Mirror, Mirror

 Mirror, Mirror on the wall,

I am the saddest of them all.

Show me, please, what I must see

to make the world what it needs to be, 

so all the sad things fade away

and the world inside me is okay. 

Mirror, Mirror on the wall

I am the neediest of them all.

Show me, please,  what I must do

to make all those things out there come true.

What should I grasp for or push away?

What  should I do, think or say?

What minute details should I create

to build  in me a peaceful state? 

Oh Mirror, Mirror on the wall

I am the loneliest of them all.

Show me, please,  who will fix my heart

and love me wholly from the start,

filling in each fissure, crack and hole

by taking responsibility for my soul.

Oh Mirror, Mirror on the wall,

I am the most frightened of them all.

Show me, please, where safety lay 

so I can go there to hide away.

Show me when  to close my eyes

and turn away from each surprise.

Protect me with some loving arms

or at least sound your loud alarms

so I can run when danger comes 

to a place that soothes, distracts and numbs.

Oh Mirror, Mirror on the Wall 

Please? You are nothing real at all,

just a reflection of a broken mind. 

The more I look, the more I'm blind.

I close my eyes and walk away

You give me lies ; I will not stay.

Dale-Lyn, January 2023

I can't believe I am putting that up.  The remains of Ego are saying, "Nooooooooo! Don't do it!" , lol  And that is exactly why I must do it! 

Anyway...check the links on the previous entry to see why I was inspired to sit here why this came out of me. 

All is well!

Being a Rare Flower; Willing to Heal the Heart

 Spiritual growth is about fixing the heart and returning it to a state of well being. It should be clear by now that the problem is not outside in the world; the problem is your inability to handle your heart's full expression of the world. Page 141

As if Michaels Singer didn't already do a great job explaining the need for heart healing in living untethered,  he explain it even better in the podcast from, The Temple of the Universe, as linked below.  In it he explains how the heart got broken in the first place.  We broke our own hearts!!

Yes samskaras have certainly caused a lot of problems inside us but what really did a number on us is our unwholesome use of the mind.  We tend to use the mind as a place to run to in order to escape the mess we left behind in our hearts. We ask the mind to look around at the world and to come back and tell us what we need to grab or fix, what we need to push away "out there," just  so we don't have to deal with what is "in here". 

There is definitely "pain" in our hearts...there is unpleasantness and many normal challenging emotions we have judged as "bad, wrong, shouldn't be!" We don't want to deal with that, do we? So we go to the mind and we ask it to  distract us and numb us from the experience of heart; to dazzle us and divert our attention to its amazing analysing  and conceptualizing ability; and to do the impossible duty of changing "what is" into something that works for us.  The mind simply tries to do what we ask it to and does its best to create a comfortable and safe zone for us  to hang out. Despite how busy and crazy it can get  up there, the mind's creation is familiar and it keeps us from heart pain....well to a certain degree. 

But the heart is still broken and hurting, neglected and abused, calling out for our attention whenever life circumstance triggers it or bumps into it. A broken heart cannot release what it is meant to release...love, joy, peace , inspiration etc. We don't get that stuff from outside...it is inside us, where it always was  ...in the heart.  It is blocked  from flowing up and out because of the samskaras and all the brokenness that is in the way. It is the heart, not the world that needs to be healed.  We can not even begin to heal the heart, however,  if the mind is in the way and the mind is in the way for most of us. 

Michael Singer explains that the way out of suffering is all about going to where that suffering is...the heart.  You really don't have to jump to get there, you just have to stop going to the mind. We automatically go to the heart when we refuse to go to the mind any longer. When we refuse to look "out there" for both the cause and solution to all our problems, when we realize how responsible we, and we alone, are for the mess in our hearts and become willing to go to the roots, we will find ourselves  sitting  with the heart and all its pain. We have to be willing to face, not run, from that pain in order to get to the amazing stuff behind it. That willingness to go to the heart, to make it the object of consciousness, rather than the mind, is key.

Few of us, however,  are willing to leave the mind and begin this painful journey into the heart.  We have run from heart pain for so long, hiding out in all our thinking and doing, that the thought of simply being in  with that pain is overwhelming for many of us.  We would rather keep running in the hundreds of unwholesome ways that we do. We would rather keep depending on the mind to take us away like a box of Calgon.  But the mind can't heal us...it is too broken.  We are asking a broken,  neurotic mind to tell us how not to be neurotic or broken. It doesn't work.  It just causes more pain.  And where does that new pain go? Back to the heart making it  sicker than it already is. 

The only way  out of suffering is through the heart.  In the same token, the only way to experience true love, peace, joy and bliss is through the heart, as well. It is not through the mind and not through the world out there, that we will be freed.  It is only through the heart. 

Turn round and face what is in your heart. If you are willing to do that, Michael Singer says, you are a rare flower on this planet.  Instead of doing what all the other flowers are doing becasue it is "normal", you will be standing alone and doing the only thing that can truly bring you everlasting peace. You will be healing your heart. 

My sankalpa, as I mentioned before,  is always: "My heart is opening; my heart is releasing; my heart is healing and my heart is expanding."

As this becomes my priority in life, I may be an odd and weird looking flower amongst the many but I am determined to experience what is on the other side of this heart pain.  I am going to stop resisting and just sit with my heart in the same way I sat with my children when they were sick, rocking them patiently and lovingly against my chest until they were well once again.  I didn't heal them persay, I just was attentively present,  as I allowed it all to pass, embracing all of it until it did. That, I believe, is how we heal the heart.  We simply become willing and attentive to its needs.

All is well.

Every experience makes you a greater person if you don't resist it.Page 141

Michael A. Singer (2022) living untethered. New Harbinger/ Sounds True

Micahe A. Singer/ The Temple of the Universe. ( January 8, 2023) When May I Live In the Love of My Heart. https://tou.org/talk-archive/

Appreciating the Instrument

Just as the human mind is something extraordinary that can take you beyond the limit of your senses, so the human heart is even more extraordinary.  It can play notes from one end of the spectrum to another.  Your heart can go from absolute ecstasy to deep pain and sorrow in a matter of seconds.  It can raise you to heights where you feel like angel wings are carrying you to heaven, and it can bring you down to your darkest hours...what an amazing instrument you carry inside of you.page 139

I love this description of the heart that Michael A. Singer offers us.  I love looking at the heart as a beautiful musical instrument...a violin, chelo or a harp maybe. Something that can create the most amazing music...that which can move us to tears, be they tears of joy or tears of the deepest sorrow.  Up and down our hearts beat out so many notes of emotion,  creating this music  Life would be so empty without. 

Why are we not okay with our hearts then?

The trouble is you're not okay with the full range of your heart.  You want to control your heart so it only plays the notes you can handle. Spirituality is about learning to thank your heart for the beautiful expressions it is creating within you.140

We are not okay with our hearts because we only want them to play certain notes. We don't see how each note is needed in this melody. We do what we can to shut down or prevent the low or unpleasant notes from being added to the arrangement. When we hear  or anticipate we will hear what we, in our tone deaf states, believe will be painful and unnecessary we step in, waving  our flimsy batons in the air ...saying "No, no, no!" As if we know better than the heart or the brilliant composer behind the music does.  We know nothing...except that for a second or two it is sometimes unpleasant inside and we don't like unpleasant.  So we shut down or push down those notes and we destroy the masterpiece of this perfect performance the heart is giving us. We mess it all up when it would have been perfect...full of sorrow, full of joy...just as it is if we would only  let it in  and let it all be. 

What we need to do is appreciate and thank our hearts for the beautiful range of notes/emotions it is giving us to experience.  Remember we are here to experience, not control. We are not here to control the music.  We do not know enough about Life to do so. But the heart knows.  We need to learn to appreciate what the heart can do...all of it!!

