You should never fight with your mind....everything is energy and all emotions are just energies trying to be released.
Michael A. Singer
Michael Singer tells us that, Thinking is just an attempt by the mind to release the energy
I too believe emotion, like everything in this world, is just energy but it is an energy that is too often misdirected and knotted inside us. It is an energy we need to untangle and release.
It is more productive to consciously work with the energy than it is to resist or supress it...allow it to release.
I sat in bed this morning before and during my meditation noticing the tendency in me to resist certain lower energies that come up with thoughts about things I have done or not done. I felt the energy, possibly just one energy, wrapped around these superficial passing thoughts emerging. I recognized these energies/this energy as the shame -fear combination that I am all to familiar with.
Thoughts and Beliefs
I discover when I am willing to look deeply into these feelings when they start coming up, instead of the usual pushing them back down I do by saying "How can I fix this situation or what can I do to sedate that feeling or make it go away?", that these experiences are subliminally directed by several deeply rooted thoughts below the superficial ones. When I look closely into that which is being triggered, as recognized by that uncomfortable body sensation, and really allow for an open space for release, these deeper thoughts will come up to the surface: "Who do you think you are? You shouldn't be speaking out, making a noise, or thinking you know anything. You don't!" (In a very critical and condescending voice), "You are not doing enough for people...you are so selfish.", and the deepest and probably most toxic of these, "You are going to hurt people with your inadequacies and mistakes. You are not only going to fail in "helping" , you are going to cause great grief in the world." (I have no idea where that one came from lol)
At these moments when I am willing to release, I not only become aware the thoughts are there, I experience them completely. It isn't pleasant. I want to resist. I usually automatically do, but this morning I didn't.
The Emotional Energy
What I was experiencing this morning was the fear-shame energy I have attempted to supress and repress my entire life. It is something that is very uncomfortable for me. Shame is a twisting feeling in my gut that makes my body cringe and curl forward. Fear is that which keeps me in fight or flight when there is no actual danger around. I also know that this emotional combo ...just normal human energy...is knotted and tangled inside this human I call "me" because of how I resisted it over the years. The knot I created with this energy is blocking my shakti. It is is blocking my life energy. Sigh!
Reacting to these knotted energies
Shame and fear are not the problem. They are just normal human emotions that flow in and out of our experiences. They are just energy and like all energy they want to move freely. Left alone...they will not last. They will be like a breeze blowing through two open windows, not always pleasant as they are blowing through but important to the human experience. They are not the problem.
The problem is what we tend to do with them. We trap them inside under heavy rock layers of samskaras...experiences we did not let pass through us like breezes but shut the windows on once they were in. So, shame and fear are trapped in most of us because we do not want to experience them. Like all energy they want out and are constantly rumbling and tumbling inside us, triggered by life events. They slip through the cracks of our stuffed stuff, come to the surface, feel terrible, so we push them back down. We also stuff so many other emotionally charged experiences on top of them. And these emotions continue to swirl around getting all tangled up in each other forming knots as they try to be released. What a mess. This mess makes life difficult. It keeps us from experiencing the peace that is ours to experience.
What have I done all these years to endure these knots of shame and fear I have within me and the combo's toxic nature, to deal with these thoughts and their associated feelings? I have done what most of us do. I buried the thoughts and the memories they came from. These thoughts are not on the surface...they are deep core beliefs hidden beneath layers of superficial self- concept, self-esteem thinking. With the buried thoughts is the buried emotional energy always wanting to be released.
Besides putting great, great effort into holding them down, which is exhausting, I also did whatever I could to control the external world so it wouldn't bump into this emotional energy duo. I avoided the wrath of the inner voice originally responsible for these thoughts. I was quiet. I didn't speak out. I put myself down before others could. I tried to stay in the background. I didn't "show off". I was "nice and quiet" so people, if they couldn't like me, would at least not get mad at me. I pleased. I also did my best to avoid situations where I would not be in the limelight or asked to "perform" in front of others. I did that most of my life but that was very difficult. I still got called out. I still got rejected and criticized as we all do in life. My samskaras still got triggered.
From Shame to Redemption
So, at one point I convinced myself that there were two extremes to this scenario: I could continue to try to stay hidden which was proving to be next to impossible, or I could create a persona of being "extra special" so that it was okay to be seen. Maybe I could share myself while avoiding rejection or wrath, if I was really good at doing certain things. I was trying to redeem myself from shame. I was on a mission of self-redemption. I set out to do more, be more, appear more. I tried to "help" more than the average person would. I became a nurse and later went on the educational path to become a psychologist (though I did not stay on that path). I couldn't seem to redeem myself in these ways so I said I would try seeking redemption in other areas: writing, speaking, teaching. I studied writing, and I wrote. I studied how to speak through Toastmasters, and I spoke. I studied how to educate, and I educated. When I was in the lime light redeemer ego would feel only momentary relief or even pride before I realized I was standing in the firing line for rejection and criticism...not so much from others...but from myself. Even if they are initially flaunted, I would/ will often pull back my accomplishments, diminish them, hide them, not allow them to be exposed and seen. I might create something with the greatest intention...with nothing but pure intention...and I know in my core it is mean to be shared but will feel such shame if I do. My job here is not for "ego glory" I will chastise myself, "but to help others."
Shame About Not Helping Enough.
I studied how to help, and I helped. I studied a lot and spent a great deal of my life in formal and informal learning scenarios. I helped others but while helping others in my professional, parental, familial, community and universal roles there were so many beings I couldn't help. There were always people and animals I couldn't help. And even when I put great energy into helping certain individuals or beings I never seemed to help them enough. It would often get turned around onto me and I or others would perceive that not only was I not doing anything right, I was hurting others. That triggered the greatest resurfacing of shame and fear in me. It seemed to be an endless battle.
No wonder why we resist!
Another Approach: Responding to the Arising of Samskaras rather then Reacting
So, when the feeling emerged in me this morning...when that emotional energy that wants nothing more than to be released was disturbed and started to make its way up into consciousness...my first reaction was...and I could almost visualize it happening... to push it back down.
I didn't. I decided to allow and welcome it to the surface. And it was a totally different ball game with willingness and welcome in the picture. It started with some superficial thoughts about the student, the book I wrote, my sister -in-law. I felt the physical reaction. I allowed it and called whatever was beneath this to come up. Shame and fear came up and I welcomed them. I visualized myself hugging these big blobs of moving colour one by one. I heard the core thoughts in my head that they brought with them. I recognized where those thoughts came from. I really felt what was in my body as it intensified and this urge I had to suppress and repress it emerged but I didn't. I just sat there with the experience. The thoughts slipped to the background and there was just the feeling. I allowed it. I spoke to it, "It's okay...you just do what you have to do."
And it passed.
Hmm!
There are no psychological needs [when we are open and free of samskaras]
We all need to, as Singer suggests, look deeply beyond this conversation or fight we have with the mind to supress or soothe these feelings that are coming up and ask instead "why" are they there. We need to get to the point where we say, "I am ready to stop stuffing more in here."
I think I am ready...finally. I hope you are too.
All is well in my world!
Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( January 23, 2025) Learning to Channel Lower Energies. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujIdIyvVAvY&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=1&t=2466s
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