Home for the Holidays

There is something so innocent and delightful about watching my dog delight in "digging" around on the big white fleecy blanket that is on the sofa. He loves that thing. And yes, it's a pretty awesome blanket. I wonder if it's because when he's on it, it's like he's camouflaged, so he feels invisible and safe. Or maybe it's the texture. Or the smell. Whatever it is, he feels at home when he's there.

We all have things, places, people, smells, that make us feel "at home." But what home is it really? Is it the home of our essential nature? The home we were raised in? The idea of what we wanted home to be like?

Do we feel more "at home" with our habits? Or more "at home" with our voice of truth? When our habits are running the show, we make our decisions based on keeping those habits in play. We make decisions to support and justify our habits to keep us closer to the things we like and farther from the things we don't like. The more we do that, the more entrenched in those habits we become, and the harder it may be to step out of the box we have created for ourselves. How does this play out? Let's take a generic example. Let's just say that in college I used to eat a hot fudge sundae, watch TV and the get drunk every Friday night. On Saturday, I'd eat a greasy breakfast and then work out, then get ready to go out and party again. That was college. It's ten, twenty, years later. Am I doing the same thing, just a different geographical location? Or maybe it's not a hot fudge sundae, but I go out for a special dinner. Maybe I'm not getting drunk, but I'm "enjoying a large amount of wine" while watching a movie. And maybe the next day, well, it's still a greasy breakfast, but perhaps the "healthy" version of this. 

Those habits, aka tendencies, and in yoga, we call them "vasanas," keep trying to re-create the feeling of the first time. The time when that hot fudge sundae and first college party felt liberating and the breakfast the next day was a time of bonding with new found friends. Those impressions, aka "samskaras," leave us with wanting what made us happy in the moment. But the moment is gone. Immediately. But the memory lingers on. 

In a relationship, you know the one that you were still in way past it's expiration date? That was the vasana/samskara cycle in action. We kept hoping that the relationship would make us feel the way it did  when we knew we were in the arms of our "true love." But time marches on, and sometimes the beat changes, and we lose step of our growth, and out of fear, or habit, or both, we consciously or unconsciously cling to the past.

Why this preaching? Just a little context. It's the holidays. We will be with family, and what better place to watch these habits play out. What happens if this year, we change the game. We deliberately react differently to the same old patterns that repeat themselves every year. What if this is the year we actually decide to either keep quiet, or stop agreeing with the judgmental and petty comments that Great Aunt Whoever makes. We don't need to change Great Aunt Whoever, but we can change what we do with the situation. I'm not saying get on a high horse, I'm just saying, where do you want to invest your energy? Are we making those expected comments that we don't believe in, because we are afraid of being rejected? If so, what evidence do we have that we will actually be rejected? And if we are rejected, is it so bad? What about the little deaths we die every time we lie about who we are. Starting with our Selves. 

That's why getting to know our Selves is so valuable. And it's a process. An ever-changing, ever-evolving process. So we start where we are. And we watch and observe ourselves for awhile. Get to know the game. And when we are ready, we change our role in the game. We change our relationship to the game. And eventually, we change the game itself.

There are no rules except the ones we ourselves impose. So there's no messing up involved. It's just us, using the holidays to figure out a little more where our "home" is. 

And my dog? He's peacefully sleeping, safely camouflaged in the fluffy white blanket. 

Be your own blanket. Tuck yourself in, and rest in the safety of who you really are, and go "home for the holidays."