Learn to enjoy your heart by ceasing to resist it, Its not about losing yourself in your emotions. It is about being willing to experience them in the same way you experience a beautiful sunset. You simply let the sunset come in...You are simply allowing awareness to be aware of what is in front of it. Sometimes it is a beautiful sunset, sometimes it it is a sense of loss...You are not clinging or suppressing it.Page 142

All is well

Michael A. Singer (2022) living untethered. New Harbinger/Sounds True

Letting Go

 Every single moment of your life you are either naturally enjoying what is or letting go of what is keeping you from letting go of what is. If you let go of the wants and fears that are limiting you, you'll always be okay. Letting go of yourself, instead of serving yourself, is the real paradigm shift. 

Michael A. Singer, living untethered ( 2022; New Harbinger/ Sounds True), Page 138

I am not quite naturally enjoying what is right now, as the poem below will attest to, but I am committed to the  process of letting go of that which is preventing me from enjoying all of life, exactly as it is.

All is well!

Cracking?

 High Waters

Cracking, cracking, cracking

the hidden waters, 

for too long forgotten, 

knock against that 

which holds them back.

A trickle, 

then a stream 

emerges  in puddles, 

up and through,

the impressions,

 left by winter's frozen grip.

Cracking, cracking, cracking...

they push

until Spring's  persistent 

intention to renew

unleashes  

the full force of something

so determined to be free.

And "me" , 

as a tiny speck of wooden debris,

once so sure of the solidity 

of that which I  rested upon,

am pulled so violently 

down and away,

Cracking, cracking, cracking...

armour falls apart in pieces.

The once contained force is strong...

my power to suppress,

 push away, 

and hold it back is weak. 

I am swept away 

with the pieces of jagged ice,

crying out 

as they tear into my flesh, 

knocking me around 

until I am dizzy.  

All I thought I was 

is now caught up 

in the turbulent flow...

and "me" 

is cracking, cracking, cracking,

as it is pulled along.

Why is it so surprising?

I have witnessed many 

changing seasons...

many freezings and

many thaws.

This gushing force 

has always been there,

though I could not see it,

hiding in the depths 

beneath  the thick barrier 

of samskaras 

which are now 

nothing but broken chunks. ...

cracking, cracking, cracking.

The flow is taking "me" away

and I am both surprised 

ad frightened by its power.

I reach out to passing shorelines,

seeking something solid 

to hold on to 

so I can pull this weary form

from these cold currents.

But alas ....

everything I attempt to grasp

slips through my fingers,

 becoming nothing but sand

I was never meant to cling to

My resistance is 

....cracking, cracking , cracking.

I have no choice

but to surrender 

to the cracking ice 

and the high waters' release.

It won't be until I let go

and stop resisting, 

until I lay back into the flow,

allowing the samskaras to

brush against me 

and naturally melt around me 

as the waters  continue to rise 

higher, higher and higher,

that I will feel 

the kind, supportive arms 

of this flow,

confidently lifting me up and away

from my old delusions of solidity.

Drifting  back 

into these  fluid arms,

I close my eyes

and breathe.

I allow myself to be

carried by nature's

ever knowing power.

I am being taken, 

the voice within 

the depths whispers,

not to destruction,

but to  freedom.

I am being carried to 

 the infinite space 

of  an ocean

 that never freezes, 

and never cracks.

These high waters

are taking me home.

I want to go home.

Dale-Lyn , January, 2023

Hmm! This came out of me as life continued to knock and knock and knock on my psyche demanding my attention today.  I thought for a bit there,  that I would crack.  Still this was determined to come out. Despite all the  interruptions and other things I had to deal with, both inside and outside, this came out. Imperfect, for sure but it has something in it I am meant to listen to.  

Man I am overwhelmed by life circumstance right now. Why?  because my ice is cracking open and all these pieces of samskaras keep bumping into me, cutting into me, shoving me up against the boulders. I am kind of confused and overwhelmed by feeling that was stuffed inside me for so long. I have to deal with that as well as the circumstances unfolding in front of me.  As my samskaras crack open and are carried away by Shakti I am challenged to stop grabbing for the shoreline and to  just lay back so I can get to that ocean! I  just want to get to that ocean. :) 

All is well!

Be In the Space

 Between the stimulus and the response there is a space.  In this space is the power to choose  our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

Victor Frankly

Hmm! Let's look at this space that exists between the stimulus ( that which triggers us) and the response ( the emotional and behavioural reaction).  This space is everything...it is who we are.  It is the  pause between the in and the out breath, our peaceful and kind essence, and it is the back row seat we always have the option to drift back to when we are too caught up in the drama unfolding on the stage in front of us. It is clarity, stillness, silence. It is a kind and loving attention which we can apply to ourselves and to the world to ensure wholesome response. 

Tara Brach explains that we all have the biological and conditioned reflex in us to be prepared to react to the negative.  We are programmed to look for the negative and potentially harmful stimuli  in our environment so we can respond.  We are always on alert and ready to do so. (Thanks  amygdala! ) As a result, we pull back and away pretty quickly when we set our hands on the hot stove of life.  In such a case there is very little time between the stimuli...awareness of that which causes or has the potential to cause pain... and the response. This can make us pretty reactive,  anxious, focused on the negative and not too much fun to be around. Often we use that negative focus and hyper alert states against others.  And we use it against our selves.  We focus our unkind attention on what is or could be wrong with us.  In fear of our own inadequacy, we often assume we will be hurt by others or the world and close off in self protection mode or we strike out before we are struck. 

But, she reminds us,  we also have ingrained in us the  capacity for tending and befriending . We have many seeds of compassion, kindness, love in us as well.  They are contained in that space between the stimulus and the response...waiting for the opportunity to sprout outward.  They are our power.  If we take the time to sit in that space...to extend it long enough for us to water and nourish those seeds...our responses  will be less reflexive and  more wholesome and life affirming for us and for others. 

We grow and are freed, the more we are in that space. Why? Because instead of getting lost in fearful, aggressive or unwholesome reactions, we put that kind attention on what really matters...not the stimulus, not the response...but the space itself.  That is who we are.

All is well.

Tara Brach (November, 2021) Meditation: Awakening Self Compassion. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMkzlOhnaQU&t=1s

Tara Brach/ Sounds True (2019?) Waking up from the Trance of Unworthiness With Tara Brach. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0G_kS6XIEE&t=1s

Drift Back

 Mana eva manusyanam karanam bandha moksayoh

Sanskrit saying

Say what?

As  the mind, so the person.  Bondage and liberation are in your own mind. 

Still don't know what you are talking about, crazy lady. 

Do you see yourself as a slave to life circumstance, to belief systems, emotions and all phenomena in front of you? If you see yourself as bound, you will be bound and your life will reflect that.  If you see yourself as free, you are free and your life will reflect that. Freedom and bondage take place in the mind...nowhere else. Things outside have no effect. They are just passing phenomenon coming in and going out of our awareness.   Only our focus of attention  and our attitude will determine how free we are. 

We will come to realize this after we take on the task of observing our minds,  We will see just how problematic they are and how much trouble they cause for us.  We will see how they make no sense and really do not know what they are talking about but there they are inside us telling us this and telling us that.  And we listen.  This is what keeps us in this dungeon of an inner world.  Inside this dungeon we are the "me"...a flimsy, veil of pseudo protection that is nothing more than an idea or self concept. We spend our imprisonment doing whatever we can to protect this "me", to make it more real, secure and solid to no avail.  "Me" can be blown over with a puff of air...yet there we are struggling, protecting, defending, grasping, clinging, averting...full of restlessness and worry,  and doubt, trying to make this "me" something it isn't...real and solid. 

Huh?

Will ask you another question: 

What seat are you sitting in right now as you watch the world unfold in front of you?  The seat of being or the seat of drama? The seat of peace or the seat of disturbance?  (Michael Singer) The seat of wisdom and clarity or the seat of illusion and confusion?Are you, in other words, living in your spiritual being or living in your human being?  Are you sitting back far enough to observe not only what is going on in front of you but what is going on behind you? Or are you so close to the world's stage , you believe you are a character in that drama? 

