Riding the Wave or Observing it?

 

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don't resist them- that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.

Eckhart Tolle 

It took me a while to come here and actually place my fingers on the keys today. Why?  I was lost in the meanderings of my petty little mind, trying to figure out what "I" as this clump of flesh and much too busy mind, could "do" to "fix" and "control" the life event sitting so obviously before me.  I must be leaning over too much, allowing the wind to knock me off balance, causing me to fall  into the turbulent waters of my mind...again. I somehow recognize I am there, splashing around, fighting a current I actually created. I stop and tread. I take a deep breath, pull my drenched and soggy body from the waters huffing and puffing as I do.  I drag myself to shore and look over the bank and ask, "What the fork just happened? Why do I keep ending up in that bloody water?" 

So now I am reflecting on why I keep getting sucked into this fast moving current when all I truly want to do is observe it.  The Life Event that I am reacting to is awareness of my financial situation. My bank accounts tell me that I am getting more and more in debt trying to stay afloat.  I am not the only person on this planet experiencing financial woes at this present moment in time. That I know.  I also know that we do not all act the same to this so called "problem." Many, with similar circumstances as mine would probably be handling it with a lot more reactivity, with  more drama than I am right now.   "Oh my God...I can't pay the mortgage.  How am I going to pay off the debt I am incurring to pay the mortgage? I can't handle this never ending stress of trying to stay a float.  I will have to give up the house.  Then where will we live? Oh my!  I can't accept that I am in this situation. It should not be this way at my age after working so hard like I did. It is all so unfair. What do I do?  What do I do?  How do I fix this, change this? " Thrashing and splashing, fighting and struggling, resenting and resisting.  Believe me I understand that approach...been there, done that...and there are many times I still  wake up to find I am once again  there.  

Sigh! Staying centered is not as easy as it looks.  I often find myself getting sucked into the thought stream, fighting against what life has given me as if it shouldn't be this way.  I blame it for making things so hard for "me". 

This world is not designed to make you happy-it is designed to challenge you.

Eckhart Tolle

Many others in the same situation, ( maybe not many, but a few, evolved human beings I would love to  emanate) would handle it in a much more enlightened way.  They would  be observing calmly from the shore...where I am at the present moment...and saying, "Oh wow!  Look what is down there! Some challenging waves...some choppy water...cool! Not sure how long this white water travels but it is all good. " (Which I am not quite saying). Then if they were even more evolved they would go into the water, lay back and just float...rising  up when the waves crested, sinking down when the waves troughed...just allowing it all to be exactly as it, without fighting or resisting. The white water, (the challenging life event) would be viewed as a wonderful and exciting challenge that they embraced and experienced fully  rather than something that "shouldn't be".  They would trust it as they trusted this flow of Life  to take them home. 

I am not there yet.  I am still on the shore observing the water, coming to acceptance of it.  I do see that right where I am focusing, the water is choppy. There is challenge and this challenge is not a problem from here but I am not quite at the point where I am ready to go down and ride the waves.  Observing is enough for now; reflecting on my tendency to get sucked in is enough for now, staying centered is enough for now. Accepting that it all is just as it is, is enough for now.

What I intend as I sit here is that I I find peace when I go back down into that river of Life...I used to believe that would only happen if  my circumstances miraculously changed or I was able to "solve the problem" or "fix the moment" somehow but now I see there is another way. I intend to develop the serenity and fortitude of those more evolved beings I wish to emanate. I want peace and the ability to truly experience this flow of Life  I have been granted the opportunity to experience, no matter what it offers,   with appreciation and awe.

All is well! 

Should Be and Shouldn't Be

 The universe unfolding in front of you should not be the way you want it to be.  It should be the way it is.

Michael Singer

I often tell others that I believe one of the most toxic words in our English language is the word " should". When we say a thing, an event, another person  "should or should not be"  a certain way we are resisting what is. We are stepping up to Life and saying..."I don't accept what you are doing and "I" know more than you.  I know what should or shouldn't be happening here, back off and let me take over." 

Should and Shouldn't Be

Michael Singer, in the video linked below, reminds us that  the Universe has been happening , growing, expanding, being for over 13.8 billion years, long, long,long before we, in these temporary forms  plopped down here.  Many, many natural forces, we could not even begin to understand, have been working together to form that which is unfolding in front of us right now. What we are looking out upon in this moment -be it a beautiful sunset or an image of our bank account, now in the red-is just a very impersonal result of billions of causes and billions of effects.  It really has nothing to do with us. How and why it is there, showing up in front of us, is really none of our business.   We just have the very honored but often unappreciated opportunity to observe the unfolding universe in action.  Whatever is in front of us is one of an infinite amount of possibilities and we get to observe and participate in it.  Wow!  That is something that should fill us with awe, gratitude and reverence. But it doesn't, does it?

I look at my bank account and I get a boulder sized knot in my gut. I don't appreciate what I am seeing.  I fail to appreciate the billions of events that have evolved to lead to this moment. My moment just seems "wrong", Life seems "bad" and this present unfolding seems  like it "shouldn't be." Why?  Because my image of a separate, personalized self  doesn't like it. It does not like this reality and it wants something different.  It wants the situation, the moment, the universe to be different than what it is. So I tighten up in resistance.  I walk up to life wagging my finger and say, " This shouldn't be!" and I begin to tell it what "should be" .  Me, in this little clump of flesh that will only be around for less than 100 years, that knows absolutely nothing about anything, is going to tell the intelligent, wise, 13.8 billion year old universe that creates every speck of dust on this planet, every being, every non-being, that works in perfect balance and harmony with all the ancient invisible forces around me...what it "should be" in order to accommodate my desires in this point of my puny existence. Do you see something wrong with that? 

Reality not behaving? 

We often see problems where there are no problems. We see problems when reality won't behave:   When what we want to happen isn't happening ; when what we don't want is happening; when what we want to happen in the future might not happen or when what we don't want to happen in the future might  happen.  We even have an issue when what we wanted to happen, didn't happen and when what we did not want to happen , happened.  Man, it is crazy to put all that energy and effort in that way  we do to change the present and future so it accommodates our petty desires,  but to put energy and effort into resisting the past is even crazier, isn't it?  We cannot go back and change the past. Yet there we are, wagging our fingers in Life's face saying, "You shouldn't have done that or you should have done that!" and we won't let it go!

Life is not the problem...how we relate to it is. 

The Buddha's second noble truth taught that the cause for all suffering is "desire".  What is desire?  According to Michael Singer, desire is simply the making up in our mind of the way we want reality to be. "I want it to go like this, be like this, do this...if it does I will be happy and Life will be good." If it goes the way. we tell ourselves it should go.....great...we are happy and we have a great "controlling" relationship with Life ( for the moment, it lasts, that is).  If it doesn't go that way, we have a very resentful relationship with Life. With desire as our motivator, we set out to "fix", control, manipulate Life so it goes our way...because we determine it was "wrong" and that we know better. 

 And all Life was and is ever  doing is doing what Life does.  Life knows what it is doing and where it is going.  We, on the other hand, don't know and we have to accept that fact.  Life/ the universe, God is wiser than us and we would be much better off relaxing into its process than trying to control that which we cannot control!

Most of us face each morning wondering what we can do to make the day  go our way. Imagine waking up in the morning, looking out upon the world and saying, This is the day the Lord hath made. Rejoice in it and be glad. Psalm 118:24

Ride the Wave

Those who flow as Life flows know they need no other force.Lao Tzu

What would happen, I wonder, if we did as Singer and many of the wise sages suggest,  and stopped "desiring"....  If we stopped stepping in the way of our Life experiences with our wagging fingers and our "want and don't want" demands and instead  relaxed into the unfolding  event that shows up in front of us each moment? Would we learn to appreciate and be in awe of whatever happens, whatever shows up even if  it is  what old, conditioned  mind might have previously judged as " bad, wrong, shouldn't be"?  Could we learn to look at our so called problems, like financial difficulty, in the same way we look at a sunset? Could we learn to accept it all just as it is?  Could we revere and trust Life enough  to put away our personal agendas, so we can flow with it instead of against it...letting her do the doing while we just rest in the  flow?  Instead of awing about Life ...can we learn to be in awe of Life, every moment?  

