Laughter, Anxiety and Writing

 The trembling of laughter is the trembling of anxiety seen through a different perspective.

Alan Watts 

Hmm!  I love laughing.  It is one of my most absolute favorite things to do.  I love being around people who have the ability to make me laugh. I seek out funny things and funny people.  My most cherished memories are those times I recall trembling with laughter. I have this feeling though that I have not "trembled" enough, I have not laughed enough, especially in the last decade or so.

Anxiety trembling , however, is something I am a bit too  familiar with and  definitely not as fond of.  Over the last week or so, I have been brewing with a very low level anxiety that I refer to as the hindrance of "restlessness and worry".  I mean there has been apparent reasons for it, there has been a lot of external chaos...wakes, and grieving people around me ( I pick up other people's emotions), the uncontained activity of babies and children (as beautiful as that is), holidays and big suppers, the ongoing connection to the suffering of others, reminders of my financial scarcity,  my own confusion as I continue to awaken, and my writing which seems all over the place.  It is when I sit down to write that I feel this restlessness brewing the most. I feel it in my core.  I feel it in my shoulders. I feel something up.

The Natural Flow Impeded

Writing for the most part for me is one of those activities that is very "easy" and "natural".  (Don't get me wrong...it can be very challenging, time consuming, effort inducing and crazy making too...especially when it comes to submitting or preparing something for publication) .  But when I am just writing for writing's sake it is like a beautiful flow of energy comes from some place deep inside me, moves  through my mind, my limbs like water and just pours onto the page or screen.  What I am writing right here and now, for example,  requires so little concentrated effort.  It is like it is happening to me, not something I am making happen.  Does that make sense? Writing is like laughter...it just ripples and waves and flows through me creating this great trembling of release. Once it starts I cannot stop it until it is spent.

When I sit to write, and instead of feeling the light, easy flow of laughter coming from me I feel the trembling of anxiety, I know there is something that needs to be explored.  So I am observing this "trembling" : recognizing it, allowing it, looking deeply into into and doing my best to nurture it and myself.  I call  it up from the basement where my conscious mind wants to keep it hidden...and ask it to sit here beside me.  I put my arm around it and say, "Hello , restlessness and worry. Though I would much rather be laughing,  I see you trying to get my attention,I feel you in my belly and my shoulders, I hear you in my mind but I am not sure what it is you want me to understand from your presence. Please tell me"  And I do my best to just sit and listen. 

What does this feeling of restlessness and worry have to say? 

This is what I imagine it has to say ( and no, I am not hearing voices lol):

• You have had a lot of external going ons and you are absorbing it.  Though you have grown so much in regards to your ability to respond rather than react to life circumstance, you may still be reacting with thought which leads to emotional reaction , if not with word or action.  Recognize that and don't beat yourself up for it.
• Are you still attached to expectation and outcome?  Are you expecting that you should not be reacting at this point and are you less than compassionate with yourself when you see that you are reacting to Life circumstance....that you are actually feeling restlessness and worry?   That's okay...go from here.  
• Are you attached to writing expectation and outcome?   Most of this anxiety seems to come when you sit down to write.You look to writing as if it were a Guru guiding you to peace and enlightenment. You expect to feel better with every page written , not more confused or restless.  Right now your Guru is trying to teach too many subjects at once, maybe? You have so many things you want to write or finish, so many things started, so many ideas. It is hard to find peace there.  It is hard to find solace when there is no clear path or direction to go with that.  Do you need to stream line your writing focus? Do you need to focus on writing more poetry or getting  some chap books together?  Do you write more articles and essays and get them out there?  Do you just focus on this blog? What about the books you are writing or have written?  A great deal of restlessness comes up when you sit down before this book you are revamping. You are not clear in what you want but at the same time you have these expectations of yourself being able to whip through the 300 pages with ease...turning them all around to make it more "reader friendly" than you assumed your original manuscript was. You keep meeting obstacles and the writing process isn't flowing the way you want it to flow...the way, you tell yourself, it "should" flow. That "should" is just expectation, a mind thing, and it is not skillful or wholesome... Do you think you actually need to revamp this book at all? Whatever you are experiencing in your writing just is...nothing is either good or bad but thinking makes it so.  Hamlet
• Hmm! Do you think your renewed desire for publication and getting your message out there is contributing to this attachment to outcome worry? Didn't this feeling get more intense when you told yourself a few weeks ago that is was time for more  publication? ...You had this idea you "needed"  to submit "something" for publication in all the genres you write in.   You put pressure on yourself for publication. 
• You have been feeling "scarcity" not only in income but in what you see as "writing success"?  You were questioning why this type of success has not yet manifested in your life...you have done both the external and inner work...why isn't it happening? This brings you back to the core belief of not being worthy of the abundance Life has.  You see it as punishment ...yet you are learning that this is not how Life operates.  So you are confused. Putting even more publishing pressure on yourself...not only to prove that you should be writing but also to prove  that you are not being punished by the universe. You are expecting publication to put an end to this core belief once and for all. 
• You were testing Life, weren't you? You wanted some sign that both your spiritual practice and your writing practice were leading you somewhere. So you told yourself that you, at least, had to try to get a publication. If you got a publication, it would be a sign to keep going. Even when you got a publication, was it enough?  You wanted more of a sign....and then another...and another. 
•  Do you need a sign to do what you love to do?  Think about that.  Do you need publication to validate that you should keep writing?  That you should keep up with your spiritual practice? Are you going to stop if you do not become more and more published? Why do you want publication?  
• What part of you is feeling "stress" when you sit here?  What part of you is feeling restlessness and worry?  It is obviously coming from the ego part of you.  It is a hindrance to you getting to where you want to go but it is also a wonderful opportunity for you you to see how your mind is behaving.  You are watering unhealthy seeds of expectation , attachment to outcome, judgement of self, skeptical doubt, outer world pursuits, ego gratification, etc. Use mindfulness and compassion to surround what you allowed to grow in your mind ...then water the seeds of non-judgement, equanimity,compassion, peace, awareness, acceptance of what is, enthusiasm for what you are doing, and patience instead. 
• Allow a healthier approach to  your writing naturally emerge with awareness and acceptance... allow patience, compassion and joy to emerge. 
• Understand what part of you is guiding that intention to write : The ego who wants to be known and saluted  as writer or the deeper you that does not see the "me" in this and wants what has come through you to be recognized? It is the deeper  you, right? Gently let go of ego intention and write what comes from the deeper you.
• Write ! Write ! Write!  Laugh!  Laugh!  Laugh!

Hmmm!  Well that was long winded and probably quite boring to read but that is what came out lol.  So I leave it up.

The point made is that though we laugh as often as we can, we need to salute restlessness and worry when it shows up.  Don't push it down...just recognize it, accept/allow it, look deeply into it and nurture Self and it when it shows up. With practice, before long, we will view anxiety and laughter in the same way...harmless and worthy of our attention.  The  trembling of anxiety and the trembling of laughter after all, come from  the same source...both have the potential of enhancing our lives. It is all  just energy... allow it to flow through.