Still not getting it

Are you suffering right now because of what is happening around you and in you?  If so, you are too close. Would you like to stop suffering?  Would you like to feel peace and joy and even ecstasy all the time  instead ? 

Yeah but how?

Trade seats.  Instead of sitting so close to the  stage that you can't help but be caught up in the drama, take the seat of observer instead. Sit back in the seat of being, of Self. There is no drama there, no suffering, no disturbance. There is just a steady flow of peace, wisdom, clarity.  You can see it all but from a distance.  What's more it doesn't bother you.  It is just something you are allowing into your awareness and something you watch leave your awareness.  Back there you are free.

What action is required?

Observe! Simply observe and notice what your mind is doing...holding it accountable. See how no matter how much you attempt to manipulate the play or the characters or the scene or the atmosphere...Life just keeps doing what it is doing and you keep suffering. Not becasue of what is going on up there but because you not letting it go.  You insist on being so close to it, a part of it when it really ahs nothing to do with you. You are stuffing it all inside as if it was a drama put on just for you. You are believing what is happening and what the mind is telling you is happening.  You are allowing all that drama to hit your stuff and you are following the mind's instructions on how to make that not happen when the mind doesn't have a clue what it is talking about. The more you listen to the mind, the more you sit where you are sitting, the crazier and more disturbed it all gets inside. 

Realize it is not where you want to be.  You don't want to keep suffering...you want more. You don't have to keep hanging out in that part of your being

Want out! Do you want out?

Either you want out or you don't. If you don't you won't. 

Wanting to be in the seat of consciousness/being...is the most important and sometimes only step needed, Michael Singer teaches. If we have  a sincere desire and willingness we are fifty percent there. If you find your insides a mess right now because of all that is going on up on the stage, and becasue of everything the mind is telling you to do or not do "out there" in order to make it okay "in here" you are probably getting ready to ask for a seat change. You want it. Once you want it you are halfway there. 

Decide to ignore the mind! Singer also teaches that a major component of the spiritual path is to stop buying into the advice the mind is giving us when it tells us what we need to fix, grab, push away or control "out there" to make it better "in here." We cannot stop it from chirping away and going on with all its mixed up advice but we have to learn, at some point in our lives, just how misleading that advice is. This is not as easy as it sounds.  We are so conditioned by our habitual tendencies to follow the mind's advice, to listen and to believe it. And  mind is so convincing in its message that the drama being played in front of us is all about us.  We will find ourselves pulled back in again and again.  We just need to stop listening. 

Go nowhere!  We really do not need to get up and move.  We just need to lean  back into the space that has always been there.  We need to drift back away from what is going on in front of us, and into who we are....the witness, the Observer, that is seperate from the craziness inside. 

Drift back into the center of who you are.

Spirituality is not something you do, it is who you are. Just permit it to be. 

Watch! You can still observe what is going on in front of you from that back seat.  Be the watcher instead of what is being watched. 

Let the  "me" go. Be willing to die in order to be reborn

 Use life for the purpose it was meant for.  Instead of fighting and struggling to change what is in front of you, use every opportunity to get rid of me, to be free.  When life circumstances are not to your liking...use that. When  the  samskaras get triggered...use that. Resist nothing.  Use it all for your liberation. Welcome and throw the remains of me out there so  you can be set free. 

Only one thing your life is about and that is to get out. Use everything around you as a means to your liberation. 

Be Who You Are. You are consciousness. You are the Witness. And when we sit in the seat of the witness a whole other universe appears for the consciousness to relate to.

Watch as consciousness shifts back to Self and you become free.

All is well! 

Michael Singer/ Temple of the Universe.(January 16,  2023) A Shift In Consciousness.https://tou.org/talk-archive/

Satchididananda (2011) Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Integral Yoga Publications

Nirodha Parinamah: Taming of Ripples

 

Vyuntthana nirodha samskarayor abhibhava pradurbhavau nirodha ksana cittanvayp nirodha parinamah 

Patanjali, Sutra III-9

What the Fork?

That beautiful expression is in sanskrit , missing a few accents. According to Satchidananda, Patanjali is saying : 

The impressions which normally arise are made to disappear by the appearance of suppressive efforts, which in turn creates new mental modifications. The moment of conjunction of mind and new modifications is nirodha parinamah. 

Wow! Zero readers today and yesterday.  I cannot even get into Google Analytics to verify that. I have been cut off from the rest of the world. And it is all good. Not suppressing this impression, not adding to the truckload of mental modifications already within me. I want nirodha parinamah .

What is this nirodha parinamah, crazy lady? 

Well, also according to Satchidananda , it means the moment of conjunction of a thought and one's effort to retrain it.

Huh? 

Basically, what I think it boils down to is: As soon as we become aware ( conjunction of the mind) with a potential samskara (new modification) we are offered an amazing opportunity to make a choice.  We can either go back to the old tendencies of suppressing and repressing...stuffing it all down...or we can gain the freedom  that comes with this awareness. Once aware, we can simply let the experience come and go.  That's nirodha parinamah. So that moment when we catch ourselves running off after a thought or experience in the old habitual ways...when we can observe ourselves doing what we automatically did without awareness...that is the crucial moment in our awakening! 

According to yogapedia, Nirodha parinamah , is an advanced stage in a yogi's journey where they have freed the mind  from citta vritti  [its attachment to thought waves or mind stuff]; where they are free from samskaras. 

Evey thing that comes in through our senses gives us an opportunity to practice letting go of this tendency toward attachment/clinging/ suppressing...including this non existent readership I am presently  seeing. It gives us an opportunity to practice letting go of the habitual pattern of creating new mental modifications when we judge what is happening around us...when we suppress it because it is to painful to deal with. Practice helps us to learn to smooth the waves that such tendencies have created so we can experience all of  Life as it is. I practice it also with my health and health seeking ( which I stopped putting any concern or  worry into. I look at professionals now telling me things that are not true  for "me" and there is absolutely no need arising in me to explain myself or to challenge what they are saying...it is amazing.  I cling to none of it!), with my parenting  ( much more challenging there) and with all the little things that come into my awareness during the day. I am really trying to observe and understand the cause of all my mind stuff so I can be free of it, so I can reach a state of nirodha parinamah which would , I assume, simply mean falling back into what I am and always was...that calm, still lake of consciousness.

All is well. 

Satchidananda (2011) The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Integral Yoga Publications -page 169

Yoga pedia https://www.yogapedia.com/definition/6164/nirodha-parinama

Ripples and Samskaras

 The meaning of your life is purification...

Michael A. Singer

We need to purify! 

Just Another Experience; No Need To Make It Another Samskara

Readership is registering zero to one over the last few days and I am okay with that.  I let that phenomena: the realization of a pretty much non existent readership, come all the way in and then watch as it goes.  I am not clinging through attachment or grasping for more readership nor am I clinging to it through aversion by telling myself, "This is bad wrong, shouldn't be".  I am just letting it in and then letting it go like it is meant to.  It is an experience, just as writing this is...I have an opportunity to experience it and everything else in the world.  How can any of it be "bad, wrong...shouldn't be", when it just is? By not attaching or pushing away the realization  of no readership, it  will not become another samskara. It will not act like a second arrow bumping  into and aggravating the samskara that reverberates a sense of inadequacy in me. 

The Purpose of the Body

I heard Michael A, Singer speak today in one of his weekly talks from The Temple of the Universe which he founded way back in the 60's or 70's when he  began his own yogic "forest dwelling" experience..  He said something interesting about the meaning of the body and the meaning of Life.  First of all, as someone who taught Anatomy and Physiology for years, I was very interested in what he had to say about the purpose of the body.  It actually made sense.  He said the major components of the human organism were the special senses. Everything else...every system, organ, piece of tissue or cell is simply there to keep the body going so it can sense.  Why?  Because, he explained, senses are what  allow us to experience and we, as consciousness or  these spiritual beings who inhabit these bodies for a period of time,  are here to experience Life...all of it. As consciousness we observe whatever is before us and experience it through the body. The body offers us the means to pick up such information through our eyes, ears, nose, taste buds and our touch receptors. Experience begins with the sensory information we pick up which is later taken to the brain for interpretation. From there, at a level we cannot see or understand , it  is absorbed, interpreted and understood by the mind. 

