Human “Doing” or Human “Being”

“There must be more to life than increasing its speed.” – Gandhi

Up until 7 years ago, I lived my life in a state of “what’s next?” No matter what I was “doing,” I was always thinking about what I should do next, or in the future. My life was made up of lists and schedules. If I wasn’t “doing” something, I felt guilty and would search for something to do. Reading books was my only escape from this “mind fuck;” My mind had to be “doing” something and reading was a “doing,” which my kids and partners can attest to. And yet, I would also go into states where I thought of nothing but the past and how I could have done things differently. As was the case for me, you can have both nervous systems on full drive at the same time. So, while I was always “doing,” it felt like a heavy weighted exhaustion existed over me.

When I started this journey I aimed to figure out why I felt the strong need to be “doing” all the time – I explored many important layers. These layers proved to be deep and complex, and thus, this quest took many years. On the first layer, I discovered that my “doing” equated to how much love I received. If I was not “doing,” then I was supposedly not worth anything, and why even exist? I believed that love is conditional, and the condition was “doing” for others. The second layer related to my worthiness as a human. Growing up, I was never shown that “being” was ok; I had to be “doing”. Lastly, on a deeper layer, I found that I did not know how to self-regulate my nervous system. However, I gave myself action steps to address each of these layers, and worked on these steps.

It is the cosmic joke since we are Human Beings not, Human Doings!

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