Self-Care Society
Self-Care Society
Episode 55: No Mud, No Lotus
Are you ready to redefine the way you perceive life's struggles and empower yourself with the control you've always desired? Strap yourself in for a soul-searching discussion about the wisdom embedded in the phrase 'no mud, no lotus'. Life's beauty is often birthed in the muddiest waters, the darkest struggles. In this episode, we navigate these muddy waters, embracing the necessary work we tend to avoid and urging you to do the same. We explore the transition from feelings of resentment and entitlement to an appreciation of challenges as the stepping stones to our unique magic.
Life is a movie, and you are the star - aren't you ready to take the reins? We journey into a mindful exploration of self-direction, the power to choose who stars with you, where the scenes unfold, and how to practice deep self-care. This is not a journey devoid of hardships, but it is through these hardships that we grow, emerging stronger and empowered. Join us as we weave through this beautiful tapestry of struggle, growth, and appreciation. Let's discover the lotus blooming within us, together.
Welcome to the Self Care Society podcast with your hosts Celia Williamson, ashley Kutcher, louis Guardiola and Carrie Shaw, a podcast devoted to those whose job it is to help others get or remain mentally, physically and emotionally healthy, but who also need to take care of themselves. How we're going to do this? By first showing you the filtered, pretty version of success and then the real struggles, real work and raw grit it took to get there, how they took care of themselves and also achieved their goals while doing it Together. We will work with you to improve and maintain your internal health and growth, while helping you achieve your external goals and your next professional achievement in life, and we're excited to show you how to follow your own individual and unique path and achieve the dreams you have, while taking good care of yourself. So let's get started. Hey, welcome to the Self Care Society.
Speaker 1:This week, I'm on Dr Celia Williamson and I want to talk about no mud, no lotus. Do you know what that means? It was a book and it was a philosophy developed by a Vietnamese monk no mud, no lotus. Let me explain. A lotus, if you've seen a lotus flower, they are beautiful, delicate, wonderful. They grow from the mud and such is life right. You have to go through the struggle to get to the beauty. The beauty is more, it's appreciated, it's sweeter. Your life is more appreciated once you've gone through the struggle. A seed in the dark, wet, damp mud has to crawl and struggle and fight its way through that muck to become the lotus. We want our lives just to always be right, with no left. We want to always see the sun, but you can't see the sun without creating a shadow. In order to appreciate what we have, we have to go through fight. We have to go through struggle. If we always had the warmth without the cold, we wouldn't appreciate the warmth as much. We have to go through our struggle and the more you go through struggle you gain wisdom.
Speaker 1:It's the people that avoid the struggle that go under it, around it and avoid it. Those people never learn their life lessons. They don't gather wisdom. They don't appreciate the beauty of what they have. They don't feel grateful. People don't feel grateful, people resentful. Think about it. If you're not grateful for your ability to wake up, for your ability to see the world, for your ability to walk, for your ability to have the family that's driving you crazy, to have the job that doesn't pay you well, but you have a job A job. If you don't appreciate it, if you're not grateful, you're resentful. Because when you're resent stuff, it's because people owe you. They owe you more, they owe you more than they owe you more. Your family just isn't good enough, just isn't right enough, your relationship just isn't good enough. But when you can feel grateful, when you can appreciate because you've been through the struggle, then the taste is even sweeter.
Speaker 1:People I say all the time people don't gain wisdom with age necessarily. They gain wisdom from going through the struggle, going through the mud to become the lotus. What's the evidence? You see lots of senior citizens that don't have wisdom. You see lots of young people that do have wisdom. It's about going through the struggle so that when you come out of the shadow and into the sunlight, you appreciate the sunlight. If there's no struggle you can't appreciate, then you feel resentful, you feel entitled. What else can you give me that I haven't earned through the struggle?
Speaker 1:The next thing I want to tell you is the magic that you're looking for right now in your life. It's in the work that you're avoiding. Think about that. The magic that you're looking for is in the work that you're avoiding. If you need to have that conversation with someone, sit down and have that conversation.
Speaker 1:If it's time, let's get after it, because in my life I don't say, oh my God, why me, why do I have to go through this? I don't say that anymore. You know what I say. Now. I say I'm in the struggle. You know what I was built for this shit. So let's get it. Let's get after it, because I know at the end of the struggle, what's going to open up to me is going to be sweet and it's going to even be more beautiful because I'm going to appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Just think of a rose. You know it's a seedling, it seems weak, it's under the dark, dank ground and it has to make a choice. Man, do I go through the struggle all the way up to the surface of the ground and then, my God, the most fear. Do I poke my head through? Because I don't know what's up there? And once that little seedling pokes its head through, my God, they've gone through the struggle. And you know what's waiting at the other end the world, the sunlight, the grass, all the other flowers that are saying where you've been, we've been waiting for you. So if there's a fear that's blocking you and just on the other side of that fear is the magic that you're looking for.
Speaker 1:Stop avoiding the work that you need to do to get there. It's a conversation, a difficult conversation, a series of conversations. If it's a change that you need to make in your life, no matter how small or how big, stop saying oh, why me? And start saying let's get after it. I've been through the struggle before. I know how to do this. I'm just avoiding it. Gain the life lesson that it gives you so that you can get on the other side of it, so that you can taste the sweetness that comes from the struggle when you get on the other side and your life is the way that you have commanded it to be.
Speaker 1:See, because our life is like a movie. We're the star and we decide if the movie is a hit or a flop. We decide who's gonna be our co-actors in this movie. Life just doesn't happen to us. We have to take the reins and make it happen. We have to put people in our life that benefit us. We have to spend time in places where people appreciate us, and so some of us have to get after it. No mud, no lotus Until next time. Just remember, it's not selfish, it's deep self-care. That concludes this week's episode. And remember, it's not selfish, it's self-care.
.jpeg)
