Leaping Lotus Wellness Studio Group

The Art Of Being Empty......

Many have heard me talk about allowing yourself to be empty and to stay in that space as long as you can. I've also referred to this as sitting in your own bucket of sh*t. I'm sure this sounds completely ridiculous. Why would we want to do such a thing?

Empty is probably one of the most uncomfortable feelings to experience, but if you can stick it out, the benefits are unimaginable.

Let's do this visualization practice together:

Visualize yourself going to the grocery store. You grab a cart and go aisle, by aisle looking for things to put in your cart. Sometimes you have a list, sometimes you don't. Up and down the aisles you go. The cart gets full and off to the checkout you go. Everything gets whisked home and into the pantry. Ahh....the task is complete. A full pantry can give us a feeling of satisfaction, completion, and safety. We are stocked up and ready for anything. A rainy day, no problem! We have it covered.

Have you ever wandered up and down the grocery aisles looking for things to buy, but aren't really coming up with anything? The essentials are obvious, but what else is there? We put things in the cart because they look good, or we think we will use them, or we want to try it. The mind says...well you came here so buy something...don't waste your time...just grab anything. You don't have time to come back until next week.

Once we start putting everything in the pantry, the mind says. "What did I even buy, or why did I buy this?" In the pantry it goes. It's full.

Take a closer look at your pantry. How many items in there are used regularly and how many items are just taking up space? Sometimes we keep things around as fillers. It makes us feel better knowing that there's something there, just in case. Think about how an empty pantry or refrigerator makes us feel. Does it freak us out or not? It can bring on feelings of urgency or restlessness, because we are lacking supplies. But are we?

Now visualize yourself going to the grocery store and walking up and down the aisles with a cart. This time, you walk the entire store and keep the cart empty and go home. This sounds like a waste of time for sure, doesn't it? When you get home think about what you really need, look around you and look inside of yourself. Ask yourself what do you really need? Go to the grocery store and "window shop" a few more times. Now go back and just put your essentials in the cart. Nothing else. Put them in your pantry and see how you feel. Try to do this a few more times, buying just the essentials.

What is the meaning behind all of this craziness????

The grocery cart is a metaphor for our minds.

We fill our grocery carts just like we fill our minds. We fill our minds with chatter. We fill our closets, we fill our social calendars, we fill our tummies, we fill everything we possibly can, until it's overfull to the point where we can't breathe. Just like our stuffed pantry...but what's really in there???? We aren't really sure, because we can't make heads or tails of the clutter. The sales pitch is...fill that calendar, fill that closet, fill all of your free time, but what is is filled with? And...is it fulfilling you....or is it just filling time or space? And is that ok with you?

What if we took up the art of being empty?

The art of being empty allows us to experience life without feeling the need to fill the grocery cart, just for the sake of filling it. This is the art of creating clarity and space so that only the items that nourish you go into the cart. This is easier said than done! It takes a lot of stamina to let yourself be in the uncomfortable place of feeling empty.

How many times have we gone out just to go out. We come home annoyed because we didn't feel fulfilled. We don't want to be bored, or sit home on a Saturday night, so we find something to put in the cart. The last thing we want to do is sit in our sh*tty bucket. What if we used that time to be empty instead of trying to fill it? What would happen? How many more times are we going to fill our grocery cart with people, things, or situations that don't bring us peace?

The emptiness can be quite intense in the beginning. It can feel like a big hole and natural reaction is to fill it. Here's where you have to hang tight and push through. The hole starts to slowly fill up by itself. A shift starts to happen. The peace within starts to fill you up, and the need to fill the cart starts to lessen. We start to discover things about ourselves that we never knew before. We start to ask ourselves...How do I want to fill my cart? What do I want in my cart? We stop grabbing things for the sake of filling space.

We start to "Window Shop" for ourselves.

This is the art of sitting in your own sh*t.

The art of allowing yourself to feel uncomfortable.

Through the discomfort, the emptiness, sitting in our sh*t, the tensions slowly dissolve and we start to see a new horizon.

Clarity emerges.

It happens.

It's a practice.