Lucid Dreaming

 Lucid dreaming lets you make use of thedream state that comes to you every night to have a stimulating reality  

Stephen LaBerge

I am a lucid dreamer, have been for as long as I remember. Lucid dreamers have certain traits that lead them toward a certain lucidity in dream state.  I have a lot of those traits.  

1. Frequent Nightmares: I have had night terrors since I was a little girl and the lucid dreaming arose, I believe, as a way to handle the terror in my dreams and the trauma induced fear in my waking life.  The nightmares  went away after I dsicovered that it was best to confront fear, rather than run from it.  I began to confront it in my waking life and I began to actively confront it in my sleeping life.  If the source of my night  terror was hiding behind a window or a door, instead of attempting to scream for help with a voice that would not come out, or run on legs that would not move , or curl up in a ball waiting for it to come and "get me"...I began to make  myself  walk towards the door or window my fear was behind and open it. I told myself, in my dream, that facing fear was the  only way through fear. .As soon as I opened the door or window I would find nothing there and I would stop remembering my dream from there. The night terrors diminished significantly. 

2. Vivid Dream Recall: I am not saying I remember all my dreams in detail but I remember a great deal. I make it a point every morning to write what I remember from dreams down. Some recurrent themes to dream snippets  are driving...and not quite knowing how to get to where I am going, dressing/changing clothes/ suitcases full of different outfits, caring for people who are sick and or dying, looking after/saving  animals and teaching people about who they really are.  These themes  have been in my dreams for as long as I can remember in varying context.  I see different characters...some I have never seen before and others   are the same recurring  characters in different forms?  I know who they are even if they are in different bodies.  I am not sure what body I am in...it seems to keep changing.  I never really see myself except from a distance the odd time.  I often talk to people who have passed on...usually by telephone?  They call me...I know who they are even though they never talk to me...I talk to them but I know they have a message for me and I try to "guess" what it might be.  They often get frustrated with me and hang up because I keep getting it wrong...even though they do not say anything, I know they are frustrated. Other times...they seem pleased that I got it and they really, really want me to remember it when I wake up. Throughout my dreams both the alive and dead people are relaying important information to me...and I say in my dream, "I am supposed to remember this when I wake up, aren't I?" I promise to remember it but when I wake up I often remember that I was supposed to remember a number or a phrase or a symbol scribbled on a piece of paper or a stanza for a poem I am supposed to write but I often cannot, at least not in detail.  Sometimes the messages are so vague and cryptic and other times they are so clear. I did recall when I was told by a very familiar entity that I could not see, "Something is going on in your pelvic area...don't worry ...it is not life threatening...but it will become so if you don't make certain changes in yor approach." That was days before I started bleeding.  I also remember what I was told in my dream last night by this Something or Someone I could not see...I am often given messages by  this familiar female energy. I won't share it here becaause it does not make a lick of sense...yet. lol

3. Sleep paralysis.  I have not had an episode of this in so very long...knock on wood...but I do at times wake up completely paralyzed.  I can not move my body or make a sound...and there is this heaviness pushing me down.  I know at that time...I have a choice...to fall back into the heaviness or do whatever I can,  fight with all I have, to turn over on my side ( I am usually on my back) . The heavines seems so powerful pulling me back into it.  In those moments it is so hard to turn over but I fear if I give into the heaviness, I will never wake up again. My survival instinct kicks in and I push through it. I can also see and experience some very "unplesant" things in those moments...what I have come to undersatnd as hallucinations because I am still partially in REM sleep.  It is a very terryfying experience so I do what I can to avoid sleeping on my back. 

4. Introspective personality: Well that is self evident by my writing here. :)

5. A person who meditates: I am discovering that I am becoming more and more lucid in my dreaming, the more I meditate.  I woke up yesterday morning feeling  that heaviness, that idea that I have to change my life somehow, that I have been carrying around over the last six months. On top of that I had the pelvic pain. I did not feel 'good'.  So I said I was going to spend a lot of my day meditating.  I did four guided mediations over the course of the day.  I felt better in the  evening, better than I felt in a long while. And last night ...my dream state  was so cool.  At one point ...after I recieved the messages (which still do not make sense to me though they made perfect sense in my dream)  and was looking for a piece of paper and a pen (in my dream) to write it down so I wouldn't forget...I said to the characters around me, "Oh my goodness, I am doing it again.  I am dreaming and I am aware I am dreaming. I am a lucid dreamer , you know? This is a dream. "  They just looked at me and I had the impression they thought  I was nuts. "This is so cool!  " I said, "Watch me." And I decided I was going to make myself do some somersaults in the air. So I jumped up and spun around very slowly and then I did it again even more slowly before landing back on my feet.  I am not sure of their reaction...not even sure if I was looking for it or cared even.  I was just so thrilled that my lucid dreaming had advanced to that point.  It was very freeing.  I woke up this morning feeling so much betetr than I did in a long time. 

Where does a lucid dreamer go from here?   I can use my dream, as Carl Jung would surely recommend, as a means to relieve and  resolve this heaviness/"what change do I need to make in my life" issue.  I can sit down with my dream characters, add those who I trust to the circle, and discuss it with them.  That female entity that cannot be seen...just might be the wise Self within me and she may just be able to provide a clear message that I will remember on waking up. Worth a try, isn't it? 

Hmmm!  

I share this because I have always been fascinated by the healing power of dreams. Thought, by chnace, you might be too.

Check out the articles I found on lucid dreaming 

All is well in my world.

It is actually a scientific phenomena : https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2737577/

                                                             https://www.sleepfoundation.org/dreams/lucid-dreams

                                                             https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/the-superhuman-mind/201212/lucid-dreaming-and-self-realization

                                                              https://vbchange.com/lucid-dreaming-spirituality/

 

Stephen LaBerge & Howard Rheingold (1991) Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming.Ballantine Books

Allowing It All Into The Circle

The sound of the rain needs no translation.

as quoted by Alan Watts in the video below

I love the sound of the rain and by the cloud cover out there I think I will be hearing it again soon. 

I also love this little quote because it speaks to this idea that we cannot always translate Life and the experience of it into words, ideas, concepts or explanations to appease the mind.  There is simply a "beingness" to Life that can only be experienced.

Many of us are looking for, striving for "knowledge" on how to enjoy Life and ways to spread that joy instead of just enjoying each moment of it as it unfolds before us.  We are too busy trying to get someplace 'up there'  to enjoy what is now. 

To spread joy you have to have joy, to impart delight you must more or less be delightful...you have to do things that are a delight for you....People who are interesting are people who are interested. 

 I come to the realization, that after all the "work" I have done, that  I am still striving for something I have yet to feel I "achieved". My "search" for peace of mind, for joy, for a sense of purpose in this life time has led me full circle. 

I am going around in big bold circle aren't I?  We all are, aren't we? That is Life... a perpetual rhythmic circling...not a linear process of from here to there. 

Throughout my circling "in search of peace" I have had tremendous moments of peace, joy, laughter, clarity and faith, , realization of growth, and moments where I sensed "achievement''.  I have also had moments of turmoil, stress, grief, confusion and doubt, a feeling of being stuck and moments when I sensed failure. 

Even in those dark moments there was a certain, underlying supportive presence, a love that I cannot translate accurately into words. This Something or No-thing that I can not explain, gently guides me and encourages me, motivates me to move around and around and around again even when I am not conscioulsy aware of it.

My mind may tell me "I am searching for peace in order to end suffering " and "when I suffer I have failed in my mission" .  But this loving Something or No-thing reminds me that I am simply circling...moving in and moving out of circumstances,  as circumstances move in and out of me...the way Life intends. 

I am going to keep circling...even if my search for peace, which is nothing more than an idea, is dropped . The more I realize and connect to this Something or No-thing that moves me  the less I have to search or strive for anything. I can witness it all , enjoy it, find delight in it  I will not  get hung up by the dark moments, the heavy circumstances, the apparent failures( which are really no different than my achievements) and this idea that "I am not quite there." 

There is no "there".  It is all just "here".  Living Life from "here" will make me interesting, and allow me to spread joy and impart delight as we are all meant to do. 

How lovely is that?

All is well in my world.

The Exuberance of Nature

What happened here?  There was a pic and a quote?  A pic that I can prove came from my camera? I am going to investigate further.

In Turmoil?

 People think well  it would be nice to have peace of mind, to be calm, to be serene, to be undisturbed by this that and  the other but you see as long as you make all those things objects of your desire you are defining yourself as lacking  them and a person who is looking for peace is obviously in turmoil....the more you strive to stop the interior commotions, the more you are stirring them up. 

I was made aware of something in myself upon listening to Alan Watts speak as he did in the video linked below. "people looking for peace are actually in turmoil." 

I have been on a life long journey of waking up, of seeking peace. Why?  Because I wanted to put an end to this sense of struggle and turmoil I carried with me my whole life. My real goal, as it is for many of us who want to find peace/enlightenment, is to end suffering.  I read what I read, I write what I write, I meditate, practice yoga, surround myself with natue, quiet and solitude because I want to  put an end to the mess 'my' mind is constantly making of things and the unease that causes me. That is my motivation ...to end suffering.

Attempting to Get There

Peace has become some place I will get to...a finish line that marks the end of suffering. I see it as the marker by which I will be able to measure my success, to let me know I got there. 'Getting there' will allow me to  say, "I did it! I got here!I ended suffering because I now have found peace."

So I read the books, I listen to the wise ones teach, I sit to meditate, I practice yoga everyday, I write what I learn here, ...all with the intention of getting somewhere up there in the future. I am taking steps toward peace.  I mean  though there are moments when I feel I am there ...there are many more moments when I am 'struggling to get there". 

But really it is not about going anywhere.  Every thing I "do" should simply be  about doing it completely and living it fully. 

...every moment of it you are simply absorbed in the ripply luminous world...you are not going anywhere.

And what have I been doing on my mental journey to get  somewhere up there?  I have been stepping over peace to get to peace.  I have been stirring up the unease in my attempt to flee from it. 

Not Quite There Yet

I have always had this sense that "I am not quite there yet."  Sure I figure I am getting there.  I see how I am evolving and learning and growing.  I see how I am getting closer to peace ...but I also see that the more I strive to get there...push to get there,  struggle to get there...the more unease Life seems to dump on my lap.  Why? Because Life wants me to realizie  there is no up there, no "golden Goodie" as Watts refers to it,  up there at some proverbial finish line.  What I am looking for is already here...I am surrounded by it.  I am it!

Make this peace seeking whether it be in the form of meditation, yoga or walking around the streets chanting some mantra.... merely a form of joyous energy...instead of a search for something.  Anything, according to Watts, can be a form of meditation. 

It is not the future that holds what we are seeking.  Peace is already here right now and right here.  In fact, we are peace.  We do not need to seek it. 

If you would only realize that the purpose of life is not in the future and if you think it is you will go on and on and on looking for it there and never find it because the future in its own way fades out in the same way that the past fades out.

There is no need to seek or strive.  Peace is now. 

All is well in my world! 

Alan Watts/Wiara (Sept, 2017) Alan Watts-The Real Purpose of Doing Anything. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMpJm_dYbx0

A Reminder to Live

 

Deepening The Wonder 

Death is a favour to us,
But our scales have lost their balance.

The impermanence of the body
Should give us great clarity,
Deepening the wonder in our senses and eyes

Of this mysterious existence we share
And are surely just traveling through.

If I were in the Tavern tonight,
Hafiz would call for drinks

And as the Master poured, I would be reminded
That all I know of life and myself is that

We are just a mid-air flight of golden wine
Between His Pitcher and His Cup.

If I were in the Tavern tonight,
I would buy freely for everyone in this world

Because our marriage with the Cruel Beauty
Of time and space cannot endure very long.

Death is a favour to us,
But our minds have lost their balance.

The miraculous existence and impermanence of Form
Always makes the illuminated ones
Laugh and Sing.

by Hafiz

Isn't that absolutely beautiful? 

Huh?  What the heck does it mean? 

Hafiz is telling us that our span here in this existence is short...we are just travelling through ...we are that liquid that flows between His Pitcher ( the infinite, eternal  Source of everything) and His cup( the vessels we end up in that are finite and impermanent). If we could only allow ourselves to look deeply at the impermenance of form and see our bodies as simply vessels that temporarily hold that which is permanent...we would celebrate and share all we have to offer with everyone and the whole world. 

As the wise ones know, this awareness of death can remind us to play, to dance, to laugh, to sing, to enjoy, to give and to love for the short time we are here, celebrating in the miracle of Life. Yet, too many of us have minds that have "lost their balance" ...that judge things as good or bad, things worthy of considration or things that  need to be denied. Death has become such a thing in this twisted way many of us look out at the world.We consider it dark and something we want to avoid considering.

 When we run from Death...we do not live. We are looking at only one side of existence. When we do not consider both sides, the  contrast, that every bit of light has darkness, every front has a back,  every coming has a going...we are not balanced. 

Let's, instead, learn to look at death and impermenance  as something that balances the scale..that creates equanimity, wholeness and that also offers  a reminder to live.  Hmm! 

All is well in my world. 

Invite

In order not to get trapped in the repetitive  activity of the mind...you need to invite the unconditional mind into your life at every moment.

Eckhart Tolle 

Narrow Focus

 The Price which we pay for specialization in conscious attention is ignorance [ignore-ance] of everything else outside its field...if you concentrate on a figure you tend to ignore the background.

Alan Watts

Alan Watts is my man these days.  I am finally ready to understand his teachings.  I have tried for years to do so, sitting down with a bunch of his pamphlet sized and contraband books on my lap while others in my household  chastised me with warnings that it was"sacrilegious" to study such things that went so against the church.  But there I was in my rebellious late teens, with a Norman Vincent Peale book in one hand and an Alan Watts in the other,  determined to learn something valuable.  Norman's teaching I could understand, Alan's went way over my head.  I wasn't ready. 

Now I am. I see my ability to comprehend and soak up these teachings as a testament to my growth. I have advanced from one level to the next. I  am an advanced student now. So many learning barriers have been removed from this proverbial classroom  which is my mind...and it is like "aha!" ....I can see clearly what the many teachers that come in and out of it are teaching. All teachings, all lessons, all levels were so valuable in getting me here. 

Unity Vs Seperation

So the lesson I have been focusing my conscious attention on lately has been this idea that What is explicably two can at the  same time be implicitly one. Every inside has an outside.  Every right has a left.  Every front has a back.  But if we rely only on what our five senses, which are very selective filters,  are allowing into our consciousness we will only see the front and not the back.  We will not see it as one being that needs a front and back, right and left, inside and outside.  We will see the seperate parts and not the whole.  

If we focus on the figure we will also ignore the background.  But that figure could not be if it wasn't for the background. 

Seperating the Organism from the Environment, the Foreground from the Background

As a person who likes to take pictures, I will often purposefully blur the background in my potrait or macro shots. I make the camera "focus" on the figure in front of me.  The figure is what I want you to notice as significant.  The background, I want you to see as insignificant.  I know it would distract from what I want you to notice so I selectively blur it. I narrow my focus. It is as if I am trying to portray that there is a significant organism in an insignificant environment.  Yet,  that  is merely a trick of the camera ...just like the way we see the world is often a trick of the mind. 