I don't know but it would be pretty cool if we could. I am willing to do my best to at least try this other way.  What about you? 

All is well!

Michael Singer Podcast/ Sounds True (April 2, 2022) From Fighting to Harmony: Changing your Relationship With Life https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbnJq_96xAI

I think therefore I am?

 I think therefore I am.

Rene Descartes

or

I am therefore I notice my thinking.

(I am not sure who said this.  I have it scribbled down in my notes without an author attached to it. My bad! Sorry. ) 

Which of the above quotes makes the most sense to you?  I  remember loving the first quote, seeing so much wisdom in it, as the philosophy prof shared it with our eager ready to be molded minds.  I don't see much wisdom in it anymore.  In fact, I see how unwise it is.  Thinking, I eventually learned by examining my own mind instead of blindly accepting the teachings others throw at me, keeps us from experiencing the "I am" of our lives. 

I am...

I love the second quote. I see the wisdom in that.  I feel the wisdom in that. We are "I am" before we are "thinker". The "I am" is always there, has always been there, will always be there as the core observer and participant of our experience here. Thinking,  like all things in this world, is not something "we" do.  It is something that just happens...flowing into our psyches, our experiences and flowing out. There is no substance to it.

Clouds in the Sky

"I am" is the spacious blue sky, eternal, unchanging, infinite.  Thoughts and other mental formations or mental modifications are just clouds that float over that blue sky.  Sometimes the clouds are light and fluffy not creating enough of an obstruction to hide the blue sky beneath.  The blue sky and all that light and goodness still shines through. We experience joy, peace, love in small or large amounts depending on how much blue sky is getting through.  Sometimes, the clouds are dark and heavy, even stormy, creating a thick veil over the  blue sky so little of its light shines through.  We experience heaviness, darkness, confusion, fear, anger, depression etc only becasue the light from the blue sky is not getting through the veil the mind has placed in front of it.  The blue sky is still there as it always has been and always will be, full of light and space and freedom.  We just don't see it through the cloud cover. The only thing between us and this sky, then,  are these clouds. The only thing between us and the peace we long for is the cloud cover of mind...our thinking.  The only thing between us and connection with the infinite blue sky are our mental modifications. 

The Sky Beneath The Cloud Cover

"I am" is still there underneath even our heaviest and darkest mental formations, our thoughts and feelings. It doesn't go away because we are not "observing" it.  It is and always will be observing us...observing the clouds...observing the thoughts, observing the feelings, observing the world beyond the mind.  It is always able to observe us even when we lost our attention on it.

We want to connect with it.  We want to be a part of it ( I mean we are always a part of it but we want the experience of being a part of it) and we begin by doing what it does...observing that which keeps us from it. We notice when we are thinking and when we are not.  Most of us have a lot of cloud cover in our psyches so we have a lot of noticing to do...but we notice the clouds. "Oh I am thinking. That is blocking my peace." or  "Oh! I am reacting to what that person said, filling my head with feeling, story, judgement and that is blocking me from experiencing peace, joy, love etc" .  We make a commitment to keep the sky above us ( which is in our mind and heart) as open as possible. We do our best not to cling to any clouds or attempt to push away clouds ( that only makes them more persistent and potentially stormy).  We just notice them. Clouds are going to come and go and we just notice.  Thoughts and feelings are going to come and go and we just notice. They will pass by on their own. We just notice!

Noticing the "I am"

The more we practice this the more we notice the blue sky, the more we fall into the blue sky and realize just how much a part of it we have always been.  "I am" the eternal , spacious  blue sky that notices the clouds that pass upon it.  "I am" the eternal, spacious observer that notices the thinking as it passes by the mind.

Hmmm! Well that is how I see it. What do I know? 

All is well! . 

Winds of Change

 

It is cloudy out today.  My office window is open and I can hear the breeze blowing through the now full hardwood.  It is so beautiful, more musical than any symphony.  

There are patches of Lily of the Valley right below this window and every now and again their fragrance gets picked up by the careless wind and is  blown in here.  I close my eyes and breathe it all in,  reminded  of my childhood, picking these same flowers from the graveyard by where I used to live.  They grew there in abundance and despite my fear of "the dead" I would run into the old fenced in crypts, shove my face into their delightful little congregations and scoop up as many as I could, leaves and all. I probably would have sold a bouquet  to my Nana because I would have felt a tiny bit entitled or at least worthy of her  smiling, big -open-armed generosity. I knew even with my broken and immature mind, that I never had to impress her by giving her anything.  And graciously but awkwardly I would have given  them to my mother whom I spent a life time trying to impress, without success, it seems. They, the little white happy faced flowers with their lovely perfume always seemed to make her smile.  They seemed to be able to do what I never could. 

The wind, like my breath, pulls me from my memory and brings me back to this moment.  Nana and my mother are gone now, just distant wisps of memory that, like the wind I am listening to, blow through the open windows of my psyche  once in a while. 

I look through the open section of curtain. All I see is green and luscious out there and it is like "Wow! When did that happen?" I just cannot seem to keep up with time.  The world is changing so fast around me,  it is  a blur.  One day the earth is sad and heavy, languishing under the dirty snow of early spring  and then  there is this. My yard  is now  flourishing in an abundance of chlorophyll induced colour.  I did not see it happening. 

Why  can't I keep up with  the transitions of seasons and the transitions in this thing  I call, "my life", I wonder.

Hmmm! Maybe, I know why, after all. My vision has stopped changing. It is no longer chasing or  dependent on the objects before it. I am looking out at all this through eyes, though clouded with cataracts and lens that don't refract light the way they used to on the outside, that are clear and changeless. Beneath this body that  wrinkles and sags, dying a bit everyday, is this never changing observer of things.  There are  no calendar pages to turn, no transitions, no ticking clocks in here,  though everything that surrounds it comes and goes.  There is no winter or summer...just this ; no past or future, just now. When I lay back into its arms, allowing my attention to rest on the changeless, there is no passing of time. So I do not notice the changing world around me  the way I used to. 

I feel my breath and I listen to this ever changing world as the wind sings so softly for me this sweet lullaby:  "Just this!  Just this!" 

Hmm! All is well. 

Oh it is all so confusing...yet beautiful at the same time. 

The more wisdom you attain[open up to]and the more conscious you become, the crazier you will appear to others.

Unknown

That is why I call myself "crazy lady"...I know in the eyes of many I am crazier than a bag of hammers and  am only on the first lag of my journey. Oh man...lol

I didn't want to leave this site with such negativity as the last entry brought out.  It is all good.  All this learning is good. I don't mind being thought of as "crazy" if it means that I am coming in contact with some wisdom. 

All is well.

Fear, Belief, Narcissistic Egos and Cults

 Your beliefs don't make you a better person, your behavior does. 

Sukhraj Dhillon

I have been thinking about cults again, thanks to Netflix lol. I actually have had a fascination with cults for quite some time. I have this desire to understand them for some strange reason.  My fascination and desire to understand  leads me to watch these series that come up on Netflix related to them.  I binge watched the series on the FLDS and Warren Jeffs yesterday and though it left me feeling a little sick inside I couldn't stop watching.  

Cult Leaders

Though I have such a strong visceral aversion to cult leaders, I want to understand why people tend to follow these leaders when they seem so obviously, narcissistic and egoic. Ego and narcissism, I observe in these leaders,  often goes with  Anti-social personality Disorder...a lack of compassion and remorse leading to an abuse of power, a need for control and adoration,  a making "right" that which could never be "wholesome" or "skillful" to suit very self-centered personal needs (greed, accumulation of the community's resources to serve self, sexual exploitation, diminishing the value of others, demanding blind obedience even if it leads to harm, severe punishment for not obeying  and the abuse...sexual, emotional and physical even of minors).  This type of leadership involves everything that is the opposite of "spiritual" though it is often,  through the guise of  faith and spirituality, that cult leaders  gain their power. 

