It’s really quite simple. So simple I am amazed I have not seen it before. Squeeze / Release (Suffering / End of Suffering). When I feel things out of sorts, when I feel tightness, when I feel the squeeze reaction in my stomach, that is something to notice. It is time to pay attention to it, watch it, but only for a moment. Then it is time to allow release. Give my mind something else to do. Allow things to simply be and not change them. I don’t cause the release. The release simply happens.
My mind loves to solve problems. It is drawn to disorder like a compass needle pointing north. My mind sets up the tension, wants the disorder to go away. Maybe it even offers ways to make it go away. My human mind has evolved to be very good at performing on demand. It likes to solve problems and is constantly searching for problems. Best to give it something useful to do.
Sometimes putting the mind to work actually does solve problems. Mostly it simply quivers at distraught attention, the pointer dog who sees the bird, strikes a tense pose, and can do nothing. It wants to act, and sometimes it unskillfully springs unbidden into action, solving problems without being released to solve them. My mind wants the problem to go away, and tension arises. I feel the tightness, I feel the squeeze.
For me it helps to give the mind something constructive to do, like paying attention to my breathing. My mind is like an anxious puppy, wanting to spring into action. Sometimes it is good to toss it a bone to gnaw on. I send it to my breath, the sensation in my fingers, the touch of the parking lot on my feet. I don’t make the tension or suffering go away. It simply ends.
I have lived with the tension of “getting my act together” long enough. Wanting to act creates tension, the squeeze. Most of the time it is about something I cannot have an effect on anyhow. The tension and squeezed feeling is a sure sign it is time to allow the release.
My mind wants action, and most of the time that is wasted effort. Allowing the mind to convince me that “I have to do something” causes me to suffer, to be tense, to be squeezed. I don’t want the suffering, but it is what happens.
As soon as I unskillfully yield to my urge to “make it go away,” I know I am being squeezed by my mind. It is simply a good time to skillfully give my mind something else to do. It’s actually that simple.