Is it ever enough?

Photo: Tara Winstead

There’s this cool concept, you may have heard of, called the Hedonic Treadmill. You run, you chase, you experience that sweet rush of pleasure from getting what you want, and then...

You keep running. You keep acquiring. All the while staying exactly where you started.

Science shows we each have a baseline level of happiness that we return to, no matter what 'good' or 'bad' things happen. I've noticed this in myself recently. I get a thing (a client, a room, an opportunity), I'm washed by a flood of excitement, and then the chemicals swim away. In that vacated space, I remain. 

I, with my moods and my worries, my yes-but's and my what-if's, remain. When the high fades, I fall back, so easily, into a state of general dissatisfaction, of comparison, of perceived scarcity.

So then, what's the antidote to never-enoughness?

One answer might be gratitude. But gratitude subscribes, still, to the philosophy of 'having'. I should be happy because look at what I have... I propose another way: A way that doesn't require having, or warding off losing,​ to feel content. Are you familiar with it already?

It's called BEING!

Being is always enough. Being is rich, abundant, and ever-present. It is free of striving and acquiring. It is our birthright. It's exactly where you start, where you go, and where you end. But you're not on a treadmill. You're in awareness.

These days, my favourite way to get in touch with my beingness is to snap shut my laptop, walk (skip) to my yoga mat, melt down horizontally, close my eyes, and feel the earth coming up and my limbs going down, basking quietly in that union of pressure and coolness. 

In the felt experience of my flop, in the darkness of closed curtains, in the crescendo of cicadas outside my window, and in the silent relief of the neighbour's lawn mower flicking off—there is no past to mourn, no future to yearn for. Everything, yes, everything, is enough.

Chasing, getting, and having; these are limited states that only take you so far. Being is unlimited, and, as I see it, takes you all the way home.