Our thoughts are not the [only] reality

I used to hear a pharse in the rooms of recovery: "feelings are not facts". While I do maintain that feelings are real, they are indeed not facts. Neither are my thoughts! 

The impressions of the present moment are real, but the charge or ruminations of the past- not reality. The ponderings and prognositactions about the future, also, not reality.

It is hard to grop, to get, to absorb this as my thoughts can give rise to energy in my body. My body feels in the present moment. My heart is beating hard and fast NOW. My hands are cold, NOW. My shoulders rise NOW. And there is nothing but the feelling of the fingers on the keys and the sounds of the tapping that are real.

My issue seems to come from identifying my fears about the future as being real. The mis-education in my body, the lack of breath and present time awareness scalds my mind- making the ideas in my head more real than what is around me.

So, yes, the thoughts are not the problem. It is the illusion that they are real, when I identify with them. And I may think that the thoughts themselves are facts, as if every thought were of the present.  

With breath, with my senses, with practice I come to the moment, let go of thoughts, and just let them road. I do not need to own them.

The thoughts are not the problem. Thoughts are the nature of the mind. The problem is that we identify with them.

- Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo, "No Excuses" 

Kyczy has published several books including “Yoga and the Twelve Step Path” 2012 and “Life in Bite Sized Morsels” 2015. Her book “Yogic Tools for Recovery; A Guide To Working The Steps” will be out November 14, 2017.

She is a contributor to national and international magazines (I Love Recovery Cafe, Yoga Times, 12 Step Gazette, OM Magazine, Recovery Today Magazine and Indigo International, among others.)  Kyczy has developed a series of yoga sequences for Studio Live TV that incorporate recovery principles in all-levels yoga classes. The link for them can be found on her website www.yogarecovery.com.

Don't Turn Your Back On Yourself

Feelings are not permanent- they DO deserve acknowledgment as they arise. To refute, refuse or dismiss them is to turn your back on yourself.

Joy, sorrow, frustration, resentment, happy anticipation, celebration: they all are temporary. Feelings have an energy in our emotional body and in our physical body. Letting them BE is the way to let them through. While I want to cling to the positive and avoid the negative; there is no neurological way to put a gate, a filter on feelings. I block one I block them all.

This difficulty with ANY feeling is how I respond to it; if I crave for more, if I dampen or resist. In fact, the feelings themselves can nourish me- I am alive, I have people whom I love and whose absence makes me sad. I am rich with this feeling. I am alive, I have people I anticipate seeing whose presence lifts me up. I I have work to do that allows me to experience curiosity and challenge. Feelings flow and the sensations witness the life in me. They sustain me.

I am human; I have preferences. It is being open to them all, however, without gripping or turning my back that helps me stay in the REAL feeling and not the rage, the depression, the hysteria or the anxiety. I am able to have my feelings, and acknowledge them in health. Acceptance.

When we open to our feelings as they arise, we create the causes and conditions of mental and physical health. This is what acceptance-based inner awareness entails; it is not a practice to put off, any more than breathing, sleeping, or consuming nourishment.- Josh Korda, "Flowing Feelings"

Kyczy Hawk is the author of “Life in Bite Sized Morsels” (2015), “Yoga and the Twelve Step Path” (2012) as well a several short books and manuals. She is the creator of S.O.A.R.™ (Success Over Addiction and Relapse) teacher certification program. Her students have gone on to create recovery oriented classes and workshops to serve this population across America and around the world.  

In her third decade of recovery she has faced many situations that have called on her abilities to face adversity while maintaining sobriety. Those that have come in her recent years

Ms. Hawk lives in Silicon Valley, California sharing her time between her family, practicing and teaching yoga, writing and pottery.  www.yogarecovery.com