Ripples on the surface of a clear and still lake.

It is said by yogis such as Patanjali,  the mind's natural state is clear and as  pure and undisturbed  as a still lake. Our minds and therefore our life potential is peaceful. It is from  the clear state of the  mind that we add the beginning strands of knots or disturbance.  Somewhere along, instead of just accepting  all phenomenon as valuable experience material, we begin our judging of that sensory information as good, bad or ugly and this dictates how we experience Life. We begin to want and not want and go about seeking what we want(that which is interpreted as pleasant to the senses and pushing away what we don't want (that which is judged as unpleasant). Through the judging, thinking, believing, analyzing, and differentiating  we come up with ego mind. It is from that mind state that we create  the egoic little me.  The egoic me is a mind created "thought" or "concept" that likes, dislikes and bases all its actions on that liking and disliking. Our consciousness, our beautiful, wise, non judgemental  awareness gets directed to this "concept" of "me".  We focus on it, and all its likes and dislikes.  It absorbs all our attention and energy. We forget who we are beneath it (the lake). We "believe" in it as if it were real when it is nothing more than a "ripple"in our pure and perfect consciousness...a "mental modification" as Patanjali would refer to it as.  This self is just one mental modification. (Satchidananda, page 7)

Purpose of Life: To Experience

Life unfolds in front of us and everything it offers,  like all sensory material it is meant to come all the way into body and mind ( heart)...be experienced  and then flow out.  We as consciousness are here to observe it all but because of our liking and disliking we judged certain things as "bad, wrong, or  shouldn't be"  and pushed those things down into our store consciousness so we wouldn't have to deal with them.  We close our hearts so we don't have to focus on these samskaras. The problem is not what the senses pick up, that is just experience making material, what we are here to simply experience.  The problem is with our grasping at things we like and pushing  away things we don't.  We are misunderstanding the purpose of and misusing the body and mind to feed a concept...this idea of "me". 

We are not fulfilling the purpose of Life when we do that...which is to simply experience...to let it all in and to let it all go.  Our clinging creates ripples on the  surface of the clear and still lake of consciousness.  We focus on the ripples and we cannot see the lake beneath them. Everything is distorted and disturbed because of our samskaras. We are here to be the lake , the observer,,,not the ripple. Ripples are meant to come in, be experienced and then let go of. 

Purify

We need to get rid of our ripples and our impressions so we can once again be pure like the lake. Our major life purpose, then, is to experience but because our samskaras are in the way of our experiencing...we need to make our life mission one of purification,  of getting rid of these samskaras...so all can just flow through...o we can fulfill our Life purpose. 

Hmm! Anyway, so much to say to that but I have been watching my grandson all day.  What normally would have taken me an hour to write has literally taken eight hours. Another thing I need to let go of.

All is well 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 19, 2023)  Setting Your Polestar on Real Inner Growth. https://tou.org/talks/

Satchidananda (2011) The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Integral Yoga Publications

Samskaras

 I am really stuck on samskaras lol...want to understand them and release them. Hope this helps someone other than me.

And oh my thoughts go out to an individual and a very worried family right now.  May he be well, peaceful and safe. 

All is well

Disturbed? Tossed around?

 Yes, there are beautiful experiences, but they come and go. The meaning of Life is much deeper than that. Page 120

Michael A. Singer

Deeper than what, crazy lady? 

Disturbed Mess Inside

Deeper than our pleasant emotions, even human love. Of course that is hard for most of us to get our heads around because we are so busy looking for something out there to fix what is broken "in here." Things like pleasant experiences, even human love, we tell ourselves is enough  to fix, or delete the mess. At least, we convince ourselves when we become more aware of our tendencies,  these things we pull in from the outside  are enough to  temporarily numb or help us distract and get away from the disturbance inside us.

I have a disturbed mess inside me right now.  I am pretty "moody" and emotional. I am feeling negative and my attention seems to be drawn to the negative. Why? Because some particular  samskaras in my heart  have been hit by recent life circumstance and the shakti trapped  beneath them   is shooting out like a faucet with a partially clogged trap,  in its attempt to be released..

Huh?

Emotion is Blocked Energy

An emotion is caused by the shakti hitting the blockages in your heart and shooting out to release the blocked energies.  This creates enough disturbance to your normal flow that your attention gets drawn to these disturbed energies.  Emotions are a release of blocked energy.  This goes for both negative and positive emotions. page 117

Samskaras Blocking the Flow of A Determined Shakti

According to Michael A. Singer in  Chapter 24 of  living untethered, I am likely feeling "down" because Shakti energy flow is down, and that is down because there seems to be just a pin prick size hole in my heart right now letting the energy through. The Shakti on the other side of that hole is determined to push its way through, despite the interference,  making me an emotional mess.  There are big old samskaras...some past injury   in my heart center right now. It is acting like a  fat clot or some nasty plaque formation narrowing the lumen of the heart center artery.  It is getting picked and prodded by my reaction to life circumstances and this in turn is disturbing the energy flow. Shakti is building up in pressure on the other side. It will not be held back forever.  It is determined to flow.  It has to shove and push and break away pieces of this samskara to get through, pushing memories and the pain of old unhealed wounds up into my psyche .   What is able to come through in spurts and splattering gushes with the memory, is a chaotic collection of old trapped feelings of inadequacy, shame, fear, doubt and helplessness. This disturbed flow  is taking "me" away with it.   I am getting all tangled up and tossed around as it becomes my focus. Hmm! 

Old Habits Die Hard

I feel even more pain than I would feel by simply experiencing the life events taking place around me. I don't like the pain.  I  find myself going back to old familiar tendencies or habit energies...searching "out there" to help me find peace "in here".  I see myself desiring some form of redemption in external world standards...I see myself reaching for soothing pleasant experiences and feeling let down and beat up when I can not seem to grasp or cling to enough of them, I feel the unpleasant coming up and automatically I start to push it back down again. 

Sure, what I am dealing with now in regards to life circumstance is challenging but it is turned into full blown suffering and dukkha by the reactivation of samskaras...these past wounds that keep getting poked. It is the old wounding that is really causing all the problems.

But I Am More Aware

What is different now, in this stage of my evolution, is that I am more aware of  what is happening inside me. Though I still get tossed around, I am aware that I am being tossed around.  I am no longer in the normal state of not paying attention.  I am looking inward and reflecting deeply.  I am committed to healing,  once and for all. I am determine to suffer through so the heart can open and stay open. I want these samskaras out!  

Its hard to believe that our moods, attractions, and repulsions are so dependent on our past, but it is true.  In our normal state, we're not paying any attention to what is going on- we're just being tossed around by it. Page 121

I have a lot of deep wounding. So I think I am experiencing, with this sudden darkness to my moods,  a  broken or disturbed faucet flow about to become a damn bursting type of scenario,. Am I ready to handle that?  I don't know.  .I want an open heart...at all costs...which will mean dealing with some pretty nasty pain of second arrow wounding. But I am determined  to heal once and for all.  So... bring it on!  Bring it on!.

