Steps In the Space Between

That space between reaction and awareness is what you are here for.

Michael A. Singer

So we are here to  grow and evolve.  There is a space between our infantile reactivity, our focus on "poor little me" with  all its desires and fears  and our coming to  awareness...full awakening.  "Growing up " is a journey that occurs in steps, according to Michael Singer and many others. I can attest to many of these steps because I have taken them (and I have tripped on them)  as I make my way to full awareness. 

The steps are,, I believe:

1. Reactivity: where we react with out thought, like temper tantruming toddlers and their "me-me" proclamations, to the life circumstances that surround us. This is where we begin to build our psyche ( the collection of all our learned experiences) and begin writing the lists of our wants and don't wants. 
2. Planning: as we begin to grow we realize that reactivity only gets us in trouble, giving us more of what we don't want and really doesn't help us get what we want...so we learn to plan.  We have collected, in our psyches, all those experiences that felt "good" inside and we plan ways to manipulate, seek and attain that which will continue to make us feel good.  We have also "learned" to decipher what things and circumstances made us feel "bad" inside and we plan ways to fix what is broken "out there"and we plan ways to protect ourselves from more of these situations. We reinforce this idea of "me"...we reinforce our psyches. The power of unfulfilled desire is at the root of all man's slavery. Yogananda
3. Noticing: We begin to notice and observe what we are doing in regards to reactivity and planning; we observe that we have been doing it our whole life and that it doesn't work!  We see that even though we put so much energy into this and no matter how much we achieve in outer world standards...it isn't making us happy; it isn't taking away our suffering.  We are still constantly struggling.  We are still suffering. 
4. Realization that we are not okay: We see that  as long as we have things inside that bother us or things outside that bother our things inside we are not okay. We see we suffer.
5. Reaching a limit of not being okay: We finally have enough of these tendencies that don't work.  We finally have enough of suffering and struggle.  We just want peace!  (That is the stage where I am most times)....
6. Saying "No"to the Mind's Habit Energies : We finally put our hand up and say, "Enough! I am not going to do this any longer! I am not  going to be pulled by desire and fear anymore." ...
7. Turning inward rather than outward: We finally get it that we have to deal with what is inside and stop blaming and worrying so much about the outside. Since you alone are responsible for your thoughts, only you can change them. (Yogananda).  Of course we are going to be completely shocked  when we see how much we actually have stuffed inside that we have denied most of our lives.  It will be a little overwhelming. 
8. Willingness to Evolve: We become willing to step back and watch without reacting as Life does what it is here to do... We, as these troubled reactive, planning little "me"s are, at least, willing to get out of the way for that which is deeper to come through. (This stage is not about renouncing...it all about noticing and being willing not to follow old habit energies any longer ). Though actually being able to get out of the way and staying out of the way, at this point, is not that easy
9. Testing out the Seat of Awareness: We will, because of our willingness to let go,  have moments when we find ourselves centered and peaceful for no explicable reason.  In those moments we are momentarily in the Seat of awareness...we are the witness and observer.  Little "me" is out of the way.  It will seem that we got it....but... we will likely not stay here for very long.
10. Series of slips and falling back into old ways: This is a "practice" and a practice means there is a certain degree of mistakes and failures as we learn. We will fall back into old habit tendencies. That is a given. It is so important we don't punish or reprimand ourselves harshly, or give up on the process because we just don't seem to "get it" quick enough. We must be compassionate and patient  with our inner students, no matter how long it takes. Every time we notice we slip, we are progressing. The season of failure is the best time for sowing the seeds of success. Yogananda
11. Releasing and Letting Go: old stored stuff begins to emerge and rise up to our conscious awareness. The pent up energy from our Samskaras is  heading out the door.  We may be tempted here to pull it back in or push it back down because it is painful. Don't! If we slip and do , however, we can go back to step 10 
12. Moving Through Confusion and Chaos: As we begin to awaken there is stage we hit where Life seems more confusing and chaotic than it ever did before.  Our defenses have eroded away.  We are no longer using our old go-to- methods of coping with life (escaping and numbing) and Life just wants to seem to challenge us. On top of that the painful energy we buried our samskaras in is also rising up. It gets yucky both inside and outside. (Yeah...I know this stage well). This, I believe, is the proverbial "Dark night of the soul."
13.  Reinforcing our commitment:  We may be tempted to throw in the towel here...but don't.  The confusion and chaos, like all things, will pass. (Well that is what I keep telling myself. :)) We will probably have to reinforce our commitments several times with "I will do better next time!" Persistence guarantees that results are inevitable. Yogananda
14. Relax. Relax, Relax!:   It is all about relaxing, not so much about relaxing into what is unfolding but relaxing in awareness, stepping out of the way and allowing whatever is to just pass through us. Again, this relaxing is a practice  The better we get at relaxing, the more things will pass through us, and the longer we can stay centered in  higher consciousness, where things are seen more clearly...In centered relaxation, we are the "witness" of the stuff we are seeing and not the stuff we are seeing. That is a tremendous realization. We have relaxed our "attachment" 
15. Opening of the heart:  Well the heart is naturally open.  It is just through our reactivity, our fear and desiring that we closed it up.  Without fear and desire dictating our every move, the heart will naturally remain open and things will pass through much more quickly and smoothy. An open heart means we are more open to Life, allowing and embracing what is.
16. Energy Flowing: We will, according to the masters, and I have yet to experience this other than in a few glimpses and teasers, feel a surge of natural free-flowing energy as shakti, now freed from behind the blockages, pours through us. We will not only find the peace, I am doing all this for, but enthusiasm, bliss, joy and love .  It will feel amazing!  ( Well that is what I am told and what I choose to believe). It will no longer matter what is happening out there.  We will see that love, joy and peace have always been in us and as long as we stay open, we cannot be disturbed by anything. We might start to get some invisible and some visible support here. (That would be nice! :)) 
17. Questioning the Source: Where it is all coming from? Singer reminds us that we can go beyond step 16 and experience something even greater.  When we feel this energy we may begin to question where it is all coming from. What is the Source of this love, joy, bliss?  We know it is coming behind us so...
18. Falling Back  into the Source : We let everything we are still  holding onto go and we fall back into the Source.  We just let go of "me" and our humanness completely
19. Merging: Here we are said to merge...like a drop of water we fall into the ocean and once again become One with it.
20. Complete Awareness: If we are lucky, and few beings on this planet have ever reached this step, but if we are lucky here,  we realize experientially that we are simply awareness. We are as evolved as we can get. At this point, or before, we will be able to look back on our past and see that everything, everything we experienced was there to take us here. It will all make complete sense. Imagine!

Hmm! I am not sure if I will ever get past step 14 but I am willing and committed to keep  trying. It, regardless of outcome,  just seems like a very important series of steps, don't you think? Well, it is the path that feels most right to me. What about you?

All is well.

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( April 2, 2023) Accelerating Your Awakening. https://tou.org/talks/

Paramhansa Yogananda (1946) Autobiography of a Yogi. Kindle Edition

No Longer Offend

When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way, nothing in the world can offend.  If a thing can no longer offend you, it ceases to exist in the old way.

Third Zen Patriarch

The Space of Unconditional Okayness Beyond the Clutter

Relax, allow your mind  to become empty, and surprise yourself with the great treasure that begins to flow from your soul.

