I was working with a woman this week who was describing how tired she feels trying to “live her best life.” How she is trying so hard to do everything “right.” Not only is it not working, it’s backfiring. She’s not enjoying herself, and she’s not getting the results either promised to her, or that she believes she should be getting with all this effort.

I told her she was not alone. And I told her that there is a good chance that what’s driving her, does not even come from her own desires. Or from what her body or her life truly needs. Or even from an authentic source of what it actually means and takes to live your best life.

Not only is there a multi-billion dollar health and wellness industry intentionally cultivating insecurity in us while driving us to look outside ourselves in order to sell us lots of stuff, there is social media with its cruel drive to pit us against one another in a competition around living our best lives. And then of course, there is the entertainment industry with its warped, computer-generated, plastic-surgery-altered and starved-body version of beauty and health.

And while intellectually a good many of us would say that we know that all of this is not real or something to reference, we do so anyway because somewhere deep down inside of us, we have come to believe it. Or we believe others believe it and that we will be judged by those standards; leaving even the hesitant among us to go along with what we know is bogus. And harmful.

All of this has reminded me of something I heard a teacher say when I first started training in yoga. That being, Yoga is not about self-improvement. I had no idea what they were talking about. What do you mean it’s not about improving? Are you suggesting I don’t try and be a better person? Go for, in today’s parlance, my best life?

Yes. That is exactly what Yoga and any other Light-filled perspective, tradition or religious approach is saying. It has not, and never has been, about self-improvement with a little “s.” Instead it is about the Self with a big “S.” The one that needs no improvement. The one that has never been diminished by our choices or the ways of the world. The One that is an authentic expression of Source.

But what does that mean in terms of self-improvement? It means that whatever we choose to do, we do so in the service of our soul. In the service of our highest and best good. In the service of taking care of our bodies and minds that they may support us in being here in a life-affirming way. In the service of behaving in the world in a way that aligns with our highest calling, along with a deep and abiding sense of connection to All That Is.

Want to take this into practice? Get away from the commercials. Get away from social media that leaves you feeling less then. Get away from entertainment offering up plasticized themes and characters. But mostly, learn to source Something Greater than what a person is trying to sell you, mandate or demand of you in order to be seen as having value and a right to belong.

When I think about the times we’re living through, I see vast, vast possibilities before us, standing side by side with the devastation of a world crumbling to pieces from the inside out.

I know it’s only natural to drop back into fear, anger, despair and outrage. I know it’s only natural to lash out in blame. I know it’s only natural to separate ourselves from one another. But what I also know on a deep and personal level is a place of possibility that I have visited many times in my life. That being, when you can allow for the breaking down, for the coming apart, for the falling to pieces, for the going up in flames, something new will be born.

Every. Single. Time.

Personally speaking, I am up for these times. I am up for more of us getting pushed to the brink of what is no longer working. I do not wish upon anyone the suffering that accompanies these kinds of tectonic squeezes and shifts, but I do wish for a struggle born of a big enough and noble enough cause that forces us to wrestle with creating an honest look at our lives. Individually and collectively.

To that end, I pass on a phrase a friend shared with me recently that I believe has the potential to act as a set of instructions for how to go about living through the breaking apart of the world:

Get Your House In Order

Get your house in order. If you let it, the words carry the resonance of a Truth that is deeply and uniquely powerful and personally impactful for each and every one of us. A code, if you will, that is personalized to who we are and what it is that needs to be done next. And then what needs to be done after that. And then, after that. And after that.

So, without trying to figure anything out with your mind, first, just say that phrase to yourself. What does it move in you? Repeat it to yourself in the days, weeks and months to come. Let its vibration work on you, guide you, and ultimately, inspire you to take action. You might also flip it around and make it a question. One posed on behalf of your own life and that of the world.

What do I need to do next to get my own house in order?

If you can be with this, I promise you this: Your life will be the better for it, and so will everyone’s around you. For the world can only find order when each and every one of us has figured out how to get our own house in order.

This week I find myself in an internal state of reactivity, making it impossible for me to write with clarity and from a place of balance. In the spirit of doing no harm, I will do nothing.

Might I suggest the same for any of us in similar circumstances.

