Get Off the Hamster Wheel

 Use every moment of your life to let go of whatever is trying to make you not let go.

Michael Singer

Many of us are caught on a hamster wheel, going round and round, in hope of  getting somewhere.  

Where do we hope to go?  

To a place we feel well, happy, peaceful or at least better than we feel at the moment. 

Is this wheel getting us there? No. 

What is the wheel? 

 It is our constant searching and striving  to appease the mind when it says "Go there, get that...that will make you happy...that will make it all better....Don't go there!  Don't do that!  You don't want that!  That will make you feel worse.  That will cause pain!  Avoid! Push away!"    It is the wheel of grasping, clinging desire; the wheel of stuffing, avoiding, resisting that we are on. So much effort, so much energy we expend on this ever revolving wheel and guess what? ...We are not getting closer to that place of wellness, peace and happiness, in fact we are not going anywhere.  We are just going around in circles,getting dizzy.  

Why can't we just get off?

We seem to be stuck on this wheel for many reasons.  Number one, something within us tells us that the wheel works in getting us to where we want to be.  Something convinces us that tomorrow...if we are really careful to push away the unpleasant and grasp for the pleasant, clinging to it with all our might when we get it...if we work really, really hard and run really, really fast ...then this wheel will take us there. We are conditioned to believe it works and that  it is the way to go.  It is what all hamsters do, right? Just look over at the dude in the next cage...he is going full tilt on his wheel...and the gal behind ya...she is going all out on hers.  We have come to believe that this is what we are supposed to be doing.

Number two, it is a habit.  We have been doing it for so long...it has become a piece of who we are.  Habit mind is operating here and habit mind seems to be in control. It may seem impossible to break this addiction. 

Number Three, we also don't always "want" to get off.  "What happens if I do not have the momentum of activity to distract with?" We may ask ourselves?  "I will have to sit with all those feelings I have stuffed and spent my life running  from!  Man, I don't want that. "

If the Hamster Could Only See the Futility of its Effort

Can you imagine yourself as a hamster on this wheel, a hamster that had the ability to think like a human? What would be the first thing you would do once you realized that this wheel was not getting you anywhere?  Would you get off? I would.  In fact, I did. After a few years  dealing with the dizziness-hangover  I am now pretty grounded.  I am a heck of a lot closer to reaching that state of wellness I am wanting.  I am more well than I have ever been.  I am also more peaceful and happy ( like authentically happy) than I have ever been. I feel like I am getting somewhere...well ...I am actually getting to  "no where", a nowhere   that does not involve a fruitless waste of precious energy and effort.  It is a "nowhere" because it cannot be found in the "out there" that  I spent most of my life travelling in, grasping for what I liked and pushing away what I didn't like. 

We can get off the wheel and we are better off when we do. Part of us knows this, part of us  really, really wants off.  The other part will do whatever it can to convince us not to get off.  Who do you think we should listen to?  The part that says, " keep going around in circles getting nowhere", or the part that says, "stop spinning, stop wasting your energy going nowhere, relax and settle in to what you really want because it is already here."   

That's the truth we can't see when we are constantly running for or running away: The wellness, peace and happiness we are hungering for are already inside us.  We don't need to go "out there" to find it.  In fact we can't find it out there.  As long as we are running on that wheel...we cannot relax.  If we cannot relax, we can't fall into the abundant beauty  of what is.

You are not a hamster! Get off the wheel and relax into the wellness, peace and happiness you deserve. 

All is well!

Sounds True/ Michael Singer ( March, 2022) Michael Singer Podcast: The Stages on the Spiritual Path-the continuum of Letting Go https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W23Qob0d6rA