 There are much higher energy centers you are capable of experiencing, and the further you go into these centers, the more beautiful all of life becomes. But if you can't do the work with the heart center, you will never know the higher centers exist. page 120

All is well

Note: Though this chapter really made a lot of sense to me in so many ways, I still find myself confused about what "me" is and what to do about it. Several questions come up as I write this like "Who is the" I" that has the disturbed mess inside,  if the true Self cannot be disturbed?  Whose insides are we talking about...must be "me's" insides right? Because the Self is an observer looking in? Are we dealing with little "me" again?  M y samskaras are "me" injury and wounding, not Self wounding, and therefore not significant or even "real",  are they? So if we witness it all going on as Self / witness consciousness why be bothered releasing the samskaras?  If samskaras are a "me" thing and therefore not real ...how can Shakti, which is real,  be blocked by them?? I need to reflect on all this as well.

Anyway...just putting it out there.

Michael A. Singer ( 2022) living untethered. New Harbinger/ Sounds True

More on Self-Care

 

Love yourself enough to set boundaries. Your time and energy are precious.You get to choose how you use it. You teach people how to treat you by deciding what you will an will not accept.

Anna Taylor

Still working on that bit of advice I recently received. 

I am hoping that what I put here is read with a grain of salt.  I am definitely  no expert.  I learn a lot from what I consider to be great teachers and I share what I learn.  Most of what I provide, though, comes from exploring my own mind...my own internal reactions and response to life circumstance.  I learn a heck of a lot from my mistakes and I make many! I have come to view mistakes ( wrong view, wrong thought, wrong action, wrong speech, wrong livelihood etc) as positive and valuable learning tools that help to take me to the "rights". So I share what I learn from others and from my own experiences.  That, I know, is not for everyone. I am okay with that.  I feel compelled to share anyway.

So in that stream,  I will share, once again, about what I am learning about self-compassion and self-care. As I was saying in my last entry, I am very confused about the self in self care. Traditionally that self is the "me" we are trying to dissolve.  So it seems kind of counterproductive to care for something you are trying to get rid of, doesn't it? Yet ...just as we learn with compassion not to step on  insects just because they are annoying  and  in the  way...we need to learn that  we do not squish and punish the self ( even if it is just a mind-made thing) because it is annoying and  in the way. 

Upon looking deeply, I figure that the ego does serve a purpose on our journey.  We don't have to punish it; we work with it compassionately until it dissolves on its own accord , once it becomes a shadow  in the greatness of Self. 

Body often reflects the need of that self.  I have spent many days this week up all night caring for beings in need in one way or another.  I had put aside the needs of "me" ( my body and lower mind needs) for the needs of others. I neglected "me" and I even punished "me" for  asking to have its needs met. As a result, I found myself in this situation of semi-chaos...things are just messy and chaotic around "me" and me is in pain...physical and emotional.  I woke up yesterday with a cluster of chest pain that is still coming and going and instead of being able to push "me" to do more I have pretty much been confined to the couch.  

Emotionally, I have just been overwhelmed with the suffering of others and this sense of helplessness I feel in taking away that suffering even though I know it isn't mine to take away. And my old samskaras keep coming up to the surface, sometimes so unexpectedly and I often feel that pain. My outer world is a little chaotic and crowded and busy right now...so I am not having the time to practice and write and reflect like I would.  I am not having solitude.  Boundaries are blurred. My time and energy is not  always put towards doing that which nourishes me.  So that adds to the emotional disequilibrium I have been experiencing.  "Me" has so many other needs that psychologists might point out that are not being met and sometimes I feel them missing.

This is simply a reminder that we cannot deny or punish "me" in our quest to be more evolved.  I pushed myself too hard and too far.  I neglected my own needs. We need to recognize the needs of "me" while me is still around and to  meet,  the wholesome ones at least, in a healthy way.  Self compassion is key. 

Anyway, still do not understand completely and maybe I never will but I will share any insight I gain to whomever might benefit from it.

All is well. 

Dealing With the "Me"

 May you[and I] be filled with loving kindness, held in loving kindness. May you [and I] realize loving kindness as our essence. May you [and I] be happy.  May you[ and I] be well. May you accept yourself just as you are. [May I accept myself just as I am]. May you[ and I] feel peaceful and safe. May our hearts and minds awaken and be free.

Tara Brach 

What do I do with me?

I am having a hard time with understanding what I need to do with "me". I desperately want to dissolve the personal "me" so it isn't in the way any longer.  I see the trouble it causes and how it prevents the energy of who we really are from coming through.  I do. I see how we get all tangled up in "me" stuff to the detriment of being able to experience the amazing flow of Life, with all its coming and goings, in a clear and peaceful way. I see the unnecessary suffering that "poor little me" and all the samskaras and habit tendencies lead to for ourselves and for the world.  I don't like "being trapped in "me". I want out. I want to awaken, be Self-realized and enlightened...as woo-woo as that may make this all sound. I want to be free from all this suffering or dukkha that too many of us consider "normal".  I want to be clearer and wiser. I want my  speech and my actions...what I give the world...to be wholesome. I want to be detached from all the "drama" personalities bring about. I want to experience Life through the clarity of witness consciousness not from ego. I want to get away from "me".

The Conundrum

Yet, though I am studying and learning and practicing how to do this, I constantly run in to a conundrum. These questions come to light: Am I doing this right? Am I supposed to just drop "me" like a pair of dirty socks? Or is there some part of me that I am supposed to nourish, nurture and  care for? To look after? To stand up for and protect? I am learning that Self-compassion is necessary for there to be other compassion yet I am also learning that really there is no separation between Self and other. So how do I deal with "me"?

Desperate to Be Free of Me

Now I know that self ("me") and Self are not one and the same.  Self is who we really are...the witness consciousness...that which is everything. It is this part of us that never changes, never dies, always "is"...doesn't get wounded or disturbed by what is happening to us or around us. Before we are fully aware that we are  merged with witness consciousness...before we are completely yogic...there is this wounded "me" we need to deal with, however. In the process of realizing the woundless Self we need to deal with the wounded self...do we not?  The "me":this personality, this body and this mind was wounded ( even if these things and the wounding are just perceptions). In the process of realizing that which can not be harmed, we are still dealing with that which we believe can be harmed and  therefore  we are experiencing or have experienced harm. Thus the samskaras. Can we be free of "me" as long as these samskaras keep getting poked inside this "me",  constantly dragging us back to the perception of "me"?

Complete Self-Denial, Not the Answer

Th Buddha himself tried denying "me"...and detaching from me by ignoring the needs of body and mind.  He tried starving himself, not sleeping , and even flogging himself ...in hopes of getting rid of his attachment to this "me"...but it didn't get him anywhere but deathly ill.  If his body and mind were to succumb to this type of "me"-deprivation...he would never have become the Buddha.   He would never have awakened or become truly Self-realized. 

Until we totally get the unreality of self, how much do we deny it? 

Hmm! Though I am far from undertaking the level of  ascetism  the Buddha attempted, there seems to be a level of self-denial  in my process that is unhealthy. This  body and mind I am in still has needs and wounds that keep getting triggered.  I still hurt.  I have been trying to deny them...push past them and give all of " me" away to the point I am exhausting self and becoming so depleted I have little left to give.  I have so little physical energy, joy and peace in me. I made, it seems,  everyone's needs more important than my own. I don't have what psychologists would call "healthy boundaries" .  Someone calls me in need and I go.  It doesn't matter how tired I am or how much I am giving up to go...like my practice for example or my sleep or my meals or my limited funds or my space or my energy.  I just  go or I give!  If I don't act I absorb the suffering of the other as if it was my own and it will haunt me.  I am so full of the suffering of others I don't have time to deal with anything inside this "me". I give so much I deplete my energy.  

"What about me"?

Sometimes a little voice will emerge in my head saying, "What about me?" and I will squish it so quickly and somewhat angrily with, "Well it isn't about "me"!  My goal is to get beyond me. Me doesn't matter...it is only in the way. Go away "me"...go away! " 

Others will approach me and say, "You look exhausted.  You are doing it again.  You are giving too much.  You need to learn to say "no" and set some boundaries for yourself.  You have rights and needs too. You deserve to be cared for too.  You have to look after yourself."   And I will just look at them with a sense of spiritual superiority and smile as I think to myself, "They don't yet  understand that "me" and "self" are just mind made things in the way of what I am seeking. They are not as evolved as I am." 

