Remember the Well
I recently participated in a Temazcal (sweat lodge) ceremony in Los Barriles, held by a Mexican medicine woman. She described this style of lodge as a feminine holding, and that was surely my experience. It was gentle, womb-like. We made beautiful prayers and sang medicine songs, weaving them into the herbal steam that rose from the hot stones for our cleanse.
These words were spoken in the lodge, and they've echoed in me:
Happiness is your responsibility.
I believe it — AND — sometimes it’s easier said than done. Rarely can someone hear “happiness is your responsibility,” flip an inner switch, and poof — they’re happy. It just doesn’t always work that way.
So I've been contemplating: What does it take to be happy, when the seduction of fear is so strong, and we care so much, and “misery loves company”? How can we take responsibility for our inner state, right now?
One of the first steps is trusting that it’s ok to feel happy, even when the world looks like it’s falling apart. It's not that you deny your heartache or bypass what's happening, just that you give yourself permission: I’m also allowed to feel good.
If you’re feeling happy right now, you might feel criticized or guilty of bypassing something important. You might even believe that worry — or anxiety, or fear — is needed... as though feeling afraid somehow helps others.
It’s so tender, isn’t it — the part that believes worry is love. As though if you let yourself relax, you’re abandoning what matters. But worry isn’t the same as care, and it doesn’t actually help you serve life more skillfully.
And… it’s not always wise to chase happiness as the goal, because “happy” can become another standard to meet — another way to judge yourself when you’re not feeling it. But "happy" is just a mood. Like all moods, it's transient... and so we go deeper.
Deeper than happiness, deeper than contentment, deeper even than peace... deep in the very center of your being, beyond all thoughts and feelings, there is a well that is always available to you. It is infinite, and infinitely available. It is a stillness you can access, and it asks nothing of you but your presence.
This stillness within can hold grief. It can hold anger. It can hold tenderness, confusion, heartbreak, joy, happiness — and it remains. It doesn’t disappear just because you’re human.
Inside this stillness lives the truth that there’s nothing you need to do, no way you need to be, no "right" emotion to feel, nothing to fix inside or outside yourself. You can simply be.
In the well of stillness, you can become aware of your breath and know that as you inhale, you're inhaling life force, and when you exhale, you're sharing life force with the world. The breath moves through you in such a way that you can experience it as sensation and energy. This energy can be known as Light; and its essence, the qualities of joy, compassion and love. You can simply breathe, and be, and receive from the well.
So what does “responsibility” look like in real life?
It might look like taking ten minutes — right now, today — to stop outsourcing your inner state to the next headline, the next conversation, the next social media scroll, the next surge of collective intensity… and instead, return to the well.
By making this choice to pause, you claim your power. The energy you spent reaching outward is gathered back into yourself. Maybe it literally happens... right... now.
Right now, if you choose, you can place one hand on your heart.
If you're game to move toward the well, go ahead and slow your reading,
and take a long, deep breath.
Inhale slowly, and feel the sensation of the breath moving in you.
Read on when your inhale is all the way full.
And exhale slowly...
feeling the exhale release
fully.
All the way out.
And another slow inhale. Take your time.
There is no rush.
This is a moment of self-care.
And let it go...
all the breath goes out...
slowly, slowly.
And let the breath move however it wants.
If grief is here, let it be here. If peace is here, let it be here. You’re not trying to manufacture happiness; you’re practicing relationship with what’s deeper than mood. The depth can hold whatever arises in you.
The stillness is here for you. You might find it when you
inhale slowly
and
exhale deeply.
Your state of being touches the people in your life. It's not your job to carry anyone else, or to perform "high vibes" for the world... but true presence is contagious. When you root into the deepest place in you, the field around you settles... and it becomes easier for others to remember themselves too.
The world may continue to look like a scary place. At the same time, you can shift your energy to something steady, something sourced, something that doesn’t depend on circumstances.
This well lives in you. Drink deep, Friend. Beyond thoughts, beyond emotions, this is who you truly are and what you're capable of.
I'm here if you want direct support in making the shift from outsourcing your inner state, to remembering the well.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I am sending infinite blessings of light into your beautiful heart.
Love,
Aowyn