I am in the midst of one of those fake conversations with another person inside my own mind. If I’m being honest, it was less a conversation and more of a me telling them off. Even though I am “winning” the argument, it’s not going well. Why? Because it is happening in the middle of my morning practice. The very place I go to for understanding, peace, solace and did I say, Peace?

I am at war inside myself.

All my usual stuff to re-route my mind isn’t working. Frustrated, I decide to be still for a moment. Spent on trying to resolve it myself, I turn to Source and ask a question. “Can you help me figure this out?” The response, You won’t understand. This doesn’t sit well with me, so I ask “Why not?” Because you would have to see the big picture, and you can’t. Again, I don’t like the answer so I say, “I can do that. I can see the big picture.” The response, Infinity Big Picture. 

“Oh.” That I cannot do.

Here’s my takeaway. What if we knew, I mean really knew, that even though we can’t see the whole thing, that everyone was exactly where they were supposed to be (including us), doing what they are supposed to be doing, and that it was all being done, for us? Not to us.

Personally, I do believe this is true (as hard as it can be to live with that knowing all the time). But for argument’s sake, let’s say it’s not true. That this is just a bunch of New Age hooey. Would it matter? What would be the harm in agreeing to the fact that we don’t have the biggest perspective? That there is so much more than one human mind can know. That there is always way more to the story than our limited set of “facts.”

Given where we are at collectively, what would be the harm in throwing caution to the wind and admitting that we don’t know it all? That the usual stuff isn’t working and that we need a much, much bigger perspective if we are ever to have the peace of mind we all long for. Not to mention the peace we need with each other if we have any hope of being here together and not being at war with each other. Both in our minds, and in the “real” world.

(If there is even any such thing anymore given what we have constructed and agreed to.)

It’s so easy for me to go to outrage the moment I perceive even a hint of injustice or harm being brought to bear in the world. For a very long time, it felt like it was the only sane response to a world gone mad with polluting, degrading our food and water supplies, not protecting children from the vagaries and sink holes of the screen technologies, a disease care instead of a health care system, power running amok everywhere with its disregard for human life, and more.

I could go on, but I believe you get the point.

But as the years have gone by, I see things differently. I see that I am wasting my precious life force to be continually shaking an angry fist at the powers that be; believing that the intensity of my commitment in this regard will change what is happening. It doesn’t. Or believing that I have to be the one to hold the line against all the ‘bad’ guys. I don’t. Or believing that if I stopped feeling so much intensity, it would mean I was giving up. It doesn’t. 

I recently heard someone say that outrage is the voice of the victim. That sealed it. That was all it took to fully push me all the way into another camp.

That camp being a kind of “Build it and they will come.”

Now I am not suggesting that we turn a blind eye to the injustices of the world. Nor am I suggesting we leave it in someone else’s hands to deal with. And I am definitely not suggesting we check out into some fantasy land where everything will somehow magically correct itself all by itself.

So if it’s not any of this, what is it?

Here’s where it gets tricky. We need to act. But how? And then, here’s where it gets really tricky. Can we recognize that everything is happening for a reason, without collapsing into giving up and doing nothing? This is a lot to sort out, and because of its seeming enormity, it can feel impossible, or at least too daunting to sort out with any chance of having a meaningful impact.

But here’s what I know. There is something that each of us can do simply through how we choose to live. This doesn’t have to be big, or even anything anyone else notices. It’s got nothing to do with guilt or beating ourselves up for being people of the first world. It’s not a competition to see who recycles more or gives their kids organic snacks. And for goodness sake, it’s got nothing whatsoever to do with what you can post about and get rewarded for the virtue you show as you wait for all the ‘likes’ to pile up.

This is about choosing, when and where you can, for a world that makes sense to you. Dare I say, for a world of your dreams. And it’s as close to you as your next thought, word or action. It’s as close to you as how you behave when someone, in person or online, behaves differently than you want them to. It’s as close as not taking more than your share at dinner or at the grocery store. It’s as close as not flipping someone off when you’re driving.

And it is as close as catching yourself playing the victim instead of doing what you can do. Instead of doing what is yours to do to contribute in a real and meaningful way to a world literally dying for more of us to do so.