Imagine! That is how all this "getting -past -"me" thing goes on in my head.  And I and some other people tend to think I am such a giving, compassionate  person!

Being A Martyr Is Not the Answer

Contrary to what people might say, this doesn't make me a self-less, kind and giving spiritual person...it makes me an unhealthy martyr. Martyr's are not evolved beings...they are people trying to gain something ego boosting through their so called sacrifices. Through my "sacrifices" I am trying to create order and peace around me so I can feel comfortable inside. I still have this mixed up notion that I will only be able to be ( or deserve to be, maybe) at peace and be happy if all those around me are at peace and happy. I am erroneously trying to create, fix and manipulate a certain peace in my outside world so I can have peace in my inner one. I am also trying to escape my own suffering by focusing on the suffering of others.  On top of that, I am trying to gain spiritual brownie points so I awaken faster e  And I am really not helping the other by doing what I am doing.  I am enabling probably more than helping. Their suffering is there to help them grow. By taking it up as my own, I deny them that opportunity.  

I know, through the Buddha's journey,  self-denial and ascetism  is not the path to Self-realization. There is a gentler and much more effective approach we can take. Self-compassion is  key! 

Accepting and Being Kind to "Me"

 Eventually the "me" will be dissolved but in the meantime, in the earlier stages of self realization that most of us will never get beyond, while "me" is still in the picture, maybe we have to treat "me" like an ignorant and needy child.  Maybe we need to be loving and kind to it instead of always wanting to deny it or  punish it like I seem to have been doing.  Maybe we do have to do, as the psychologists suggest,: set boundaries and ensure its rights and needs are met. Maybe in our quest to understand that there is no individual self, just one united Self, we need to treat this idea of self in the same way we treat the idea of other.  Maybe we need to show just as much loving kindness and compassion to "me" as we do to those so called "others". 

Undeserving?

Why is that so bloody difficult to do? Why is self compassion so hard? Why is nurturing ourselves not a priority? I suppose there a thousand root causes to this resistance wrapped around every samskara still stuck within us. One word stands out as the source of suffering for me ( and possibly for many others) and that is "undeserving".  Within those wounds are some messages that  chirp that we are undeserving as an individual self; that others are more deserving. Some core belief gets triggered with every samskara bump that says that, "Me is bad wrong or inadequate and therefore undeserving of having its needs met". And the messages we receive on our spiritual journeys that explain the necessity of getting rid of "me"...of how it is only in the way....may actually trigger some old samskaras in us that echo this message even louder.

Message Revealed and Reinforced  From Departing Samskaras

Despite all my confusion about how I should handle "me", I know I am doing something right in my practice and with my motivation and intention to wake up because old samskaras keep coming to the surface.  And these samskaras are not only releasing pent up emotional energy when they come up but they are also releasing this message into my mind. I am hearing, along with the wise words of enlightened others, that I, as a "me", am inadequate and undeserving. I think that is also why I may be overdoing it with the giving, and pouring myself dry, why I am having a hard time being compassionate with my lower self. I am listening to the mind's messages again.. 

Anyway, as I was contemplating this and looking to meditate on it, I came across this loving kindness meditation for self from Tara Brach with the above affirmations in it. I recommend it for anyone struggling as I am to be kinder to self as they attempt to diminish it for Self.

All is well. . 

Tara Brach (2019?) Meditation with Tara Brach: Developing Self Compassion. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYk-MldGDWA&t=1070s

Stepping Back to Observe With Willingness and Motivation

 With the light of perfect wisdom, dispel the cloud of ignorance.  Subject to decay are all conditioned things.  Practice with diligence. 

The Buddha's last words

I want to practice with diligence. What about you?

One of the things we are reminded to do through our practice, be it a yoga practice or a dharma practice or just a life practice...is to step back into witness consciousness and observe.  Take a step backwards, create some distance between Self and "self", between what seems to be happening and what is etc; while we detach and let go of our wrong views and mixed up ways of seeing . We replace ignorance and confusion  with clarity  as we observe what is happening on the stage we erroneously believe is us, and on the world stage before us, which erroneously believe isn't us. ...without getting all tangled up in it. 

Taking a step back,  we observe our mind and heart patterns.  We observe what we have been doing that is not working as we travel along on our hero's quest for happiness! We seek to drop the veil of ignorance so we can experience the wisdom that is there for us to embrace. 

Enlightenment, Eckhart tolle reminds us in Laughter Breaks Through the Ego, is all about "light".  It is a discovering of light inside us, the same light that is shining in all of us, a light that will remove darkness,  "the cloud of ignorance".   It is also referring to our ability to become "lighter",  in terms of  achieving a lack of heaviness which means freedom. Enlightenment is Self realization. 

To awaken, like the Buddha did, we need to be willing and motivated to look inside our hearts and minds. This motivation will require the development of  a "courageous heart" and the of use " heroic effort".  We need to see how we have been seeking happiness in all the wrong places and in all the wrong ways and to understand we  are only suffering more in the long run from our misguided attempts. 

Why should I , being subject to decay and death, subject to change keep seeking that which is subject to decay and death, keep seeking that which is subject to change? In these great cycles of birth and death where is freedom and happiness to be found?

The Buddha

We are all looking for freedom and happiness whether we know it or not. How do we find it?

Well, we are hopefully getting that the method we have been using to date, of clinging and resisting, doesn't work.  Right? So if we want freedom and happiness, we need to be willing and motivated enough to change our patterns of relating to our inner and outer worlds. We start by observing what those old patterns are and then who is the One observing?  We observe from the spaciousness of  witness consciousness

It is certainly difficult knowing what to do when all that commotion is going on.  The only lasting solution is to realize that it is the same you noticing it all. You are the one who is aware that your thoughts and emotions are shifting. It happens to us all the time.  Just relax and be the one that notices.  Be the one who sees the many-this is the path to self-realization.  Michael A. Singer, page 115

In The Buddha's Life and Journey with Joseph Goldstein, we are reminded of Joseph Campbell's mythological description of The Buddha's awakening under the Bodhi tree. We can apply those stages to our own awakening.

We can recognize our call to destiny. Suffering often is that call, that catalyst that says:"  I don't want to do this anymore, like this. It isn't working.  I am suffering more from my misguided attempts than I am finding happiness. I can't run from what is inside me any longer...it only creates more pain in the long run."

Then in the second stage, the great renunciation, we let go of our wrong view, our mixed up way of looking at the world, our tendencies that do not serve and we become willing to release those samskaras we have clung to.  We loosen our grip and stop clinging. We stop resisting what is. 

In the third stage we enter the great struggle.  We struggle, because we are motivated to do so, against the powers of delusion and illusion. We remove the veil of ignorance for the clarity of wisdom. 

And finally we awaken...seeing and understanding that which is ours to see and understand. We understand clearly the cause of suffering and the solution for it.. 

Goldstein reminds us of these lovely words from Henry  David Thoreau,  I went out to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and to see if I could not learn what it had to teach., and not, when it came to die, discover that I had not lived. " 

What is your motivation for practice? Why do you want enlightenment or Self-realization? 

My motivation for being here...is my desire for wisdom and understanding. I want to front out the essential facts.  I also have a desire to be happy and at peace so I can help others be happier and more peaceful. I believe there is quality to this motivation regardless if I ever help another soul or not. I guess my motivation makes my actions successful.

The quality of the motivation is a much truer measure of our actions than their success or failure...Dali Lama

It all starts with stepping back and observing the process and how we are in it. 

All is well.

