Done Taking?

 When you are done taking, you are done with yourself.  You just serve. 

Michael A. Singer

Another glorious day out there.  The sun is shining, the air is warm during the day and a bit crisp at night.  Pears should be ready soon and the apples are waiting on that first frost. The trees are already starting to change in colour.  Seeing glimpses of reds, oranges and yellows as I look about.  I love September.  It is my favorite season. Oh, there I go preferring again.  Preferring something over  another is such a part of habit mind, isn't it? 

Let's talk about the preferring and habitual personal mind. 

Most of our day to day affairs are propelled by habit mind, wouldn't you say?  We proceed through the day, not quite aware of anything but personal mind's repetitive instructions: "Go here, Get that, Do that, Don't do that. Stay away from there etc." It is like we are sleep walking. Goldstein in the linked podcast below tells us that habit is just a gentle word for addiction. Hmm! We get addicted to things "out there" and "in here" being a certain way, don't we? (Well ego gets addicted). We just listen to the mind, as if hypnotized, and follow its instructions, getting so caught up in its drama and story,  without truly realizing what we are doing. Maybe we need to stop and have a good look at our minds and what we are thinking, feeling, saying and doing in reaction to them.

Singer reminds us that we have this tendency to become so fixated on the personal mind...that ego...that thing we created with all its habits, preferences, likes and dislikes, with all its story and drama,  that we cannot see the impersonal reality beyond it. Waking up involves taking our attention away from personal mind and placing it on the impersonal reality of what is.

Hold on crazy lady!  What do you mean by" personal mind" and "impersonal reality" ?

Personal mind, your ego, is the self-concept that you created.  There truly is nothing in this existence that is personal except for what you made up in your mind.  This idea of a "person" is just a self-concept...an idea made from all the memories of experiences you have had over the years. It really isn't real.  There really is no "me, my, or mine" in the fabric of existence. Yet, we are all so caught up in this drama of  "me", and thereby  using whatever we can in the service of this "me".  We habitually attempt to  take from the world around us what we erroneously assume will bring happiness, comfort, joy and fulfillment to this ego, this idea of "me"and to push away what will disturb it.  We attempt to use the world to serve the "me" and its addiction. So focused on serving "me" in this mind made drama are we that we fail to see anything beyond it. We are so tangled up in our habits...those preferences...that all our energy and consciousness goes to the service of this unreal personal mind.  Our ever expanded, spacious consciousness constricts and contracts its beam of light so narrowly on this personal mind when we do that. We miss so much!

What is Real

According to the teachings of the Buddha, as passed on by Joseph Goldstein...there are only six things we can experience as human beings: the sights before our eyes, the sounds we pick up with our ears,  the tastes and smells we absorb, the sensations we experience through the skin and all the mental stuff going on in our heads .  This is what our body picks up and through the veil of "me" we wear it is often not experienced fully. Our perception colours it and often makes it less than real.  The universe, on the other hand, is real but it is not here to serve"you"or "me" as we come to believe it is in our self centered focus.  It is here with its own agenda. It has been expanding, growing and evolving perfectly  over billons of years to get to where it is now...to get to that narrow window of experience that enfolds in front of us in each moment. We are not meant to take from it that which will help our ego grow, that which will feed our addictions...we are here to experience it, enjoy it, respect it, be in awe of it as we serve it. 

Refocus the Light of Consciousness

If we could learn through steady practice to remove the light from this idea of "me" we would see something so much greater. Of course, it all begins with the willingness to stop and observe our minds and our habits and what we are doing, to wake up a bit from our sleep walking tendency.  It starts with recognizing that "preferring" did not take us anywhere but to suffering and bondage. It starts with wanting to be free of our addiction to "me".  We can refocus the light of consciousness on what is real by simply removing the light from the unreal "me". If we want to be free, we need to let go of our preferences and our habit minds...we need to die to be reborn.

Anyway, there is so much more in the below linked podcasts than what I could ever offer you here. Have a listen.

All is well. 

Joseph Goldstein/ Be Here Now Network ( August, 2023) The Wisdom of "No" with Joseph Goldstein-                   Insight Hour Podcast-Ep 178. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BacE8zOrcGk

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( September 3, 2023) Understanding Personal Vs                                  Impersonal. https://tou.org/talks/