That face, that flower, that insect in my photo is nothing without its environment.  I can blur it for the senses, reducing what I allow the  camera and your senses to pick up all I like but the reality is you would not see the figure if it wasn't for the environment it was in. First of all if it wasn't for the environment the organism would not be . And secondly, photographically ...that face you are seeing depends on the  background...on the light, on the colours behind it, on the  shade  etc.  Even if the camera and your mind ignores the background...makes it "appear" insignificant...the background and the figure are inseperable. 

The foreground and the background, the organism and the environment share a unified field of behaviour. 

The organism is not the puppet of the environment, being pushed around by it, nor is the environment a puppet of the organism, being pushed around by it. The relationship between the two ...is transactional. 

We often do not see that do we ? We seperate things and ourselves in a multitude of ways.  We tend to see differences as seperating instead of understanding their unified and transcational behaviour.  We allow our senses to select the input necessary to determine our reality. We therefore often see the seperate figures and not the background. 

Noticing: From a Narrow Focus to a Wide Angle

Our senses, however, are very limited and  selective in what they allow us to pick up from this world. We narrow our focus and use our limiting central vision when we can actually expand our conscious attention instead.  

Just like I can switch lens on my camera depending on what I want to see and capture, we can switch our attention on what we gaze on.  If I put a wide angle lens on my camera ...I am going to pick up everything in the field .  I see how everything belongs in that frame with all the contrasts, highlights and low lights, blacks and whites...it all fits together to create this one image. If I put a zoom lens on I can get really close to one thing at the expense of ignoring everything else. I seperate that thing from its environment.  I isolate it.  I make it appear alone. I remove the contrast to some degree. 

So we can focus our attention with a type of central vision that blurs everything else out or we can open up that vision with a wide angle attention so we see everything.  When we chose the first lens/ attention focus we see the differences and the seperation...making everything look scary.  We become afraid of the contrast that slips into the frame.  We have a tendency to look at the world this way. To select into our conscious attention only that which is note worthy.

Our physical world is a a system of inseperable differences..everyting exists with everything else but we continue not to notice that because what we notice is noteworthy...What is noticed appears to you to be significant and the rest is insignificant. 

Try zooming out of your selective focus on seperate things and look at the whole. Snap  on a wide angle lens...so you can see how all the different things are actually inseperable.

All is well in my world.

Alan Watts/Wiara ( April 2018) The Most Important Lesson, Everyone Should Learn. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVpj7WWC-nw 

Hasty Judgements?

 How little do they see what really is, who frame their hasty judgements on that which seems.

Daniel Webster (Brainy quote of the day...https://www.brainyquote.com/quote_of_the_day)

Do you make hasty judgements?  Are they based solely on what seems to be real to you? Do you ever stop to ask yourself, just when you are about to assume something about another or something, "Hmm! Could I be seeing unclearly?  Is it possible that what I am about judge is not exactly as it appears to be?  Could the  anger, resentment, or fear that is being released with some old memories be blurring the real picture for me? Would it be best to pull back my desire to plant a "right or wrong", "good or bad", and my "should and should not" label down on whatever I am witnessing? Would it be best to consider that what I am about to judge is not as real as it seems?"

Sigh! 

I often fail to stop and ask myself those questions when I am looking out upon the world before me. I reactively go around with my invisible label puncher slapping judgements on the experiences I am having with things and other people. People get hurt when I do that.  I get hurt becasue I am not being true to my Self....the part of me that does not label or judge. I have to remind myself, in my yet to be evolved state,   I may not be seeing clearly.  Hmmm!

Just be aware of that possibility.  Do not judge yourself harshly or hastily either for judging. It is a human tendency. Just quietly step back and observe your self starting to judge or getting lost in judgement and gently coax yourself back. 

It is process of committed practice and learning that eliminates this tendency we have towards hasty judgements and that takes us to the place where we can see what really is. 

All is well

Relax Into the Learning

 

Your mind will answer most questions if  you learn to relax and wait for the answer.

William S Borroughs

Missed a couple of days here.  Life circumstance has pulled me away again. Let me rephrase that...my resistance to Life's lessons have pulled me away Sigh!!! Can I sigh again?  Sigh!!! 

That teacher in front of the classroom thinks I am a heck of a lot smarter than I am because boys is She/He throwing the lessons at me. Some moments during the intense lessons I feel stressed and agitated like I am suppose to "do" something to make it all better. I am out of my seat,  pacing back and forth.  Then I get confused, confronting the teacher with..."What do I do? " And the teacher just looks at me shaking his/her head, says nothing and points to the seat I was assigned. I sit again and remind myself that doing is not the answer  until I at least understand the lesson better. So I start studying the lesson in front of me...thinking I might just get it and wham...another one is thrown on my desk.   Then another and another. I get overwhelmed.  I feel like it is too much at once.  

Too Much? 

I realize, when I stop long enough, that it isn't too much. I am just using my tiny, personalized mind to make a judgement that it is too much.  I am listening to this hyperactive, conditioned portion of "my self" instead of trusting the teacher before me...Life.  

Life knows what it is doing, I remind myself, Life knows that I am capable of catching on to. It isn't about my little mind, my little body..."my" anything. 

Just breathe and begin again. Breathe and begin again.  Breathe and begin again.

Don't force the learning...just relax into it, open your heart and mind to it and the clarity will come.  Hmmm! 

All is well in my world.  

If That Wasn't There, You Would Not Be Here.

 Underneath opposite/contrast there is harmony.

Underneath duality there is unity.

Alan Watts 

Hmmm! I am seeing that more and more.  I am seeing how we cannot have one without the other.  We cannot have light without darkness; we cannot have a coming without a going; we cannot have pleasure without pain; we cannot have good without bad; we cannot have right without left. The meaning of absolutely everything is relative and its very existence is interdependent on the existence of the "other."  

Existence  is releationship.

So the opposites come together to form one thing or a no-thing. Though we may see a vast distinction between right and wrong, for example, ...right and wrong do not see it in themselves. They come together as they are meant to. We may not "see" this unity on the surface but it is there. We cannot have spring and rebirth without winter and death.  They seem like opposites but they are totally related and interdependent. 

Duality is always secretly unity.

Everything is  meant to be and everything comes together, folds in and out, winds around the other   to form the perfect fabric  of the universe. Absolutely everything is necessary underneath our limited understanding of it. 

Everything reflects off of everything else...so if one of those "things" is missing...the other cannot be seen or known, therefore cannot exist. 

If "Left" was missing...there would be no "Right", would there?  Can there be an absence of"Right" as long as there is a "Left"?  Take a piece of paper and cut the right side of it off.  Will all that you have then,  be  a left side?  Were you are able to get rid of the right side ?  Of course not... you may have a thinner piece of paper but you have a left and right.  You can snip and snip and snip but you will not get rid of the right side until you get rid of the left...until there is no paper to cut. This interdependence beteen what seems to be contrast cannot be removed. We are just one of many of these things. Our very existsence is dependent on the  existence of everything else.

If that there wasn't there you wouldn't be here. 

If there was no other being or thing in the universe  to see, hear you, touch you etc you  would not exist, would you? Your being here is dependent on them being here.  

In the same way we all come from the same Source...we are splatters of stardust scattered around the earth. Whatever had an impact making some of that stardust look and behave a certain way, had an impact making you look or act a certain way.  Whatever affects the molecule structure of anything on this planet will have an effect on you.  If that  knob on the trunk of the tree in the corner of your yard was not there, you would  not exist ( at least not in the way you are existing now). Whatever made that knob the way it was will affect you and make you the way you are. 

There is a law of connectivity and interdependence to everything... creating an intricate Web of Life  that determines how things manifest in this world. Everyting is relationship becasue existence is relationship.

Fascinating, isn't it? 

All is well.

Alan Watts/True inspiration (December, 2017) The Web of Life ( Interdependence of All Things) by Alan Watts https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPaSiVc75w8

Think about that for a while.

You Are A Wave

 You are something the whole universe is doing, in the same way the wave is something the ocean is doing.