Joseph Goldstein /Be Here and Now Network. The Buddha's Life and Journey with Joseph Goldstein https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW7_twGZJRs

Joseph Goldstein/ Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, The Example of the Buddha,https://tricycle.org/magazine/the-example-of-the-buddha/

Michael A. Singer ( 2022) living untethered New Harbinger/ Sounds True

Eckhart Tolle/ Namaste Publishing ( ) Eckhart tolle Laughter Breaks Through the Ego. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyUG5KnutTo

From the Heart Flows Rivers of Living Water

 Your psyche is the net result of all your blockages and how the energy manages to flow through them.

Michael A. Singer, living untethered, page 113.

Do we all get that ? 

Do we understand that within us we have samskaras: old stuffed  memories and impressions wrapped in an emotional energy we find too painful to face; and we also have the wonderful blissful, loving energy of ,what  yogis, likeSinger, refer to as Shakti. 

Shakti is constantly trying to flow through us and out of us as it is meant to do but between the samskaras and the emotional sticks we jam into the flow...we keep blocking it. Like a jammed river...with the unstoppable drive to flow....it is constantly trying to get past or find a way around these blockages. Many of us have so many blockages...so many samskaras getting bumped and hit...so many negative automatic thoughts stirring up the inner turmoil...so many opening and closings of the heart...so many complex emotional vibrations that  the inner energy is so disturbed we feel anything but bliss. Some of us feel hardly any joy, love or inspiration because little to none of that life enhancing Shakti can make it through.  Yet that Shakti, like the water of the Colorado River behind the Hoover Damn, is constantly pushing, pushing, pushing to get past these blockages so it can do what it is meant to do...flow. We feel that build up of emotional energy and blocked Shakti  like we are "about to crack" or "explode"! This is the normal for most of us.

Our thoughts and feelings are dependent on our blockages and  blockages are running our lives! 

Until you get very centered in witness consciousness, you are going to follow your thoughts and emotions, and they are determined by your samskaras. page 113

We emotionally, cognitively and behaviourally  react to life circumstance when it triggers our samskaras. When we deal with a life circumstance that triggers a pleasant stored memory that we were clinging to in hope and expectation of reliving it again and again and again...the heart opens and we have a big gush of Shakti through the heart   It feels good inside...not because of what did or didn't happen on the outside... but because the heart opened enough for enough Shakti to get through to make us feel good.  

If, on the other hand,  we encounter a life circumstance that triggers a painful stuffed memory or emotion...we may react by closing the heart through resistance and aversion. We jam a stick into the flow, reducing any space  around the samskara so little to no flow of Shakti can get through.Sure that may mean we don't have to deal with the full painful vibration of the samskara at that time but it also means  little joy, love, enthusiasm,  inspiration, happiness or bliss gets through. We also feel the  build up of  this Shakti on the other side  of  the blockage. It has to try even harder to push the samskara up and away or at least find a way to flow through or around.  We are a mess inside when that happens. 

Of course, the solution is to eventually release all the blockages, to keep the heart open so the flow of Shakti can constantly and consistently flow up and through.  With nothing in the way we would feel the wonderful energy of  love and bliss and joy all the time...regardless of what is happening to us or around us. Our inner happiness would not be dependent on what is or isn't happening out there. 

So the goal: Let go of all the junk you are holding on to.  Just let it go!  

How do we do that?

• Observe and notice what you are doing. This is where yoga comes in. Observe your mind and your heart.  Watch your inner tendencies...notice when you are blocking your Shakti by reacting and resisting what is unfolding in front of you. Recognize how your emotions and thoughts are  closing your heart. Notice how you are stuffing and putting great energy into holding painful memories down.  
• See how these tendencies create more inner turmoil instead of peace
• Be willing to do it differently: Make a commitment to not close the heart.
• Relax into the triggers. Start with small triggers and work up to the bigger ones.
• Start to confront that which you spent a life time trying to avoid: your samskaras.  
• Accept and allow the discomfort of the samskaras as they make their way up into your psyche and make room for them to be released.
• Most importantly:  Realize all this inner turmoil  isn't you! We are not the triggers, the samskaras, or the emotions or the thoughts...We are the one who is witnessing all that is happening within us. As a witness to our inner flow of energy we are not caught up in it.

The important question is not what to do about this, it is: Who is noticing all this?  The same consciousness is aware of this entire process going on inside. There may be many samskaras in there, but there are not many of you in there. There is only one consciousness watching all these competing patterns and identifying with them.  page 114.

All is well! 

Michael A. Singer ( 2022) living untethered. New Harbinger/ Sounds True

Already Are That Which You Seek

There is no goal to be reached. There is nothing to be attained.  You are the Self. You exist always. Nothing more can be predicated of the Self than that it exists.

Ramana Maharshi, from Be As You Are (David Godman, editor), Location 545 

The ego self appears and disappears and is transitory, whereas the real Self is permanent. Though you are actually the true Self you wrongly identify the real Self with the  ego -self. (Maharshi, location 551) 

Not Difficult Just Because the Ego Says It Is

It seems that "waking up" to who we really are is difficult and problematic.  We do not know how to reach that goal of  Self.-realization. Maharshi reminds us that we are already Self-realized , we just don't know it. Our doubt and confusion, elements of the ego-Self , are in the way of us simply knowing that which we already know. 

Avidya is only our ignorance and nothing more. It is ignorance of forgetfulness of the Self. Can there be darkness before the sun? Similarly, can there be ignorance before the self-evident and self-luminous Self? If you know the Self there will be no darkness, no ignorance and no misery. (Maharshi, location 574)

Summing up what I have read today from Ramana Maharshi or at least trying to.

We are already Self-realized; already free...yet  a certain ignorance is in the way of our knowing that. This ignorance is   brought on by our Samskaras which are brought on by our ego-self which is nothing more than a thought, an illusion in itself. If we remove the veil of ignorance by removing the samskaras , by removing the  thought of an ego self ...we will be free. Hmmm!

We are trapped in an illusion of being trapped when really we are nothing but free because we are nothing but Self.

Nothing Unreal Exists

I am reminded of the famous passage from A Cours ein Miracles: 

Nothing real can be threatened

Nothing unreal exists

Herein lies the peace of God.

Self cannot be threatened . Self-realization really cannot be threatened either.  It is as it is Our difficulty realizing Self therefore doesn't exist, because it is unreal. Ego self doesn't exist because it too is unreal. There is just Self and in that Self is the peace of God we  erroneously believe we are struggling to realize. 

There is an analogy that Maharshi uses and it will relate to our most recent discussion on dream and deep sleep state. If a man ( or woman) is sleeping in a big room but is dreaming of  travelling all over the world.and even  if those dreams are so  vivid the dreamer  does not see or experience the room they are in, they are still in the room. Right?  They may have traveled miles and miles in their dreams but when they wake up they realize they have not moved an inch. Why? Their dream travel was all illusion...mind stuff. 

Well when we wake up from this "dream" of being a "little me", an ego-self,  who is struggling to find Self we realize we were Self all along and any idea of  struggling to find Self, of being anything else but Self was just an illusion. We are Self and were all along. All the travelling, struggling and seeking was for nothing. We are already the goal we struggled to reach. 

Objectivity is in the way.

Knowing the Self is being the Self, and being  means existence. No one denies one's existence anymore than one denies ones eyes, although one cannot see them. The trouble lies with your desire to objectify the Self, in the same way as you objectify your eyes when you place a mirror in front of them. You have become so accustomed to objectivity that you have lost the knowledge of yourself, simply because the Self cannot be objectified. .(Maharshi, location 587)

All is well.

A Couse in Miracles: Combined volume. ( 2007) Foundation for Inner PEace

Ramana Maharishi (David Godman, Ed) (n.d.) Be As You Are: The Teachings of Ramana Maharshi. Penguin: Kindle Edition

Observing the Heart

 If you want to know your heart, first  and foremost understand that you are not your heart-you are the experiencer of your heart. You are the consciousness that is aware when emotions are taking place. Singer, page 105

Hmmm! Okay so that is very important to realize. Just like we realize we are not the body, mind  or all the mind stuff, we must realize we  are not the heart or all the emotions that go with it. We are the observer and the experiencer of it all. 

