May 14th, 2022

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I have just come home from holiday in India: a month of festivals, family, weddings, travelling and more. 

I love visiting this beautiful, vast, diverse country where you see people from all walks of life – both social status and economic levels. 

There is a lot of competition in India, whether it’s studies or work, because everyone wants to be the best so they can secure a comfortable future for themselves and their family. There is no welfare security net, so your future is entirely dependent on you. 

But the common mindset I see among people in India is this attitude of living in the now. Every moment is cherished. They share an attitude of not knowing what will happen tomorrow, so live in the moment today, embracing both happiness and sadness at the same time. 

Holding different emotions.
Yes, Indians have the ability to hold onto different emotions at the same time, and this is what I want to pass on to you. You are capable of holding happiness and sadness, love and anger and pressure and calm – all at the same time. 

This balance of emotions is what makes you whole, and accepting this duality allows you to live in this present moment. It allows you to accept each moment as it comes and goes. Because then you know that this moment will also pass. Enjoy the moment while you have it. 

“Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin,” Mother Teresa once said. But how do you actually do it?

What not to do
Well let me tell you first what not to do and what most of us end up doing anyway. When something happens to you and you feel sadness, you believe, sometimes subconsciously, that you must stay in that sadness. You may even feel guilty if you feel joy or laugh out loud when you are ‘supposed’ to be feeling sad. 

Another scenario could be that you are angry and arguing with someone, but in the middle of the argument you feel love for this person or say something funny that makes you laugh. But you stop yourself because you want to be angry at that person.

Do you recognise these situations? Because you are meant to hold different emotions at the same time, and that doesn’t mean that your sadness or anger becomes less because you laugh out loud or feel joy at the same time. 

It just means that you are being your whole you, your balanced you. You are allowing you to hold yourself and the situation and all that it calls for. You are being truly who you are with all the different sides of you. 

Loving life: step-by-step
Identify your feelings. In the moment you are feeling angry, sad, frustrated or anything else, just take a moment and identify your feelings. Ask yourself: what are you actually feeling? What are you angry at? Go through all your emotions. When we break things down, they often become smaller than we make them or disappear completely because we realise that they don’t matter as much as we thought.

Allow yourself to have this emotion. Breathe through it, accept it. By doing so, you are allowing yourself to be who you are: who you truly are.

Take a deep breath and notice what else you are feeling in the moment. Are you also feeling good, grateful, joyous, loving? By practising this, you will slowly become able to hold all of your emotions together at the same time. And instead of feeling disconnected, you will begin to feel more and more connected to the whole you and become more aware of the present moment.

Ask yourself what is truly important for you in this moment. After all, tomorrow is not known; all you have is this moment. So enjoy it with all that you are and all that you hold and, before you know it, you will be loving every moment no matter what life brings you.