When Your Mind Plays Tricks

and enough is actually enough

Photo by Maciej Pienczewski on Unsplash

“Are you sure you’re not a type 7?” my friend asked me this morning. “You have a lot of FOMO going on.” Boy was she right, not necessarily about my being an enneagram type 7, although I lean hard on that wing for sure, but about my desire for the next shiny thing, the next cool experience, the next trip, when I’ve just returned from one and leave for another in a few weeks. I’m trying to slow down, way down, and ask myself why this is. Why do I have such a hard time staying still? It is uncomfortable and a bit unnerving.

I think I have a hazardous relationship with dopamine which shows itself in lots of different ways, not just in what I put into my body, but in how I choose to move my body in the world. When Anna Lembke’s book Dopamine Nation came out a few years ago, I thought long and hard about the idea that pleasure and not pleasure (not necessarily pain) need to be balanced in order for us humans to not be in distress. We hear sound bytes right and left about the need for balance, but what Lembke showed concretely in her book was that our brains require balance in order to function well. For me this might mean allowing myself to get a little bored, taking care of some tedious tasks in my office, not going on a trip which just presented itself and would be an amazing opportunity but would also be too much for my calendar, my bank account, my nervous system, my marriage.

When I was in Greece a couple of weeks ago, I was surrounded by a gaggle of beautiful type 7’s and I learned a great deal about what makes them (and sometimes me too) tick. The name of the 7 game is avoiding pain, avoiding pain at the risk of growth, avoiding pain from fear of feeling, not even understanding why on a very concrete level discomfort might be necessary in life. The “vice” of the 7 is gluttony and this is the challenge. There is always more, more, more available to us. Lembke’s book is subtitled “Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence,” and when more becomes becomes problematic, the 7 needs to sit back and rest in order to be healthy.

The idea of MORE always being good is what we are told by the shiny lives of social media and television and aspiring and indulging and deserving. We can feel out of it and honestly as if we are LESS THAN if we aren’t participating in all this MORE culture.

I'm taking these next weeks to allow for the mundane, the everyday, a space where there is spaciousness, in order to gain some balance. I made chicken kale soup last night. I lay in bed for an extra hour reading a book. I got on the floor with my dog Freya and buried my face in her freshly washed fur. I paid some bills. I spent some extra time consoling a friend going through a rough patch. I pulled a tarot card and took some time to consider what it means. I am not missing out. Enough is enough.

Natha Perkins and I will lead a workshop this Sunday on discovering your dominant element (fire, earth, air or water), using the overarching structures within astrology and tarot. It will be recorded. You can sign up below. I'll let you in on a secret. My dominant element is fire.

Discover Your Dominant Element

xoHanna