Not long ago, as I drove among the yellow-green trees on my way home from a hike, a dear friend who is a teacher called my cell phone, wanting to sort through his feelings and thoughts about a distressing event. Teaching has been extra challenging this past year or two, especially after the long stretch of not gathering in person, and especially for the many dedicated teachers who find that building relationships with their students is central to their work.

I listened for a minute, then found a place to pull the car over. There was a mostly empty parking lot in front of a "Self Storage" business. This reminded me of the times during the pandemic when it has crossed my mind that "self-storage," if it were possible for humans, might not be the worst way to make it through 2020 and 2021. (Another kind of sheltering in place?)

I turned off the car, opened the window, and listened some more. My friend was caught in a thicket of painful feelings and intense worries and wanted some help with disentangling himself. I remembered parts of what I had recently read in one of Jon Kabat-Zinn's very wise books.

When he asked me what the book title was, I said, "Okay, I don't know how this title will sound, but I like to hear it with all the humor and compassion that I find in the book. It's called 'Full Catastrophe Living.'" I held my breath. My friend burst out laughing. "Sounds perfect!" he said.

As promised, I went directly home and emailed him a few key paragraphs. Below is what I sent.

From Jon Kabat-Zinn:

". . . Part of this learning process is coming to see, as we have now emphasized many times, that you are not your thoughts and feelings and that you do not have to believe them, react to them or be driven or tyrannized by them. You can watch them and perceive them as discreet 'events in the field of your consciousness.' They come, and they go.

And when they go, they are--for that moment at least--gone. If not fed, they dissolve, and for that moment, you are free. As you practice, ...you are likely to come to see your thoughts and feelings as discreet, short-lived events, much like individual waves on the ocean. These waves arise in awareness for a moment and then recede.

When you observe the unfolding of your own thinking moment by moment, you may come to notice that thoughts carry different levels of emotional charge. Some are highly negative and pessimistic, loaded with anxiety, insecurity, fear, gloom, doom, and condemnation. Others are positive and optimistic, joyful and open, accepting and caring. Still others are neutral, neither positive nor negative in emotional content, just matter of fact thoughts.

Our thinking proceeds in rather chaotic patterns of reactivity and association. Elaborating on its own content, building imaginary worlds, and filling the silence with busyness. Thoughts with a high emotional charge have a way of recurring again and again. When they come up, they grab hold of your attention like a powerful magnet, carrying your mind away from your breathing or from awareness of your body.

When you look at thoughts as just thoughts, purposefully not reacting to their content and to their emotional charge, you become at least a little freer from their attraction or repulsion. You are less likely to get sucked into them quite as intensely or as often. The more powerful the emotional charge, the more the content of the thought is likely to capture your attention and draw you away from just being in the moment.

Your work is simply seeing and letting go, seeing and letting go, sometimes ruthlessly and relentlessly if need be, always intentionally and courageously. Just seeing and letting go, seeing and letting be."

from "Full Catastrophe Living" by Jon Kabat-Zinn, page 443