Paulo Coelho

Sometimes I am very grateful for days when there is little to no readership.  I realize on those days that I am still trapped and caught up in the idea of me, even in my attempt to get to that place of what I call, "unconditional okayness", that lay in the space beyond "me". It leads me to think: 

The Intrigue of watching Hoarders

My "me" is a mess and my consciousness is just amazed that something can get that messy.  It is like walking by a TV while an episode of "Hoarders", is playing.  You don't necessarily want to watch  for all kinds of reasons but your mind is like, "Wow! How can a place get so bad!" So you just can't  walk away from the screen, you are transfixed on it. In fact, you find yourself sitting down watching episode after episode. You become addicted. 

The Addicted Mind to "Me" 

Well as I immerse myself into this inner world of my spiritual growth  I catch myself  looking at my own psyche and saying, "Wow!  How can  a place get so bad? !" 

Collecting The Desirable

I, like most people, have been focusing all my attention on my little "me" in action  for many, many years.  My life is a Hoarders episode and it is hard to look at anything else. Little "me", is like so many people, collecting the desirable and pushing out the undesirable or the feared. It wasn't until very recently that I have come to see the "me" as an addict and a hoarder.  At first,  I was addicted to collecting and holding onto things out there that I thought would make me feel better in here. I collected a lot of special stuff and people, pulling them inside and clinging to them. Though I denied it for a long time, I finally realized they didn't make me feel better.  They just made a mess and the more I collected the more of a mess they made.  

Pushing Away The Unwanted and Feared

I also used the mess to hide beneath. The more "stuff", the less there was of the vulnerable and unworthy  "me" to deal with. I was constantly going around organizing this stuff so it was comfortable enough in here.  That meant, however, keeping certain "unselected and unwanted" things out of my messy but familiar little world. My fear led me to close the door on anything or anyone that could possibly come in to disturb my piles or who might  judge, criticize or tell me I had to "get rid" this mess I was so addicted to.  I didn't want anyone "out there" to see the mess in here so I put my consciousness and mental energy toward  making the  outside look good so no one would notice the  inside.  I kept pushing my stuff farther and farther back away from the door into rooms that became extremely crowded. It was too hard.  Naturally, the expanding piles were growing and wanting out of their cramped containment. It was next to impossible  to keep it all contained inside...stuff landed in piles out in my yard for all the neighbors and all passer bys to see. It consumed me with shame. The shame of not being what I thought I should be was exhausting. Fixing it all, keeping it in order while I kept adding to it with more things that might make me feel better, but never did, was also completely exhausting.  The mess took over my life. It took over my conscousness...it was all I could focus on. Eventually I realized if I wanted anything akin to peace...to get to that spacious space beneath all the clutter where "unconditional okayness" existed,  I would have to clean it all up inside my mental home where I was trying to live.

The Cleansing Process

 Just like the cleaning processes on these programs, it takes a lot of time to purify one's mind...I notice in my own cleansings, one layer  of psyche is removed to reveal another layer, another messy pile and then another and another. Things I never even realized I collected come to the door. There doesn't seem to be any end to it.  It is soo painful! And my consciousness cannot seem to look away from the mess. Old tendencies emerge. I want to push it back down and/or I want to blow it out of me. There are two things we mental horaders can do when we become upset about our mess.  We can continue to suppress or we can express.

Suppress? 

Suppression is bad, right?  It means pushing down and away from our conscious awareness the mess and how it makes us feel. It is really not cleaning the mess up...it is just a matter of pushing back so we and others cannot  see it. It is still there, all jammed up inside us, cluttering the space. We are really not cleaning, really not changing and really not removing anything in the way of us experiencing peace and okayness.  Suppression does not work! So is expression the way to go? 

Express?

I get so overwhelmed with the mess sometimes that I just want to blow it all out the window with a power hose lol.  What I do, in this case,  is "express".  Expression, like suppression, though totally acceptable by modern psychologists and the like , is not really healthy, if we do it in the way I have been doing it.  When I complain, unload for the sake of just unloading, come here with my tales of "poor me" and my long list of grievances, I am simply blowing all the mess I was holding inside outside to relieve some of the pressure.  My piles...my junk... is now just polluting my yard and neighborhood. At the same time...I am still very much in possession of it.  It is still "my" stuff. And as long as it is my stuff I am not going to get rid of it. I am still attached.  I am still clinging to it, protecting it,  and using it to hide behind. That is not healing.

Let the Space of "Unconditional Okayness" Emerge

So neither suppression or this type of expression is healing.  Knowing that, we let the space that wants to emerge emerge.   We need to stop looking for more "out there" to pile up into this space, blocking it.  We now know what a mess desiring  makes. We also  need to open heart's door as each layer of mess is naturally released at a time.  As the junk  makes its way close to the door, we stop pushing it back. We also don't grab  the stuff on its way out the door by saying, "Well on second thought...I think I might need that or I could use this for something.." We let it all go. We also stop pushing away those things we fear, that may actually challenge us to do a thorough cleaning. Let the cleaning help in and let the junk go out. 

We Are the Space Where Soul's Treasures Can Be Found

We need to remember that we are not the mess and we are not even the hoarders attached to the mess.  We are the space beneath the mess, the "unconditional okayness" on top of which we piled all this useless junk. We couldn't know that because we were too busy focusing on the clutter.  In order to know that, we have to experience that space.  We can't do that until we clean out our insides of the clutter we collected and fearfully protected. Better said, we just let our insides clean themselves so the space can expand.  All we got to do is keep heart's door open so the stuff we don't need can get out and the stuff needed for cleansing can get in.  We clear the inside so space is what we can focus our whole attention on. Then we can revel in this space of unconditional okayness that just gets better, the experts say, the more we stay in it. We can keep a door open in the front and a door open in the back, so that once we are free and spacious,  Life can blow in and blow right out again without disturbing us in the least. Now that would be something. Don't you think? 

The real treasures are not the stuff we collect from the world, creating this safe familiar but cluttered space we call"me"....it is that emptiness the soul provides for.

All is well. 

Inspired by :

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( April 2 & 4th, 2023) Accelerating Your Awakening & Experiencing Love and Joy Instead of Fear and Desire. https://tou.org/talks/

Being Willing To Learn and Grow

 Reshape yourself through the power of your will; never let yourself be degraded by self-will. The will is the only friend of the Self, and the will is the only enemy of the Self.

The Gita, Chapter 6, Verse 5 (as translated by Eknath Easwaran)

So this spiritual process many of us are undertaking is basically a reshaping of ourselves from overidentification with self to realization of Self. The key component is our willingness to awaken. 

I am definitely willing. So often I find myself, however,  frustrated as I look at my awakening process. I catch my mind questioning, "Am I moving at all?",  as I continue to jot down my learning and practice highlights and lowlights here. I so often feel like I am in a vehicle going up a hill in neutral. Then I listen to Michael Singer on one of his weekly podcasts  or read something beautiful from a scripture or from another enlightened master and it is like..."Man...I am getting somewhere. I am learning.  I am growing, albeit not quickly, but steadily. "  My willingness to awaken is getting me up that hill. 

I had such an "aha moment" today upon listening to the podcast below. Yesterday I wrote about what I am learning to do with pain as a practice of relaxing into what is. I recognized that I hit a limit I was at this point not able to get beyond.  Everytime we recognize ( and record like I do here) our slip ups into reactivity,  is learning.  I see how I am catching myself sooner in my reactivity and learning to relax and to release into uncomfortable experiences like physical pain.  I see how I have accomplished so much and at the same time see there are fruit out there that remain  a little too high for my reach...for now. 

I am using my will to awaken.  I am using it for Self and not against Self...well that is what I am hoping I am doing lol.I am starting to wake up and it is very confusing and uncomfortable in here as these old samskaras rise up to the surface.  It is challenging not to degrade myself and push them back down.  The core beliefs I am reminded of are difficult pills to swallow.  Yet, I know they have to be up here and not down there if they are going to be released. Resisting them requires a use of my self-will against Self rather than for it. I don't want to do that anymore but it isn't always easy.

