Waking Up in a Busy World: Getting Beyond the Fifth Force: Will

Letting go of yourself means being God dancing with creation.

Michael A. Singer

Besides electromagnetism, gravity, weak nuclear force, and strong nuclear force, Michael Singer tells us there is another energy: Will/ volition/intention. It is the fifth force, the inside force. Will is a force that can oppose anything, a force with great power that we often, unknowingly, use against ourselves in the creation of samskaras.

To understand this force and how it operates inside the human form, like any of the other forces of science, we need to understand energy.

Everything in this world has its nature...its certain essence at the foundation of what it is. This nature or essence is energy, and all energy is meant to flow through. The energy of all things that unfold before the human form is meant to be experienced by the Observer. It is supposed to come into the body and mind , be felt, and then released. The energy of the phenomenon which is unfolding in front of us at any given minute is meant to come in through our senses so that which is at the center of who we really are...Consciousness or Awareness... can experience it. That is what the body is for...it a sensing vehicle that allows the awareness to travel around this playground called Earth in...while it experiences it all through us. Once fully experienced and processed, the energy is meant to flow right through, be released. So, this is the purpose of our human lives: to be a spacesuit for consciousness to explore this world with. ...to be an open conduit for energy to pour through

So, what exactly is the body, as a spacesuit, able to take in to allow for this experience?

It is the energy of that thing...the essence of it that is of upmost importance to the felt experience of living. We obviously do not take in the physicality of an experience. The body takes in its vibrating energy in the form of sound waves and then the mind interprets it. When listening to someone play the piano, the pianist or piano obviously do not come into our bodies. The vibration of the music the pianist is playing on the piano enters through the sense organs of hearing. The mind then interprets its nature...forming a sensation of pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral...creating an experience. All experience is energy and energy is everything. The mind, however, where the powerful force of Will is created...has the power to oppose this energy. And that is where the problems come in.

How should it be in an ideal human experience of living?

All experiences could be beautiful in neutrality. The vibration of music could be beautiful...be it a harsh cacophony of clanging, uncontrolled cords...or a soft soothing masterpiece... if mind didn't judge it and the force of Will didn't always do Mind's bidding based on these judgements.

What gets in the way of us having these open experiences?

Will. Mind judges, especially if it is riddled with samskaras as most personal minds are, the energy that comes in from events, other people, things, emotions, thoughts, and circumstances as "good or bad, right or wrong", or something that "should be or shouldn't be". Then Will might be ordered to oppose the natural nature of that energy trying to flow through, blocking it from doing so, creating samskaras. The energy may not pass through because Will got in the way.

So, what is wrong if energy of experience doesn't pass through?

All energy, including the energy of emotion (energy in motion) is meant to move through. That is the nature of energy. Think of electricity, the powerful first force understood by science. Electricity is meant to continuously move through things. It is a current. If someone gets electrocuted, there is an entrance wound and hopefully an exit wound in the body, showing how that charge not only entered but how it has moved through and out. Otherwise, there is a problem. When that charge that is meant to flow through doesn't exit but gets trapped inside the body, it will continue to move looking for a way out doing all types of internal damage, creating a mess inside. When the energy of life experience doesn't pass through us, and gets trapped or stored inside the body and mind, it does damage and it creates a mess.

What if the Mind judged the experience as pleasant, does it still create a mess?

Yes. Let's go back to the music scenario. Once mind makes an interpretation that the music was very pleasant, and then makes the decision to accept and allow, or even cling to that sound because it is so soothing to the samskara loaded personality, it opens us enough so a bit of Chit Shakti ...our joyful, peaceful, blissful and love-filled eternal, internal energy from within, can flow through. We have a pleasant experience as we listen to the music. We wrongly attribute the cause of that experience to be originating solely from a place "out there"...the piano player at the piano. In reality, the cause of the pleasant experience is that energy is allowed to do what it is inclined to do...move freely. We have the energy of the music vibration entering and moving through the body without too much resistance, and we have the energy of shakti from within able to finally move through us too. We have opened just enough for some of that Shakti to flow through, even if it is only a trickle. That feels good! Now, if the mind judged this experience as really, really pleasant and told Will it was something it wanted to keep experiencing, Will will do its thing. It will oppose the outward flow of this energy. It will push it back down into the body and subconscious mind. We hold onto the energy and we create a samskara...an impression, a pattern of behaving from now on. Hmm? We create an attachment to this experience we judged as pleasant, desire, a craving, a preference for more and we actively seek things that will bring similar vibrations into our environment or vibrations that will remind us of or stimulate that good feeling which we stored inside. We will keep looking for the experience we had when those vibrating chords of music first entered our experience. Through Will, the omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipresent power of Our Consciousness will be narrowed down to an outside search to fulfill personal mind's request, "I need more of that." We have built a samskara, an impression and a pattern of behaving. This tendency is going to be one of "desire" which the Buddha Himself said was the cause of suffering. This never ending seeking to quench a thirst that will never be quenched by anything out there, will definitely create some problems inside.

What happens when the mind judges it as unpleasant?

When the mind judges something as undesirable, it may resist it, creating an even bigger mess inside. . . Now if the mind interprets the clanging cacophony of sound as very unpleasant...unpleasant to the point it says "I can't handle this! And I don't want anymore of this stuff coming in!" Will will do what it does. It will attempt to resist that vibration from coming in and go through the motions of doing so. It will stand on guard and close the heart to that vibration. Of course, if you already heard the music, no matter how much you put your hands over your ears, how much you look away, avoid, deny, numb... what happened has already happened. There is no changing that reality. The vibration is already inside you. Will will then push that experience down below the level of conscious awareness, so we don't have to deal with it, through a process of suppression and repression. We will not fully experience it. We formed another samskara to add to all the others. That charge of energy has entered but it didn't leave. There is no exit wound...and therefore it is circling inside looking for a way out. The Mind will then direct Will to do whatever it can to protect us from the resurfacing of this vibrating energy. It will look outwards determining how it will keep us away from all potential triggers. It will focus inward on these samskaras and do whatever it can to keep them down. That isn't fun. And as long as we are closed to what might trigger us out there, we have closed the flow of Shakti from within. We have created tight little lives. Energy is moving creating turmoil but it is not flowing through. It is making a mess inside.

Sigh! So, what do we do?.....

We recognize what the mind tends to do and we work on countering those tendencies. We use this amazing power of Will to release and relax. We stop using it for resisting Life energy and holding it down. We practice staying open and not closing to all Life offers us...so this Shakti can do what it is meant to do, so the energy of Life experience can do what it is meant to do- flow through us!

Hmm! When we do that, when we let go of what is in the way, we will simply be God dancing with creation again.

All is well.