Patterns
I’ve written a lot about how getting curious can be the beginning of zooming out your lens on life to see a larger picture. Another way of putting this is understanding your patterns. This is easier for larger things like your morning or bedtime routines, preferred exercise or how we meal plan. It’s easy to see how our pattern of turning off screens and reading allows our mind and body to relax and then fall asleep (and there are a lot of studies on this). But, the smaller patterns are where the real juice is.
Think about it. Maybe it’s a pattern of feeling resentment when your partner is sitting on the couch while you clean up the kitchen. Or, whenever a certain someone at work joins a zoom call and your stomach physically turns. What about when you are really excited about trying something new, or putting yourself out there in some way, and that same old thought reappears and makes you second guess yourself?
These are all patterns. Patterns in thinking, being, responding or reacting and physical sensations in our bodies. What if we were to break it down a bit?
A pattern of feeling resentment when your partner is sitting on the couch while you clean up the kitchen: What is it about your partner sitting on the coach at this exact moment that bothers you? Does it really have anything to do with your partner? Or, are you tired and wish you could be sitting down too? Maybe it’s both?
A certain someone at work joins a call and your stomach physically turns: Is this person a physical threat to you? Did they do something to hurt you? Or, are your perceived thoughts about them taking over your mind and body? Do they possess something you wish you had or feel that you’re lacking?
That same old thought reappears and makes you second guess yourself: What is the fear of? Where does the fear stem from? Is it true? Is it 100% true?
We can thank Byron Katie and her amazing work for the last one. Most of the time nothing is 100% true which leaves the possibility of something more for us.
Patterns are just “any regularly repeated arrangement”, according to the Cambridge Dictionary. Yes, I am oversimplifying. For us humans, it’s more complicated than that because we’ve created these patterns for years and years, decades, even. Breaking the pattern and changing the pattern takes effort, of course it does. Change can be difficult, of course it can be. The first step is noticing these patterns in your life.
Let’s not bite off more than we can chew. That never gets us anywhere, concerning change. Let’s just notice some of the recurring patterns in our life. Make note of them in a journal, post-it-note or even just mentally. Then we can play with the idea of making the smallest of tweaks and seeing what happens. There’s that trial and error again! It’s not until we notice what we’re doing and what’s occurring that we’re able to conceive something else taking its place.