I would love to accelerate my awakening so I am willing to use everything taht comes my way as a means to do so. Of course I slip up but at least I am noticing when I slip up and fall back into reactivity.  That is a positive thing, isn't it?  Anyway....

Singer assures us that if we keep up with this practice, we will eventually be free of our blockages, Shakti will flow through and someday we may even connect with the Source of that shakti. But the more we let go, the easier it gets. We will eventually see that we are and were never alone. Hmmm! 

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and  all these things will be added onto you. ( Matthew 6:33)

All is well in my world.

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of teh Universe ( April 2, 2023) Accelerating Your Awakening . https://tou.org/talks/

Learning And Physical Pain

 In most cases, learning something essential in life requires physical pain.

Haruki Murakami

So tired!  I had a very, very rough night of pain...and not chest pain, abdominal pain.  I can handle pain...I can.  With my practice I am learning to relax into all experiences even physical pain. 

Easy Learning

 I started with Charlie horses, which can be pretty nasty,  years ago and I can say that I have mastered it.  Every time I have one, I resist the urge to resist...meaning that I do not give into  old pull - the- hand -away from -the flame - reflexes. I assure my amygdala that it is all good, that there is no immediate threat to my survival, that the pain will come and the pain will go. Instead of automatically jumping up and down in hope of putting out the internal fire...I still myself.  I release anywhere I am starting to clench up and I breathe.  I simply breathe. Now a charlie horse can skip up the pain scale pretty fast to an 8/10, right?  Especially if we are adding extra muscle tension to it with our resistance of it...and they can last a good five minutes.  But with my practice I am able to get the immediate  pain to go from an eight to a two or a three.  I also give it the opportunity to do its thing and be gone in less than a minute. What a difference! It was easy to practice with Charlie horses.

Intermediate Learning

Then I went to chest pain. I handle my chest pain remarkably well.  In my practice, I am learning to remove all story and narrative from the experience, all worry and concern about possible outcome.  I remind myself there has been no fatal consequences or critical damage done to the heart in the 25 + years that I have had it therefore the likelihood of there being damage now is minimal.  Most of the resistance one has to chest pain has to do with fear.  Without fear there is less resistance, without resistance, there is less pain. Again, I resist the urge to resist it. ( and am learning, albeit not as quickly,  to not push past it).  I am learning to sit with it and I simply breathe while I become aware of areas of the body that are not experiencing pain sensation. If the pain still  reaches a 6 or 7 on the pain scale or persists after a half hour of rest, I will take nitro...and do that protocol. I also look deeply into the root causes of the pain experience...what is going on in my life or my mind that might be triggering old samskaras.  Long story short, I take a lot less nitro! And I have not gone into emergency with this pain in about six years!  

I am learning to do it with other pain as well.  Like the pain I started getting in my LUQ about a year ago.  That was easy because it was never that bad but not knowing what was causing it and it being where it was, led to concern about it and my seeking an answer for it. ( to no avail). Which made the pain a little more intense than it had to be.  I was able , once again, after a lot of heart to hearts with my amygdala, to assure it there there was no reason for  worry. That led to a decrease in intensity of the pain experience.  The left lower quadrant  pain ...is fairly easy to handle, as well, especially  with the mind relieved by evidence that it is just a benign cyst. When the mind with all its analysis and worry is out of the picture, physical pain is so much easier to handle.

Advanced Learning and Failure

But as I practice ,the challenges are getting harder.  The pain I am most challenged by is abdominal pain.  Now I am used to abdominal cramping...I have had a lactose intolerance all my life and know what happens when I eat dairy. Those middle of the night sessions can be pretty intense ...reaching an 8 easy on the scale and lasting, hours and hours,  right through to morning.  I have  had plenty, plenty of those.  So I have been practicing there with the "waves" of pain. I can relax in all the in between sessions and in the crest and trough of the pain, but when it peaks it is a lot more challenging.  So I just remind myself I am riding a wave.  The water will be still, then it will crest and peak but after that peak...it will trough again and settle into a peaceful remission until the next wave of pain. And eventually, the mission of the waves, will be accomplished and the pain will be gone....until the next time I eat too much dairy again. This is, of course, the same technique  that Lamaze uses with labour contractions.   I understand the physiological mechanism of this pain so well and that is helpful.

What is the  Mind Doing In Our Pain Experiences?

I also notice and am still quite shocked by the  psychological aspects of this pain, any intense pain I experience. After an episode I feel relief and hear myself saying...okay ...you took your punishment well.  Now you have earned a bit of  rest, a right to tend to the fatigue and other symptoms that remain..  It is like I give myself permission to sink into the recovery period of pain without guilt or shame...only if I did some intense suffering.  That old core belief, associated with that old smaskara deep within me , that tells me  I need to suffer through Life in order to earn my right to be here,  emerges. The only way I can truly "nurture" myself, stop "doing" for others etc,  is if I earned that right through intense suffering. Hmmm! It is only then, I feel I can turn to someone and say, "I had a rough night.  I had a lot of pain." Otherwise, the discomfort of others drowns out my own.

So anyway...I am learning.  We can learn so much through all our experiences...each human experience can help us to evolve at the deeper level. Physical pain can offer such an opportunity. But sometimes, it isn't easy.  Last night...it wasn't easy. Something has been going on in my gut for a long time but man...it reached a peak last night.  I woke up at two with that sweaty restless feeling I  had the last few nights but this time there was pain, a type of abdominal pain I am used to but it was much more intense.  I began practicing right away by relaxing into the pain, breathing, self talk etc but the pain shot up to a ten on the scale very quickly and each peak of pain was lasting so very long, getting stronger and stronger with each wave. My usual go to of "walking pain off" was not able to work because I was so very weak with it.  I could only walk a few feet even during the little pause between the waves because my body was threatening to collapse.  I felt like I was going to pass out.  It made me feel chilled all over between each wave of intense heat.  And I knew something was blocked...the waves of pain were fighting against a blockage and this pain was not going to go away anytime soon.  The pain increased, the faint feeling increased.  I collapsed onto the bathroom floor, shivering. I think there was so much pain, it was putting me into shock. Instead of relaxing and allowing the pain, I found myself, in some bizarre way, praying for death.  I was pleading to some force I could not see but felt was punishing me again, "If you plan on making this go on any longer than  an hour as punishment for my being here on this planet...well I rather not be here.  I can't pay this price. Put me out of my misery.  It is too much. I would rather be dead."  It was  that bad.  And then just like that it stopped...well not stopped but diminished to the point where I could crawl back into bed to sleep. It was like the teacher  pushed me to the point where she realized I was not going to pass this test and  said..."Okay, you failed this time.  I will try  you again later."  Man, I don't want to go through that again.  I am feeling better pain wise right now but my body took a beating last night. I am, however, giving myself lots of recovery time because after enduring the intensity of taht pain, I  feel I have earned it. 

Okay, crazy lady, what was the point of this big long ramble?

We can use every experience we have the opportunity to have as human beings, including the pain experience, to learn and grow. All lessons come in graduated levels .  Some lessons will be easier than others. We cannot beat ourselves up if we do not pass the advanced level tests...but, even in failure,  there is still learning in them. Facing, allowing and even embracing the challenge of physical pain can help in our practice of accepting Life, and in our practice of  relaxing into all that is.

