No Cows

 As you follow your feelings, you become aware of the different parts of yourself, and the different things that they want.  You cannot have all of them at once because many of them conflict. When you satisfy one part of yourself, the needs of another go unsatisfied. ..When you enter these dynamics consciously, you create for yourself the ability to chose consciously among the forces within you, to chose where and how you will focus your energy.

  Gary Zukav

Less than 

I have been struggling a bit lately with a less than adequate income.  Well let me rephrase that...the less than adequate income is not the problem, what my mind does with it, is. When I am made aware of this horizontal world reality,  the inner restlessness and worry I have been carrying around with me over the last few weeks gets poked and aggravated. Most of that restlessness is due to some struggle I have with the different motivations I have for writing.  The Deeper Part of me wants me to write for the sheer joy of writing, to write for Soul.  It wants me to put aside any unskillful  "ideas" I have about the outer world fulfilling me with some type of reward.  It seeks intrinsic and higher level reinforcement. It is very pure and unconcerned with how I am going to pay the property tax in a few weeks. 

But, unfortunately,  that is not the only part of me. 

The ego in me, on the other hand, is very concerned about what I owe. It, being the way it is, wants safety, security and some type of control.  It  also  wants to be inflated by whatever I do, including writing.  It wants recognition and payment as a reward for my time and effort. This part of my personality is beginning to openly express its unhappiness over my choosing to write for purely intrinsic reasons, thus the worry, restlessness, frustration and physical symptoms I have been getting, thus the push and pressure to become known as a writer. It tells me to try harder  to be heard, to publish, to sell what I do. ...so that it doesn't have to worry about getting by, and also so  ego can get all puffed up and dressed up in the costume of a "successful writer".

This blocks my writing instead of helping it.  My writing comes from the deeper part of me, where motivation is anything but "earning"  centered. It is like a natural and beautiful flow of water.  This flow gets blocked by this self induced  pressure to publish and get paid for what I do.

Conflicting Parts: Horizontal or Vertical Direction

So the internal restlessness I have been experiencing has to do with conflicting parts of my personality: The part of me that really, really wants to awaken and be free of all this entanglement on the horizontal plane  and the part of me that doesn't want to leave the horizontal plane. This part of me that does not want to go deeper is still trying to convince me that I need to worry about the money.  I need to eat and keep my house!  I need to make more money  first. Then and only then...it says... happiness and fulfillment can be found on the superficial level of physicality.  It tells me if I work harder to get known as a writer than all my needs will be met and then some. When I work hard, however,  and there is no rewards to be seen...when I am shown, again and again,  how I am still operating under the poverty line...I feel that restlessness taking over. I know then that I am "reacting" to life circumstance in a less than healthy way and am adding to my Karmic debt.  This just makes the restlessness and worry increase.  It is a big, ugly  cycle. 

I don't know how to break the cycle because I do not know how to stop worrying about surviving .  There is no doubt about it I am heading in the vertical direction whether ego likes it or not.  I made up my mind. I want my writing motivation to be pure and intrinsic. That doesn't mean I won't still submit and accept publication and payment should it come my way ( I will obviously rejoice in it) ...but publication and payment cannot be why I write! So how then can I find peace with that?  How can I find peace with the idea that I may never be rewarded externally for what I choose to do; may never be free of this debt and may never have that financial security I once took for granted? 

Have You Seen My Cows?

As soon as I ask myself that question I am reminded of the Buddhist parable about the cows. One day when the Buddha was sitting in a field with his disciples, all of whom  had renounced all their earthly possessions and had taken vows to be poor, a frantic farmer ran past them.  Huffing and puffing, visibly very distressed, the farmer asked, "Have you seen my cows?  They ran off and I have already lost so much from my once very profitable farm.  I will be completely lost without these cows." The Buddha responded that they did not see his cows but pointed in a direction the farmer could look.  With that, the farmer , weeping and worried , ran off in that direction looking for his cows.  The Buddha then turned to his disciples and said , "Aren't you glad you have no cows?"

When we are operating on the horizontal plane, we are very attached to things like cows, to those things we assume are responsible for keeping our pain  at bay or for ensuring our pleasure, well at least our comfort.  The farmer was very attached to his cows. With them he felt a sense of safety and security. Without them he felt he would be lost.  Depending on these cows for his happiness and security meant he always had to be on guard, watching over them  and running after them when they ran off.  This created great stress in his life.  The monks on the other hand had nothing to lose.  They had no cows, they had no attachments or things to run after.  Their happiness, their peace of mind was not dependent on the unpredictable comings and goings of worldly things. 

 I still have a few cows in my pasture that I feel are running off but many more have already run off. With each cow ( worldly thing)  I lose, the lighter I become, the less I have to lose.  I can be grateful with the little I have ( which I know is more than many have) becasue it means the less I have to run after and worry about. I am so afraid of losing these few cows I have left but maybe I could be, like the monks, and renounce them too .  I mean I could emotionally renounce what I have left by simply letting go of my need to cling to it.

Replacing Skeptical Doubt with Trust

The hindrance to awakening that comes after restlessness and worry  is skeptical doubt.  If I could renounce my need to run after my writing and replace the doubt that I will not survive without my proverbial cows, with trust than I will not have restlessness or worry.   There will be nothing to be in conflict over. 

Sure, for now I still have a part of me that is chasing cows. I just have to remind myself that I can choose differently.  I do not need to cling or chase after anything. I don't need cows. The Universe will support me. Will the universe support me? Zukav tells us that if only 10 percent of our  personality  is heading down this vertical path, we will have full Universal support.  Once fully committed to that path it won't matter if we have cows or not. 

Well I think that is something to think about...don't you?

All is well.

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster