Looking for a Buzz: What Happiness Isn't

Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.
Jim Rohn (https://www.brainyquote.com/topics/happiness)

Our Idea of Happiness

Let's face it, most of us in the west do not have a clue what "happiness" actually means.   We live in a culture that is in constant search for a buzz, a high of some kind that takes us away from the perceived and judged feeling of pain.  We need that feeling so we seek it in everything we do or we constantly grasp for things outside ourselves to provide it. What we want is anything that takes us from having to be still in this moment. That is what we call happiness. Distraction, escaping, numbing and running from the present moment in search for something better is what we tend to do.

The Buzz

We need a buzz...we need a sensation or feeling other than boredom.  Boredom is the first sign we are still and man we cannot be still, can we?

We  get a buzz from the electronics in our hands so we are constantly tweeting, Facebooking, Snapchatting, Instragraming what we want others to believe is this state.  We post the best selfies of the best life and we see only the best pics of others in their best portrayal of the perfect life they want us to envy. Having someone envy us brings a buzz, doesn't it even if what we portray is not a 100% real? Striving to achieve what others seem to have is also buzz inducing. Social media is a perfect supplier of this buzz.

 We get a buzz from activity so we do more, move fast, keep going. We push, push, push, do, do, do, move, move, move.  Heaven forbid we should stop for a minute and see how exhausted we are or to ask even...where it is we think we are going?  The movement is the buzz. It is intoxicating and addictive.

We get a buzz from seeking to achieve or own the "things' of the physical world that  sparkle like diamonds in the distance.  We seek money; we seek material possessions; we seek the best body; we seek the best job, the best houses, the best education, the best social recognition.  We seek the best image, assuming this is happiness.  We reach for the buzz that never lasts when we attempt to  attain any of these things.  If we get them, we just end up needing more like junkies chasing the dragon. We will never sustain that buzz this way.

Is this happiness?

But this is our idea of happiness isn't it? Both Eckhart Tolle in "The end of ego morning star" and Gelong Thibeton in "Choose Happiness" address this need to redefine happiness.  Tolle states that Happiness is a generic term. It differs from culture to culture.  In happiness studies done throughout the world, it is not countries that have so much in terms of material wealth that rate the highest in this area.  In fact , the US and Britain rank 18th and 19th falling below countries like Israel and Costa Rica.  This type of life style pursuit does not bring happiness. (Forbes)

I believe there are  six reasons why we are not as happy as we can and should be.

Reasons for a sense of unhappiness:

1. We confuse ego happiness for real happiness. According to Tibetan Buddhist Monk, Gelong Thubeton True happiness is a state of freedom. In our reckless pursuits for the accumulation of more we take ourselves toward bondage rather than towards freedom. (Satchidananda,2011)We are constantly attempting to add 'more' to our sense of "Me" and "My life": more stuff, more approval, more knowledge,...so much so the "I" gets smothered beneath it.  This is not freedom. This is not happiness.  Happiness is a natural state of true contentment that is always with the deeper I...we just can't experience it if we are buried beneath the 'junk' we accumulated. Happiness then is a freeing ourselves from attachment to  these piles on top of us.  It is not the accumulation of more but the freedom of less attachment that will bring happiness.
2. Endless wanting causes unhappiness. In our constant wanting of the feeling, of the buzz we neglect to experience and know the happiness that is already in us where it has always been.  Our searching outside ourselves for things of the physical world to make us happy, 'the buzz" leads to more and ore unhappiness.  Like drug addicts we can never be satisfied in this type of seeking.(Gelong Thubton)
3. By depending on the unpredictable to provide happiness we will never find happiness.  Let's look at the things of the outside world that we are dependent on to bring us happy.  Money, for example.  We think a certain amount in our bank account will provide happiness.  How realistic is that?  It may bring momentary security and pleasure but sustained happiness?  No.  This money can go just as quickly as it comes in.  We live in a constant state of anxiety trying to ensure we do not lose what we have or trying to make more.  What about the special person who assume  will make you happy?  How predictable is that?  They may leave you.  They may die. You may not be able to find that special person in this lifetime. Things come and go; jobs come and go.  Some days people will love you and other days they won't. Depending on the  unpredictable things of this physical world will not sustain happiness. (Gelong Thubton)
4. A lack of gratitude for what we have.  As long as we are seeking more we are living in a state of deficiency.  We are focusing on what we don't have rather than on what we do have. This causes great unhappiness.  The antidote?  Be grateful for what you do have in your life.
5. We resist the moment as it is right here and right now. The only place happiness can be experienced is in the present moment because that is all there is.  We too often use the moment just as a stepping stone to get to the next moment.  If we are constantly seeking a buzz in the next moment we are not settling into this one. It is almost as if we believe the next moment, which is nothing but a thought in our head, is more important than the moment that we are presently in.
6. We want happiness for the "little me" when it is really all about the greater Self.  Happiness can never be achieved and contained for the ego.  True joy  is not a selfish thing but a selfless one.  If we want happiness we need to put away our question: "What can the world give me that will make 'me' happy?"  for "What can I give to the world to make all happy."

Turning it around

So how do we turn this around so we can experience happiness? We can start by realizing that happiness is freedom.  Then we can stop our endless seeking for things outside the Self. We can see how unpredictable the physical world is and start depending on the true Self within as the provider of happiness. We can practice gratitude and of course we can learn to accept the present moment for all it is. We have to learn to be still. Finally, we can seek to serve the world  rather than expect to be served by it. 

If we do not seek a buzz  from meditation, it can help us do all of these things.

All is well in my world.

References.


Madden, D. ( March, 2018) Ranked: Ten Most Happiest
Countries in the World. Forbes.  Retrieved from;  https://www.forbes.com/sites/duncanmadden/2018/03/27/ranked-the-10-happiest-countries-in-the-world-in-2018/#1a7d178273e9

Thubton, Gelong (2015) Gelong Thubton: "Choose Happiness" 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0wg1Pv0pfM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1B-_qhG_rM

Meeting Pain with Love rather than Judging it with Fear

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.
-Khalil Gibran (https://www.brainyquote.com/topics/pain)

Hmm!  A little more on judging pain.

One of the things we often judge and then do whatever we can to avoid is pain, right?  We don't like pain, discomfort, suffering or any of those thoughts and feelings that go with it.  We resist experiencing it and we resist thinking about it.  We fear it! We may come to  meditation practice with the intention even of 'escaping pain'.

 I know that was one of the reasons why I began meditating.  I wanted to put an end to all those nasty thoughts in my head. Meditation was going to 'clear out the clutter' wasn't it?  It was going to make my mind a blank slate?

How realistic is that? Really?

I learned very quickly that I couldn't end thinking simply by wanting to.  So I told myself I would selectively think, only allowing the good thoughts, the positive thoughts in my mind during meditation practice as well as through the rest of my day.  I put a little guard with a stop sign in my head that would actively halt any negative  thoughts that tried to enter.  The poor guy got trampled within seconds of starting his new job.


The basis of meditation training is not to get caught up in the fruitless mind activity of resisting thinking but to simply become aware of it and bring self back to an experience of less thought. As soon as we tell ourselves not to think painful thoughts, what happens?  Our heads get flooded with them.  If I told you right now not to think of monkeys, what do you think you would suddenly think about?  Monkeys, right? Resisting anything makes it persist.  Resistance of  painful thoughts creates even more painful thoughts.  Resisting the experience of pain creates more pain.  Hmmm!


What determines a painful thought or experience and the need for resistance? Perception!!!  A Course in Miracles teaches, I see all things as I would have them be. (ACIM-W-312). I will see and experience things as I think they are.  It goes on to say,Perception follows judgment.  Having judged, we therefore see what we would look upon. (ACIM-W-312:1:1-2) .  The real problem with perception is judgment.  We are judging things as bad or good, acceptable to our experience of living or not acceptable.   "Pain" is a judgment.

Breaking Down the Judgment

Let's examine the judgment we made about pain that determines our perception and experience of it. What is pain anyway?  Is it really something to be avoided? Is pain really the opposite of happiness?

I watched a wonderful little video of a lecture yesterday on meditation by a Buddhist monk named Gelong Thubeton (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vTviVkFJzM).  In that video he stressed that the  discomfort we feel is actually the key to happiness and compassion rather than something to be avoided in meditation practice as well as daily life. When we embrace pain as we do all our emotions we open up to something big. By expanding our awareness around all feelings, dropping the story line and relating with compassion to that emotion we will meet a feeling of kindness and love toward self and others. Allowing pain can actually take us to happiness.

His biggest piece of wisdom offered in that video was to meet pain with love.

Meeting Pain with Love

How do we meet pain with love instead of fear?  By dropping the judgment of it as something that should be avoided, we allow pain and painful thoughts to be. We become observers of those things, aware of them like maternal figures watching children.

 In our meditation practice we can allow all thoughts to be without resistance, without fighting or struggling against them.  Just let them enter our moment knowing they can bring us into that place where we really want to be. They bring us back again and again with our awareness, our gentle  maternal observance.The more we allow pain the more we learn we are not the pain but simply observers of it.

If pain (and painful thinking) is met with love rather than resistance we make friends with reality and that brings us joy. (Gelong Thubeton). If we all could simply allow pain and learn from it the world would be a better place.

I have no purpose for today except to look upon a liberated world, set free from all the judgments I have made.  (ACIM-W-312: 2:1)

All is well.

References

ACIM

The Power of Conscious Awareness/Gelong Thubeton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vTviVkFJzM

No Comment!

Judgment was made to be a weapon used against the truth.ACIM-W-311:1:1

Mental Commentary and Judgment

One of the many remaining issues I have in this awakening process is in my challenge to say "No comment" to the roving reporters in my mind. I find myself commenting on what I am experiencing to others and to my self.  Not only that I am judging things as good or bad still.  For example I may be walking in the woods on a beautiful day, determined to be peaceful.  In that short little hike of a few minutes duration,  I will too often catch myself saying, "Oh this is lovely.  Look at that beautiful tree; the sound of chickadees is so lovely.  This is good...this is such a good experience and I like it so much.  I am so grateful for it. This day  is a wonderful thing."

What's wrong with commenting on what's right with the world?

While I am commenting on anything I am doing two things that take me away from the present moment.
 1)  I am judging things as good or bad and in a sense determining what is acceptable and what isn't
 2)  I am observing, following, experiencing thought rather than experiencing Life.

The Problem with Judgment

As soon as we judge anything we set up the premise of what is acceptable or what isn't in our minds.  If something is pleasant we are open to it, allowing it into our experience.  We also set up a precedent for what we will do when the opposite occurs.  For example, if during that walk , all of a sudden a storm came pounding down on me, I get sprayed by a skunk or fall and seriously hurt myself...what then?  How would the commentary go then?..."Oh My God!!!! This is terrible. I can't believe this happened. This day sucks!"

The day isn't wonderful and the day doesn't suck...it just is.

Judging things as good or bad, right or wrong, worthy or not worthy take us away from truth...from the 'isness' of the moment we are in.  Judgments  are very selective guards that determine what we allow into our moments and what we actively resist.  Good things can come in and bad things will be beaten out of there with a lot of "Oh No!" It is a very conditional way of living and it takes us from our moments rather than towards them.

All things in the moment are worthy of being expressed.  Our acceptance of all this as simply being what it is...is the only way to truly experience life and find peace.

Observing Thought is not Experiencing Life

As long as I am commenting and narrating my way through Life...I am stuck in words, thoughts, stories and not truly experiencing Life.  Remember that thoughts  are the clouds and we are the sky. The clouds can obstruct the presence that is us...the present moment from being fully embraced.

There is a Taoist story that I cannot cite exactly because I only have it in my head at this point.

 In a monastery long ago there lived this esteemed Tao master and his many disciples.  The master liked to walk every evening as a form of meditation and he would take one of his worthy disciples with him on the walk.  He had one rule...that no one, no one talk at all during the walk. 

One day he chose one of the newer but promising disciples to come with him and pleased as punch the young disciple happily went along.  As they were walking, reaching the top of the hill they came across the most magnificent sunset ever witnessed.  It was outstanding. The young disciple gasped at the beauty of it and uttered, "What a beautiful sunset." To which the master responded by turning around and walking back to the monastery leaving the disciple where he was. 

Later the disciple was told that he would never walk again with the master because he broke the rule.  Feeling sorry for the young man, one of the other monks approached the old master and said, "Surely you can forgive the boy, he only uttered one sentence.  It seems like a pretty unfair rule to have in the first place. He was, after all, just commenting on something beautiful."

The master refused to concede and said instead, "As long as he is commenting on something beautiful, he is not experiencing something beautiful. If he comments on the sunset  he is watching his words not the sunset."  When we comment on the moment, we are not living it. We are watching the clouds instead of experiencing Life as the sky.

So the next time ego holds a microphone to your mouth asking you to comment on something that is happening around you or in you, simply say, "No comment!" and get back into the moment that can not be experienced  with words.

All is well.

Timelessness is Fearlessness

The joy that comes to me is not of days nor hours....ACIM-W-310:1:3

There is no room in us for fear today, for we have welcomed love into our hearts.ACIM-W-310:2:4

The End of Suffering is Now

I have conceived of time in such a way that I defeat my aim.  If I elect to reach past time to timelessness, I must change my perception of what time is for. ACIM-W-308:1:1-2

So , while still on the topic of suffering, and while I am thinking of an old Tina Turner tune where I slip  'time' in where 'love' should be,"What's time got to do with it?" ...I ask the question:  What does time have to do in relation to our experience of suffering?

What is time?

In 1905 Einstein defined time as a reading on a perfectly synchronized clock located at the same position as the event,(http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/www/),


What is time besides the tick -tocking, hand sweeping momentum of an instrument created by the human race to measure some misunderstood phenomenon devised by the same race and labelled as time? Whew!  That was a mouthful to read out loud.  Probably should have used a different instrument too, for symbolic purposes.  Some younger readers, if there are younger readers,  may not even know what an analogue clock is lol.

What is time for?

I don't think we truly realize  that time is just some theory we created to help us understand the process of  Life.  It is a mental construct, that's it, an idea, but it in itself is not real. Does this theory help us understand Life or does it take us further away from full understanding of it?


When we think of time we think of all the yesterdays of the past and all the tomorrows of the future, don't we?  We rarely think of now. Past and future become our mental focus then ...and therefore it becomes our life. Time keeps us trapped in what happened before and what might happen in the future so that we don't experience the now.  Technically, because of our reliance on time, we don't recognize, savour, experience the present moment where life really exists, where life only exists.  We live in our tormented and delusional ego minds instead. And we suffer.

The Past

In this moment...instead of simply savouring life, we too often dig up  and relive (in our minds only)past memories of all the wrongs that were done to us back then...all the mistakes, all the mistreatment, all our sins and the sins of others. Or we ruminate over the passage of this imaginary time and regret what we have lost,  attempting to cling  to all the sweet things of the world that came and went through those ticking hand motions of the clock. Sometimes we long  to go back to a time we felt joy, safe or loved or use those memoriesas if they were precious stories we can distract from the now with. We do not connect to where we are right now, right here when we do that.

The past is not real.  What ever went on back then is gone. Those moments cannot be physically relived.  In this moment, the past is just thought.  So when we are living in a memory be it one that brings joy or one that brings pain we are not truly embracing Life, are we? We are simply stuck in our minds.

The Future

We may also use time  to escape the present moment and its reality that we just find too hard to accept for some reason.  We may project notions about living into the future so life becomes an idea rather than a reality. We try to live in that future fantasy. We are even encouraged to do so with some of 'manifesting' instruction out there.   We fantasize, imagine, hope, plan for, work for, strive for and anticipate a better life than this moment has to offer.  "Things will be better when..." we tell ourselves. "When I get there, When I achieve that...When I find my true love...When he changes...When she changes...When Life becomes easier etc etc".... I will live then.  So we hold our breath, close our eyes to the moment we are in and we wait to live.

Or we may dread the future. We may worry over, fret over, become sick over what may or may not happen in a time that isn't real.  When tomorrow comes it will be today.  When the next moment comes, it will be the moment. There is no future anywhere but in our minds.  We spend our present moment in our heads suffering over something that isn't real. That's not living.

The Now

Is the only Life you have.

The instant is the only time there is. ACIM-W-308

Is Time responsible for Suffering

Yes!  Ego loves our attachment to time.  It needs us to stay in our minds, the only place it can exist.  It wants us anywhere other than in the moment, here and now, because if we are present it can not survive.  Ego is the antithesis of presence just as the now is the antithesis of past and future.

Most importantly fear is ego's fuel and fear depends on past and future to expand and grow. As long as we are hooked on time ego can be fueled by fear. It is fear that makes us retreat away from here and now, to hide, run, numb, distract and defend and attack. It is these things that cause our greatest suffering.  In attempt to use these external things to escape suffering , we create even greater suffering for ourselves and the world.

Can we be saved from time and from suffering?

The only interval in which I can be saved from time is now. ACIM-W-308:1:4

The now will save us. The now equates to timelessness. It is in timelessness we will be free of fear

How?

 We can come back to the here and now.  We will never enter it if we are stuck in mind time.We can come down from our heads and into our bodies and our hearts.  We can enter the present moment from there. We find the timelessness that will set us free.

What is the  opposite of this fear that causes so much of our suffering? Love.

And love is ever-present, here and now. -ACIM-W-308:1:8

Suffering

Only in our body, with its heart and mind, can bondage and suffering be found, and only here can we find true liberation.
-Buddha (https://www.azquotes.com/author/37842-Gautama_Buddha/tag/suffering)

There is so much perceived suffering in the world. I question why I am being reminded so acutely of that again and again lately.

I dealt with it last evening in another individual who remains in my son's life long after it is healthy for either of them and believe me when I say it isn't healthy. The pain I seen; the pain I heard and the pain I felt just sat in my chest like a ten ton brick.  I wanted to help but realized there was so little I could do but listen and make myself available. 

Not that I underestimate or diminish the healing power of true listening and presence but I had this overwhelming desire to take the pain away. We can't take the pain away from other people. We can absorb it though like I seemed to do. 

I got through the communication session well.  I played the part I have been self and professionally trained to play in these circumstances and I also staid sincerely present. I got through the rest of the day okay too but woke up at five feeling drained and yet not able to sleep. That experience was clinging to me like similar experiences do, making me feel so heavy. I felt so sad for her.  I felt so sad for him.  I just felt so very sad.

Then I asked the universe, "Why are you giving me this pain to witness on top of everything else?  What am I to do with this realization of suffering in others?"  I will ask the question again in meditation later on  and see what comes up.

It dawned on me that there is no such thing as coincidence and that everything happens for a reason so I know I am supposed to do something with this.  The 'doing' doesn't have to be anything elaborate or concrete but there is something. This suffering I witness is a part of my experience for a reason.

Maybe all I am to do is recognize, allow it and express my experience of it.  Or maybe I am to do something more grandiose and big.  I don't know.  I will keep ego down and out of the way until the directions for  inspired action comes.

One thing for sure though is there is a way through suffering whether we experience it directly or indirectly.  That healing takes place in the same place the suffering started... in the mind.

All is well in my world

Fear

If you do not get to know the nature of fear, you will never know fearlessness.
-Pema Chodron

According to Buddhist teaching, the enlightened one is said to be completely fearless.  Are you completely fearless? I know I am not.  Fear is the one thing that will likely be the most challenging for me to overcome in this awakening process.  I fear a lot of things and unfortunately I still fear letting go.

I am in the process now of understanding what fear is so I can transcend it.  (Thus the book I wrote: Beyond Fear and Shame, There is Love.) This little video I came across where Pema Chodron is lecturing students on how to become fearless helps. (see below).

Understanding fear involves understanding ego. Ego wants us to numb and avoid anything uncomfortable.  According to Chodron, the definition of ego is trying to get away from direct experience. Addiction and our mind numbing activity, our habit of over thinking is all of the ego.

She suggests to attain fearlessness we need to place fear in the cradle of loving kindness[maître], which is one of the four limited wants of Buddhism. (The other three are compassion, joy and equanimity.) Loving kindness will help us to understand fear, accept it and then heal from it.

All is well in my world.

Have a look:

Pema Chodron: Once you get this, then everything will change.(full lecture). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EznAKT3L_zM

Each moment is completely fresh.  It never happened before and it will never happen again.
-Buddhist teaching

Okay...this moment happened before lol.  I have not been shooting so I have no fresh pics to put up. Repeat!! :(

Whose Will?

Let me not make another will, for it is senseless and will cause me pain.
-ACIM-W-307:1:3

We often cling to this idea of free will and are convinced  that choosing our own will, which must be the opposite of God's will, will free of us from the chains of unhappiness.  So we set out on our independent treks to make our own choices, to determine our own paths and create our own destiny.

We have the power.    We do not need God's Will to live in ego's world.  In fact, it is contraband. We got this!!!  Do we really?

 As soon as we stub a toe, however, what do we do?  Do we not automatically call out to God or  curse and swear at the Universe/Source/God/ Divinity  for putting that boulder in our way? Do we not look up to the heavens when things get tough and ask  "Why are you doing this?"  We expect and demand that things be the way we will them to be. If they are not Life is at fault, God is at fault. We are so quick to blame God, aren't we?  Is that taking accountability for our choice of  will?

So far...looking back at the history of man kind, what has man's will over God's Will, gotten the human race?  A lot of war,  a lot of resistance, a lot of greed, a lot of planetary destruction and a lot of suffering?  Has man achieved collective 'happiness' and peace by making a conscious stand against God? Hmmm...do you think it is working for us?

There is only one Will and that is  "God's will' (or whatever you call that Divine Essence of Everything that exists beyond the mess we have made in our minds as ego followers) .  It isn't God that is making things challenging for us...it is our resistance to letting go and letting God that does that.  God brings happiness to  us.  God brings  peace because that is basically all there is. Your Will alone can bring me happiness, and only Your Will exists. ACIM-W-307:1:4

When we follow our own will, or ego's will, we are simply putting a deep dense fog over that truth.  It's delusional.  It's insane. It does not bring happiness.  It takes us farther away from it.

Free will then is this: you have a choice to accept God's Will for you or ego's will.  What's it going to be?

All is well

Beyond the Shield of Conditioning

The one thing or the no thing that never leaves you is the essence of the here and now.
-Eckhart Tolle (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VysaqZR44VY)

Conditioning (that which we grew up to believe is real)  can be a thick and heavy filter through which we see and make sense of  the world. We often perceive based solely on that conditioning. There is, however,  a stillness that exists behind our sense perceptions. 

 This stillness is presence.  It  is awareness of that presence that will free us from our chains and make shadows transform into beautiful sunlit reality. 

This stillness never leaves us...we just don't see it.  We are often too busy focusing on what we can  see and sense with other physical senses,  before determining that to be all there is. We build stories and dramas around that judgment and see ourselves as characters in them.  

