beck.
Yet,your intuitionis saying, “No, honey.
Get out now.”
Choose to simply cave early.
Breathe through it and just say no.
Learn the soul lesson without putting your heart through the ringer.
The key is not to cave to your fear but to your intuition.
Fear might say, “Cave early because this is too risky.”
“I am gentle with myself.”
So many of us beat ourselves up ruthlessly.
The only way real change happens is through gentle self-compassion.
But these tactics don’t work.
Only radical self-compassion and gentleness can allow us to make the brave choices that transform our lives.
“I accept.”