Not Yet Wise

 Things are the way they are because of all the influences that made them that way.  You are not going to change the weather by complaining about it. If you are wise, you will start to change your reactions to reality instead of fighting with reality.  By doing so, you will change your relationship with yourself and with everything else. 

Michael Singer, living untethered, page 157

If you are wise...

Hm! the above quote from Chapter 31, Low Hanging Fruit, makes so much sense to me but I am still having a hard time with this practice. I am not yet wise.   I still allow myself to get all gobbled up by habitual patterns of relating to my life circumstances. Maybe I am managing the low hanging fruit better...those smaller, less distressing situations...  but when I get overwhelmed with the constant influx of bigger situations, even the low hanging fruit are a real pain in the butt lol and I react to them...becoming frustrated, angry with others, resentful, negative and snappish. . 

There are too many situations deemed as "crisis" in my life, it seems, and I am constantly responding to one "Fire!" call after the other.  I am not really saving anyone when I do either.  I cannot put out the fire.  I can only wait for it to burn itself out while I do my best to ensure no one else gets burned. Oh, I get burned, again and again and again ...yet I jump to the call, dropping everything I might have had planned for "me" or others and I go in, breathing in the smoke and absorbing the heat from the flames  into my skin until the fire is at least somewhat contained. Then  I  hope that the person I am their to help will wait until I at least get home before they light another match.  Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. It is so bloody exhausting!! 

Yesterday I got the fire call after I planned a perfect day: a half day of work giving me ample time and energy left over to do my thing here and to prepare for my community yoga class. Then the call came...somewhat expected...and I sat where I was knowing that I couldn't keep responding to these calls...the person I was so wanting to help was going to keep lighting matches until they discovered, what I and others can see,  that they are the ones starting their own fires. I didn't want to give up the work day or make it inconvenient for those who were depending on my being there.  I didn't want to exhaust myself before my class tonight either.  I knew the quality of this class would determine the possibility of others. I wanted to prioritize "my" things. So I hesitated. 

But someone called "Fire!" again , this time louder. I found myself sliding down the pole and jumping into the truck with sirens blaring. I responded to yet another crisis, dropping "my" things to go stand in the midst of flames I had little to no responsibility for starting while I was told over and over again that I was not doing enough, I was making the fire worse. 

Then when the fire settled enough for me to go back home with my radio ready to receive another call telling me to go back, I left to prepare for my class.  I was burnt out and exhausted. My mind would not work the way I wanted to, as a result I did not offer the class to my expectation. 

What I found was that I was resenting how the constant fire alarms were always interfering with my own attempts to improve my situation.  I was resenting how they were  interfering with the bit of Life this "me" I call myself was having. I was resenting the sacrifices, I, as "me",  was making. . 

Anyway...what I am trying to say is I need to change my reactions if I want to live wisely. Maybe not the external reactions of going to help out at fires but the resentment for doing so.  Maybe I also need to start offering as much care to myself  as I offer to those others I am trying to help.  

I feel this is all  triggering in me that samskara of inadequacy hiding in my core. I don't know...too tired to think right now but I will reflect on it farther. 

In the meantime, I call this non-reactivity, this letting go of pain ... a practice. 

The best way to let go of stored pockets of pain is to practice. Michael A. Singer

All is well!