Why Forcing Things Breaks the System
Photo: Sajad Nori on unsplash
Systems tend to move when you drop resistance to them.
Recently I was involved in something that had become my life on many levels. I put everything I had into creating something new. Something that would drastically change my current route in life.
Along the way something didn’t feel right, and I knew what was happening. I was getting too close and too invested, which almost always means I’m projecting something deeper. Something was fueling the obsession, and even though I could see it, it was still running the show.
Let me clarify something. At this point in my life, after doing this work for so long, or what people call inner work, I am still just a human being doing human things. I am not Buddha. I am not a saint. I am not a guru. What I do have is awareness of what is actually happening and a systems based way of looking at things. Inputs, outputs, and data are how I see reality, combined with a non-linear or more esoteric layer in there somewhere.
In simple terms, I watch how my system moves. I notice when something is off and I adjust based on real information, while I sit at a bit of distance from it all. That said, the system still self corrects in its own way, and when it does, it is rarely comfortable.
Life Is A System
Here’s the point: When life, which is a system, is moving naturally, there are no problems. We might label things as problems like death or change, but life itself does not see them that way. Things move and things happen. The flow never stops and life is always in motion.
The moment we grab onto that flow and try to control it, resistance pushes back. Sometimes it shows up in strange ways like synchronicities or unexpected events. Other times it shows up in very ordinary ways like stress or health issues.
When we get in the way because something unresolved inside of us is trying to project itself onto life, problems are guaranteed.
Resistance narrows outcomes. The moment we say something has to go a certain way, we place the system inside guardrails that it wasn’t meant for. That pressure alone limits what is possible.