It all seems so real, important to so many of us  ...that never ending stream of fear filled 'unconsciousness'.  We identify with that not realizing that All that is essential is invisible (Tolle).

Just because we cannot see it or wrap our fingers around it doesn't mean it isn't real.  Presence, consciousness, is very, very real and it is who we are.

So no matter what happens around us or to us; no matter what story we tell ourselves or other people ...who we really are is something  that is never effected or changed by our limited version of reality.  The sooner we realize that and decide to live in the conscious presence of this stillness... the sooner we can step out of the caves we have created.

And it doesn't matter what the shadows are doing.  They aren't real. We can leave them behind any time for light.

Today I can forget the world I made. Today I can go past all fear, and be restored to love and holiness and peace.  ACIM-W-306:1:2-3

References

ACIM

Tolle https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VysaqZR44VY

Shadow Symptoms

There is a dimension in every human being that has not been effected by what happens.
-Eckhart Tolle

Shadows and Body Focus

My body is feeling the effects of my perception of external stress.  The shadows on my wall are really freaking out, let me tell ya and I am allowing it to get to me.  Despite all the work I do, I have this perception that my hands are chained behind my back and I can't even move my head. The crazy voodoo dance those shadows seem to be doing in the firelight, cursing the heck out of me, becomes my reality. :)

I had another cardiac episode last evening. (I know  it was a cardiac episode. It is what it is. ) Anyway...I nearly went down again.  What a sickening feeling that is. 

By the time I made it to the chair and was able to take my blood pressure ( yes...despite my giving  up on outside help... I will still monitor my blood pressure when I am that symptomatic but only when) ...it was 70/54...which is not that bad.  It has been much lower at other episodes... but low enough to make me feel pretty crappy. 

I didn't faint!!! I had a lot of thumping in my chest  that led to chest pain but I did come around without too much intervention other than the head between the legs until I could make it to the bed  and put my feet up. I feel a little off this morning but much better.

Taunting shadows

Why am I sharing all this boring 'body' information with you? It relates to what we were talking about yesterday.  The symptoms were more than just my body's reaction to my perceived stress. They were like shadows that taunted and teased me with reminders of all I have been through with my health seeking journey. You are really sick and you  will never get outside help for this, is what they are mouthing in my direction. Your heart will eventually fail and you will die and someone somewhere  will make up some excuse.  Your loved ones will suffer the same fate.

Like those prisoners in Socrates  cave,  it feels like my hands are tied.  I cannot seem to do anything but watch these damn shadows dance around in front of me until I can watch no more.  The fact that I am watching them reminds me that I haven't let go, that I am still caught up in the drama and the story...that I am still over identifying with my body.  The fact that I am writing about it now for others to read is also ego's way to draw others into the drama of it all. I am reminded of ego's presence in my mind once again.

Egoic Reaction

My reaction to these symptoms, these shadows is totally egoic when it doesn't have to be. There is something in me somewhere that is not effected by what happens to me or around me.  There is something in me that can never be chained in darkness.  There is something in me that can never be sick or worried.  There is something in me that knows that Life is much more than shadows on a wall.

My chains are things ego created to keep me staring at the wall and stuck in my 'body limitation'.  It doesn't want me to see there is a way out of this cave, that there is sunlight and much more to 'see' and experience in that light.

So if it is ego who put me here, who will take me out?

Those yielding diagnostic ability? No.  Anyone or anything outside of me?   No.  The only thing that will free me is a change of mind. As the mind so the person; bondage or liberation are in your own mind.(Satchidananda, page 5). 

I do not have to watch these shadows dance their crazy dances. I can find that part of me that remains unaffected , beyond this limited perception. The peace of stillness and awareness within me can carry me out of here to a world worth seeing.

And all the world departs in silence as this peace envelopes it, and gently carries it to truth, no more to be the home of fear. ACIM-W-305:1:3

All is well.

ACIM

Sri Swami Satchidananda (2011) The Yoga sutras of Patanjali. Yogaville: Integral Yoga

Perception is a mirror and a wall full of shadows

Perception is a mirror, not a fact.  And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.
-ACIM-W-304:1:3-4

Do you believe that above quote from A course in Miracles?  Whether you are a student of A Course or not, does anything in that statement ring true to you? Is it the first time you heard such a 'preposterous' 'New Age idea lol?

It is not the first time I heard it and my introduction of it certainly didn't from any 'New Ager'.  I remember reading The Allegory of a Cave in an introductory philosophy class (I won't say how many years ago) during my university years. If you haven't read it and care to do so I enclosed a link below.

Though the point Socrates was trying to make was how knowledge can be blinding and  socially destructive if forced upon a person or taught too fast....I was stuck on  Plato's interpretation and the question that arose, "Why do these prisoners believe the shadows are real?"

These prisoners, many  believed represent souls caught in an illusionary world dependent on  their five senses ...their very limited physical perception...to determine their reality.  They  were conditioned to believe in  their very restricted , chained states that the shadows were all there was.  They didn't know there was more beyond what they could presently perceive.  The shadows reflected off the wall were everything.

We only see what our mind allows us to, be they shadows on a cave wall reflected by a fire light behind us or real images in sunlight.

What if we could take ourselves and other people from this limited perception out into the light?  What would happen to perception then?   It may take time for us  to let go of  old beliefs and perceptions, to actually adjust and see with different eyes what is really there...but it would be worth a few burnt corneas wouldn't it? To get to truth?

The point is perception is just a mirror or in this case a wall...reflecting shadows.  Let's open people up to the real vision.  Let's remove their chains, and take them into the light of Truth. Let's change the collective  state of mind so the world changes.

Hmmm!

Read:


The Allegory of the Cave: https://web.stanford.edu/class/ihum40/cave.pdf

https://faculty.washington.edu/smcohen/320/cave.htm





https://faculty.washington.edu/smcohen/320/cave.htm

Don't Mind what Happens

Man throughout the ages has been seeking something beyond himself, beyond material welfare-something we call truth, or God or reality, a timeless state-something that cannot be disturbed by circumstances, by thought or by human corruption.
-Krishnamurti ( https://www.brainyquote.com/authors/jiddu_krishnamurti)

The Non-Guru's Secret

Jiddu Krishnamurti stood before the crowd. "Do you want to know my secret?" he asked.  His small frame seemed to expand on stage with every word he spoke.

The room  became very quiet.  The scattered minds of many followers stopped what they were doing and focused on the figure on the stage. Hushed and anxiously anticipating the words,  the crowd that was  falling at his feet for decades to hear, held their collective breath and waited.  Their guru who never wanted to be their guru, always teaching that man must be his own source of truth, was about to share the  secret to living a life of wisdom, peace and vitality.

With a gentleman's  British accent the aging Indian born  man said, "This is my secret.  I don't mind what happens."

I don't Mind what Happens

What does that mean and why is that such a great secret? Krishnamutri never really elaborated on those words.  Maybe the wisdom in them is beyond elaboration with mere explanation  but heck I need something to write about so I am going to try.

I believe he offered an invitation to accept life for what it is without resistance.  Sure crap is going to happen to us and around us but do we really have to 'mind' when it does?  Do we have to freak out and get caught up in the drama of it?  Do we have to get caught up in the 'mind' at all?

Not minding what happens is a detachment, I believe, from the busy chatter of ego and the never ceasing demands and promises of the physical world.  It is a knowing that nothing 'out there' in the world of form (which includes body and mental activity) can break us or make us.  Passing clouds...that's all it is...passing clouds.

He summarized so many spiritual, psychological, philosophical teachings in one short little statement of how he maintains peace, "I don't mind what happens."