Followers

Now some potential leaders  have charisma ; some have a way of drawing people in with their charm , looks and personality.  Obviously Warren Jeff did not have those assets to use.  Yet,  thousands of people blindly followed him despite how much suffering it caused them. Why?  He, like other spiritual cult leaders,  used the power of " belief"  in others, to manipulate and control.  

My mind will often judge that as "sick" of the followers and " pure evil" of the leaders,  but to the followers these leaders are often viewed as "next to God" or "speaking for God". Even after they have been exposed, prosecuted by the law...these "true followers" will still adore and blindly follow these leaders. Why?  Because somehow the followers are convinced that belief is more important than behavior.  

The Dangerous Power of Belief

Belief is so friggin powerful, isn't it?  Belief is so friggin dangerous!   People are willing to give up their children for it, to allow their 12 to 14 year old daughters be raped by these leaders or other men in the community under the guise of "marriage" for it. In this case the individuals believed they would not be "lifted up" from the fires of damnation when it came...and it was coming soon...if they did not blindly follow this sick, cruel  and oh so selfish, far, far from spiritual man in everything he said.  Fear and belief, then, often go together. 

I am sure at one time the beliefs these sick individuals exploit were also authentically and sincerely a part of their lives...at least to some degree, weren't they?  Warren Jeff was a believer in what he preached was he not, at one time? He  believed in the message at one point, didn't he? Or did he from the beginning only see a way to self fulfillment through the power this belief seemed to have on others in his community. Was he plotting from the beginning how he could use that fear and that belief for his own personal gain?

Reinforcing Belief

I don't know but I can see from this series and others how people were drawn in.  The belief was externally  reinforced and reinforced and reinforced over and over again through the visuals on buildings, walls, shoes even , "Stay Sweet!" "Pray and Obey"...it was everywhere.  They sang these messages, they read these messages, they spoke these messages, they heard this message 24/7.  They were hypnotized by them. And it was always followed by a big, "Or else..." which fed their fear.  They were not allowed to question the message, the teaching or the messenger.  Doing so meant punishment...being torn away from  loved ones, being physically violated or emotionally abused. They were conditioned to obey! To believe!  Believing in the message, and the selected messenger...no matter what he was like... became an external and internal law. Questioning it was to break these laws and would mean eternal damnation for self and loved ones.  More fear increasing the stuckness in this cycle.

 So when the unthinkable was asked of them...well not asked...demanded of them..."Become my wife number 62( come on...the rational mind would see, wouldn't it, how unwholesome and unskillful being one of 62 wives is, wouldn't  it? )  Give your 16 year old daughter to that lecherous 85 year old man as a wife...don't worry, he will become young again. Marry your 14 year old daughter off to her first cousin.   Bring your 12 year old daughter to me for some ritual in the sacred, holy bed of the temple." The behavior of the men in the community, I personally judged,  as so outrageous but the belief was stronger. ...making it all okay.  

Deprogramming

I wonder what would happen if more women, like those few brave women who spoke up, had a chance to step away from the programming, just for a month, to go to some Buddhist retreat or some ashram somewhere where they would learn to meditate and just focus on breath. If they could just create enough space in their mind between what they were taught to think and believe and  their conscious mind,  maybe they could just observe it all  objectively. What if they could walk themselves through belief to what was on the other side, coming to terms with the question, "Who am I (besides a wife, man-pleasing sexual object, a mother" ?" ...would they be willing to be wife 62?  Would they give their young daughters up to be raped? Would they follow blindly this messenger...would they follow blindly their belief? Or would they shake their heads , as if waking up from a bad dream, and say "WT Front door was I thinking?" 

Hmm...

Now this cult thing is the extreme of what the mind can do and what following blindly our beliefs and the propagator of them can do. Yet...their is a lesson in there for all of us.  Our beliefs are just thoughts . Beliefs then are not more important than behaviour. They do not determine our goodness.  They can, in fact, get in the way of our goodness. Spirituality and true faith go beyond thought and conviction, to that goodness...that is unconditional, and not dependent on any validation from the likes of Warren Jeff. Teachers, of anything, messengers of any message...are just people with egos. Remember that!

  If we can't question our beliefs, look at them objectively and ask..."Is that true for me inside?  I mean should this belief dictate what I should do here?  Is there a better way?" or "Is this person I am listening to right?  Is he/she/they coming from a good place when he/she/they teach ?  Does he let me think for myself?  Is she adding fear to the  message?  How does their message resonate inside me? "... then there is a problem with how we believe.  We need to have the courage to reexamine it all: message and messenger; belief and believer

Oh my goodness...no more shows on cults for me for a long time lol.

Netflix (June, 2022) Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey 

Returning to Center

 That act of losing your center and then coming back again, over and over, is a deeply spiritual thing...it is the core of your practice.

Michael Singer 

Many great and wise beings , including Michael Singer, tell us that the true spiritual practice is not the meditation we do, the yoga we do, the mantras, the praying, the reading of scripture, the going to church or  temple  etc. True practice is the intention to remain in awareness for as long as we can.   

Huh?

Our Most Important Goal: Stay Centered or Return to Center ASAP

The true goal in Life is to remain centered and aware, in the seat of objective observation,  through what ever Life unfolds. If  you  truly want truth and peace, you need to constantly observe what goes on inside you. You need to notice when you are being pulled down and away from the present moment, when you are getting lost in the story that goes on in your head so you can bring yourself back to awareness of what is "really" going on here and now. It is not about fixing or changing anything "out there" so it doesn't disturb you.  In fact, it is not about what Life is doing, at all.  It is about how you are relating to Life.  

Fix Yourself 

If you truly want to grow, you need to change your attitude, not Life.  You need to not only stop blaming Life for not going your way, you need to stop having "a way".  In other words, stop preferring one thing over an other...stop liking and disliking; stop grasping for  what you tell yourself is pleasant and pushing away what you tell yourself is unpleasant ( only because of how they  touch or don't touch your stuff inside), while you ignore the billions of beautiful but neutral things. Stop looking at Life as if it  is some big dessert cart put together especially for you that you can pick and choose from. Life has little to do with you...the personalized version of you, that is.  It is not here to cater to your needs. If you are disturbed inside, as 99 percent of us are...it is not Life that is broken...it is you that is broken. Fix yourself!.

Sounds harsh I know.  I put all the "you" in there for a reason so it would have greater impact but "you", I must stress, are not alone in the need for this message.  99 percent of us are in need of that message to really sink in so we live by it. This version of Life I call "me" is in desperate need of that reminder every day, as well. 

How do you fix yourself?

Of course, I am going to suggest you  meditate.  It is a wonderful practice to create space between you and whatever is going on in your mind so you can observe it objectively.  I am going to suggest you listen to the great masters and read the great works of wisdom as well.  I am going to suggest you pray if that is meaningful for you, to go to church, temple or synagogue if that too has significance and brings you peace...but...the most important practice is something so practical and simple, it could easily be overlooked.  That is, go to the source of all your so called problems...the mind...and observe it, really observe it. And keep observing it, every moment of your day. 

Say what, crazy lady?

The Real Practice: Observing the Mind

You may come out of church feeling peaceful and centered and wonderful but just as you are about to  drive home  someone in the parking lot backs into you, doing  a lot of damage to the car you are so attached to...what happens to that peace then? Does it stay or does it go? 

Most of us are going to get pulled down into disturbance pretty fast, aren't we? We are going to find ourselves saying, "Oh No!" or a whole lot worse, while thoughts of "Oh my goodness we just had it painted, is my insurance card updated, what is wrong with these drivers?' flows through our head.  We will feel ourselves going from a state of shock, fear to anger.  Our blood pressure goes up, our face gets red, we feel a boulder in our gut as our hands go into tight little fists. We may go into automatic reactivity, jumping out of the car to confront the other driver. The point is...we are beginning or are already in full blown automatic reflex reactivity to what just happened. We are lost in our minds.  We lost our center! And if we are really off center we will carry this with us for days and months. 

Normal Isn't Necessarily Healthy

Now this is a  very normal, conditioned response.  You would get a lot of empathy and support from most others you tell about it,   I am sure. But "normal" doesn't mean healthy, does it? Normal...doesn't mean it is the most wholesome  approach for you.  Normal does not mean it is going to bring you closer to truth and peace.  Most normal reactions, I have learned, take us farther from peace rather than closer to it....unless...unless...you become aware enough to use it as part of your core practice. 