The real you is not a puppet that Life pushes around. The real deep down you is the whole universe.

Alan Watts From T & H Inspiration and Motivation (August 2012) The Real You-Alan Watts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMRrCYPxD0I

Beams of Light

 Beams of Light

The world emerges,

dances and plays,

trips and falls, 

suffers and dies,

jumps  up again,

shakes itself off

then bows 

in mock seriousness

before scampering off the stage

to get ready for the next act.

And we watch

behind this heavy dark curtain, 

each a pin prick of light,

a tiny beam shining onto the stage,

allowing  the actors

in there ever changing scenery

 to be seen.

So intent are we  

to  follow the  drama,

to be  entertained, 

pleasured and pleased

numbed and distracted, 

that we cling to the velvety fabric, 

hold our breaths and watch,

allowing ourselves to get lost 

in the play unfolding

before us.

We cry when the hero falls,

we cheer when she gets up.

We shoo away the villian

and scream in warning

when the lights go down

and the orchestra's tempo rises.

We feel the  fabric,

against our flesh

as we look out 

through the tiny eyehole

we call our own...

at what we believe to be real.

We are self-consciously aware 

but try to ignore

 the other

 pinpricks of light 

that shine out 

from seperate seats .

We do not want to feel 

the proximity of  hands

clinging, like our own,

to the curtain we share.

We just focus on

what our own little light

allows us to see

with our unique intrepretations

as if 

this was all there was. 

There may be  many seperate 

holes in the fabric

but 

there is just one 

brilliant glowing 

light  that emerges 

through all these openings

and we 

are simply one opening

through which this light shines. 

If we were to release 

the hold our tight fists

have on this curtain,

step back and away

from its many folds,

we would see...

we are all small beams 

from One Great Light.

What is being played out on stage 

is not important...

this Light is. 

© Dale-Lyn April 2021

Inspired by :

Alan Watts/True Inspiration (December, 2017) The Web of Life (Interependence of All Things) by Alan Watts https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPaSiVc75w8

And of course from Jacques, Act II Scene VII As You Like It ...William Shakespeare

All the world's a stage/ And all men and women merely players...

 

Hmm!  As you know, I have been having this gnawing feeling that someone or something ( a bot or whatever) has been doing something unethical  with my site, possibly taking stuff and calling it their own. I did get external warnings that this was likley happening but I pushed it all aside for the joy of being able to come here. The feeling would not go away though, (either did other people's warnings)...you know how these feelings of mine work by now. :) Then I came across a blog entry today  that was read today and  obviously tampered with. An entry with a poem and pic  was removed and replaced with another entry.  I have a copy of the previously published hard copy to prove it.  How did they do this? They had to have access to the editorial portion of my site, or be able to sign in to my site.  hmmm! More importantly, "Why?" Why  would anyone want to do that? If they get into this site, can they get into my computer?   I will contact the administrators  and see what I have to do.  I do not want to shut down but I might have to. :( I will let you know. 

Fall Into the Space Behind the Mind

 Be the space for that which arises.

Eckhart Tolle

"Follow me," the mind says. "You have to fix and work out your whole life?" 

Too often we follow that order from the conditioned and "normal" mind.  We go off trying to analyze what is wrong, what could go wrong,what needs to be fixed,what we have to do to prevent things from getting broken, who is to blame, who we need to defend ourselves against,  and how to bloody control  every thing in our lives so it fits us comfortably.  Wow!  That is a tall order from the mind and though it does its best to assist us in fixing our whole life, it certainly causes a whole host of other problems, doesn't it? 

Most obviously, it keeps us stuck in our heads away from the quiet stillness we hunger for, whether we know it or not.  It takes us away from the only place Life can be found: here and now. It also leads to alot of judgement on our parts, a lot of determining what is good and what is bad, what is right and what is wrong...and therefore  a lot of expectations about how our life "should be" or "shouldn't be". When we meet up with the sad reality that our expectation are constantly going unmet we fall into unconscious reactivity.  We end up hurting others and we end up hurt by others.  

After all, it is the "normal" mind that says "follow me." It is the "normal" mind that says there is a problem out there-fix it!"  It is the "normal" mind that says , "Things and people should be a certain way." If it is "normal"that means  most people operate under the control of this mind. That doesn't mean, however, that normal is healthy.  This isn't healthy...at all. This keeps us unconcious. 

The Healthier Option: Fall into the space behind the mind.

Instead of listening to this mind with its never ceasing demands, we can simply fall into the space behind the mind...the space from which the mind and all its thought emerges.  We can move from the unconscious state of reactivity which is in the forefront of our experience, to the conscious state of response which is the background.  

Movement there requires little effort. Just fall into that space. Meditation, yoga or a mindfulness practice can drop us into this space. Once there we can tap into the Observer who is not following the sick advice of the "normal" mind...it is simply watching it. It is not attempting to fix, or manipulate and control what is happening around us... it is just watching it.  It is not judging or expecting...it is simply watching.  It does not tell Life what to do...it just observes...It becomes alert, and aware of mind and all its thinking, feeling , reacting. It is alert and aware of the circumstances of  life unfolding.  It acknowledgs those thoughts, and emotions, as well as the people around us and everything they may or may not do. It does this while  it accepts and appreciates all the moment offers.  It clings to nothing. It denies nothing.  It just is as Life just is. Loving all of it. 

That is the healthier option, don't you think?

All is well in my world.  

 Just an FYI.  I am taking all these blogs and putting them into book form with an ISBN and all lol.  Will be ready soon. Something within just told me to do so and to let you know I was doing so. :) 

All is well.

The Broom is too Far Away!

 Just Writing!

I just did a bit of a free flow creative writing exercise and all that came up was the title????  I have no idea what happened to it!

So I am back after two hours to see if I  I can rebuild the story I lost.  I wonder how much actually stuck with me, or if it will flow like it seemed to do as it came off the top of my head. Let's see how much of it I remember.: 

The mat outside the mudroom is piled high with footwear of various shapes and sizes , thrown  in random chaos from  sloppy and hurried feet that had better places to be. I see puddles of dry mud etched with paw prints, also of various shapes and sizes, creeping toward me. I know I should tidy up those shoes and sweep up the dirt but the air around me makes it too heavy to move.  Even if I were to fight through the invisible wall of gravity, to bend down to undo that pile and point all the toes in the same direction, it would be for nothing.  Within minutes those shoes would jump and climb and tumble their way back into the chaotic mountain they long to be in, getting taller each time. 

As for the sweeping...the broom  seems miles from where I am, a distance I cannot even seem to contemplate, let alone attempt to cross. If I was already standing and I  had it in my hands, I suppose I would sweep away the mudroom mud and make my way into this kitchen.  Pellets have managed not only to escape the five metal pet bowls that lay scattered around on the floor, but also my bigger dog's keen awareness and insaitable appetite. She is not one to leave a morsel of food  behind but tonight she has left a trail of  dejected nuggets, that taunt and tease me to do something about it. Sigh.  I am not standing and I do not have the broom in my hands.

I am sitting out at the dining room table where my  computer and writing space , has been randomly and hurriedly relocated from my office  in order to make room for another needy body and mind to crash in. I have chords and wires wrapped around me and the happy checkered spring table cloth  is bunched and wrinkled in a ball beneath my keyboard. It adds to the sad decor of a reality where the only one that cleans is too tired to do so.  If only the broom was not so far away...maybe I could use it to make others do what my body tells me I will not be doing.  

From here I can see the counter top and this mornings dishes, and some of yesterday's too, cluttering for space on this old and tired painted surface.  I also see the "perishable"  junk that should have been put back in the fridge hours ago by others, others who do not seem to know their names. 

And then there is  the banana peels to consider,  wrapped around the base of the blender despite my never ending pleads of "Don't feed the fruit flies!" 

