Comfort
This installment may initially confuse you: you may be saying, “How is comfort a challenge to spiritual growth? Aren’t we supposed to rest?” Therein lies the problem: confusing comfort and rest. Comfort provides us the conditions to relax. Rest rejuvenates our body, mind and spirit to provide energy for the journey. For many of us, seeking comfort has become a goal in our life. Not because our passion and purpose as a created being is to be comfortable, but because our human society has created a world where comfort is not a given. Collectively we have created a world where basic creature comforts are not available to everyone. We must strive for them, fight for them, work hard for them. This dynamic creates the risk of becoming addicted to comfort – something made artificially elusive so that we substitute seeking comfort for living our passion and purpose, spending all our energy chasing comfort instead of bringing our greatest gifts into the world. We are counselled by our elders “do something that will make a good living, not something that you love.” We put off our dreams to work for someone else’s dream. Comfort has been commodified in our world, which creates the risk of addiction because we can always be “more comfortable,” a bigger house, a fancier car, etc. If we feel like comfort is in short supply, we focus all our human efforts on getting more and more of it and mistakenly see that as a successful life.
Rest is essential to maintain maximum functioning of our physical, emotional and intellectual energy bodies. Rest is when we clear out the toxins created through experiences and growth and our energy bodies reset to a higher potential for functioning. No one and nothing can grow without rest. And the quality of the rest is dependent on the conditions around us – that is, dependent on comfort. If we try to sleep in 40 degree weather without something to keep us warm, our rest will be less successful than if we have what we need to stay warm. And we are learning why sleep is essential for the efficient functioning of our brain. During sleep the toxins in our brain are removed. (Click here for Jeff Iliff’s Ted Talk, One More Reason to Get a Good Night’s Sleep).
Deeper Inquiry
We all need these three steps. The first step is to identify what our body needs for optimal functioning. When we enter the seen world, we are each given a beautiful, efficient and complex system we call a body or a vessel. While we start this life dependent on our caregivers, we each ultimately are responsible for the care of our body. Our brain collects information from our experiences (we call this memory) that tells us what promotes and what detracts from our functioning. Part of our collective memory (we call this science) has gathered basic data on what our body needs to function. Sleep, temperature control (both clothing and shelter), water and food are all essential needs for every human to maintain physical health. Your unique vessel has specific requirements that may deviate from the specific needs of other vessels. As social creatures, we also need safety, love and belongingness. As spiritual creatures, we also need to make meaning of our lives and to believe that our lives have purpose and direction.
The second step is to create the conditions to meet these basic needs. Every human should have the conditions to promote full functioning. When we are dependent and are provided a healthy dose of the basic needs, we develop healthy patterns for seeking and meeting these needs as adults. On the other hand, if there is a deficiency in any or all of these basic needs as a dependent child, we can develop unhealthy beliefs and patterns around how we get these needs met as an adult. For more information, click on this link to check out the information and materials about the Adverse Childhood Experiences (“ACE”) studies.
The third step is to individually balance growth and rest. We grow into our innate passion and purpose by coupling it with adequate rest to refuel and recharge for additional growth. We grow into manifesting Love in the world in each of our unique expressions.
One of my working hypotheses is that our current culture attempts to distract us from spiritual growth by attempting to focus us on “wants” rather than “needs.” One example should suffice: preparing and eating a home-cooked meal satisfies a need of food. Advertising on television that does everything it can (by visual and auditory stimuli) to entice us to eat at their establishment creates a “want” over and above our need for food. Our current culture creates a want for comfort and then sells it to us.
Creating breakthroughs
In closing, here are some statements that I know to be true for me. Test them out in your heart to see if they ring true to you:
- Comfort are the conditions necessary for satisfying a need for rest.
- Rest is an essential human need.
- Our current culture does a poor job of making sure everyone has their needs met and does an excellent job of selling comfort.
- Pursuing comfort for comfort’s sake is a distraction from spiritual growth.
This is part 7 of a 12-part series. I would love to hear from you at challenges@thomascapshew.com The next installment will be about the ego. May your path be filled with health, joy, clarity and Love! Tom