Huh?

Beyond the Obvious Practice

At that moment you are probably not going to run back into the church, kneel down and recite 100 Hail Mary's ( or whatever prayers or mantras go with your tradition).  You are probably not going to bend down to do the Sun Salutations or pop a squat on the pavement and go into some deep mantra focused meditation either.  Nor are you going to reach for one of those Holy Books you keep in your trunk for such occasions, and riffle  through it until you find some passage that applies to such situations.  No...it is going to be so in front of you you will have to deal with it in this moment. This moment then becomes the most important part of your spiritual practice. 

Michael Singer, in many of his podcasts,  tells us that it is much more important to understand what took us out of our peaceful, meditative, post church state than it is to know what will put us in it. Recognizing what is happening inside us, what changes are occurring in the mind that is taking us from or keeping us from peace is the most crucial thing.  We can only recognize that by turning our focus away from the life event and observing, objectively, what is going on inside. 

You have to remind yourself...though the mind and all those observers and listeners you tell your story to will be convinced otherwise...it was not the event, the person backing into your car that disturbed you.  It wasn't this event that unfolded in front of you.  It wasn't Life that pulled you away from the peace you were just experiencing. It was you!

You were already disturbed inside from years of conditioned and socially approved stuffing and storing, pushing away and grasping...and the fender bender just poked at the disturbed stuff already in you, agitating it.  It felt very uncomfortable to you...and your mind, doing what it is programmed to do,  told you you had to do something about it. So you got sucked into the conditioned and habitual way of thinking and reacting. You followed habitual mind away from center into condemnation, judgement, unhealthy perception, negativity and you got lost in it.  For  a moment, for an hour, for a few days, or a few years you  can be lost in this...believing erroneously that it was the event that was the cause of your disturbance, not the way you reacted to it. 

So what can you do here instead of react?

The Three B's

You can take a step back, mentally or physically, creating a bit of space between you and your mind's tendency to react in its habitual way.  You can breathe...centering yourself again in the place of spacious awareness, or "True Mind"  and you can begin again from there...objectively, without judgement of this incident being "good or bad", "right or wrong", "should be or shouldn't be".  Remind yourself that it was just one of the trillion events that could have unfolded in front of you. It just is. 

Relax your body, relax your mind and make a commitment to notice the event, allow and experience it and then release this event and all it brings with it.

Relax! Encourage your mind and body to soften, as strange it may seem to do this at a time like this.  The body and mind are conditioned for fight or flight but we don't need to give into primordial brain.  You  don't fight the stress response  or struggle against it...you  just relax into it.   You pause before acting. Breathe slowly and deliberately and  remind yourself...that you intend to stay conscious, calm and aware.  Peace is your goal

Notice! Stay aware...instead of slipping into the tendency to suppress, repress, resist, avoid, numb, push away this situation as the mind is conditioned to do when things are unpleasant or uncomfortable...notice what is happening.  Observe what is happening around you but more importantly observe what is happening in you.  Feel the shock...the heart racing, the heat in your face, the pressure in your chest, the way you are breathing.  Feel the anger if it is there and notice what the mind wants to do with that anger...notice the resistance, the judgement ...the pull towards reactivity if it is there. Don't follow it, just notice it. Just observe what the mind is saying, doing or wanting to do...just observe it objectively.

If you have already slipped into mental reactivity...just notice that you have and as soon as you notice that you have, you are no longer lost in reactivity because you are now observing it. Don't beat yourself up for it...just notice and with great compassion bring yourself out of the thought stream and back to the centered "True mind". 

Allow! Allow this to be what it is.  Like really, what are you going to do?  No amount of temper tantruming or praying is going to make what happened "unhappen".  It did.  It's done.  You have no choice but to allow, do you? Someone backed into your car.  It is as it is.  Let go of your resistance and those habitual tendencies that do not bring you to peace.  Accept and allow! 

Experience it! "Oh wow!  Look what Life just gave me!  This is new.  So this is what it feels like to have this happen. Wow! I will add this to my host of life experiences.  Cool!" I know that might seem strange but if we could remove "the pleasant and unpleasant"  from our life experiences , "the shouldn't be and the should"...we would have much more peace, wouldn't we?   If we could experience everything Life throws our way with awe, curiosity and wonder instead of labeling it as something that should be avoided or something that we should chase after...man we would be much happier wouldn't we? We are here to experience everything...10,000 joys and 10,000 sorrows. It is all amazing!

Release it! When the experience and the energy of the experience is ready to leave, as all things eventually are, just let it.  Let it go.  don't cling to it because it was something that your mind tells you you  could add to your list of grievances, your "Proof that Life is Out to Get Me List"....just let it go.  If you don't use mind to stop it...it will go. All things in this Life come and go...nothing is permanent. The paint job on the car you just had banged up is very temporal, as is the car. This experience is even more temporal. The person driving the car may not be here tomorrow. Heck, you may not be. All form, all events are impermanent waves flowing through you.  Cling to none of it, resist none of it ( which leads to a form of storing it inside) and like the beautiful wind outside my window right now, it will all blow right through.  Let it! 

Hmm!  That was a lot of learning and a lot of sharing for one day.  :)

All is well! 

Too many of Michael Singer's podcasts to cite

Freedom in the Seat of Objective Observation

 To understand oneself is to be aware of every thought and feeling without condemnation. When you condemn, you put a stop to your feelings and thoughts;but if you do not condemn, justify, or resist, then the content of your thought will reveal itself. Experiment and you will see. 

J. Krishnamurti

The Seat

Krishnamurti , a brilliant Indian philosopher, was big on encouraging everyone he spoke to, to maintain the seat of objective observation. By that he wanted us to remain centered and objective as we did the most spiritual and the most practical well being seeking thing we could ever do...observe our minds. This is what all the great masters tell us to do, do they not?  If we want liberation from our suffering, we need to go to the source of that suffering  and observe what is going on in there and then determine the roots of it. This mission we may or may not be on to "awaken" is not about stopping our thinking...we couldn't do that if we tried.  It is just about understanding Self.  If we want to understand Self or the No-self (if thinking in Buddhist terms)  we need to understand  all that is blocking the true flow of Self, of Shakti or Chi, of Life energy, through us which is often our thinking.  We need to understand what is causing the disturbance.  So we take our seat as the objective observer and we observe the mind.

Lost in Thought or Feeling?

Now, we cannot observe the mind if we are lost in the mind.  If we are so carried away by the story the mind is telling, if we see ourselves as characters in that story, we cannot "observe" it "objectively" without condemnation, justification or resistance, can we? If you get so caught up in thinking, in the disturbance and distraction the busy mind offers, you lose awareness that you are thinking.  If you lose awareness of thinking, you can not observe your thinking. (That goes for feeling too , of course, and for all the mental modifications as Patanjali referred to them as or the "mental formations" as the Buddha referred to them.) 

Being Aware You Are Thinking

The first step is always in coming to the realization that we were lost in thought or reactivity ( actually acting upon our thinking). "Oh my...I was really getting carried away there, thinking about that or doing that becasue I was feeling that or thinking about that." As soon as we have caught ourselves thinking we are the observer. We have stepped away from the thought stream and are now on the shore watching what is going on in it. 

The Stream

Michael Singer in his podcast ( linked below) gives us this analogy.  Imagine your Life was this amazing stream going from point A to the infinite Ocean...If we look at this as a spiritual path, without disturbance it will flow naturally and freely toward the Ocean...the Source of All...God.  If we look at it as a psychology or wellness path, without disturbance our minds  will always flow in the direction of peace, joy, happiness and Love.   But for most of us there is so much disturbance that getting to God, or peace seems almost impossible. 

What is causing the disturbance?

Singer gets us to imagine there are big rocks in this stream...the rocks block the flow, creating currents and eddies leading to disturbance. Now we can get so attracted to these rocks and this disturbance because it is all so big, noisy, loud and demanding, we can get sucked right in.  If fall into the thought stream, and if  we are fighting to survive in that stream, we are not in the seat of objective observation, in our calm center observing it.  We are likely condemning it and resisting it big time, right?  The thing is we need to get out of that stream, to separate ourselves from the pull of the current. And once out on shore we want to do our best to stay there...to maintain the seat of the objective observer. 