The most important thing, I believe, is to look deeply into the psychological aspects of physical pain.  Man, it still blows me away to see that deep rooted samskara in me that screams out the belief that I need to suffer so intensely just to breathe the air on this planet, that I am being punished, deservedly so, without every bout of pain I have. 

Man...noon deserves to suffer like I did last night and I don't care what they might have done.  Imagine thinking one deserves that! 

Anyway, just sharing experiences that might be familiar to others....for learning purposes. We must learn to look at pain and and all it entails, saying.."And this too...this too belongs." 

All is well!

Soaking Your Self With Love?

 Empty handed, existence is love but is like water running from a hose. It all depends on which direction you point it.

Alan Watts

Do you point that hose of natural, free flowing love enough in your own direction, at your self?  And what part of self are we talking when we say "self"? Hmm those are pretty important questions. Ones that I am pondering right now. In a nutshell, I am realizing that I seldom show  compassion for "me"... I am seldom kind to myself. In fact, I am beyond "unkind" to myself...I am down right abusive.  Sigh!  That is somewhat difficult to admit, especially on a public forum, like this. 

So why are you sharing all this personal crap here,  crazy lady?

I believe, in the old axiom: "Go big or stay home."  So I guess that is why I spill it all out here. What I gain in terms of learning, I do so feel I must share. Of course, no one is obligated to learn from or even read anything I write. If you just happen to be reading along in any of my entries and you see me using the word "I" , you may  begin to question, " Why is this crazy lady always going on  about herself?" Please know I don't expect you to read on.  It is only if what I say resonates with something in you, should you do so.  My intention is not "egoic", (though ego is certainly still lingering around) but, even still, you may not need or even want what I have to say. 

Kind or Unkind to Self?

So let's get back to the question. Do you tend to be kind or unkind to yourself....and what part of self are you being kind or unkind to? If you notice that you are often unkind to yourself, or if you are confused about which part of self we should be kind to, please read on.  Also please note that it takes a lot of courageous and painful insight to look deeply enough into what you truly believe about yourself.

So do you love yourself enough and which part of you do you love?

The part of "me" that is challenging to love

As I reflect on my own internal experience, I see I have great respect and love for my "higher being". ( I still have not completely accepted yet that this higher being is not a separate entity but a part of what I actually am. It is pretty easy to love it as long as I still see it "out there" and not "in here"). On the other hand, I am seeing, upon some painful reflection, that I have "deep hostile contempt" for my lower being...this person I call me who is a mother, sister, partner, friend, who has roles out there in community related to teaching,  who has a limited amount of money in her account and whose body and mind are also  limited. If I look deeply and I have to go deep...I see the truth and it is painful.  To see that my relationship with myself is absent of a certain degree of love is one thing, but to see that it is  full of  hostile and overly critical "contempt" is quite disturbing.  I always knew I was one to put others needs first and to not value my own as much...but "hostile contempt"?  Wow! That is hard to swallow. 

An Example of Unkindness

For example, instead of showing myself compassion when I am ill and unable to work...I actually punish myself very harshly.  I have worked only one day in March because of everything that went down and my physical and emotional reaction to it actually exhausted me.  Chest pain was a consequence.  Now though it it is still there, it has subsided a bit and I thought I could work today when I realized I didn't have to look after my grandson. I made myself available with every intention of going in. But I became quite ill during the night with a generalized heaviness, nonstop sweating, smothery feeling and stomach upset. I tossed and turned. I just felt awful and when I finally fell asleep I get a phone call from my daughter...another crisis that I could not even lift my head to deal with.  D. took the phone from me and took over.  Anyway, that just aggravated my symptoms and long story short,  I did not go in today. 

I would totally understand if another didn't work based on these conditions, I would , but I beat myself up for my lack of availability.  Underneath the  armour of insisting and proving to others [and self] that I am not being the productive member of society I know 'I should be", for good reason,  I am constantly punishing myself. I accuse myself of  being a wimp and making too much of things, of using illness to avoid that which I fear. And the mind continues to remind me that my fear  is totally abnormal and unacceptable,  adding to the reasons why I am so much less worthy than others, why I have to pay extra rent for being on this planet that people like me just do not deserve to be on. I am often  "beating myself up" in so many ways.  Disrespect, resentment, extreme criticism, unreal expectations as to what I need to do to redeem myself so I can be at least partially worthy, prejudice, down right cruelty, hatred and abuse...that is what I feed myself, have fed myself for most of my life.  When the persona I have built to redeem myself cracks open and  I  have the audacity to say to myself or others, " I am suffering, "  man, does the verbal abuse ensue. You see, I have been taught through my experiences, that suffering is my penance. My penance for what sin? For my sin of being alive.   

Pretty drastic, eh?  You might be saying to yourself at this point, "Yeah, you really are a crazy lady." The thing is,  I am not the only person who does this when they are being less than perfect, am I?  The expression "beating myself up" would not be as popular as it it is, if I were. Many of us find it difficult to love ourselves fully, many of us are unkind and some of us, are like me, down right abusive. 

Core Beliefs and Old Programming

Now I know how irrational these thoughts and core beliefs are.  I also know where they come from and what this "little me" endured to make it think like this. Knowing that, one would think that understanding and compassion would be warranted but no...my mind just resumes the messages that others have started without an ounce of compassion, Now I have done work...so much work on the psychological and spiritual level to deprogram this messaging and sometimes I even feel that I have.  But every now and again, like recently, I am reminded that I am still tangled up in  a toxic and abusive relationship with self.  The samskaras, making it so,  are very deep.

So does  internal programing  have anything to do with our being ill? Of course, it does. It has everything to do with my heart condition!!!   I have always been a big believer in the psychosomatic cause  of all physical illness. The mind is much more powerful than the body! Though there are definite (albeit somewhat benign)  biologic, structural and genetic variables in my case, they are not the real cause of my health issues.  My mind is...more specifically...these impressions that I stored inside are. Life triggers these samskaras...they start to rise and the vicious internal dialogue starts...even if I am not actively listening for it ( or closing my ears to it by filling my mind with positive affirmations) . The dialogue comes with the emergence of the samskaras.  

It is also important to note that  these stored impressions are also arising naturally the more I practice releasing and relaxing into life. I guess one would say that the samskaras and the attached messages and core beliefs are making their way out. That is a great thing...that is what I want...The problem arises when I push them back down because they are so challenging to deal with when I have so many other external stressors on my plate. My recent bout of chest pain and whatever it was that kept me awake last night is a result of me resorting to old habit tendencies of pushing it all back down. Because the wiser part of me knows that they really need to come out, each pushing back down reaction is being more dramatically felt by my body and mind. "Get it out already!!"

Now the month of March alone was crazy, even without the chest pain thing. Crazy!!! Anyone that goes through even a part of what I went through would receive a fair degree of compassion from others. Yet, here I am beating myself up for not going to work and not fixing everyone's problems!

Patterns of Difference

Kristen Neff, an expert on Self Compassion, reminds us in the video below that there is patterns of difference between how we tend o treat others and how we treat ourselves during times of suffering. I know how I treat others, how I have treated others this month, is and was very compassionate.  I feel the others  pain, I do not judge, I give myself 100 percent, I listen.  I validate.  I talk in a very kind and calm tone.  I encouraged them to rest, to prioritize their own healing, and to nurture and nourish their lives with joy. There is no criticism...I accept and allow "all of them: the good , the bad, the ugly",  even when they get abusive towards me because of their pain. And the two people I was there for the most this month were people who literally put themselves in the situation they were in and who still refuse to take an ounce of accountability for it. I understand their resistance and the level of pain that has led them there, I do.  I have deep compassion. I am just saying.