What would our lives be like if we didn't mind what happened?  What would the world be like?

All is well.

References and reading suggestions

Burkeman, O. (August 2013) This column will change  your life: the guru who didn't believe in gurus. In The Guardian.com.  Retrieved from     https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/aug/10/stop-minding-psychology-oliver-burkeman

Tolle, E. (June 2015) Not Minding what Happens. In Awaken.org. Retrieved from http://www.awakin.org/read/view.php?tid=2089

We thought we suffered...Now we see that darkness is our own imagining, and light is there for us to look upon.
-ACIM-W-302:1:3,5

Perception and Addiction

Unless I judge I cannot weep.  Nor can I suffer pain, or feel I am abandoned or unneeded in the world.
-ACIM -W-301:1:1-2

Oh what a tangled web we weave 

I am thinking of  those famous words from Sir Walter Scott's poem, Marmion.  Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.  The word "perceive" would also substitute for deceive and apply beautifully in today's topic about addiction.

I have been dealing with and thinking about the  conundrum of  life threatening drug addiction, any addiction really.  What causes it?

Many of us, as humans,  feel pain from time to time.  It sucks to have to do so. We naturally want relief from the pain...so we look to something outside ourselves to 'numb' it with.  If we find something that  works  we do it again the next time we feel pain, and the next and the next.  And then fearing future pain we begin to numb before we have to feel its dreaded and much avoided presence in our lives. We begin to use the substance or activity to avoid pain all together.

We easily become very attached to our choice of relief and pain prevention. It becomes a lover we do not want to lose.  We fear that it may be taken from us and jealous and obsessed  we cling with all our might.  We may resort to lying, cheating, stealing and God knows what else just to keep that numbing relief in our day to day existence. This leads to more and an increased need to do.  We need more and more of that thing to get the numbing effect.  We create a massive tangled web around our lives and the lives of those we love when we do.  This is addiction.

So what are the issues that lead to addiction, in spiritual terms?

Most people would be quick to say that 'pain' is the cause of addiction.  Would you say that? A person who uses,  abuses or partakes in any type of numbing activity is usually seeking to relieve pain, right?  It is true that many opiate addictions begin with a need for physical pain relief.  Many people reach for the bottle when they are depressed.  Even in recreational use, a person reaches for an addicting thing in order to relieve the pain of boredom.  We naturally just want to relieve pain and feel better. Correct? So pain definitely has a part to play in the creation of addiction. But is it the cause of addiction?

Does Life cause addiction?

To say that pain causes addiction is to say that Life causes addiction. Every human being has pain at some point in their life, so why isn't every human being an addict? We all have the potential to be addicts but some are said to be more genetically prone to taking substance use to the next level because the way their brains are wired.  That is true but I believe that what makes  our society as a whole  so 'addiction prone' today goes beyond pain and genetics to choice. 

Choice

We all have heard of that choice/illness argument in understanding addiction but when I use the word choice I am referring not so much to the choice to use or not  use but the choice to deny pain or allow it as a part of being human.  I believe the real cause of addiction is our refusal to accept and understand the pain experience for what it is, our resistance to accepting Life for all it is. 

The Choice to Resist Pain

Most of us resist feeling pain and avoid it at all costs! When we resist anything, what happens? It persists and magnifies into some great sense of suffering.  Ego steps in and adds story and identification to it...so the pain becomes a part of you rather than something you are just experiencing. You become an addict...a person addicted to the process of avoiding and resisting anything that you judge as bad.

Judging pain as a bad thing

Every thought is a kind of judgment. Eckhart Tolle (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VysaqZR44VY)

Why do we resist?  We resist because we judge pain as a bad thing.  We are conditioned to believe that it is something we need to prevent or  relieve ourselves and others from right away.  We try to fix it, minimize it, avoid it.  Judging pain as a bad thing is a societal norm.  We judge momentary slips from comfort a bad thing, life events that do not go exactly as we planned as a bad thing, and physical and mental aches and pains as bad things. Instead of just seeing pain as a temporary part of the human experience, we judge it as a bad thing that needs to be avoided or ended right away.

Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to perceive

Could addiction actually be a perception problem? Could it be that we need to examine our need to avoid certain experiences in life that we judge as bad as being the cause of most of our so called suffering?   I believe that pain is not the problem...the avoidance of it is. 

Do we need to examine, then, the way we look at things?  Maybe we need to reconsider our dualistic need to distinguish good from bad. I am compelled at this point to bring you back to Hamlet Act II Scene II Nothing is neither good or bad but thinking makes it so.  (Shakespeare). 

What if we took a second look at the things that cause pain and that we feel so desperate to avoid?  What if that person who was feeling depressed looked differently at depression and seen it not as a never ending thing that would define them but as a temporary physical world experience that they could simply watch themselves pass through?

What if we just learned...truly learned to allow the moment to be as it is and be willing to sit through what it offers, to observe it without fear.  If we stopped resisting just how fleeting and doable would pain become, I wonder? What if we simply learned to sit through our feelings?  I know that sounds so simple but it isn't for about 90% of this population.

Preventing Addiction

Could we not put our energy and focus more into preventing addiction rather than spending so much energy and resources into treating it with things that may actually make it worse?

How would we do that? What if we started teaching our kids at a very early age at home and in our institutions to feel all emotions and to experience the magnificent beauty of all Life's many contrasts?

 Let's put away our good and bad, right and wrong judgments when we speak to them and instead infuse them with the beauty of "it simply is" . What if we stopped teaching them to 'resist', avoid, hide,  pretend, deny  and fight their way through the so called 'bad things' that show up?  Of course...we still need to protect them from the choices of other egos until the world smartens up...but let's not be afraid to show them that Life is worth living with clarity and full awareness, that it is not something they have to numb themselves from. Nothing is either good or bad...

Unless we judge we can not weep...

Please know, that I am not diminishing the drastic life altering effects addiction and certain 'pain' can have on the life of the addict and their loved ones ...believe me, I know how challenging it is.  But Letting go and Letting God is one of the major twelve steps in recovery for a reason, don't you think?  Let's let go of our judgment and start living.

 I'll stop rambling now. 

All is well.

Passing Clouds obscuring the Peace of Now

Only an instant does this world endure....And it is this serenity we seek, unclouded, obvious and sure today.
ACIM-W-300

Hmmm! We think we are 'enduring' a life time when the world itself only has to endure an instant...one little moment.  A moment is all there is.  This moment that we are living in...is all there is. 

There is no past...just thought about it.  There is no future...just thought about it.  This moment...right here...right now...is all there is to endure. The rest is just  'false perception', or 'mental modification'..a passing cloud upon a sky eternally serene.(ACIM-W-300: 1:2)  How beautiful is that?

All thought we have in this moment is not life, is not the world, and it is not us.  It is just a passing cloud over   what is meant to be eternal and serene...the moment.  If we truly want to live we need to embrace the now and whatever it gives us.  We need  to see beyond the cloud that simply covers our eternal serenity. 

Patanjali taught this as well.  In the Yoga Sutras as translated by Sri Swami Satchidananda, it is taught that we are normally and naturally in a peaceful state. "That is the natural condition of the mind.  But these citta vrttis, or the mental modifications of the mind-stuff,  disturb that peace."(Satchidananda, 2011, pg 4)

If only we could get it through our thick, overly conditioned heads, that this moment is all we need to endure.  Recognizing that our thoughts of time, our thoughts of anything really, are just clouds that keep us from experiencing the peace of the here and now; that they are just clouds that obstruct the eternal light ...is healing.  This healing can lead us to eternal peace and serenity. 

Hmm!  Something to think about.

Look beyond the clouds.

All is well in my world.