What are these rocks that we are so attracted to that cause disturbance?  

Those rocks are our thoughts, our beliefs, our feelings, our emotions, and our perceptions that we have stored inside us, that we cling to out of attachment and inadvertently out of our need to stuff down, suppress repress, avoid etc. .  Our tendencies to push away that which we feel increases the disturbance and our tendency to cling to that which we feel will allow us to float calmly in this stream just aggravate the water. The thing is we don't want to float calmly in this stream...we want to be out of it observing it as it flows through us. We do not want to condemn anything either...to judge it as bad, or wrong or shouldn't be.  When we do that we just increase the disturbance. Krishnamurti tells us that condemnation of our thought and feeling experience just make the rocks hide under the surface.  They are still there causing great disturbance but we cannot see them.    The Buddha would say that those rocks are our five hindrances: our desire, our aversion, our sloth and torpor, our worry and restlessness and our doubt.

What is the point, crazy lady?

Without these rocks there would be no disturbance.  The only thing holding us back from experiencing the peace that is the natural state of mind...the only thing keeping us from experiencing God which is the natural state of any spiritual evolution...  are these rocks, these mental modifications, these hindrances, this stored stuff.  We cannot remove them, however, if we cannot see them. Until we are willing to look deeply into the mind as the source of our so called suffering, our steams will constantly be disturbed.  And if we do get to the point we are  able to observe  each moment but we are doing so with judgement, condemnation for what Life has given us, with resistance to what is...and that includes these feelings and thoughts we have stored...we will never see clearly.  

Release and relax, let go of condemnation and a need for things to be a certain way...and the rocks reveal themselves.  We see clearly and can get to the root of our suffering.

Once the rocks are removed the stream goes back to its natural peaceful flow and we observe it as it flows through us and to the Source of all things.    This is true healing.  This is true freedom! 

All is well! 

Michael Singer Podcast (July, 2021 ) Doing the Real Work to Free Yourself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDp9I9qwjrQ

D Day and Uncle Harold

 

Harold, to his brothers

 

 

For my uncle Harold, who lost his life on June 6, 1944 on the beaches of Normandy.

 

Remember me,

not in my uniform of grey,

 dog tags dangling from my neck,

but with my ball cap placed 

a little to the side,

my well worn glove out stretched

as I leaned over waiting 

 for the ball to come

in my direction.

 

Remember me,

not in a polished stone of white,

sitting amongst so many,

inanimate and lifeless,

but in my laughter,

my twinkling blue eyes

and my smiling

red cheeked face

as I lived and breathed 

along with you.

 

Remember me,

not  in the stories you

have been told 

of my bravery and courage,

the words typed so coldly in textbooks,

but in who I really was :

a young man, 

panic racing  in my heart

 as I stumbled, 

with all the terrified others,

 from that boat

that fateful morning.

 

Remember me,

not in the images of how I lay when

our  brother found me,

but in how I ran bare foot

through the tall grass as

my dog Skip and all of you  

ran along by my side.

 

Remember me,

not in images of how my life 

was taken from me

for the sake of glory and freedom 

for those I left behind,

but in how  I was before that awful day

that haunts the world still.

 

Remember me,

 in how I lived

and how I  laughed

and how I loved

not in how I died.

Remember me 

not as an idea,

forever laminated,

in some photograph

but as a real 

human being.

 

Remember me.

 

 

Dale-Lyn November 11, 2014

 

The Space Between

 

Between two thoughts try to be alert; look into the interval, the space in between. You will see no mind; that is your nature.  For thoughts come and go-they are accidental-but the inner space  always remains. Clouds gather and go, disappear-they are accidental-but the sky remains. You are the sky.

Rajneesh

(I had some reservation using this quote because of the author .   Rajneesh is OSHO...you may have watched Wild Country on Netflix about his movement.  I made a strong personal judgement about him and his movement after watching that series and doing my own research. Whether it is wholesome and skillful or not, that judgement is inside me.  My gut actually gets activated at the sound of his name. I react.  But...in my quest for wisdom, when I hear something wise that resonates inside me, I separate message from messenger. As a human being he may have been deeply flawed;  as a messenger he was dangerous and very unconscious in his desire to use wisdom and the devotion from others  to gain wealth and power but this part of his message [which never did belong to him-coming from ancient teachings he just happened to use]  is not contaminated by that unconsciousness. So I use this quote.) 

Anyway....

Well zero readers again today, according to the stats and truly it is all good. I will just keep going as I am called to do.  

I want to talk just a bit about the space between our thoughts, "The Gap" as Wayne Dyer referred to it  in his book with the same name. As we are doing our mindfulness checks, especially as we become more advanced in our observing ability, we want to be able to observe that spacious but alert stillness that occurs in the mind between thoughts.  We can practice this by listening to someone speak with our eyes closed and just really listen .  If we are really listening from a place of presence our own thoughts will be at a minimum as we absorb the words of the speaker.  Even more cool is when we can actually feel and be aware of their pauses in speech, making that our true mindfulness focus.

I notice ,as I do this exercise, I often hear a resonance or an echo in my psyche after the last word is spoken and before the next word is uttered. It is like my mind is repeating what was just said.  That's okay, I tell myself, this thought is not mine, it is not here and now...what I am hearing is just a trailing reverberation of what was said. It is like the wake of a boat that has nothing to do with the movement of the boat forward, so I couldn't follow it if I wanted to.  I can observe it knowing the insignificance of it. I know that it too will pass and it does before there is silence again. There is a beautiful silent  pause before the next word is uttered and another thought is heard. 

You can try this listening-to-the-gap-exercise  with this little meditation from Eckhart Tolle if you want to.  He has a lot of pauses in his speech and it is a great practice.  Not only do you gain the gems of  conceptual wisdom  from paying attention to what is said, you gain an even deeper  wisdom from observing the pauses in the speech.  In these pause you observe the unconditioned dimension of consciousness. . . you observe the cloudless sky.

Pretty powerful stuff.

All is well in my world.

Eckhart Tolle ( June 4, 2022) Discovering the Unconditioned: A 20 Minute Meditation with Eckhart. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg4zjh6bhCQ

Mindfulness Check: Is Your Mind Elsewhere

 If the mind is elsewhere the taste of  food that is eaten is not experienced; if the mind is elsewhere we do not see what is in front of us.

Deepak Chopra on the Vasisthas (The Secrets of Healing, Spotify) 

How much of your food do you truly taste? And how much of the world in front of you do you truly see?  How mindful are you?  How  present are you in this here and now? 

Is Your Mind Else Where

If I could put you on pause right now with some special remote control and got you to observe on some multi sensory screen your experience in that moment on pause, how would you  answer these questions without thinking too much about it, I wonder :