The Dialogue to Self is not the Dialogue to Others

I did not treat myself with the same regard. Here I am, one imperfect  and tired human form, holding all this and I am beating myself up. This is what I say to myself in a tone that is very hostile and hateful: "What are you complaining about.  It isn't about you!  You are so selfish.  And you talk about being spiritual and here you are complaining about being there for others.  Why aren't you doing more?  Why aren't you there more?  Boo-hooo...so you have a little chest pain, so you are a little tired...making it all about you again are ya? Pathetic! Who do you think you are? You can't think of yourself....now  Get back out there. Serve more. Stop being so selfish. And why aren't you working?  Look at the state of your finances.  Imagine...at your age and with all that education...pathetic...you have nothing to give to people who need it...all because you decided to let a little fainting and a little pain keep you from working like a normal human being.  You could have kept working at the college ! It wasn't that bad. Now you have a chance to redeem yourself and you are blowing it! You certainly can't do it well ...everyone will know that soon enough...but at least it is a job. You are  letting this stop you again. You are just a wimp...a scaredy cat! Pathetic. Why do you think it was so hard for everyone to believe you? Because it wasn't that bad.  You just made too much of it, like you make too much of everything. God...you are pathetic. No wonder why everyone  thinks you are crazy. Why no one would want you working for them...you are just all smoke and no substance on the surface and crazy on the inside. Weird! You probably just used it because you were afraid.  Man...you are useless and unproductive...a failure really...a loser...these things are all happening to you for a reason.  You need to be punished!"  

Have you ever stopped and simply listened to how you speak to yourself and what you say? Yeah, it can be pretty brutal. Neff tells us we speak that harshly to ourselves because we are trying to drill ourselves back into shape when we feel we are losing control.  We become drill sergeant's  wanting to create strong soldiers who can  fix the situation we are losing control of. That could be true but I think we do it mostly to carry on the messaging we received from others in our past.  I know that is it in my case. 

Anyway, what do we do about it?

Turn the Hose Inward

Well you know that hose of pure and unconditional love that naturally flows through us? We need to point it in our own direction.  Give yourself a good soaking.  You deserve it ( even though your mind may tell you differently) . Watch how you treat others and know that you are definitely capable of expressing compassion and loving kindness...so turn it inward. 

Remember that Self doesn't need our love because it is Love

When we turn that light in we have a choice as to what to shine it on.  There is this little me with all its habit tendencies, its vices, its wrong view and there is the Deeper I." What self do we shine the light of love on.  That is easy...the Deeper I does not need love becasue it is love. The little me needs to be pulled up from the lower energies, into Self realization,  by the healing power of Love.  Focus there...focus on loving "me" even if it isn't a hundred percent real.

Accept all parts of "me"

Ram Dass tells us  that loving ourselves is all about accepting all parts of this "me"...all our imperfections, mistakes, unwholesome tendencies as well as all the things we do right. So write a list sometime of all the things about you that you are okay with...and then go a little farther and write down what you are not so okay with...watch your internal reaction when you get there.  Then say, "And this too!"  "This belongs and that belongs...and this too!" Even your resistance to those parts of yourself that cause you to be unkind to you...belong.  We have to notice and allow it all.  Love starts with acceptance.

Look Deeply at the Roots

Then of course, we need to look deeply at the root causes of our self hatred or lack of self love...just notice there is a reason for it. And then we need to accept that reason.  Accept that samskaras have formed in us from that conditioning and maybe even learn to love them too. Just allow it all..."And this too!" 

Notice, Reconstruct and Nurture

Then take a step back, breathe and notice when you are talking to yourself less than kindly or failing to give your self what it needs at the time. Notice and reconstruct those old patterns and tendencies with new behaviours, new words, new tones. It may take some time to do but we can learn to treat ourselves better.

Stop Resisting, Stop Pushing the Samskaras Back Down and Let Go

Most importantly, we need to stop pushing back down what is coming up for reasons of shame and fear.  When the samskaras start emerging , let them...with them will come the old habit tendencies of self abuse ...notice, allow and then let go.  We have to let them come up , no matter how much buried pain comes up with them, if we want them out. Let it all go.

Hmm!  Well that is how I see it anyway but what do I know?

All is well.

Ram Dass (2023 ) Self Love https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUDaQHKELpk

Kristen Neff (July, 2020)Self Compassion in Difficult Times. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoqSvlakeSQ

Alan Watts(Feb 2020)  We Must learn To Love Ourselves https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jK-_0CTRezU

I See Your Pain

 I See Your Pain

I see your pain.

My imperfect human heart hugs yours,

Though it feels  crushed 

under the weight of sufferings' strangulating hold

and mind wants nothing more than to pull back,

I am learning,  through steady  practice,

to stand my ground 

and not look away.

Though I cannot fix it...

I see your pain.

You tell me,

I seem so cold and distant

 as I stand above you

in my mechanical detachment, 

but these tears that trickle  down my cheek

are warm and real.

Though I cannot fix it,

I see your pain.

This hand that reaches out,

though cold and trembling,

weak and tired, 

wants to offer you that which

lays beneath this aging form.

I long to feel 

those  clenched up fingers of yours

opening and  relaxing into my sweaty palm

where my own life force,

escapes in a natural desire

to mix with yours,

to mix with the world's. 

Life touching Life,

 as all made up

borders and boundaries disappear

is what we all long for,

whether we know it or not.. 

You pull your hand away

but I do see your pain. 

Though I cannot fix it....

I see your pain.

I do not validate outwardly

in the way  you want me to with:  

"Poor you" and "This is not fair." 

Instead,  I stand here quietly,

absent of advice,

absent of expression,

absent of solutions as to how

to fix it 'out here',

so you can feel better "in there"

but I see it. 

Though I can not fix it,

I see your pain.

I  see the prison walls 

the  names, labels and diagnosis'  

have built around you,

making your world so small

and your discomfort so great. 

I see those busy hands of yours

reaching through the bars

and fidgeting about in an attempt 

to control and manipulate 

all that exists around you 

so it doesn't get past your shields.

I see them reaching, seeking, clinging 

to anything  "out here" 

that brings comfort "in there".

I see them somewhat apologetically 

grasping for numbing relief

if they  cannot stop the  arrows from

getting through 

to  your tender spots.

I also see the  chain mail 

you have wrapped around 

your fragile, broken heart. 

in hope of protecting it 

from all the unpredictable 

arrows life may throw your way.

I see your fear.

Though I cannot fix it,

I see your pain.

I see the pain in you,

I see the same pain in the world.

And there is so much.

I am still tempted at times

to resort to old  habit tendencies,

  I so want  to squeeze my eyes shut 

when the  images of dirty faced,  

and starving children 

with their swollen bellies and fleshless legs

unfold before me.

I want to drown out the homeless beggars'

plea for work, for food, for  help

or simply to be seen,

as I walk by with my cellphone to my ear. 

I am so tempted  to turn my back on those, 

who so lost in their own pain,

do desperate things to undeserving others.

I want to pretend that innocent beings 

are not getting sick,

not hurting  and are not dying

needlessly 

all over the world for reasons that do not

make sense to me: war, poverty,  a lack of care,

arrogance, prejudice and greed.

The world is constantly showing me,

in flickering flashes that pierce my retinas

and pierce my heart...

that there is suffering in it.

I want to close my eyes, turn away 

or pretend otherwise

but I don't,

not anymore.

I see what is there for me to see.

I cannot fix it,

 but I see your pain. 

My mind often tells me, 

that  the pain is too much

for this imperfect human form to carry.