References:

ACIM, Work Book, Lesson 300

Sri Swami Satchidananda (2011) The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Yogaville: Integral Yoga Publications

Learning from Activation of Pain Body

Rather than being your thoughts and emotions, be the awareness behind them.

-Eckhart Tolle

All Set to Let Go

I am all set to Let go!  I embrace the idea of it. I am in the process of giving up on all the stressors in my life, and miraculously things start to turn around. My loved one with depression has a few much improved days, and another's financial issue gets resolved (with more than a little help from me...I may not be overly assertive when it comes to dealing with my own issues but when it comes to my children...I am a Mama Bear...watch out lol).

More Learning Challenges

I was feeling peace and a relief of circumstantial heaviness as a result .  It was a wonderful feeling that lasted for a day or two...such a welcomed reprieve.  Then Bam! On a day  I am feeling 'physically unwell,'  I find evidence of  addiction induced semi- criminal behaviour in a loved one who ended up under my roof...again... and ...and I have to kick them out...again. I, not everyone maybe, feels an addict has to be held accountable for all behaviour if there is any hope for recovery (and there is always hope)...especially the criminal stuff. I am firm with that.  

At the same time I am dealing with that I get a call from my youngest daughter that she was in an accident .  No one was hurt physically...thank God...but she was quite shaken up.  She totalled the car that was registered and insured under my name. Did I even make my last insurance payment? My heart sank to my knees.

The Return of Ego

Ego just had a field day with me last evening..."Really?  Like...Really?"  I found myself looking up again.  (Why do we look up? lol  Why do we assume that the Divine place with all the answers and miracle inducing capability, as well as all the power for punishment,  is somewhere "up there"?  Even if Heaven was 'up ' we are circling around on an axis...where is up?  Anyway...I digress. )

Ego took over and man was I feeling the effects of S-T-R-E-S-S.  I wasn't fit for company.  I was throwing around a bunch of , "Can you believe this?" and "Why me?'" like crazy.  I was convinced, utterly convinced, in some part under my skull that I was 'cursed'.  I had to be. Or I was really, really bad in some other life time and I was living out some pretty nasty karma.  I was a mad woman.

The Pain Body

Everything I learned to date about not being my life events went out the window.  I was them.  They were me...and I was pissed! No one, no one better tell me to calm down when I am feeling that way, let me tell ya, even though it is exactly what I needed to do. My physical symptoms become very aggravated by emotional stress and tension!

Ego didn't care what was happening in my body. Drama came pouring through the gates  and I clung to it and I flung it around like the monkeys in my mind were flinging around their crap.  I was a mess for a couple of hours, lost in what Eckhart Tolle refers to as the pain body.

Why was I a mess? 

Once again, I confused Life with life events.  Once again, I confused who I really was with this ego of mine, this 'pain body' of mine . These were challenging things to deal with by themselves.  They didn't need ego's interference to make them worse.  If I could have stepped by as the objective observer instead of jumping right in...I would have felt much better.

I let the 'story' get to me...I got lost in it, too identified with it. And these situations  are just parts of a story.  That is what I keep forgetting.  It is just story.  It can be read, observed, felt and expressed but it isn't me. I don't need the drama...and though ego loves it...I don't want it! I have the choice, to simply step back and observe it.

A Little Help is Sometimes Required

The pain body activation taught me something. I am not going to be able to manage all this on my own. My external stressors are too much right now and my little human brain will not absorb much more.  I need help...probably should have gotten it long ago.

 I was reluctant to because I thought I could handle all the things that were landing on my lap  in a 'spiritual' way rather than a 'psychological'.  I strongly, strongly believe that every problem has a spiritual solution. Letting Go.   I will find the means to do so and live that freedom  but maybe...just maybe I need some help sorting out my external stressors, at least enough so that I can become aware of the beliefs behind my response/reaction to them.  I am still clinging to ego induced pain and reaction and resisting peace to some degree.  I  need a little help in letting it all go. There is no shame in that.

Once the pain body has taken you over, you want more pain. You become a victim or a perpetrator. You want to inflict pain, you want to suffer pain or both.  There really isn't much difference between the two. You are not conscious of this , of course, and will vehemently claim that you do not want pain. But look closely and you will find that your thinking and behaviour are designed to keep the pain going. for yourself and others. If you were truly conscious of it, the pattern would dissolve, for to want more pain is insanity, and nobody is consciously insane.
-Eckhart Tolle  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQ32Qycyrww

For a few moments (more than a few lol)  I liked being the tragic heroine in yet another life drama. I wanted the drama.  I got lost in it. What I learned though, through my experience last evening...is that when I can see the pain body in action, step back to watch it, accept it for what it is...it seems to dissolve into nothing.

The moment  you observe it[the pain body], feel its energy field within you, and take your attention into it, the identification is broken. The higher dimension of consciousness has come in.  I call it presence. You are now the witness or the watcher of the pain body...This means it can not use  you anymore by pretending to be you.  Eckhart Tolle  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQ32Qycyrww

All is well in my world.

The Alchemy of Writing

The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words.
-William  H. Gass

I am in love with writing again!  I am in love with the mystical, magical process of it. 

When I look at something I am responsible for, long after I wrote it...I am floored..."I wrote that??  Nahhh...couldn't have." 

But I did...I did and sometimes it is actually quite good lol.  Imagine? 

I am in love with writing.  It is what I am meant to do. :)

I am not too fond of the submission part of this game.  I would love it if  all my stuff, as soon as it is written, as soon as the lead was turned to gold, ended up in homes it is needed most in... making others lives a little more rich and full.  But there is a process to follow and like it or not, as a writer I need to follow it.  :))

And I am after all a writer.

All is well in my world.

A Story about Letting Go of the need for an answer

The answer is never the answer. What's really interesting is the mystery. If you seek the mystery instead of the answer, you will always be seeking. I've never  seen anyone really find the answer-they think they have, so  they stop thinking. But the job is to seek mystery, evoke mystery, plant a garden in which strange things grow and mystery blooms. The need for mystery is greater than a need for an answer.  
-Ken Kesey http://www.artview42.com/ken-kesey-creativity/

I love this quote.  It applies to three categories on my mental map list: my health seeking, my awakening and my writing. The point is:  There comes a point  when we realize it is time to stop looking for a clear cut answer and just let the mystery of Life take over. I will live more peacefully, more healthfully  and write more deeply if I can learn to do that.

There is a story found in that wonderful little book I mentioned before, Experiencing Spirituality: Finding Meaning Through Storytelling, that depicts the value of letting go beautifully. It goes a little like this (paraphrased of course):

The Eagle Feather

There was once a postman who delivered mail on a reservation in Dakota.  One day he overheard some elders talking about receiving objects that bring  great power.  It was said that the greatest such object one could receive from the Creator was an eagle feather. Eagle feathers could bring great power, wisdom and prestige to the person who finds one.

The postman  didn't know much about this stuff but thought to himself, as he delivered his mail from house to house,  how wonderful it would be if he could receive such a gift from above. He was feeling a little down on his luck and himself, and believed a little power, wisdom and prestige would  lift him out of his rut. 

So he set his intentions on receiving an eagle feather. He had heard enough from the elders' conversation to know he couldn't buy one and he couldn't ask anyone to give him one.  It had to come to him spontaneously by the will of the Creator.

So every morning he woke up with this intention, "Today I will find my feather." And everyday he set out on his route with his eyes wide open and his mind in gear.  He looked up and he looked down.  He looked for feathers on the road  and in people's yards.  He thought about feathers almost every minute of every hour of every waking day and he dreamt about them at night. The postman became obsessed with eagle feathers.

He was so focused, so determined and looked so hard that all other things became blurred by his intention. He neglected his other hobbies; he neglected his old friends; and he neglected his loving family.  So focused was he that he lost touch with where and what he was doing  in almost every given moment and only thought of  how powerful, how wise and how well adored he would become once he found that feather.

