Un-seriousness is not a bad thing. To not be so serious about everything. Not in the immature sense where everything’s a joke. But in a not taking things personally or fixating on fleeting things kind of way. (When you can help it because sometimes you can’t and that’s okay too.)
Seriousness creates heaviness. Seriousness comes with an agenda, an endgame, a strategy. It’s keeping logs of conversations, rapports and agendas. Taking a stance and holding up barricades of defense and apprehension.
Unplug the serious socket for a second. Bring in some lightness and openness. Shake it off, literally. Especially if you’re being invited into a serious conversation or a very serious decision. Take a step back and shake it off. Feel your feet on the ground and the length of your exhale. Disengage from the story or the ongoing conversation. Unplug. Drop the whole thing.
Check in with your immediate experience. Ask yourself, what’s going on here? Underneath all the seriousness. Is there something that I’m running away from? Lurking beneath the surface driving this behavior? What’s luring me into the seriousness of it all? What are the bare basic facts of this moment without any overlay?
Once this self-honesty comes in then lightness and newness can come in too. Freshness. Seriousness often comes with a stench of stale. Lightness breeds freshness, brightness. And it’s not the newness or freshness that the mind projects but newness in spontaneity. Things you didn’t plan on doing or saying just happen. Not in an impulsive trying to get away from yourself kind of way. But an unplanned, unserious, flow and availability.
And what can stifle this flow are the personal self explanations of why I think I did this or said that. And the mind coming in this way to feel like it’s in control somehow of what’s happening. That it decided, you decided to do this because… blah blah blah. And it’s not true so it throws off this natural flow. It’s like throwing a wrench in there, the wrench of fear of not being in control.
It’s good to recognize this wrench and acknowledge this movement of trying to explain things you can’t explain. It’s much cleaner and smoother just admitting I don’t have a clue what’s going on and I don’t need to. And sort of knowing that it’s okay not to understand or try to explain.
Because there’s an intelligence which doesn’t need to be understood in the moment. And it’s in that letting go of understanding and explaining that you kind of sidestep a lot of unnecessary suffering, seriousness, heaviness and load. Instead you’re operating from a more solitary perspective of self-honesty, lightness, a willingness to feel, a non-rush, clean air, open space, an ability to move, not just outwardly but inwardly. You can move, you’re not stunted.
So just become aware of the stench of seriousness and shake it off. Walk away. Dis-engage. Follow the exhale. Look at a bird. Look up at the sky. Move, make weird sounds, smell some lavender. Resource.