If  I had a broom in my hands, one with a six foot telescopic handle , and some training in the art of horizontal sweeping,  I bet I could clean off that counter in one neat sweep.  I could probably even get the banana peels into the garbage can. I see some considerate soul has already removed the top of that can and has placed in on the middle of the floor, just so I could practice.  In fairness, maybe that someone was not of the two legged version.  Maybe it was my bigger dog, that knocked the lid off in one of her steroid induced binging frenzies. I have yet to train her to replace it. 

It really doesn't matter who took it off, I guess,  or how many times the others trip over it, cursing their way to the fake wood landing, I will be the only one to have the privelege of reacquanting the top of that can/recently turned compost heap with its body. Sigh! It just seems so far away.

Maybe if I had a broom in my hands that had a handle with a ten foot reach and some expert coaching from Wayne Gretzky I could lift that top off of the floor as if it were an obedient puck, making it land exactly where it should be.  It would be so nice to have something around me exactly where it should be. 

But atlas Wayne is nowhere to be found and my broom is still in the mudroom closet, much, much too far away. Sigh...so I will just sit where I am allowing gravity and entropy to do what gravity and entropy do best. 

All is well in my world!

Weebles Wobble

 You do not know where your decisions come from.  They pop up like hiccups... Choice is the  act of hestitation we make before making a decision. ..It is a mental "wobbeling".... Each of these lives is the right one. Every path is the right path. Everything could have been anything else and it would have had just as much meaning. 

Alan Watts

Decisions, decisions, decisions

Back to making major life decisions...and I realized today just how much I have been "wobbeling" . I have been like a Weeble...Do  you remember those? "Weebles wobble but they don't fall down"? 

I have been asking myself, considering a future decision : "What would be the right thing to do if...?" And considering decisions in my present circumstances... "Am I doing the right thing now?" 

Weebles Wobble But They Don't Fall Down

With any decision I feel I have to make, I fear that I will take the wrong path and regret it.  I fear that the choice I make might not be right for someone else impacted by my decisions. I fear that not making a decision to change something is actually a decision that is unhealthy for all. 

What I tend to forget is that I am like the  Weeble...I can't fall down.  I can't make the wrong decision or take the wrong path. 

I can't fall down. I can go from side to side, from this possibility  to that, from this con to that pro, from that road to this one...but I cannot fall down.  I will certainly wobble ...the more I  push myself  this way...the more I will counter that with a movement the other way, just like the pendulum Singer refers to in the untethered soul, swings back and forth. 

We wobble in that act of hesitation but eventually a decision will be made. When  we release the tension on either side, the wobbeling will gradually cease its momentum and we will come to a still and balanced place. We will always end up in this still and balanced place, regardless of what choice we make.

I recently had a loved one make a very painful decision that would change his life forever.  It will actually impact the special relationships he has with those most dear to his heart,  as well.  For that reason he struggled with that decision for months, wobbling back and forth. Others had a part in influencing his decision by making decisions of their own that pushed him a certain way, which he countered with a move in the other direction as Weebles are inclined to do. Until finally a decision was made. It came up like a hiccup. Though the way the decision was expressed could have been a little more appeasing...he made the decision and its done.  

Was it the wrong decision?  

No , it couldn't be .  It just meant he chose one of many paths that would lead him right to where he is now...because right here and right now, in whatever form it is in, is where he is supposed to be . 

No matter how much effort or worry we put into our decison making, how much we wobble this way or that,  and no matter what path we end up on....we cannot make a mistake. Whatever the outcome... it has just as much meaning as the alternative outcome from the other choice. They are one and the same. 

That is pretty profound, isn't it?  I think so.

I may or may not have to make a decision in a few weeks that will change my body and life forever.  That decision, I believe,  will get helped along by what is happening in my body right now to some extent... This decsion, then,  that will need to be made about my body, now and possibly in the future,  leaves me wobbeling ...true ...but it has also  inspired me to make another decision in my present reality that will be for the good of all. 

The decisions all seemed to come together into one beautifully wobbeling Weebble. A Weeble that is wobbeling to a nice balanced stillness.  I feel a certain peace, knowing that.. Hmm!

All is well in my world!

Lean in

 Lean into the discomfort and watch yourself grow.

The Prison and C.O.'s Within Our Minds

Hmm! I feel overwhelmed again as I  watch  life unfold in front of me with what most of us would see as a series of complicated "stressors".  I feel like I am getting zapped or bonked on the head by some mental correctional officer inside my head again and again,  as he warns , "Okay...you are getting too close to where you shouldn't be. Back up." 

And of course, I back up and away from the discomfort. I drop  my eyes from the source of it and therefore I drop my eyes from that which is on the other side of it.  I become afraid of the discomfort and I learn to do whatever I can to avoid the zaps and the bonks. My world then becomes very small and much energy and effort is used to keep me safe within in it. I also attempt to distract from the reality of being imprisoned in between the walls of this discomfort and numb myself with whatever diversional activity I can find, be it contraband or not. (Well that line was just added for dramatic effect...the most contraband thing I am into these days are sugar and  Netflix binges....but you get the picture right...all still numbing and addictive in its diversional ability.) I avoid getting too close to the edges or, heaven forbid,  any attempt to walk through them.

Wanting to Be Comfortable At All Costs

Isn't that what we all do when we live with the goal of staying comfortable and free of pain?  We imprison ourselves inside our minds making our lives smaller and smaller.  We use discomfort as a warning that we are getting too close to freedom  and we allow it to move us back and away again and again? 

Transcendence

What if we were to use discomfort as a sign that we are close to freedom but  instead of seeing it as a warning and an order to step back, we  learned to see it as an encouragment to keep going so we could walk  right into and through those painful and uncomfortable feelings to the freedom on the otherside? That is transcendence, of course, and I believe it is possible for all of us.

What we have to do, then when we feel the zap or the bonk, is to lean in rather than pull back.  

Lean into pain and discomfort? Are you out of your mind?

Yes I am out of my mind when I suggest that, that is how I can suggest it.  :)

And yes we lean even though that seems counterintuitive to our biological makeup.  We have a nevous system rigged up inside of us that makes us automatically and instinctively pull away from pain in order to ensure the survival of the physical body. That is all and good when you accidently place your hand on a hot burner but too many of us are perceiving everything around us as a hot burner to be avoided. We judge this or that as pain inducing, unpleasant and something to retreat from because it has the potential to make us feel uncomfortable, because it stirs up some old internal memories and feelings, or because ego and others tell us  it is a nasty thing. The correctional officers are our judgements, our conditioned beliefs, our perceptions, our aversions and  our fear. 

As counterintuitive as it may seem, practice leaning into pain and discomfort, just lean. Hold the space, don't retreat, lean. And see what happens.

Lean!

Of course, you may not want to start practicing with the hard stuff right? Don't start with leaning into trauma pain or cancer pain.   It is probably best to start small and work up to the big discomforts until we are able to use emotional, and even physical pain as a means to freedom. 

I started with Charlie Horses.  I often get what I judged to be "painful" Charlie Horse Cramps in my feet and calves.  I used to deal with the pain as if I was being zapped by an  electric cattle prod.  I would jump up, scream , "Oh No!" and  clenching my jaw and fists I tried fruitlessly to stamp the pain away.  That was the farthest thing from leaning a person could do. It was also, according to bystanders, pretty funny to watch.

I decided to stop resisting the pain and lean into it when ever a cramp would come.  I would get the zap...the warning...and I immediately reminded myself it was an opportunity to practice. I countered my instinctual reaction to resist the pain and I breathed and leaned into it instead.  I  countered the tendency to get tense and to clench up and I purposefully unclenched my fists and jaws and "relaxed!" I countered my tendency to become the pain or at least get lost in it, and I stepped back and watched it as I leaned into it.  Wow!