But the time passed.  And every night as he crawled into bed beside his now unhappy and distant wife, he was featherless.  His wife became colder and colder as the days passed. His children grew up and away from him.  His friends forgot his name. But that didn't seem to matter.  He just became more and more determined to find his feather.  "Just wait until I have my feather ...they will see how it is all worth it when I am powerful, wise and lovable. It will all be good then."  He would tell himself those words and go to bed determined that he would find the feather the next day.

It never seemed to come.  He grew older and the people he loved drifted away with his youth.  Still, there was no feather to show for it.  After a long, long time of searching he finally had to admit to himself that no matter how hard he tried and how much he strived he was no closer to finding the eagle feather than he was on the day he started.

One hot afternoon a few months before  his retirement date, exhausted, defeated and discouraged, the postman suddenly stopped in his tracks. He could not take another step.

Finding some shade under a huge tree he sat on a boulder by the side of the road and wept. "Oh Creator if you are there...I have been foolish, lost in search for something I thought would bring me things I never really needed. My mind was absorbed by something that did not bring me or others peace and my Life whittled away without my being aware of it.  I have wasted my life looking for a stupid feather and have lost so many other "real" things because of it."

The wind blew a lovely breeze through the branches above his head and the man continued. "I am giving up the search.  I am going to stop looking for the feather and start living the bit of Life I have left.  I am not sure if I can make it up to the people I have hurt but I will try.  Oh Creator, if you are indeed real, forgive me for squandering this precious life you have given me. I now let go and let the mystery of You guide my remaining days."

The wind blew again.  This time the breeze flowed right through the postman where he sat,  filling him with the greatest peace he had ever known.  He felt the tension, melting away and leaving his body making him feel younger than he had in years.  His mind became empty and clear of any thoughts of feathers or anything else for that matter. He was at peace.

He sat where he was for a long, long time just being still and quiet in that moment with the peaceful breeze his only companion.  He felt very, very grateful.  He felt very much alive.  He felt more powerful, wise and loved than he had ever felt before.

A shadow passed over head.  Unalarmed he looked up to see a magnificent bird flying high above the branches of the tree, not making a sound, as if gliding on the wind.  He watched in awe as it passed by. 

Seeing that as an omen, the now content postman stood up. Just as he was picking up his bag a beautiful tail feather floated down before his eyes, an eagle feather.  Wisdom, power and Love (the "answer")  only come, he suddenly realized, when we stop looking for them  and start living the Life intended for us in this very moment we are in.

The end!

References

Calloway, M. ( Feb, 2018) ArtView 42 http://www.artview42.com/ken-kesey-creativity/


Kurtz,E. & Ketchman, K. (2014) Chapter: "Wisdom"  in Experiencing Spirituality: Finding Meaning Through Storytelling. New York: Penguin

Letting Go

How gladly does the Holy spirit come to rescue us from hell, when we allow His teaching to persuade the world, through us, to seek and find the easy path to God.
-ACIM-W-296:2:3

 

Hmm! What is the easy path?  I think I may have discovered it. Letting go.

I realized last night as I left my physicians office, a physician who has been so kind to me and my loved ones, that it is definitely time to let go.  I have been fruitlessly seeking  a diagnosis and treatment over way too many years, a diagnosis that I assumed would change my life for the better, that would 'save' me. I now realize I will likely never get it and even if I did it would not save me.  Other validation is not what I need. 

I need something so much more, something 'healing' and life affirming.  The diagnosis, were it to come,  is just something the ego wants...something it can use to validate itself and my story. It will, however, never validate the truth of who I really am.  In fact, it may take me farther from it.

See...life does work out the way it is meant to even if we do not understand it in the beginning.  For so many years I cried out to the universe, to God..."Why are you making this so difficult for me?  You know I am telling the truth about this bodily  experience...why are you not allowing others to see it?"  I resisted and struggled against the reality that others were not able or willing to see it for whatever reason.

If others were to see this minor little truth in the beginning, I would not be where I am right now.  I would be lost beneath even more layers of ego. As soon as I gave up my seeking for and needing this validation...I felt lighter and freer than I have in so very long. Without it and with the struggle of 'enduring' I have come to realize that I am on the wrong path...that there is a much easier path to be on, one that leads to where I really want to be. I want to teach and persuade myself and the world how wonderfully harmonious it all is when we Let Go and Let God.

All is well in my world!

The Body is a Neutral Thing

My body is a wholly neutral thing.
-ACIM-W-294

The Health Category


I am still working on the exercise I started a few days ago and am surprised to see how stuck I am in the area of health.

In the health seeking sub category, I  fear and strongly doubt I  will ever get enough validation and support for anything my body does or doesn't do  to make my circumstances improve. I have spent so many moments of so many years desperately praying for a diagnosis and treatment for my entire family to come through me.  Countless hours of fruitless wishing.  Now, I give up and when I give up I feel guilt because I know in my heart  this is familial. I know what is physiologically happening to me and other family members...but...I cannot stand up anymore to the shaming, assumptions and judgments from the only people I was brought up to believe could help me. I give up on getting sufficient help from  allopathic medicine. I will not seek help in that area anymore for my body, no matter how bad things get.  I just see no point.   There is a wall there and I don't want to even try to get through it anymore. I  do fear to some degree what will happen to me and family members if I don't continue to step up with my complaints. At the same time I accept the consequences and take responsibility for my choices. I remind myself that I and I alone am responsible for my health.

 In the mental health sub category...I know I am burnt out.  I perceive that I " endured"  much more stress than the average person can handle and I can not "fight" anymore. I have myself, as a result,  curled up in my comfort zone with a blanket over my head.  I am not dealing with life circumstances out there...pushing them all aside.  Though I believe that to do lists are ego vices,  I do know that to balance life out there with life in here...one has to do something from time to time.  But I am not doing anything, it seems! I am not dealing with all that has to get done in a healthy way and I need help to do that.

On a Positive Note:  I am Learning

As far as the physical...well I do my best to ignore my symptoms until they get loud enough that I can't.  Then I try to find the learning in them. 

An amazing thing has happened to me in this regard.  I realize that I have learned to detach from periods of physical pain and discomfort and see it as only happening to my body and not to who I really am. ...just my body. This detachment changes the whole experience.  I no longer become the pain or other symptoms  as I used to do.  I just observe it. I can't explain that too much because there are no words to give this experience justice,  but it is a very powerful learning and experience.

Though I still fear what might happen to me to some degree, I experience much less fear than I used to because I truly no longer see my body as me either.  I do not identify with my body in that way anymore. "I am not sick.  I never was."  Whatever happens to my body is not really happening to me. My body is not in the greatest functioning condition maybe, but I am not my body.  I truly see it only as an instrument to help me do what I am here to do. 

I do not panic over what is happening to it or what could happen to it.  I think I could get any  diagnosis right now and be perfectly okay with it. I would simply see it as someone's assessment findings...just like I am told by my mechanic what is wrong with my car. If I took it to a different mechanic I might get a totally different assessment. (I have seen so many mechanics over the years with so many different opinions that ironically led to a 'nothing's wrong' as my body was towed out and away from sight.)

So my thinking is,  "Why bother taking it in  especially when I won't get one answer and therefore one solution to the problem.  Besides I cannot afford to pay for it ?"  lol.   I have been paying too much in terms of energy, shaming, assumptions that led to negative life consequences and for what...a bunch of different opinions that did not change the way my body acted one bit. (Oh that sounds like a grievance...the medication I am on now does make a difference and there were physicians who also impacted my life positively...excuse the grievous nature of the statement.)

