Peace is out the back
Summer holidays in New Zealand orientate around time at the beach. My gold standard for a good Summer is a high number of swims and days of warmth. I had been dating my now wife for 8 months when she invited me to join her family on Summer holiday to the golden sands and idyllic beaches of the Coromandel Peninsula. A beach house across the road from the beach, a perfect volleyball court-sized front yard, and the opportunity for surf lessons from a father in law who had been surfing since way back. Paradise.
These family holidays had something of a liturgical rhythm. Days for boating, days for fishing, days for board games and play, the day of the visit to Colenso Orchard, the day of the walk to Cathedral Cove. But for me the best days weren’t able to be predicted. They were the days where a cyclone somewhere far off the coast was providing a generous swell for surfing and body surfing.
As a novice surfer it was surprising to learn just how much effort it was to get ‘out the back’. The technique required to duck dive was not straightforward. The urgent paddling in the window before the next wave was tiring, all the while craning my neck up, making sure the board was pointed in the right direction. Getting out the back was a real effort, but once you were finally past the breaking waves you could straddle the board, rest, and catch your breath.
Reaching deep focus and achieving peace
In his book Indistractable* Nir Eyal employs this metaphor to describe a technique and a mindset for combatting digital distraction. We live in a bottomless sea of distraction in the network age, and limiting our digital exposure and compulsive digital use is now widely discussed and attempted.
Eyal suggests that if we are to make our way into focus and then stay focused on a task, we must learn to let the waves of distraction flow over us, and do this repeatedly until we get out the back, into the deep work of the task at hand.
This same principle extends to our thought life too. Waves of disordered desire and thoughts which are negative and untrue can come at us at any time. We must learn to step around them, to let them turn our mind to the truth as we wait for them to pass.
Experiencing a hideous and embarrassing memory is a universal experience. How many of us have woken in the night with the acute experience of remembering a mistake we have made, a public misstep, or some strong memory of something we regret but can’t do anything about? If we are not careful, the reaction to that memory will have us re-living the hideous feelings that came with that time in the present. We’ll find ourselves wide awake and fretful.
How do we step around it? How do we duck under the wave of emotion rather than it picking us up and sending us through the tumble of the whitewater?
Five reassurances to downgrade a hideous memory
Here are five general things to dwell on to replace the associations related to a hideous, embarrassing memory. They need to be held onto each time the wave of thinking is experienced as we wait to get out the back, into a peaceful, reassured state of mind.
That was then, this is now
“I can distinguish between the memory and where I am now. I can recognise that I have grown and matured and now know things I didn’t know when the event occurred.”It’s not as crucial as it feels
I realise that I did not indeed die, I was not overtaken, the world did not end. I can see the memory in the correct perspective of the fullness of time.”I am a human being, not an idealist
“Mistakes come with interacting with others and being a human being. Yes, it would be nice to do everything perfectly, but that’s not realistic - it’s time to lower my expectations.”The spotlight of my focus is on me, but others’ focus is elsewhere
“Yes, it may have been embarrassing, yes I may have made a fool of myself, but this memory is only acute in my mind, it’s not as big a deal as it seems.”What we heed we feed
“The more I call this memory to mind, the more it becomes one of my mind's favourite subjects. Dwelling on it and entertaining it will only strengthen the association, time to let it go.”
The great news is that the surfing metaphor applies only to a point. A surfer always has to go back through the whitewater after every wave. But as we make new associations and renew our mind by dwelling on the truth, we can look forward to permanent change. We can look forward to coming to new conclusions about ourselves and our past and then living in them, living in peace with a mind that encourages us and sees things in proper size.
The more specific and personal the reassurance the more powerful it is, and the quicker it can bring change. Living Wisdom Counselling is about helping to identify the specific, tailor made truth that will move you into greater freedom and peace. If you wish to live in greater peace today, I would love to help. You can get in touch via email or book at appointment.
*Nir Eyal. (2019). Indistractable. BenBella Books.
If this has brought to mind anything that you would like to talk through or have help with please get in touch. Either choose a time or send an email via the contact form.
Sources of ideas and stories are acknowledged when used significantly unchanged. Underlying mental health concepts are from the Living Wisdom approach to Pastoral Counselling.