Leaning into dsicomfort is an amazing thing and the effects are so dramatic.  You still feel the zap...but that pain does not have to turn into suffering. My cramps last about a quarter of the time they normally would, releasing fairly quickly with less muscle tension.  I do not fear them and now I almost, as crazy as this sound, look forward to them. I like the challenge of a complicated lesson that I know I can master and this is one.

So now I am trying this practice with the other pain I get .  I lean into it and ask, "What can you teach me?" 

Don't get me wrong...I do not seek pain , nor do I want or intend on living a life of suffering. Just the opposite...I want to learn to deal with suffering.  It starts with recognizing, not avoiding, the reality of pain. When I confront pain..I take the first step to preventing suffering ...in order to do that I first must learn to lean into pain.

I also practice with emotions like sadness, anxiety, anger and resentment. I am discovering the more I am willing to lean rather than retreat backwards at the first sign of discomfort,  the less discomfort I experience, the less hold these emotions have on me, and the less imprisoned I feel.

Hmmm!  Well that is my experience anyway, for what it is worth. 

All is well in my world!

Releasing Layers of Resentment

 Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.

No one really knows who said that first :) 

I don't know about you but my belly doesn't feel so good.  I drank some posion along time ago and it is still doing a number on me. 

How do we get rid of all this resentment? 

I am still on the topic of resentment.  I am really contemplating the best way to release all this stored stuff so it doesn't make me sick, so it doesn't make those cells on the verge of changing change. 

As I watch myself from that higher place deal with all this I am amazed to find that in some moments , where there was once so much shame and guilt over my resentments, a certain  compassion for myself as well as all those involved.  I am getting somewhere in this practice. :) 

What Resentment Wants

Resentment, I realize then, is not looking to get revenge, to make others or myself  pay, to make others apologize or at least feel guilty for what I assume they did or didn't do.  It is simply trying to express itself so it can live out its span here and then go on to wherever emotional energy  goes when we let go of it. It wants to be released from the knots it is tangled up in within my body and mind. It wants to be free.  Hmmm!

Resentment is just an emotion with a certain degree of energy that is meant  to be processed and then  passed through our experiences. The "now" emotion would pass through so easily and be relased if only the space it was passing through was clear and there was no old unprocessed pain for it to get tangled up in. When I release the "now"  resentment that comes about as a reaction to something I perceive someone else is doing or not doing in this moment, for example, because I am clear and spacious inside ... I am doing something very healthy. I become aware of the resentment, I allow it, I experience it and I release it. What I give off is just a lot of surface level smoke. I and others become aware of the smoke. We   watch as it goes up, up, up, then gone... creating a harmless and healthy flow of emotion.

Resentment Lava

I see though how many of us are not clear and spacious inside. Many of us are stuffed to the rim with old emotion. In people who have a lot of stuffed, unprocessed resentment in them, new resentments can get the old   resentments rumbling as they attempt to  pass through. The new stuff can get tangled up in the old. Strands of the most deeply rooted resentments might  be pulled out with the new stuff. What I give off then, if that is the case, could be contaminated by old wound pain and the person I am confronting may be hit by layers of buried lava, resentment that has nothing to do with them, that has been  pulled up from the bottom of the resentment volcano. 

I definitely do not want to do that. I mean it would feel good to get rid of all that burning stuff inside me, a release... but I would be burning someone else with it. I could also hurt myself with the release of this much heat.(possibly by destroying my  property, relationships, fists etc). 

So release of stored resentment is a healthy goal for all of us. My question is: if there is so much stored stuff in so many layers, as it is in my case, how does one release such resentment in a healthy  way so as to ensure  no one gets hurt worse than they already are? How do we release such resentment and still ensure the Greater Good for all? 

How Do We Release Layers of Stuffed Resentment? 

The first thing I figure we have to do is become aware of resentment when we are feeling it.  Don't deny it , don't swat it away...and do not try to stuff any more pain down into that crater.  Then we have to be aware and accepting of that  fact that we do have resentments from the past  that we have stuffed inside and that need to be processed.  Denying this reality for the sake of appearing to be the better person or more evolved than we actually are will not help anyone. If the feeling of resentment is there either in surface or buried forms,  acknowledge and accept it. 

Then we have to make a committment to practice...and learning to let go of resentment  is a practice full of failures and successes...We commit so we can  release resentment  for the well being of ourselves and the world. 

Next we need to take the reins from ego and give them back to the wise  Observer within. Ego cannot be in charge of the release. That would lead to chaos. We want the higher Self in charge here...we want to operate from a state of awareness and presence not reactivity. We will be able to tell when ego is conducting the release of resentment by how  reactive we are, how dramatic we are, how stuck to story we are and our inability to move forward away from our grudges and grievances. 

Emotions like resentment are usually attached to thoughts about what has happened "out there" that we wish did not happen and often includes thoughts about what people did or didn't do. Things happened.  People did do certain things. Getting beyond resentment doesn't mean we deny what happened  or ignore certain things others have done. We just don't get tangled up in them. We remove judgment and bias from them. We remove the "right" or "wrong"; the "Should have, should not have."  We seperate from the external situations and look objectively at them. In higher Self consciousness we can relay in perfect detail the "happenings" but without the judgements that create the resentment.

Now, why is this important?  I believe it is important because we do need to relay the facts to ourselves about the circumstances or behaviours that have triggered the resentment we are experiencing at the moment or that which has been  stored in with the buried resentment so we can let go of emotional attachment to them.  We need to relay the thoughts because all emotion, I believe, comes from thoughts. In order to release the emotion we need to remove it from the thought.  So we need to create distance, to be able to stand back and observe. In order to detach we have  to remove the thoughts from the past or present "happening" . 

When we can stand back and observe the thoughts and the emotion attached, we are operating from higher Self.  We are not lost or blinded by resentment as ego makes us. We see clearly that the happening, the thoughts we have about it and the resentment are "out there". And "in here" we cannot be harmed by any of it.  "In here" we operate on love and compassion and we simply witness the circumstances and emotions . We are not attched to our resentment and we are not lost in it.  We are just observing it and the life event from a safe and neutral place.

So do we tell our story?

Yes but we do not tell it with the intention to cling but to let go.

 I have been pondering the benefit of story telling for quite a while.  What I have found   beneficial for me in helping me let go of emotion ...is writing  the story (collected thoughts on which the  resentment is attached) and then objectifying it by breaking it down into clear objective facts without the drama ego lives on. Create as much drama as you want in the first draft, let ego drive your emotional story wherever it wants ( as long as you are not sharing it with too many at this point)  but after that first draft is written be sure to then take the reins away from ego.  Begin removing the drama and emotion from the story.  Remove the judgement, the expectation, the heavy descriptive adjectives. Strip it down to the bare facts. When you are looking at it in its emotionless factual state you have  deatched yourself from it.  You have consciously and actively processed through the emotion and then released it. 

A Story for Every Layer

Of course, if we have have many layers of stored unprocessed emotions we need to write many stories, a story for every layer. So we write what we remember associated with that stored resentment starting at the top layer and working our way down. Becasue we may be uncovering painful memories we may want the help and support of a professional or trusted loved one as we do this. 

Exercise

It is also very beneficial to partake in an exercise regime of some kind to actively assist the stuffed emotions to be released from the body.  Walking, yoga ( especially  vinyasa) or Tai Chi may be very helpful in moving those emotions out of you.

 Be Kind to Yourself

Throughout this process you may find yourself unusually irritable and "resentful".  I am sooo irritable lol. You are, after all, releasing painful emotion. Do not beat yourself up . Be kind and compassionate with yourself knowing you are doing something very challenging that will benefit you and the world in the long run. You are clearing yourself out so there is more room for love.

Well that is what I learned from my own resentment freeing process.  I hope it helps you in some small way.

