Stillpoints of Contentment
I was taught in school that the opposite of discontent is contentment. But energetically they’re not “opposites.”
If I’m discontented with my life, there’s an energy of resistance. I don’t accept what is, and I push away any feelings of contentment that are actually here right now.
Discontentment keeps us in a state of Striving. We assert inside: “No, this is not good enough. This is not good enough. This situation is not good enough. These resources are not good enough. I must go back out and hunt for more, gather for more. It’s not good enough. I cannot allow myself to feel contented because then I’ll lose my striving!!”
Viewed from a survival standpoint, to lose our striving? Disaster.
The energy of “striving” is a drive for my survival—remembering that survival isn’t just live or die, but also my place in the tribe, my status, my territory ( meaning the things I own and control). For these don’t I need to keep striving?!?
As an emotional freedom coach, when I see someone who is profoundly discontented, I might look at their life and be able to point to various aspects: “Well, what about that? That doesn’t seem to suck. And what about this other thing?”
Yet, If I point to things in their life (or my own - cough) that have resistance around allowing contentment, what I’ll find out is that it’s being protected by a force field of struggle and striving. It often sounds like, “But it’s NOT good enough! It SHOULD be better!”
“It should be better” has a tension to it. It has a sense of, “It must be better OR ELSE!”
And the truth is you can be coached into using that energy or struggle and striving to do extraordinary things. “But if I don’t do this, humanity is going to end! If I don’t do this, my family is going to starve! If I don’t do this, the neighbors will point and judge or my family will point and judge! I CAN’T LET MYSELF STOP.”
It’s a powerful survival energy, and we can do things that look great, even heroic, when we are living from that place of striving-no-matter-what.
No matter how things might look to somebody else, inside there’s a stress and a strain of striving. I’m not judging that, but I am discerning the difference between striving—and the rigid discontentment that drives it—and thriving, with its moments of contentment that allow Goodness to infuse our mind, our heart, and every cell of our body.
In striving, there’s a huff and a puff. Even if we do notice desired things, they are met like a character does collecting treasure at a frantic run inside of a video game. Gold coin, gold coin, gold coin, crown! Points on the scoreboard! Moving up the leader board!
Momentary achievements… which are different from contentment.
You may or may not know this, but in our body there’s a craniosacral rhythm. It’s slower and it’s deeper than our breath. It’s subtle… and powerful like a deep ocean current far below the surface waves. We can learn and develop a skill of feeling for it in others and in ourselves.
There is a moment in the craniosacral rhythm called a stillpoint where the rhythm pauses. In that pause, there’s a feeling of rightness and recalibration.
The similar stillpoint is available in the breath, too. It can’t really be forced, but it can be allowed. At the top of an inhale there’s a place where we’re not exhaling yet, but we’re not inhaling anymore.
Sometimes it’s just so sweet at the top of that breath. There’s a stillness.
And after the exhale, there’s a stillpoint. We don’t need to inhale yet. Profound peace and sweetness can be found there, when we bring a dose of curiosity and presence.
With years of tending and paying attention to these moments, I recognize a quality I feel as “potential for contentment” at a stillpoint.
All Is Well. For me that is a momentary experience I can have at a stillpoint. An inner soft smile.
It’s a sensation that exists for that tiny stillpoint of Truth.
Yeah, it’s definitely not in denial that in the next moment I’m going to start actively breathing again. Breathing is essential, as are needs for food and water and collecting resources to serve my family.
But if I allow a moment of contentment, even just a blink or two, I can move forward from a place of “replenished inner smile.”
No, not constantly content or smiling. Sufficiently. Good and sufficient contentment.
Contentment in this frame of reference is not the “opposite” of discontentment. Just like dancing is not the opposite of splitting wood or carrying water.
Contentment is a different expression of who we are and how we’re being. Humans… Being.
Because contentment is momentary, our energy won’t radiate contentment all the time.
Our life force can be focused on hard work that matters. Our energy can be kinetic, expressive, angry, sad, ecstatic. Our emotions have a wide range, right?
But there remain stillpoints which hold a deep current: “Life is good. I have what is sufficient for thriving right now in this moment. I don’t have to strive right this moment. In this half second I don’t even have to be breathing in!”
I’d be remiss if I didn’t recognize that there’s a lot of energy in the world to get people to be striving. Keep them in striving—striving to keep their job, striving to get a promotion, striving to make more money, all the striving, striving to look a certain way, striving to have certain things. Sometimes we don’t realize we need an antidote until we feel the toxic effects of the poison of having our striving manipulated. And it absolutely is manipulated.
The marketers know precisely what triggers your primitive brain into striving for survival… even if you’re actually thriving! It will feel so weird to shift out of striving to living a life punctuated by moments of stillness, brief moments of profound contentment.
Moments. Moments as short in time as that gap between where the exhale ends and the inhale begins.
If we choose to consciously drop into the stillness in that space, we start noticing a quality of connectedness from breath to breath, from contentment to contentment.
Connecting us. Empowers us.
Useful Concepts for Thriving in This Story
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Acceptance
Being with what is releases resistance and frees energy for healing and creative adapting. -
Allowing
A natural Powerful Pause where energy consolidates and clarity can emerge. -
Primitive Brain
Our ancient survival system that marketers and stressors can trigger into urgent striving. -
Unrushed
Choosing a natural rhythm that loosens internal urgency and external pressure. -
Thriving
Wholehearted engagement with life through emotional freedom, connection, and inspired action.