It fearfully warns me 

that my own tiny  heart 

will  be smothered to death by it,

that this  little being I call "me" 

will not be able to withstand the weight 

of all the suffering I see, 

including the suffering I see in you. 

It tells me to look away 

but I don't....

not any more.

Though I cannot fix it,

I see your pain.

I understand your resistance,

I do.

I, too, once wrapped my heart in 

stories and  armour so it

would not be overwhelmed by the suffering in this world,

the suffering I assumed the world forced upon me,

but the armour proved to be more constricting 

than the suffering. 

I took it off...

and now my heart  is raw, vulnerable, 

terrified and excited 

as it beats in a desire to be open,

expanding more and more with everything I see. 

Through my own practice 

of embracing and welcoming all that is,

I see your pain

more clearly than I have ever seen it before..

Though I cannot fix it, 

I see your pain.

I also see beyond  your pain.

When I stand back

just a step, just a breath away from it, 

I see the ugliness, yes

but I also see the beauty.

I see the darkness, yes,

but I also see the light.

I see the chaos, yes,

but I also see the order.

I can see the perfection in it all.

When I relax into what is,

the  human part of me  feels

while the being part of me sees.

It is a perfect combination. 

My human heart cries for you 

but my soul rejoices

as it cries out,  "And this too!!

This too...this too belongs."

I see how all of it belongs, my love,

all of it.

The beauty belongs  

and the ugliness...they are One.

The rightness of the world belongs 

and the wrongness of it...they are one. 

The light belongs

and the darkness...they are one.

The 10,000 joys belong,

as do  the 10,000 sorrows...they are one.

I see it all...

and though I can not fix it,

I do see your pain.

At the same time

I look upon the ugly darkness 

that appears to be consuming you....

I can see past your expressions of agony,

past your shields and defenses, past  your resistance; 

I see past  your wounds and broken pieces

to the heart of you....

 beating, beating, beating

in perfect rhythm,

undisturbed by any of it

as it prepares you

 with each constricted splash of blood

for an opening and release

that will save you from yourself . 

I see the light ,

I see your freedom

waiting  beyond the heavy veil of your  pain,

waiting for you to allow it all in.

Just allow it all in , 

by opening your eyes and heart  to what is.

Though I can not fix it, 

I see your pain...

my love, 

and it is glorious.  

Dale-Lyn, March, 2023

What I Learn From Chest Pain

 

Yoga is the practice of tolerating the consequences of being you.

The Gita

Sometimes it is hard to be a "me" constantly triggered by Life. 

An Excuse to Hide Away From Life

Chest pain persists off and on and I am looking for a place to hide out from the world. ( Well...I am trying to avoid those parts of the world I am having such a visceral reactive response to!). So I come here.  I am telling people I have chest pain, which I really don't like to do unless I need to use it as a legitimate reason to hide out. That is what I am doing with this chest pain.  I am using it to "my" benefit, as an excuse to rest. Well, as an excuse to "escape".  . 

Listening To A Friend

 Angina really isn't a problem for me anymore.  After years of allowing it to seemingly take so much of my life away [in my mind only], I have learned to live with it amazingly well. Where as at one point, I did what ever I could to resist it, deny it, push past it etc because of the worry and shame it provoked in me, now I stop and listen. I am no longer worried about it, concerned about the outcome and I don't feel the need to waste energy trying to get others out there to look after it. I have gone beyond simply accepting it, to befriending it.  I see what it offers me in terms of learning and keeping me on track in my growth.  I do treat it in the allopathic way when it arises.  I am not stupid.  I take a medication on a regular basis that really helps and I rest and take nitro when I need to. But I am not worried about these episodes at all.  

When I have a cluster of pain that comes and goes over 3-4 days, I simply stop and say, "Hello my old friend.  What is going on in my life or in my mind that you want me to pay attention to?" 

"Look after Yourself"

I am always reminded that I am failing to be compassionate and kind to self.  It is the heart right?  Chest pain  has to have something to do with love. It is a key sign that I...this body and mind...need to have the same degree of kindness, service, compassion I am offering to others,  applied to it. I don't know why it is referring to the "me" part of Self, but until I am fully realized that might be where it is pointing me. Which is kind of confusing being that I am on a quest to diminish "me" for "I am".  Anyway...it is a plea for Self-care and Self-love.  I do recognize that though I may not always heed that suggestion like it wants me to.  

"Rest"

 The most important step to do in an angina attack is to physically rest.  The pain is also telling me to rest. Unless I can use this need to rest as a way to avoid those stressors that some would say are causing my chest pain and to which I now know are simply triggering what is already there and my resistance to it....I may not rest. I still tend to push past it, to keep giving to others, at the expense of self. Why? See above.  I don't care enough about myself. That takes me to the third thing it is telling me.  

"You have some pretty sick stuff in there!"

There are some unwholesome things stuffed in me that I need to release. At the root of this chest pain is a samskara arising to the surface.  An impression of a deeply wounded little girl who is shame and fear based to the core because of past trauma is triggered by certain external stressors. Intense feelings of unworthiness arise. as well as a fear that I might hurt more deserving others in my attempts to get what  I need from life to just survive physically.   I tend to give, give, give in an attempt to redeem myself....compensate for my unworthiness.... as I often say, "pay extra rent for being on a planet I don't deserve to be on." The denying of the chest pain, the pushing past it...the seeing it, (as well as the shaming I received in my presentation of it),  as something I simply "deserve" for taking up air that others could be breathing,  is a conditioned reaction to  these twisted and sick core beliefs. 

"Get rid of the blockages"

When that samskara begins to unravel...man is it messy in here. The messier it is in here, the more chest pain I feel out there.  It is a bit of a cycle. Chest pain is both a reaction to a body that has been not taking care of itself because it doesn't see itself as worthy, absorbing and owning the stress of others,   and it it is also a trigger for the release of this samskara.  Double whammy! My heart is physically closing in an attempt to keep the pain of that old wounding from coming to the surface, preventing those specific triggers out there from pulling them up. And the physical closing (vasospasms)  causes pain that triggers the samskaras so they will be released. The chest pain is actually trying to do me a favor.  The only  way of truly healing emotionally and physically is by getting rid of these blockages.  I honestly believe that if I could release all that old junk once and for all, there would be no more chest pain. My heart would truly be open , remaining so. It would be like a balloon angioplasty for the soul. Yoga, I believe is the best medicine for that.

Not There Yet

Sigh!  So...I know all this but I still have a long way to go to "realizing" it.  I spent the last few days resorting to old habit energies. Going between shaming myself and using the chest pain to avoid dealing with Life. I was shaming myself for the chest pain and the fatigue that comes with it...for not doing more...like cleaning the  house, or spending more time at my daughters (even though I spent six hours there yesterday), not picking up a work day, not offering my yoga classes, not doing more for my grandchildren and children  etc....I was really beating myself up. The old unworthiness samskara was flowing into my psyche like a broken faucet because  of the stressors I have been dealing with. 

Don't Need an Excuse To Say "No"

Then when I felt the "stress" was too much I told myself well I will use this chest pain, not for the purpose it was meant for, but to further resist life.  It seemed the only plausible excuse I could use   to avoid the stressors that were triggering me, so I could say to those others who seemed to need me, "Sorry! I can't be there 24/7 because my heart is acting up." I don't worry about my heart but I know they do, so I will occasionally share with them when I have chest pain in hopes it will reduce the demands. Sometimes that works...sometimes ( maybe not so much this time) they will cut me some slack and stop demanding so much of me. It really didn't work yesterday but I am trying it this morning.  Like, . "Just give me a morning to myself ...if you can't give me a whole day so I can rest up enough to be there for you."  I don't take a call for work even though I need the money...I can't risk working with this... so one would think...yeah that is a legitimate excuse .  But man...why do I have to have others reminding me that it is okay to  take the time I need to rest when I am not well?  Why do I have to wait until I am a spray of nitro away from emergency to say, "No. I can't give you all that you need...it is too much for one person." ? Again...that samskara  is operating. It is challenging to be assertive and say no when you feel, not only unworthy, but that  you are the cause of everyone's misery. Hmm! 