This realization becomes especially important when we are in what ACIM refers to as "Special relationships"...when we  say we are in love: 

You're floating in the ocean of love, but you're not the love you feel-you are the experiencer of the love you feel. (Singer, page 105)

As the experiencer, as the observer,  we can step back a bit and look upon what is unfolding in front of us in our love relationships with a certain healthy detachment. We are not all tangled up in it.  It isn't so personal. At the same time, we take accountability and ownership for our love experiences. We know we cannot look at the other person as the cause of our happiness or the lack of . 

The actual flow of love has to do with you  and your heart.  It has nothing to do with anybody else... Singer, page 105

Our "lovers" or special others  don't give us love...love is already inside us and we will experience it only if we keep our hearts open. The other person cannot open our hearts.  Only we can do that. 

That is a hard one for many of us to understand: that we, and we alone, are responsible for the opening and closing of our hearts, for our emotions. We are constantly seeking to fulfill ourselves,to  keep our samskaras down, to  fill in those empty holes of loneliness with someone else who we assume  makes us feel good inside...as if they have the power to do that, We give them the responsibility for our happiness and when they don't come through we erroneously believe we have a healthy right to blame them...to have that positive love feeling turn into its opposite. No one ...absolutely no one "out there" can make us happy...can keep our hearts open so love can continuously pour through.  Love is an inside job!

Undoubtedly, certain people or circumstances can cause your heart to open and close.  But the action of opening and closing is something your heart is doing, not the other person. Singer, page 105.

Our emotions are ours and are constantly flowing within us whether we like it or not.  We don't get our emotions from the outside therefore no one can make us happy, no one can make us sad or angry or afraid.  Our hearts are open when we fall in love and they are closed when we are feeling a lack of love. The opening and closing are our doing.  If our new lover or friend says and does all the right things and stays clear form triggering our samskaras,  we acclaim, how happy they make us and that we are so in love with them , when in actuality we are simply feeling the free flow of love already within us because our heart is open.  As soon as they say or do something that triggers those old knots and impressions stored within us...our heart closes.  We stop feeling that natural flow.  This "shakti"  cannot get up through the samskaras and the closed heart. 

I remember, shortly before my divorce, I was so self righteous claiming to be a victim of an unhealthy marriage.  I could list over 100 things every time I spoke about it, that proved how unloving my ex was and how he was the source of all my unhappiness.  I later realized that the problem was seldom him, no matter how he may have triggered all my old wounds.  The problem was I closed my heart. I blocked the flow of love in me.  

Don't get me wrong, the divorce proved to be a healthy decision for all, but regardless of what he may have done or didn't do, my ex was not the cause of my unhappiness.  I was...I got all tangled up in this "special relationship".  I had expectations and assumptions about how he and the relationship should be to make me comfortable inside. When he met those expectations and was able to soothe my samskaras I was "in love"....when he didn't meet them and my samskaras got triggered...I closed down.  But I paid little attention to my closing down part. All I paid attention to was what he was or wasn't doing to me or for me. I believed  that I was in an unhealthy relationship where I was the victim.  I wasn't dealing with my own emotions but I was blaming him for triggering them

If you want to continue feeling love, you have to deal with the emotions that open and close the heart. page 107

Of course the mind, and all its thinking. steps in when we are feeling this flow of love and when we suddenly aren't.  When the heart is open and we are feeling love, our thoughts too seem so positive.  When the heart is closed and we stop the flow of love,  the mind becomes negative and depressed.  Fear takes over. I was negative and depressed and blaming my ex for that. 

We have to realize then  that we are not the mind, or the thinking either...we are simply experiencers or observers of it. By keeping that distance, that healthy detachment  from what is going on in our minds and hearts, we can simply  observe and experience without judgement. 

The heart, like all our human tendencies, will fluctuate...it will open and close...it will vibrate with enthusiasm...it will simmer down with grief. Just notice! The less personal we take this fluctuation...the less lost we get in it...the more the  heart will stay open and the more love energy will flow through us.

Besides observing, our job here, is to let the samskaras...those impressions that are blocking our hearts release.  The less energy we waste trying to hold them down and blaming others for triggering them, the more energy we will have to love. Without or fear tendency...there is love. 

To believe that special relationships, with special love, can offer you salvation is the belief that separation is salvation...Because of guilt, all special relationships have elements of fear in them. This is why they shift and change so frequently. They are not based on changeless love alone. And love, where fear has entered, cannot be depended on because it is not perfect. 

ACIM: Chapter 15: V: 3:3 & 4: 1-4

All is well

A Couse in Miracles: Combined Volume (2007) Foundation For Inner Peace

Michael A. singer (2022) living untthered,Chapter 22: Why the Heart Opens and Closes. New Harbinger/ Sounds True

The Lost Man

 There were a couple of good stories I heard, read or was reminded of this week related to yoga or more specifically understanding Self. I would like to share one that Ramana Maharshi (I want to , for some reason, spell Maharshi with an "i") shared with many. 

Ten Foolish Men

Ten foolish men had just crossed a rough and dangerous stream of white rapids.  Upon reaching shore they wanted to make sure that all had  reached the other side safely. So one of the men was elected to count to ensure that ten men were now on this side of the stream.  

Drenching wet, he stood tall and began to count starting with the foolish man to his right and moving down the line of men who stood before him. "One...two...three...four...five...six...seven...eight...and nine." After he said nine, he frantically looked up and down and behind the last man he had counted and began to panic, "Oh my goodness, there is only nine!  We lost one!"  

"Are you sure?", asked  the last man counted.  "There doesn't appear to be anyone missing. You must have counted wrong. Let me do a recount."  Without waiting for permission to do so, he turned to his left and began making his way back to the first man who had counted.  "One ...two...three...four...five...six...seven...eight...and nine! Oh my, there is only nine!" 

All the men then began to look at one another  with panic in their eyes.  They struggled to understand who it was exactly they had lost, but for some reason, could not come up with a name.

"Let me count," said another of the men and turning to the right he began to count the men in a circle that brought the count to the man standing closest to his left. "One...two...three...four...five...six...seven..eight...and and nine!" he said with great emotions.  "There is only nine of us left. We did indeed lose one.  Oh. the horror and we cannot even think of his name!"

With that, they all fell to their knees at the river bank and began to cry hysterically. 

 Just then, a kindly and compassionate traveller passed near and heard them wailing.  Wanting to help, he approached them and asked what was wrong.

They shared what had happened and said that even after several counts they could count  no more than nine of the ten men on this side of the shore. They had lost a man! They also expressed how terrible they felt that they could not even remember the poor chap's name and therefore would not be able to relay the news back to the surviving family. They began to wail some more.

Understanding right away, upon looking at all ten men before him, what had happened , the traveller held back a laugh and proceeded to help them see for themselves that all ten were alive and could be counted for. He said, " Okay lets count again starting with you," he pointed to the man on the farthest right who was the first to make the discovery that someone was missing."Each of you count yourselves in order, out loud,one after the other until the tenth man is found."

Rejoicing in the possibility of saving and being reconnected to the man they we missing, they all shouted "Yes! Wonderful"

The traveller lined them all up in a neat little row and told them when to start. The first counter said "one".  The fellow next to him said, "two"...next, "three" until they made it all the way down the line and "Ten!" was heard coming from the last man. 

"We found him! We are ten, again! We are all here!" said the relieved men in unison. Grateful that the traveller had relieved them of their grief, they thanked him profusely before sending him on his way

Morale of the story:

We are seeking and grieving for that which we never lost: our wholeness, our completeness, our "Self." We just assume it is lost because self can't see Self in itself. 

Maharshi says, The only way to get rid of your grief is to know and be the Self.  How can that be unattainable? 

All is well!

Ramana Maharshi ( Edited by David Goldman) Be as You Are. Kindle Edition