• Where are you and what are you observing and experiencing here in this very moment?
• What are you visually noticing around you in regards to light, colour, spaciousness? Is it pleasant, unpleasant or neutral to your senses?
• What is directly in front of you? What is the colour, shape, visual texture of that "thing"? Is the experience of looking at it pleasant, unpleasant or neutral to your senses? 
• Is there anyone around you?  If so, how physically close to you are they?  Can you sense if their visual presence is neutral, pleasant or unpleasant? 
• What are you hearing?  Can you notice any noise in the background? Is it pleasant, unpleasant or unpleasant? Any sounds in your near vicinity? Pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral? 
• Can you hear your own body?  The crinkle of hair over your ear? Your breath? Your heart beat? 
•  If you were just speaking before I paused you, what did your voice sound like? If there are ppl around and they are speaking , without concern for what they are saying, how does their voice sound?  Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• What are you smelling?  Notice all smells around you? Nature smells? Body smells? Artificial smells and toxins? etc Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• What about touch sensation?  Reach out to that thing in front of you and that person near you...remember they are on pause too so its okay lol? What does it feel like to touch it? Cool or warm? Soft or hard? Any other textures?  Now is it pleasant, neutral or unpleasant?
• Can you taste anything right now?  Have you just taken a bite of something or can you get something from the air around you ...what is that experience like for you?  Salty? Sweet? Bitter or sour? Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• What are you doing?
• Is this activity something that requires effort or non effort? Speed or slowness? Tension of muscles or stretching of muscles? Are you working alone on this task or with others? If others are involved how do you work together? How do you need each other to get this task done? Is it a  neutral, pleasant or unpleasant experience ? 
• What time of day is it? (Without looking at a clock...is it morning, afternoon or evening) ? 
• Let's get back to body:   How does your body feel in general? Energetic, awake, sleepy, drowsy or tired?   Any tension anywhere?  Where? Any softness anywhere?  Where? Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• What is your posture like?  Are you sitting, standing or lying down? Are you leaning forward, making yourself small  or are you  tall and expansive?  Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• If you were using your hands: what hand were you using or what hand was doing most of the work?  What is the other hand doing? Are your fists opened or closed? Can you feel any sensations in your palms?
• Check in with your jaw, your brows, your eyes. How does the jaw feel...is it clenched or relaxed?Are you furrowing your brow or is it relaxed?  Squinting your eyes or are they relaxed?  Is the felt experience here  pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• Are you smiling, frowning or is your mouth neutral?  Is this pleasant, unpleasant or neutral ? 
• Where are your feet? Are they making contact with the earth...if so where and how?...Check to see how that feels.  Is it pleasant, unpleasant or neutral?  
• Now if you are standing or walking when I paused you, were both feet on the ground or was one in the air...feel that foot in the air and the foot on the ground.  Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• If you are sitting or lying down, what parts of your body are making contact with a surface?  How does that feel? 
• Can you feel your breath? Were you on an exhale or an inhale when I paused you?  Was your belly and chest expanded or contracted? 
• What were you thinking? What thoughts were in your head just as I paused you?  Were they present focused on what you were doing? Or were they unrelated to what was going on in this moment?  Were they future or past focused? Were they perceived as  pleasant, unpleasant or neutral?
• What other mental modifications were going on in that head of yours? Any emotions? Can you name them quickly?  Were they pleasant , unpleasant or neutral?
• Were your reacting as a consequence of these emotions and thoughts? Maybe feeling that reaction in body as a tightness in belly or a clenching of fists or a tensing up of other muscles?  Maybe feeling a need to act and you were making plans to or moving into automatic body movements in order to do so? Maybe you said something or were about to say something in response? Maybe you were using or about to use  one of the habitual defense mechanisms...pushing down and trying to quickly distract , diminishing with more thought, denying and avoiding with more  thought, or activity etc? Maybe you were thinking about how you could fix this moment and make it better or how you could get to the next moment where you convinced yourself that  things would be better?  Or maybe you were trying to figure out how you could make this one last?  Was/is  this  a pleasant, unpleasant or neutral thought experience to your psyche? 
• Lets get back to breath both to observe and anchor.  Is your in- breath shallow or deep?  Long or short? Can you feel the air coming in through your nostrils? Which nostril is dominate? Can you feel your whole chest expanding , your belly expanded?  Does it feel like the air is going in all the way or is it getting stuck somewhere?  Feel those muscles in your chest, diaphragm, shoulders and back ?  Are they moving smoothly with every in breath or does it feel awkward? Is the rest of your body tensing with the in breath or softening and relaxing? Are you forcing the in breath or letting it come naturally?  Is the in breath pleasant, unpleasant or neutral?  
•  Did you notice a pause after the in breath? How did it feel? 
• What about the out-breath?  Is it deep or shallow? Long or short?Can you feel the belly, then the chest softening and releasing on the exhale.  Can you feel the air leaving your nostrils?  Which one seems dominate? What about those accessory muscles ...are they moving smoothly or awkwardly? Is your body tensing or relaxing with the out-breath? Are you forcing in anyway or is the breath natural and effortless?  Is the out breath pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? 
• Did you notice a pause after the out-breath? How did it feel?

Now you have completed your mindfulness check? I bet that when you were doing whatever it was you were doing you were not aware of many of these points I asked you to check, right?  You may have been aware of what you were thinking but that thinking probably seemed like your entire reality at the time and everything else about this moment I paused you in was not experienced by you ( unless it was very pleasant or unpleasant, that is).  You more than likely were not aware that you were thinking and that that thinking was taking you away from your moment experience until you paused to check. 

If that is the case, don't beat yourself up.  That is the case for most of us.  Being mindful and staying mindful is not as easy as it looks.  It requires so much practice.  If  we all had remote controls that paused us several times a day so we could ask ourselves these questions as we observed ourselves on pause,  it would be a lot easier to learn this wonderful tool for living. But atlas...there is no such thing. In the courses I am  taken there was provided for study a research article where an app was used on the phones of  15,000 participants in a study to get them to pause several times a day in order to do a much less detailed mindfulness check in order to assess the effect such mindfulness checks had on stress reduction and life satisfaction.  Well obviously the results indicated that that the apps were very good in reducing stress and improving one's satisfaction with life.  Such apps would be very beneficial but really we don't need an app.  Do we? We just need to get in the habit of ,at least once an hour, checking in with ourselves.   The more we do these mindfulness checks, the more mindful we become and the less we need to check in. 

Hmm  Something to think about.

All is well! 

(I will link the article at a later date) 

Honoring the Disturbed Feelings

 Only by joy and sorrow does one know anything about themselves and their destiny. They know what to do and what to avoid.

Goethe

I came here to write after listening to the below podacst.  I looked down at my notes and just wanted them and the direct quotes to  do the teaching. So here they are

Quotes from Michael Singer (Some may be somewhat paraphrased)

The Earth is the place where the soul is sent to evolve. 

The world is your teacher and it is all just one big spiritual practice.

Everyone of you have just the right Life needed to take you to God.

Life is not bothering you-you are bothering yourself about Life.

Everything that seems to  happen to you, is "just an event in the universe."

There are no good or bad experiences, just experience. 

Life is vibrating in front of us.  Some vibrations are nicer than others, but all are just vibrations.  They are not always comfortable- so what? 

Let it come in and let it go.

Can't resist the event ( it has already happened) but you can resist awareness of the experience.  The energy of the experience, however, does not go away. It can get stuck inside of us as a samskara.

The meaning of Life is Life.

If I was okay inside I would honor and appreciate every single Life experience that unfolded in front of me. 

I am a greater being because of each experience.

The world unfolds, we just experience it. 

Life is neither for you or against you-it is just unfolding in front of you.

Your consciousness is a ray of Light from the sun.

Every second of your Life, you have an opportunity to go to God. 

We need , at some point on this crazy ride, to stop pushing away that which we fear will bother us; stop blaming Life and the outside world for making us a mess inside and just open our hearts and arms to what ever She (Life) gives us.  Life didn't make a mess inside, we did.  When we finally get around to cleaning out that mess, we will feel so much peace.  Hmm! Please listen!

All is well! 

Michael Singer Podcast ( July, 2021) Giving meaning to the time between your birth and your death https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgNZs6_GmQs

Intention and Liberation

 The intention is the direction the soul is looking in and the will is the power that drives it there. So pay attention to your intention.

Michael Singer

We all have intentions...everything we do is "intended" to some degree or another.  And we all have will, what Michael Singer refers to as the greatest power we have within us.  Will is the power behind everything that has to do with "us", as these "individual" beings . We have power over our thoughts, feelings and even our bodies.  We may not exercise that power but it is there. The question is : what is your intention?

What is Your Intention?

Is your intention to smoke or not smoke?  Drink or not drink? Work or not work?  Eat or not eat?  Breathe or not breathe?

 Even breath is an intention.  Yep! If you intended not to breathe...I mean really intended not to breathe, you wouldn't.  Let's just hope that is never, ever your intention. 

So we intend something...say to stop drinking, when we recognize we have a problem. We then have the intention not to drink.  What keeps us  from drinking in that 24 hour period is purely will. That is when we activate our will power.  Will is the engine of the car that takes us in the direction the steering wheel (intention) is pointing.  And we have to be the drivers, right? We are the ones that determine the direction...determine the intention.  We cannot take our hands off the wheel not even even for a minute.