All is well. . 

Observe the Mind

 The unobserved mind is the problem.

Eckhart Tolle

Hmmm!  It is not the event, the person, the weather, or the nasty feelings we are observing that is the problem...it is the mind that is observing them that is.  What should be our object of attention then?  The external situations passing before us or the mind?  

Observe the Mind 

The mind needs to be observed before we can observe anything else cleary. Until we observe and see how the mind operates nothing else will make sense. We will continue to believe what this unobserved mind is telling us...we won't see how mixed up it is making things. All things will be distorted and misunderstood.They will be observed through a thick pair of lens that are not the right prescription.

Observe the mind first. Watch it.  See how it operates and how you tend to believe all the stories it is telling you. How you gladly put those dizzy-making lens on and view the world through them. Catch yourself thinking, making judgements, perceiving, preferring, avoiding or pushing away. See yourself lost in thought.

How do we do that?

Be willing, first of all to step away ...to consider the possibility that this is so and gently step back, creating a space between you and your thoughts so you can observe them.  No one is asking you to "stop thinking"...that would be impossible.  Just make a committment to observe your mind and become aware of the space that exists between thoughts.  In that space realize , "Just then I didn't think." 

Then take it a step farther, before the unobserved mind  pulls you away again, "Prior to that I was thinking about....and I was feeling.... " 

You are using thought to reflect on previous  thought but it is an awareness based thought. When you become aware that you were thinking and can reflect on it with thought...than you are not lost in thought anymore.  You are actually observing your mind...so for that moment the mind is an "observed" mind rather than an unconscious unobserved mind. ...and you are the conscious observer.  You are the awareness. 

It Takes Committed Practice

The more you catch these spaces and catch yourself thinking  the bigger the space will become between each thought and the quicker you will realize you just ran off.  With much practice you will catch yourself while you are lost in thought instead of afterwards and eventually you will be able to catch yourself before you go off on a thought tangent. 

You will also  begin to see the patterns and habits of the mind and be able to observe how they are more destructive than productive. How they not only add to your suffering but are often the cause of it. You will be able to see that what you are seeing through those thick lens is not truth and you will take the glasses off.   You will go beyond the distorted thoughts and perceptins, ideas and beliefs to what is truly real in you.  You will have clarity.

The world you observe then will not be the same one you see now.  It will be perfect just as it is.

Observe your mind!

All is well. 

Let Go of Resentment

 Let go of expectations and live in alignment with what is.

Eckhart Tolle

I have been coming to this place, the last few mornings,  full of ideas and inspiration about things I want to write about only to face the blank page to say, "Huh? I don't know what I want to write about." 

Let's just see what comes out, shall we? 

Resistance/Attachment

I have been slipping in and out of attachment/resistance  to my life situation.  One moment I am as open and as peaceful as can be regardless of what is happening around me.  I find myself looking at the behaviour of individuals that would definitely be considered by societal terms worthy of my upset and resistance...with an accepting and non-judgemental openness I cannot even understand.  

Reactive

And the next moment I find myself irritable and reactive to things I would not normally react to. At those times, I feel myself closing up  as the tightness in my gut becomes my chief body sensation. My mind automatically goes on a hunt for the cause of my grievance and resentment..."out there".  It is easy, these days,  to find someone or something to pin it all on. But is that what I want to do?  Will that bring me what I really want and need? No.

It will bring a great story, lots of exciting drama to share with others. It will feed the ego.  If I were to share it will likely bring all the responses ego thrives  on from others and they will likely validate my reason for resentment.  Resentment will grow.  The sense of "me" as the victim will also grow...the sense of "me" period  will grow. I will find myself clinging to the story, to the drama, to the grievances, to the rationalizations, the  resentment and the situation will grow out of proportion in my mind. I will be stressed and angry, dominated by a story mind created...and far from my peaceful center.

Just Let Go!

And all this will ensue unnecessarily when all I ever had to do was "Let go".  Let go of my resentment before it built up into story.  Let go of my need for resentment in the first place.  Let go of my judgements about what is good, what is bad,  what is a right way for people to behave and what is a wrong way. Let go of my expectations for others and people to be a certain way; for relationships to be a certain way. Let go of a desire to close!

Hmmm!  That doesn't mean I sit back and say or do nothing about the situation.  I can share objective feedback and information about what I am observing and experiencing. I can express my desire for change ( even if change does not occur, as I fear it won't) .  I can once again assert my rights and needs. 

 I can then sit back and watch to see if Life unfolds a different way...while I expect or demand nothing of it.Without expectations there will be no resentment.  Without the added burden of a resenting story...I can evalauate the situation clearly from a higher place.  I will see myself in the others and see them in me...Maybe I will be guided then to do something different and maybe I won't be. 

We will see!

Resentment is a Choice!

We choose resentment people...it doesn't choose us. If we resist what Life offers us...just because those things or people in our experience  do not meet the expectations we have established in our psyches...resentment can follow.  Resentment is a sure sign that we have closed our hearts to others and to Life. 

 Let go! Let go and let your heart open not just for all those around you but for you! 

Well I guess I did have something to write about after all. 

All is well

Mind: An Instrument

The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly.

Eckhart Tolle

Hmmm! Once again I am going to discuss my favorite topic...the mind! 

The human mind is a superb instrument.  It really is.  It allows us to store all the sensory data we pick up everyday...compartmentalizing it into categories that can be filed away in the concious or subconcious filing cabinets.  It helps us to make sense of our outer world and therefore is instrumental in keeping us alive by alerting us to danger. It helps us, of course, to use these bodies effectively, being in a sense the director of the body. 

The body is the car and the mind is the instrument that allows the car to move...the motor.  It is just an impartial tool, an amazing tool actually ....if...used rightly.

Most of us do not use it rightly, do we?  

Infact we often sit back and let ego drive when ego is worse than an intoxicated madman behind the wheel. The ego then encourages the mind to just run off dragging us behind it, pulling us in this direction or that. We end up used by the mind instead of the other way around.

The mind was not meant to be in charge of where we go in Life.  It is just an impartial instrument meant to help us get around in these earthly forms.  We...who we really are beyond mind and body...are meant to be in charge of the mind, the one operating the mind. 

Yet most of us feel the ego-driven  mind is in charge of us.  We listen to what it has to say, we believe it and follow its advice.  We allow it to pull us around from here to there.  

We should instead allow the deeper I to drive.

The deeper I, within all of us, is meant to drive the mind... 

Who is the "I" ...the real operator of the mind?

 The deeper I is the inner presence and essence that doesn't change or react to all the varying obstacles that show up on the road in front of us. Unlike the inebreated ego it keeps a steady course down the middle of its lane ...in no hurry or no rush to get anywhere.  It just is where it is. 

Unlike the ego that can fly into road rage flipping off all the drivers that are passing it or going too slow in front of it...it kindly accepts and sees the beauty in all others. 

Whereas the  ego doesn't notice all the beautiful scenery  around it as it uses the mind to quickly  get to its destination, the "I" sees and appreciates  all that is around it. It sees this moment as its destination.  

When "I" is driving the mind is used rightly...when ego is driving the road is a very scary place to be on. 

So what do we do to ensure this instrument is used rightly?

Take the keys away from ego and give them back to the "Deeper I",  the only part of us that truely  knows how to drive. 

All is well! 

To Write or Not To Write...

We  live in illusion and appearance of things. There is a reality.  We are that reality. When you understand this,  you will see that  you are nothing; and being nothing you are everything. That is all.

Kalu Rinopche

Hmmm! I don't know what to write today.  

