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Why are so many of us wracked with anxiety and stress and sometimes even a sense of impending doom these days? Well, quite literally, it's because we weren't built for this.
Here's a fact. Your brain and nervous system were designed for a simpler time.
When threats took the form of an afternoon thunderstorm.
Or someone from a wayward tribe trying to steal some of your crops.
Or even an occasional bout with a tiger or a bear.
These were threats that happened, for the most part, one at a time. And threats that came and went mostly within a few minutes.
Now, compare that to what your nervous system is being asked to cope with today.
A constant barrage of information and data that needs to be sifted and processed and evaluated.
Information that comes at you from every direction: from your phone and your computer, your radio, your TV, and just about everybody around you.
And let's be honest, it's information that's been packaged and molded and delivered by the media with a specific intent to create fear and division and agitation.
It's all happening 24/7, 365 days a year.
It's no wonder so many of us are on edge.
But here's something else to consider. You weren't built to swim the English Channel either.
In fact, if most of us were dropped in the middle of that 21-mile-wide patch of icy water, we'd be in for it. We'd drown.
But if it's true that we weren't built to swim the English Channel, why then are people swimming the English Channel, and much further, all the time?
It's not because they're superhuman. And it's certainly not because they're better than we are.
It's because they trained for it.
And the fact is there are many things that we may not be built for, but they're things that we can become good at if we train.
And so it goes with living in calm and in ease and in joy, even in the midst of today's world with all of its divisions and disturbances and challenges.
Now, of course, there are many ways to train for this, but one of the most powerful training systems ever devised is yoga. And I'm not talking about just the postures or just the meditations or just the breathing, but the larger system of transformation, that may use postures and breathing and such, but it's a system that, well, it changes us from the inside, out, in body, in mind, and in Spirit.
So, the invitation becomes to remember, when you're feeling anxious or stressed or depressed during these difficult times, don't beat yourself up.
You truly, weren't built for this, but remember too, there is something you can do about that.