  Now, there are going to be times when mind steps in and says silly things to us to get us to steer the car in another direction. ...or in an example Michael Singer uses.."to get us to take our hands off the wheel and jump into the back seat". (Not recommended lol). We always have a choice...to stay steadfast in our intention, keeping our foot on the accelerator or to listen to mind.  Mind (ego-mind) may tell us to jump in the back seat; it may tell us to steer in the other direction that is familiar which might mean for that person trying to stop drinking...to take just one drink. It might tell us to stop and go nowhere. It can be very, very convincing but we do not have to listen! We can keep reminding ourselves of our intention. We are the ones that drive the car.  It is our intention and our will that determines whether or not we get to the point intention is steering us.  It doesn't matter if there are obstacles on the road or not; doesn't matter what shape our vehicle is in.  If we intend not to drink in this 24 hour period...we need to pay attention to what our hands on the wheel are doing and we need to recognize just how powerful this engine of will is.

The Highest Intention

The intention that we truly want, whether we know it or not, is the intention to be Self -realized, to be free of all the junk inside us so we can be just that.  Right now my intention on this journey is peace of mind...no matter what is going on around me ( and there are so many challenging things going on) I want to remain centered and peaceful.  I call on Will by  turning on the ignition and away we go ...down a highway I truly want to be on.  Mind is definitely around saying things like "Steer here! Steer there!  Turn around!  And sometimes even "Jump in the back seat...this is all too crazy!" but I keep my grip on the wheel, feel the power of will beneath me and I keep going.  You can too.

Why?  Why do we keep allowing this Higher Intention to steer us?  Because we know where it is taking us.  The more I go inward, the more I listen to these wise individuals that have been where I am now and who have freed themselves, the more I want what they have.  I want peace, a free, clear mind and the liberation that comes with that :

If the ego self is dead, you will not limit your consciousness. If in you the very notion of calamity , poverty, elation, pride, dullness and agitation do not arise, your ego self is dead, then you will be liberated while living. Utter purity will prevail in you because you will be a liberated sage when ego mind is dead. 

The Vasisthas as recited by Deepak Chopra

I don't need to be a sage but I do want to be free of all this clutter in my mind.  Though I am not a drinker I can understand why people drink. I imagine, though,  if they too  could clear away the stored stuff within them  that keeps getting triggered; if they could stop listening to ego mind and stay steadfast in their intention igniting their will power again and again , (maybe  even going so far as to push ego mind  out the door of the moving vehicle)...they might realize as I hope to, that without ego chittering and chattering, there is no calamity...no reason to stuff back down what comes up with another drink. Then they may get the freedom sobriety offers.  We all want the freedom of sobriety whether we drink or not.  We all want liberation from our much too busy minds. 

All is well in my world

Michael Singer Podcast/ sounds True (July, 2022) S1 E5 Your Highest Intention: Self Realization. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXJo-vw6EEo 

Getting to the Beauty Inside

 You are very beautiful-you are-not the mind, not the personality-you. The one who is in there when you relax is very beautiful and you will start to experience that beauty.  People call it Light, people call it joy...spirit...Shakti...Chi...whatever words you want to use.  You will start to experience beauty inside because  that is what is there. 

Michael Singer

We all need to learn just how beautiful we are. Beneath these overactive minds and busy bodies and personalities there is something so pure and beautiful that requires a certain process and lots of learning to access. 

Hooked On The Learning

Oh the learning, the learning, the learning.  I share so bloody much of my personal life because of this learning. I see every moment as a learning opportunity and as a learner it is my duty and privilege to share in order to pass on this learning.  I know it sounds so...as my children would say..."cra-cra" but I am utterly  compelled.  I may not have much zest and excitement in my little version of life these days but this desire to learn has such a pull on me, I couldn't untether myself if I tried. (Even though...an "untethered soul" is  ironically where the learning is taking me).  I am in this learning venture 100 % . Part of that learning is teaching, whether or not me or anyone else on the planet finds it annoying  lol.  

If you are reading this, at least if you are coming back to these pages, you are learning too and possibly teaching  against your ego's protests as well. :)  Why are we on this path and now that we started it finding ourselves unable to get off, even if we wanted to? 

Why We Get On This Path?

So, by changing your mind, you change everything. If only we could understand this point, we would see that there is nothing wrong outside; it is all in the mind. By correcting our vision, we correct things outside. 

Satchidananda/ The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali

Maybe you realized like I did years ago, that the old ways of doing things: letting the first three levels of mind run the show...being consumed in likes and dislikes, wants  and do not wants...just doesn't bring what we truly want in our lives, which is feeling okay inside. Michael Singer in his podcast ( linked below)  reminds us that if we are being really honest with ourselves, if asked the  question, "What do you truly want from Life?", we would answer, "I want to be okay inside." And feeling okay inside means being able to feel peace, love , joy, strength, enthusiasm and wellness. Though I never really looked at it this way, I knew for a very long time that I wanted "peace" instead of this monkey mind that never shuts up and that leads to so much unrest.  Peace of mind became my goal when I started on this learning venture. So I embarked on this very simple but, oh so challenging, journey that some might refer to as the spiritual path. I may never reach the final stage of this learning...what might be referred to with words as "complete enlightenment" and I can not say even that that is my intention...I am in this for the peace of mind. I will, however, go as far as this road takes me. 

How Do We Achieve Peace of Mind, Let Alone This "Beauty"? 

So how do I get to this peace of mind? Well Michael Singer offers several stages one goes through from victim of a restless monkey mind to truly transcended/ascended being. The final stages are fascinating and sure, if Life takes me that far, I will take em...but again...peace of mind is my goal for now ( and now is all there is, right?) .  So I am trudging through  the first few stages he speaks about in, The Stages of the Spiritual Path: The continuum of Letting Go. 

My View of the Process

I see it this way: I am presently learning to step mentally back a bit, relax and observe my tendency to want and not want.   I see so clearly that though this is a conditioned and "normal" way of approaching Life as a human being...it  does not take me closer to my goal of peace of mind.  It takes me farther away. It causes more stress than peace! 

Bouncers with  Lists at the Mental Club

I use this analogy to help me understand the process.  Maybe, it will help you too. I see three  bouncers or gate keepers at the door between my psyche and the external world. These bouncers are Cittas: My "ego-/"little self" mind, "judging/discriminating mind" and "Desiring mind" .  Their job is to protect and avoid disturbance inside my mental club, my version of life.  Each bouncer has a clip board with two lists on it.  A "Want it! Allow it! Make sure it comes in even if you have to go out of your way to pull it in" list and a "Don't want it!  Don't let it in! Keep it out even if you have to beat the crap out of it !" list. So these bouncers are very much busy and en-gaurde 24-7.  There is always, always something showing up in front of them  and they are always going through their lists and doing their jobs.  They are great bouncers but they work so hard they are driving us crazy. 

 And  on top of that these lists are very faulty. The trouble with the first list is that the bouncers let in guests  we think we want  just because they made the list, only to realize when they get in that we don't want them, they are not peaceful and pleasant but noisy and disturbing guests.  Or sometimes the guests on the "I want" list only stay a few minutes and leave, creating an empty feeling of loss or sometimes we want more and more of these guests but we just can't get them....no matter how busy these bouncers are at trying to lure them in, we just can't get them(/ the things we think we want)  to come in.  The trouble with the second list is that whatever the bouncers try to keep out becomes even more determined to get in. Unwanted guests  will sneak in through windows and back doors and they  will get in. They do not go away.  They get in and because they do not want the bouncers to discover that they snuck in...they will stay in the shadows to avoid  painful punishment at the exit door.  It will therefore get very crowded inside our minds. crowded, loud, chaotic, overloaded. The bouncers, so busy looking "out there" do not have a clue, nor do they care, what is going on "in here".  Their job is to select what shows up as Life unfolds externally  from the list,  only allowing in what is wanted, pushing away what isn't.  While  ourinsides get more and more messy!

So What Do We Do? 