It's not me that feels the pain, that wants to faint, that huffs and puffs its way through the day...just my body. I mean I do not want it to be unwell.  I don't want it to konk out on me anytime soon  either lol...I realize, however,  I have little control in that area and I have little control over any 'mechanics' opinion of it.  I don't need the mechanics any more to tell me what is or isn't wrong with this instrument. I don't need their opinions and judgments. I just need to  accept the experience of being in this vehicle as long as I can be. Hopefully it will be long enough to make even a slight impact on the world in a positive way.

How's that for learning?

Its[the body's]neutrality protects it while it has a use.  and after wards, without a purpose, it is laid aside. It is not sick, nor old, nor hurt. It is but functionless, unneeded and cast off.  Let me not see it more than this today; of service for a while and fit to serve, to keep its usefulness while it can serve, and then to be replaced for greater good.
ACIM-W-294:1:5-10


It's all good.

The Walls in the Mind

As the mind, so the person.  Bondage and liberation are in your own mind.
-Sri Swami Satchidananda ( The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, 2011, page 5)


So what have we learned so far about walls?

• We all experience them from time to time especially when we are travelling along roads that will never take us to where we really want to be (The road to More, the Road of Distraction, the road of Endurance, etc)
• We will often feel "stuck" like we can no longer move forward when what we were subconsciously intending to do was run away
• Walls are built on our resistance to the present moment and what Life offers us in those moments.  So whenever we feel stuck it is an indication of our resistance to Life.
• We too often resist the "unwanted", the "suffering" not realizing that it has a profound purpose in adding balance, learning  and contrast to our lives.  When we resist we build walls of fear.
• Walls, however, are not a bad thing,  They stop us from our incessant activity, our numbing distractions  and our running away so we can see what is going on in our lives and how we are reacting.  They offer clarity and reintroduce us to the fear that led to the building of the wall in the first place.
• Fear, we will learn from facing the walls, is a good thing.  It is a natural reaction signalling we are getting closer to the truth. We will see this if we stop running and start accepting and allowing  the experiences of life we have resisted or resist  even if (and maybe especially if ) they create "suffering".
• Once we accept and allow we open to the experience of  peace, compassion and love.
• It is Love that will take us through the wall.
• We therefore do not need to tear the wall down, to get over or around it...we simply need to go through it. We do that with Love.
• So what is on the other side? : truth.  What we are really seeking can not be found out there.  The special place is inside not outside. What we are seeking is the truth of who we really are.  And what and who is that?  Love.
• The walls then, if we see them for what they are, only stop us from getting what we don't really want or need.  What we really want is the experience of Life as the Self. 
• And where do all the walls  get built and where do we transcend them for freedom ?  In our minds, and in our minds only.

All is well in my world.

The Walls take us to our Self

-Me

Take a Good Look and then Go Through

Rather than letting our negativity get the best of us, we can acknowledge that right now we feel like a piece of shit, and not be squeamish about taking a good look.
- Pema Chodron


Take A Good Look

We need to take a good look and that is what that little exercise I proposed yesterday was meant to help us to do. We created a map that reflects what is going on in our heads and then we tried to sort it out to some extent so we could see why we felt like shit.


What about that to do-list we created?

Part of the exercise had us write somewhat of a to-do list. Is that a good idea? Yes and no.

 Write it by all means but do so cautiously and only for the purpose of appeasing the ego.  It is only the ego that  needs to do...not you.  The ego needs to fix.  The ego needs to control the mind. The ego needs lists and steps  to get you hung up on. Know that. And that is okay.

 Sometimes we just need to quiet the ego enough so we can see beyond it. The goal is to see beyond the ego and get beyond the wall.  If the ego is thrashing around like crazy up there, creating mental maps that are as nasty as the one I am looking at now...negotiate with it, quiet it down with some pacifying to do list and then step back.

Sure if you feel compelled  to do what the list tells you to do, do it but do not get hung up on doing it. The list of steps for action is not what this getting through the wall is about. It is just a tiny tidying up and clearing away step. Don't make that list another category in your messy mental map.

You see, ego wants you to get caught up on this list so it can numb you from the pain.  Sure this is a better choice of numbing than picking up a bottle or a pill...so go for it... but focusing on doing and fixing and controlling is not the healing part of this exercise. 

The healing part comes in the feeling part.  Each of the categories represents something you are resisting feeling ... some experience you are not wanting in your life. 

By creating lists we organize our mental noise somewhat so we can see clearly what it is we are resisting.  We see that we were not really dealing with  experiences as they arose in our life thus creating one messy map to follow.  We create lists so we can see what those things are that we suppressed, repressed, denied, minimized, intellectualized etc...but more than likely did not experience.

We created two lists just to show what we have no choice but to surrender to and those we can surrender to.  We burnt the ones we had no control over and surrendered to them.  What do we do with the ones we do have control over?

Stop Resisting and Avoiding


Hmmm! we can get lost in following every step to a tee as ego wants us to do and/or we can allow each one  of those things previously resisted into our lives. We automatically have an urge to run away from them, don't we?  But now we got a darn wall in front of us and we can run no more.

You see each brick  of the wall that stands in front of us, that keeps us stuck and not moving forward was not put there by the thing on the list... but by  resistance we have to experiencing that experience.

Welcome and Allow

For true healing to take place we need to open up, welcome and allow for the full experience of Life.  What we have going on in our messy mental maps is what we likely refer to as 'problems', the 'unwanted,' 'suffering'.  We are putting our hands up to each of them and it us creating the wall.

Put down your arms, your shields and just allow each of these to be.  Allow them to enter your "being" and just experience them.  Life isn't just about the easy and the wonderful.  It is full of contrasts and we need to stop resisting the things in our life that we "don't want".  Let it all in...the good, the bad and the ugly.  If we resist these things, we resist the moment they are in, and if we resist the moment, we resist Life. 

Compassionate Abiding

If we really want to get through walls...we do so by becoming one with the wall.  We go through it! The Buddhists call this "compassionate abiding".  Penna Chodron, an ordained Tibetan Nun,  in her wonderful book, "When Things Fall apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times," advises that in order to heal, to get through the walls we have created, we need to compassionately abide.


She suggest an exercise to help us do that in a Super Soul Sunday episode with Oprah Winfrey. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mm_0bw340Tk) Her instruction was as follows:

• Get yourself as quiet and as still as possible
• Close your eyes
• Breathe in "the unwanted" "the suffering" the "Dukkha" ...[whatever experience you have written down on your list that you have been resisting until now and all the feelings attached to it.]
• Breathe out any expectations and resistance you may have about it
• As you breathe it in, imagine it going to your heart.
• envision your heart swelling as necessary to hold the emotional experience
• allow it to expand as necessary
• then release a lot of space, a lot of emptiness as you breathe out
• compassion for self and compassion for all follows

This little exercise offers a moment of allowing and experiencing which is so much better than avoiding.  Our walls are built on avoidance and where does avoidance come from?  Fear.  It is all fear based.  Our walls are built on fear.  Recognizing that is a good thing because, as Chodron goes on to say, "Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth." (https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2464740-when-things-fall-apart-heart-advice-for-difficult-times)

So how do we tear these walls of fear  down so we can reach the truth? We don't...we simply go through them and we can do that with  love.

I love this from ACIM.  It reminds me of what will happen when we allow ourselves to allow Life to be what it is. All fear is past, because its source is gone, and all thoughts gone with it. Love remains the only present state...." ACIM-W-293:1:1-2

When we see clearly we can walk through walls that fear made and into a Life of Love, a Life of Truth. .  Hmmm!  Something to think about.

All is well in my world.


Have a look:

ACIM

Chodron, Penna  (2000  )  When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times.Shambala

https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2464740-when-things-fall-apart-heart-advice-for-difficult-times

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mm_0bw340Tk