How Resistance Adds To Suffering

You may have come across the phrase, “what you resist persists.”

Whether or not we use those exact words, the principle points to something very real. The more we tighten against our present experience, the more suffering we often add to it. What begins as discomfort can quickly become discomfort plus bracing, discomfort plus fear, discomfort plus mental struggle.

In Energy-Flow Coaching, a great deal of the work involves helping people move away from resistance and towards allowing. That sounds simple in theory, but in lived experience it is often anything but simple. Allowing does not mean liking what is happening. It does not mean passivity, and it does not mean giving up. It means softening enough to let the experience be here without fighting it.

And paradoxically, that shift is often what begins to change things.

Yesterday, I had a WhatsApp message from a client saying:

“I’m still not getting the difference between allowing and resistance.”

Here was my response.

I recognise how confusing this can be, because the difference is subtle at first, and it is something people usually understand more through practice than through explanation alone.

Resistance is essentially what happens when some part of us reacts against our present experience. We feel discomfort, tension, fear, unease or activation, and almost automatically there is a kind of bracing against it. Sometimes that bracing is obvious, but often it is very subtle. It may show up as tightening in the body, a holding of the breath, a sense of contraction, or an urgent pull to make the feeling go away.

Very often, the mind then gets involved and adds a layer of commentary on top. Thoughts such as, “I don’t want this,” “this is too much,” “why am I like this?” or “when will this stop?” tend to amplify what is already happening in the body. So the original discomfort becomes mixed with resistance to the discomfort, and that is often what makes the experience feel so much worse.

Allowing is the beginning of a different relationship with what is happening.

It does not mean that we like what is happening. It does not mean passivity, and it does not mean resignation. It means that instead of tightening against the experience, we begin to soften enough to let the experience be there. In other words, we stop fighting the fact that, right now, this is what is here.

And that is very different from giving up.

In fact, one of the important paradoxes here is that allowing often creates the conditions for change. When we stop adding a second layer of struggle, the system can begin to settle. So we can absolutely hold an intention for something to shift, while also allowing ourselves to be where we are.

That is why, in EFC, we come back into the body. Feeling the feet on the floor, letting the breath slow and deepen into the belly, and consciously softening are all ways of reversing the habitual move into resistance. We are moving away from mental struggle and back into direct contact with experience.

It is also important to say that this is not a binary. It is not a case of either resisting or allowing. These are more like two ends of a spectrum, and most of the time we are somewhere in between. The practice is simply to notice when resistance is there, and then gently move a little more in the direction of allowing.

A simple example might be something like a dentist appointment. You get the text reminder and immediately there is a reaction in the body — a tightening, a sinking feeling, some tension. Then the mind starts up: “I really don’t want to go,” “I hate the dentist,” “this is going to be awful.” That whole sequence is resistance.

Allowing would begin by noticing what is happening in the body and recognising that, in this moment, the tension itself is not the problem. Then you breathe, soften, and let the experience be there without feeding it with more mental resistance. The appointment may still be tomorrow. You may still not want to go. But internally something changes, because you are no longer fighting your own immediate experience.

So really, allowing is less about a mental decision and more about a shift in relationship — from bracing against what is here, to making space for what is here.