So I discovered that these bouncers and these lists...this process of trying to control, and manipulate what came into my life experience by liking and disliking...does not bring peace.  It creates an overcrowded and chaotic mess inside me. I discovered that what I have to do is step into the mind and from there I have to fire the bouncers I had depended on for so long.  I need to let  ego-mind, discriminating-mind and desiring-mind go.  It is hard to let them go.  I am not sure what will happen to my life without them. But I am committed to doing just that. I do  want to send them away with some appreciation for what they tried to do for me. I know they were only doing their jobs.  I will give them a good severance package and wish them well but I know I have to  let them go.  And I must insist they take their lists with them when they go. I guess, I am still in the termination process to some degree. The disgruntled bouncers have not left the building completely yet. They are still dragging their feet  as they head for the door, trying to convince me I still need them while  they wave their lists in my face. .  I just cannot engage myself in their conversations any longer.  I have to learn to ignore them until they are finally out the door. Sigh

At the same time I  am firing the Cittas,  I am learning to leave the entrance and exit doors wide open as I open up every window. I am looking for a cleansing breeze to freshen up my mind. I am also learning to stay back in True, spacious mind, to relax and release there,  while guests come in and out...allowing them all, resisting none. I simply want to  welcome and observe, look deeply into what they may be bringing with them, how my body and mind "feels" with their presence, appreciating whatever shows up and then watch each guest, each thing, each experience  leave through the open exit door. (Not always able to do that...sometimes I find myself running to the door to shut it on something that might be trying to get in or going outside my mind to find something  I can pull in that will make me feel better.  I am a work in progress).

 With no bouncers they come and they go freely.  I don't expect or want any of them to stay forever. I do my best to  react to none of it and when I can avoid reaction,  this spaciousness inside me gets wider and wider.  Even more beautiful...yes it is starting to get beautiful in here...despite the fact it is far from cleaned up...the old unwanted guests that were hiding in the corners because they were afraid of the bouncers are now free to leave.  They are gathering their courage and starting to emerge and move toward the open doors. 

I am letting go.

Spend every moment of your life letting go of that part of you that is trying not to let go.  

Michael Singer

Well this is the stage I am on now and it is challenging enough.  Though the stage of transcendence is alluring...I am not striving to get there. I am doing my best to just relax and release here.  Like I said, the bouncers with their want/don't want lists are still around.  Maybe my goals may differ when they are completely gone but for now...I am okay relaxing here. So I just let go and relax here.  This  too is a beautiful  part of the healing journey. There is beauty here. 

All is well. 

Michael Singer Podcast/ Sounds True ( April, 2022 )  The Stages of the  Spiritual Path-A Continuum of Letting Go. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W23Qob0d6rA

Troubled Mind? Do Not Like Or Dislike

Tied by your thoughts, you lose the truth, become heavy, dull, and unwell. Not well, the mind is troubled. Then why cling to or reject anything? If you wish to move in the One Way [be peaceful, and happy, in harmony with Life], do not like or dislike even the world of senses and ideas. 

Seng-ts'an Hsin-Hsin Ming as interpreted by Eric Putkonen

Another Interpretation of Hsin-Hsin- Ming I read today  as I still ponder this idea of embracing Life as Life is instead of allowing this notions of "me" to get in the way. 

A Reaction Beginning

Been feeling much better and getting to the point where I can completely forget about the woes of my body again.  That is until,  I over exert like I did this morning, and symptoms return with a very loud reminder to "Slow Down!"  Having the pressure,  pain and weakness  in the body is one thing...but having them in the mind is another. My mind still wants to  follow those symptoms and that low energy feeling.  I was so "up" before the  symptom-reminder and now I am  on the verge of going down, down, down. Especially when my daughter comes to me with an onset of symptoms, while I am experiencing mine ( and I did not mention to her that I was)  so similar to the ones I had for years: sudden run of palpitations with a rate of 160 , sweating, pressure in her chest, SOB and that awful mental feeling that goes with it.  Her heart rate  has been up over 130 for days which she tolerates....but then it will jump up to 160, 170, 180 for no apparent reason.   I want her to go in for an ECG and am strongly encouraging it but she won't go.  (At the same time I am remembering my experience when I was a little older than she was going in with these same things, again and again being miscounted. I don't want that for her either...I want her to trust what her body is telling her and not walk away confused like I too often did). But she needs to be seen and treated!  

From Poor "Me"   to  A Fear for "Others"

This is familial, whatever this is, is familial.  Why wouldn't my children have it? It is not like I conditioned her to believe she has "this"  ....I did just the opposite.  Though in the beginning of  her symptoms years ago (she ws passing out in high school gym class)  I did take her  in and insist she  be evaluated, I soon learned then the  futility of "me"being her advocate. Because of the assumption attached to me...she got referred to a  specialist who dismissed it all as "insignificant". (Very familiar words to my ears).  Somehow, I fear,  my situation contaminated hers.  So over  the last few years I causally responded  when she approached me with her concerns, "Mention it to your doctor when you speak to him.  Maybe it is just anxiety or the fact that you are out of shape ( yeah right).  Don't worry about it. Just mention it...but if the rate stays above 160 for more than a an hour or the pain gets bad...go in. Please go in!" I want her to go in, as an adult, without me  and any "assumptions" attached to me in the way of her assessment.  I have another daughter with the same symptoms...her pulse, however,  is completely irregular when she is having her runs. I know it is atrial fib but she won't go either. Man! How can I advocate for them or encourage them to get the help I never got, even though I want it so badly for them?

An Opportunity to Practice

After all I wrote yesterday, after all I have learnt over the years in my practice, I still have a mind that wants to react.  Still have an ego-mind that sees this as happening to "me" ; still have an intellectual/conceptual mind that is analyzing the data and determining that it is a "bad, wrong, shouldn't be" kind of thing and I still have the desiring-mind that wants both my daughter's and my own  symptoms to be gone and more importantly wants the "disturbance" they cause in my mind cleaned up. This is, then,  a good opportunity for practice. 

The Practice: Do Not Like Or Dislike

Anyway...I was feeling up this morning and now I am on the verge of reacting. I feel the tentacles  of "worry" around me, shame and fear resurfacing to sit by my side...and they are such annoying house guests. I want nothing more than to slap them across the face and send them back down to the basement ...but I know doing that is not wholesome or skillful.  So I breathe, just as I encouraged my girl to do.  I take three deep breaths in and and out and then I sit quietly and just observe my natural breath going in and going out. I call on the mindfulness, happiness and joy I have stored with in me. Then I step back mentally from the situation and I observe it all. I feel my body supported by gravity and I feel the symptoms.I observe my mind skipping back to the past and forward into the future. I remind myself that is not "True Mind" through which I am seeing when I do that. I make an intention to observe all this with "True Mind".  I focus on breath again.  I encourage  the body to relax.  If there is resistance there I observe that.  I allow that.  I nurture that with self compassion and understanding. Then I notice "worry, shame and fear" sitting beside me, how they feel in my body, how they feel in my mind and forgoing the urge to push them back down I say, "Hello friends.  Back again are you?  Sit beside me and tell me what you feel I need to hear. Or sit beside me and say nothing. Just be as you are." 

 I affirm  that this is my experience right now: agitation brought on by body symptoms, worried about my daughter's symptoms, shame that I cannot help her in the way I want to help her, fear for both of us, sadness.  This is my experience. I do not need to like it or dislike it.  It just is! Now from my seat in  the True Mind, I relax and observe, allow and investigate and I nurture myself and all that is. Hmmm!   

Then I get up an make an appointment for her, with her permission, that is.  And I hope she gets in soon.  And I hope that when she does get in she will have a favorable outcome.  But that is beyond both our control.  It will be what it will be. So I then find myself praying,  "May there be peace and wellness, then, may there be peace and wellness". 

How do I feel after this mindfulness practice?  Tired lol. Symptoms are gone, worry and shame and fear have all diminished significantly though they are still lingering around.  I notice them but I am not about to engage too much. I feel better. 

Hmmm!

All is well. 

Seng-T'san, Hsin Hsin-Ming : Verses on the Perfect Mind as translated by Eric Putkonen. https://www.holybooks.com/wp-content/uploads/Hsin-Hsin-Ming.pdf