Sharing the Pathetic Pieces

BTW...it is really embarrassing to see how pathetic this "me" is in its core believing . Wow! I know how irrational these thoughts are.  I do but the feelings stuffed inside don't give a darn about how much I think I know. Then why the heck are you sharing it, crazy lady?  I figure I am not the only one....in fact, I know I am not the only one who has a physical ailment as a result of a samskara related to deep seated shame and unworthiness.  Maybe not to this specific degree or detail...but similar.  

Have you ever taken the time to investigate  the relationship between your own body symptoms and your samskaras? Have you looked into your core belief's and the wounding they come from? 

I find it absolutely fascinating! And that is what I want to spend my time doing.  Not enabling, or being in a situation where I am really not serving anyone, least of all me. I know the best way I can help anyone is to get rid of my blockages  so I can be there for them in a non-resisting and open way...

Anyway, how I rambled this morning when I was  going to take my hiding away time to simply rest. Maybe this "looking deeply" is a better use of my time. 

All is well. 

Courtroom Of Resistance

 Court Room of Resistance

Tight fingers of resistance 

wrap around my heart, 

obedient bailiffs,

following the commands

of a gavel pounding mind, 

s squeezing, squeezing, squeezing. 

 I curl forward, 

shoulders hunched up 

towards my ears,

jaws  and sweaty fists 

clenched tight, 

my shrinking form playing

 the perfect victim 

in the prosecutors argument. .

The jury gasps in pity.

The authoritative judge

reclaims  the courtroom 

of my experiencing, 

c     condemning, 

      in confident tones,

 the events and imperfect beings

that flicker past. 

as images on a video screen,

e  marked,  "Exhibit A,"

e      

The "others" ,

who have been accused ,

of poking and prodding 

at my insides with their own pain

call out their self-defense verdicts, 

to no avail.

The judgment will be  made  

in little me's favour,

T    Behind the  closed doors of this courtroom,

h    they and circumstance

      will be found guilty.

Y    Yet the sweet relief of justice

r   refuses to touch me.

 And instead, 

 with every "bad, wrong, 

and shouldn't be"

I hear,

my heart,  

 shrivels and constricts

tighter, tighter, tighter,

until I can not breathe.

until  just a slither of light,

a tiny breath of Life,

 can flow through.

This rigged trial

is too much for 

the part of "me" 

that honors truth.  

I must raise my hand

and let the jury know

that the only perpetuator here

is the resistant "me."

Those "others",

they are about to 

condemn and sentence,

are just innocent players

in this game I play

against myself.

© Dale-Lyn, March, 2023

I worked a bit on this.  Not sure why and am not sure if I did any good.  I was just reminded of this poem and felt the need to come to it. Why? Woke up with the chest pain described in the poem  and though I was half-hoping to pick up a shift today, I decided against it. I feel a bit weak. So I told myself a day off would be rejuvenating after the crisis my family faced recently. I even thought that maybe since my sister is back home and I am feeling so much  relief there,  I could just have a peaceful day to myself. As soon as that thought crossed my mind, I get a phone call with a request, more of an expectation, to go and help in a situation I was hoping to avoid....a situation I feel myself physically resisting.  The chest pain, literally gets worse when I even think of it.  I am having such a visceral reaction to this stressor. Man, I am a mess.  I know  the problem is not the situation and not the constant, chronic  24/7 demands for my physical and psychological presence it entails but this thought I keep dragging up, "This is all too much.  This can't keep happening.  I need a break and I am just not going to get it." The request, the thought, the sense of unending obligation to help  fix a situation I have no power of fixing...is coming in, leading to a reaction that is so draining.   I have been dealing with it...sometimes staying open...many more times closing...for many years but lately I hit a wall. Instead of staying open, I closed up tightly and continue to close up tightly in response to it.  It is not the situation.  It is me that is doing the closing.  Why am I closing?  Because I am resisting the chronic "what isness" of this situation...part of my mind is judging this as a "bad, wrong, shouldn't be..."   I think it is the chronic nature of it, that is bothering  me and this thought I have, "This doesn't have to be this way...if only she would take responsibility for the parts of her life she can control and let go of the rest." Well, again, I stress... it isn't the situation that is bothering me, I am bothering myself about it. I am bothering myself.

Well it is from this experience that this very imperfect poem came out. I could write a thousand critiques on it but I am not going to go there cuz it does say something important. I mean I could have skipped all the over writing and over kill and simply have said: 

....the moment  in front of you is not bothering you - you are bothering yourself about the moment in front of you. 

Michael A. Singer, living untethered, ( New Harbinger/ Sounds True, 2022), page 25

Hmm! All is well

©

I Don't Want To Close!

 It all starts with your feet on the ground, your eyes open, saying "I don't want to close!" 

Michael A. Singer

I feel myself closing in reaction to certain life circumstances...to the accumulation of them at least.  I am forced to realize that I have hit maximum closing becasue I started getting chest pain again yesterday after a stressful incident, ( something my mind judged as stressful) . For weeks now, I could feel the other components of the  physical reaction of closing.   It usually starts in my gut ( the other brain) as a twisting knot. I feel my jaws clenched, my shoulders up close to my ears, the sloping of my body forward ( iliopsoas response to stress... an instinctual protect - the- vital -organs reaction to a perceived threat), I drop my gaze and automatically switch into cold mechanical mode which my daughter absolutely hates. I cringe and turn inward...a tight ball of shrinking flesh. I have before this point of chest pain been feeling "exhausted and drained" by the last three weeks dealing with a life threatening crisis in my sister and my daughter's issues. ...not to mention all the other little or medium sized stressors. ( again...these are judgements made by mind). And now I have chest pain off and on.(My angina, with the exception of a few break through clusters,  has been well controlled for almost three years now with the medication I am on and my yoga practice...being "relaxed" is the answer for most issues in our lives).  

I haven't had enough opportunity to relax...last night I only slept for 2 and a half hours because I was up all night texting back and forth with my daughter. So I am tired which makes a wonderful situation for the  pain to emerge.  It comes and goes...not just with exertion.  It is relieved by the nitro but I am so mentally overwhelmed by all the external stressors that I am reluctant to take it...part of me, literally, wants to just succumb to whatever my heart is doing in protest, "I can't give anymore!" .  If I am sick...I don't have to deal with everyone's demands of me. Yes mentally and emotionally I am completely overwhelmed and this closes my heart, almostly completely...figuratively and literally. Hmm!

I found myself scribbling this down today as I listened to the podcast linked below, (Just a scribble...not yet a poem. )

 Tightly, the fingers of my resistance 

wrap around my heart, 

squeezing, squeezing, squeezing 

as the obedient Balifs, 

follow the commands

of the gavel pounding mind.

  I curl forward, 

shoulders hunched up 

towards my ears,

jaws  and sweaty fists clenched tight.

My defendant points to my shrinking form

as farther evidence that I am nothing more 

than a frightened animal

lal laying down submissively

      in front of  the  predators' fangs,

in an act of learned helplessness.  

The jury gasps in pity.