I have a lot of ideas tumbling around in my head like: maybe I could explain why  I  posted the poem here the other day.. and what the objective was as  an assignment from In The Palm of your Hand ; to discuss  my interest in two new physics related things I learned about recently: axioms and muons and the new groundbreaking research being done that would reveal a fifth natural law to add to gravity, electromagnetism, strong force, and  weak force; sharing how I love  spring  which always brings me back to talking about "hope"; teaching about Yin Yoga and or maybe just talking about  my experience of Life from this little clump of flesh. :) And I have  this other poem  forming in the clouds of my mind...I wonder if I should  open the page up to it, so it can come out? 

There is a lot I could write about....

But ...

I don't think I am going to write about anything right now. I just don't think I want to .:) 

Have a wonderful day!

All is well in my world.

Accept it like You Chose It

 Accept what happens as if you have chosen it .

Eckhart Tolle/Wayne Dyer

I have heard that piece of wisdom from many but the two echoing voices that stick in my head are Wayne Dyer's and Eckhart Tolle's.  

New age?  

No...it is ancient wisdom, as far as I am concerned.  This is the premise of many ancient teachings.  If you want freedom from suffering...then accept...accept Life as it unfolds in front of you right here, right now, no matter what she is offering. 

It is our resistance to Life based on our unending need to judge what is good and what is bad, what is pleasant, and what is painful, what should be grasped and clung to and what should be avoided or swatted away. ...that creates suffering...not Life.  Life is just doing what Life does.  It is what it is. 

Stop grasping at it for the things you judge as "good"and potentially happy-making and stop swatting at it when you see things you judge as bad, or that you assume will bring suffering. 

Events! All of it...just events, just surface phenomena. We waste so much energy trying to control what we allow to enter our experiences that we do not experience Life fully. Put down your butterfly nets and your tennis rackets and just experience Life here and now! It is perfect just the way it is in all its apparent "chaos". 

Whether you actually chose it or not, whether you actually are responsible for everything that is happening in your outer experience or not, doesn't matter.  It really doesn't.  But act as if you chose it and you are less likely to swat any offering from Life  away. You will accept it, embrace it, honor it and cherish it.

Hmmm!

Something to think about.

All is well. 

Don't Love Your Life Too Much

 For years and years I struggled just to love my life. And then

a butterfly arose, weightless in the wind. "Don't love your life too much," it said,

and vanished into the world.

Mary Oliver https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/8347391-for-years-and-years-i-struggled-just-to-love-my

I love that!

As I continue to absorb all I have learned from Michael Singer's book, the untethered soul, I question our attachment to life in this busy world.  Life is so very, very  precious but our personal experience of it in these clumps of flesh,  like everything in this world, will pass away.  It will not last.  The knowledge of its eventual end can cause great sorrow and suffering for many of us.  We have a tendency then to want to deny the reality of Life's 10, 000 sorrows. ...

Yet, we are encouraged by wise individuals like Jack Kornfield to pay attention to all the change taking place in us and around us,  to truly notice how everything is subject to loss.  This coming and going,  is the natural course of existence.  Everything that arises will pass away.  Instead of denying or running from this reality...we are encouraged to turn  around and face it, embrace it.

Hidden in impermenance is the creativity of Life; hidden in the suffering is the endless capacity to feel. (somewhat paraphrased from Episode 35- Wisdom and Characteristics of Life)

Hmmm! Something to think about.

All is well!

Be Here Now Network (October, 2017) Jack Kornfield-Episode 35-Wisdom and Characteristics of Life. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l97qRmdMlWE

Going Somewhere?

 Where are you going? Even if you have no basis for understanding what is happening to you, you are still having the undeniable experience of going somewhere.

Michael Singer, page 174

I finally finished 'studying' the untethered soul, for the third time.  Now I am absorbing it at a deeper level than I did before.  Why?

Cuz low and behold I am getting a bit deeper.  I am actually moving somewhere.  That direction of movement is not "out there".  I am stepping away to some degree from my physical and psychological being and into my spiritual being. It is quite amazing to realize that is what is happening to me.

Back, in and up.

The direction we go then, to tap into our higher nature, involves a drifting  back,  a settling in  and a lifting up. 

Let's start with lifting up.

When we think of God, or think of the spiritual we have a tendency to look up, don't we?  We use the term "ascended beings" to describe those who are close to God, and "up there" in reference to Heaven. We have a sense of going up.

Regardless of what our cultural beliefs are in regards to the Divine we know that contact with It involves  going "up".  We are constantly going from a lower state of consciousness and vibration to a higher state.  That is what we are designed to do. We go from "low" energy to "high"  which will manifest as going from a certain illness propensity to wellness, from suffering to peace, unhappiness to joy, from fear to Love.  We are moving up from low to high.

Now let's look at drifting back.

How do we drift back? We first need to understand  the two experiences we have.  We have the experience of the world in front of us ...the foreground of our existence which includes all the form that is swirling  around us. It is a physical and psychological world consisting of things, thoughts, feelings, beliefs etc. What I call the "busy world".  

Then we have the "real world" in the background...ultimate spacious stillness and emptiness , the background on which the foreground is painted.  

In order to drift back we need to  let go of that which we are clinging to, of our attachment to everything in the forefront of our existence... We stop holding on to the erroneous belief that the form moving around us and through us  has  the power to  bring happiness or unhappiness to us. We let go of "ego" or this tendency to defend and attack for "little me" and we let go of the perspective  that this is who we are and where we belong.  We let go of the tendency then toward  reactivity...

And as soon as we let go we drift back away from our identification with things in this world. We drift  back from our identification with  mind and body.  We are no longer lost in it and as soon as we release our hold we drift back behind this illusion of a busy world. We create a distance between ourselves and our thoughts and emotions. 

Now what is interesting is that we cannot go "up"very far  in the world that exists in front of us. It has a very low ceiling because it is based on so many limiting beliefs.  If we try to go up using mental concepts or physical abilities we will keep bonking our heads on the ceiling. 

Think of it like  being a helium balloon in a room with a very low ceiling that was built as an add on in front of a room with the highest ceiling...infact with no ceiling. As a helium balloon it is natural for you to lift up but you can only lift to the ceiling.  If you want to really go up you have to slip back into the other room behind you where there is no ceiling.  You have to drift back into the background that is spacious and infinite. Of course to do that, you can't be holding on to the door frame of the low ceiling room.  You have to let go.

In?

Well in is a relative term as are all the directional pointers we are using. What is "in" really? 

What helps me to visulaize going "in" is to think of going deeper, going beyond the superficial outer world to the inner, going beyond the body or the psyche to the empty hollowness  inside. Kind of like the insides of a hollow Chocolate bunny. ..just space.  Spirit is in this space, it is this space and the more we are here the less we are going to identify with that thin chocolate layer around us. We settle into that space. So if someone or something comes and takes a big chomp out of that outer layer...it isn't going to bother us. 

When we drift back, settle in and lift up we identify more with spirit than form. 

What does it feel like to identify more with Spirit than with form?You used to walk around feeling tension; now you walk around feeling love. You just feel love for no reason.  Your backdrop is love.  Your backdrop is openness , beauty and appreciation. 

You are going somewhere!

All is well in my world.

Michael Singer (2007) the untethered soul. Oakland: New Harbinger/ Noetic Books

Walking the Path

 What happens to one who walks the path toward God? What transformation do they go through along the way?

...imagine what would happen if you started feeling tremendous love for all creatures, for every plant, for every animal, and for all the beauties of nature.

Imagine if every child seemed like your own, and every person you saw looked like a beautiful flower, with its own color, its own expression, shape, and sounds.

As you went deeper and deeper, you would start noticing a phenomenal thing-you are no longer judging. The process of judging has simply stopped.

There is just appreciating and honoring.  

Where there used to be judging, there is now respecting, loving, and cherishing.

To differentiate is to judge. 

To see, to experience, and to honor is to participate in life instead of standing back and judging it.

Michael A. Singer, the untethered soul, 2007/New Harbinger/Noetic Books, page 176-177

All is well!