The authoritative judge

reclaims  the courtroom 

of my experiencing,

c     condemning, 

      in confident tones,

 the events and imperfect beings

that flicker past,

images on a video screen,

 that can be played over and over again, 

evidence for my victim status,

while the the struggling "others" who 

have been accused 

of poking and prodding 

at my insides with their own pain

call out their self-defense verdicts, 

to no avail.

The judgment will be  made  

in little me's favour,

T    Circumstance and the others 

      will be made guilty

And with every "bad, wrong, 

and shouldn't be"

I hear,

instead of feeling the relief of justice,

my heart shrivels and constricts

tighter, tighter, tighter

until I can not breathe.

until  just a slither of light,

a tiny breath of Life,

 can flow through.

This rigged trial

is too much for 

my weary consciousness. 

I must raise my hand

and let the jury know

that it is I 

that have hurt myself.

I have  closed my own heart, 

Those "others",

they are about to 

condemn and sentence,

are innocent players

in this game I play

against myself.

Dale-Lyn, 2023

Sigh!  All is well.

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (March 26, 2023) Learning to Stay Open.https://tou.org/talks/

Samskaras and the Need for Anesthesia

No wonder people so often speak about the benign numbing effect of their addictions: only a person in pain craves anesthesia. ...Ask not why the addiction, but why the pain.

Gabor Mate,  The Myth of Normal (Knopf, 2022), page 220

I have to have a difficult conversation with a loved one today or tomorrow, a person who craves anesthesia.  I was waiting for this person to be stable enough for me to do so but I also knew there was just a slim window of opportunity before old habit energies took over again.  Those energies of denial, suppression, repression, avoidance, relief seeking, desire for numbing,  fantasizing, storytelling etc have already begun. So...it is time to share my truth.... not that I have any power to affect change in this individual.  It probably will have little effect.  I do it only because it is my truth and I need to share it before I surrender fully to what is. 

Sigh! Reminded of samskaras again. So I felt pulled to come to the camera again to talk about the buried pain energy that causes all our suffering.  (And as you can tell by the way I look...it isn't an ego thing that brings me to the camera, that brings me here.  It is something much bigger.) 

All is well in my world 

Craving The Ocean

 

There are no decisions; there is only interaction with what is in front of you. Decisions come because you have attachments, desires and fears, The only thing that will help you is to let go. If you let go of your stuff-there are no decisions- there is just life. 

Michael A. Singer

I am craving the ocean.  That is something that I want  to look at from all angles.  

First, I need to look deeply into the craving itself and remind myself  how desire is the root to most of our suffering. 

 Craving is Desire and Desire is Escape!

Desire or preference  is as Michael Singer says, a way of compensating for our blockages. When I crave something I am desiring...wanting something other than what is...in an attempt to escape from the reality that is triggering old pain inside me.  Hmmm! I definitely want to escape my present reality...those events and circumstances that are and have already taken place.  Wow! Why do we try to escape things that have already happened when there is nothing left to escape from and there is no changing what happened?  For example, my sister is recovering wonderfully on the physical level...miracle really.  The crisis with her health is done and gone...yet I watched part of me wanting to escape it the whole time it was happening and that part of me is still telling me to "run!" That time of her being on a ventilator between life and death is over...it took care of itself...and even if it didn't there is no going back in time to make it "not happen".  Is there?  Yet that is where a lot of our energy and attention goes doesn't it, ...to escaping and resisting that which has already taken place?   

Event Or Experience?

I also have to look at the difference between event and experience when I think about this escape thing we tend to do as humans.  The event was the actual  crisis that unfolded and also the immediate emotional and internal experience that arose in me as a result. In itself, it is not an experience...just an objective, impersonal, life happening. It had nothing to do with "me"...absolutely nothing. If I was clear of samskaras and open...it, as well as the "natural"  feeling of fear and sadness, would just blow right through me and be gone. The event  would last for a blink of an eye, in my body and psyche and then be gone.  The experience happens when whatever is happening out there, and "naturally" in here, becomes the prolonged and "unnatural" focus of our awareness.  If it gets snagged up in our old pain on its way through, reactivating memories and fears and grief; if it becomes about "me" rather than "it"; if we as these little reactive entities begin to resist  by clinging to or pushing away the event based on our likes and dislikes, wants and want-nots......it goes from being a life event to a personal experience. In this case, not a pleasant one.  It becomes about what the event[what Life] did to me.  It becomes a problem...an experience of suffering. 

Multiple Events Leading Me Here

This life event was just one of many that came at one time and I felt completely overwhelmed and burnt out...not from the number of events but the multiple and varied experiences I was going through. I want escape from "all" these experiences!  Each event tapped into and stirred up old samskaras within me...old wounding...so instead of just blowing through, all the events  got snagged up and caught up in "me" .  "Me" was kicking and screaming. It was messy and chaotic, exhausting and draining. I was experienced-out. I do know what samskaras were tapped into by each of the so called "crisis'" I was dealing with.  Old "unworthiness", and "born to be punished"  and fears of hurting and being hurt were yanked up from the depths of me. It was a lot...especially at one time.  But maybe, if all the events  didn't  happen at once, it would not have led to this "craving the ocean" and this inner reflection I am participating in now. I am aware of what needs to come up and these events have led to experiences that made me even more aware of the need  for "me" to get out of the way, so these old samskara blockages can be released.I don't want to be blocked and if it takes multiple crisis' to hit me at one time to unblock me...bring it on! (Not that Life is singling me out or anything...and not that I wouldn't say yes to some easier lessons in the  future lol...but heck "I want"  is in the way of me getting what "I need", isn't it? 

Why the Ocean?

Yes...I prefer, desire and crave the ocean.  I love being around the ocean.  It reminds me of the universal breath.  It is healing and soothing.  I feel peace when I am by the water. So when I am stressed out, I begin to dream and fantasize about escaping to the ocean.  Well, I live on the east coast and I can get to the ocean in minutes,  but in my escape fantasy...I prefer an "unfrozen" landscape...one where there is soothing sun and warmth. It is really hard to lay down on the beach where I live right now and just listen to the waves. I have a bit of an aversion for hypothermia and frostbite. Actually, I crave the sun too...that healing energy ...and right now where I live in Canada, the light though definitely lovely and getting stronger everyday, is not quite bright enough  to zap up my serotonin levels. :) (My body and mind would really benefit from a good dose of serotonin right now.) I want sun and warmth.  I don't want anymore darkness and cold.  I want the ocean and rest and healing.  I don't want any more challenges and hardship. So I dealing with some hindrances: desire and aversion. When I think of the ocean, however...I just feel "good"...(another dualistic  term that feeds desire). 

Renounce? 

So, I am still often caught up in this unwise and unwholesome way of thinking. Yet, if I said to myself "Okay you crave the ocean...that is bad...don't crave and renounce it...definitely don't feed your craving tendency by going to the ocean," I am not being wholesome or wise ether.  I am just suppressing and repressing ...putting more stuff on top of my buried stuff. What I need to do, is just be aware of these mind tendencies, these cravings, this desire for escape and realize that even if by some stroke of pure luck, I was able to go south or whereever...to sit by the ocean.. ....it would not be the solution to any suffering I may be experiencing, not long term anyway.  It would feel wonderful (and on a practical level, I do need to replenish and nurture this mind and form I have been neglecting so obviously over the last few months)...but I am evolved enough to know,  the only real lasting solution is to release these samskaras.  Without the samskaras, I will be open and free.  There will be no need for cravings or aversions. There will be no need for anything the world can provide.  I can still love it, appreciate it, learn from it, be in awe of it but I won't need it or want it to the point of craving, any longer.

Sigh! So much learning in every little experience. 

All is well!