Knowing Soul

 

To realize Oneself as Brahma is the goal; but to know the soul as distinct from the body is to know the truth and be free from ignorance. ...Know then, this body, this wealth, this kith and kin are not real. Atma [soul] alone is real and eternal. Perform actions in this world without being absorbed by them.

Yoga Vasistha location 291

Starting to wonder if Zukav got his information from the Yoga Vasistha?   So many similarities.  The Vasistha speaks to the limitations of the five senses and the limitations of the self/body  we identify as so often. It speaks of the importance of making the distinction between our body personality ( though it does not use that term) and our soul...and how we need to balance them.  It speaks to the need to expand beyond our entanglement with worldly form so we recognize the brilliance and the intentions of the soul.  Hmmm! Of course, other teachings speak to this as well.  In fact, I cannot get over how uncanny it is that the story of Rama is so much like the story of Buddha.  Was this text and teaching a means to bring The Buddhists back to the Veda's?

I have no idea.  

All is well.

Being Open to the Guidance

Impulses, hunches, sudden insights and subtle insights [messages from the soul or the advanced intelligence that serves the soul] have assisted us on our evolutionary path since the origin of our species.  That we have not recognized the guidance that has come to us in this way is a consequence of seeing reality through our five senses. 

Gary Zukav, page 64

How connected are you to this invisible and often inexplicable wisdom, guidance and support you are receiving 24-7?  Are you looking for it?  Are you open for it? If you are, is your radio dial tuned into the right channel? Do you even believe what Zukav suggests and most importantly what Jesus promises Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you shall find; knock and the door will be opened to you. Matthew 7:7

I am definitely open for it at this point in my Life.  I ask, I seek, I knock like its no one's business.  Sometimes I hear the answers so clearly, other times I don't.  It is like I am waiting by the radio with my hand constantly moving the dial.  I hear a lot of static but I cannot strain enough to hear what is beyond that static. I am straining to hear with my body's ears, to see with my body's eyes...to feel this guidance with the five senses.  

Zukav, as does Christ, assures us that we will receive when we ask.  It may come to us, however, in a way we cannot understand. It may come to us in a way and time frame that differs from our personality's expectations but it will come. 

How do we learn to become more aware and in tune with this guidance, according to Gary Zukav:

1. Intuition has little , if anything, to do with the intellect and everything to do with the heart. We need to become aware of what we are feeling.  Stop repressing, numbing, avoiding and hiding from feelings.  We need to learn to look deeply into the store house of the emotions we have inside and feel. We need to allow feelings to flow through us so they are not blocking our frequency transmissions.  Otherwise we will block the energy channels for this intuition to come through to our conscious awareness. Only through emotions can you encounter the force field of your own soul.
2.  Need to cleanse the body of food toxins.  Cleanse the body, cleanse the mind and therefor cleanse the soul.
3. Honor the guidance we receive.  We need to be willing to hear what our intuition says and act accordingly. Many of us are afraid or do not like what intuition tells us becasue it goes against what the ego wants...but willingness is essential. 
4. Be open to Life and the Universe...trusting that it knows what it is doing, that there is a reason for everything. 

Intuition is part of our experience here on earth in this incarnation.  When our bodies die... so will it...but for now...it is a wonderful guiding tool for us to access anytime we need to. It serves our survival, our creativity, and our inspiration, acting like a "walkie- talkie" between soul and personality.  In a sense, it is the tool of the our higher Self, the communicator between the tiny personality and the whole, all encompassing soul.  This intuition can also help us to tap into other soul energies of higher wisdom for guidance. 

We need to work to keep our channels free of negativity and blocked emotions, free of doubt and skepticism so we can reap the wisdom to be gained through our intuition and communication with the wise. 

All is well! 

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster

Psychotherapy and Enlightenment

 

The ego tries to convince us that we must "do" things to achieve enlightenment.  The spirit knows that enlightenment is not a matter of doing, but a magnificent consequence of being. 

Daniel Jackson

Question 49: Can psychotherapy play a part in enlightenment? 

All is well!

Moving Forward Consciously

Please show me the way to bliss that is above pain or pleasure, doubt or delusion.  That eternal state can't be reached by the five senses.  I desire the path by which the Great Righteous ones manage to escape from the sufferings of this world. 

Yoga Vasistha Kindle Edition  

Hmm!  I have a yoga class in a few minutes but I felt compelled to come here first to jot down a few words.  I is the most important "ritual" of my day and our days are full of rituals , aren't they?  that brings me to what I was writing about yesterday in reference to the first laws of a motion: a body in uniform motion will remain in uniform motion until it is acted upon by a force?" 

How much of our daily habits and rituals are part of this uniform motion?  I believe these things are perfectly okay as long as we are mindful of  the motives for our doing and those motives and intentions are wholesome and skillful leading us toward a higher understanding...rather than a numbing effect. I can honestly say that my being here with my words is wholesome and skillful.  The yoga teaching I am about to do is wholesome and skillful. Time spent with my grandchildren and children...wholesome and skillful.  Deep conversations at the table with D. in the mornings...wholesome and skillful.  My reading and listening...studying and seeking "pointers" from others on how to get to where I want to be...wholesome and skillful. My walks in the woods...wholesome and skillful. 

So I am moving forward consciously in many ways, there is a force within me that is putting an end to some of that unconscious uniform motion. Still...I get caught up by mind and I am pulled...up down and all around.  I get caught up in the uniform motion again and again.  What stops it?  I take a step back, I take a breath and I begin again...in another direction.

Hmmm!

All is well. 

Controlling the Fluctuations of the Mind

 As a straw is tossed into the air, and a tree is shaken by the wind, so is the action of the mind.  It lifts me up to the highest realm, then drops me unmercifully to the lowest depths of the earth..... with the control of the mind, all pains and all sorrows will perish. 

Yoga Vasistha/Rishi Singh Gherwal Yoga Vasistha Kindle Edition:  location 68-71

All is well! 

The Physics of the Soul

 

A body in uniform motion will remain in uniform motion until it is acted upon by a force.

The First Law of Motion/ Gary Zukav

Man...I really cannot believe I am going to attempt to talk about physics but I am.  And I am going to talk about physics in relation to the heart.

Say what crazy lady?

I just finished chapter 4 of The Seat of the Soul for the second time. I got a lot from this chapter.  I was reminded of how we need to get beyond the mind to truly understand what we are here to understand.  The heart is a valuable tool for that understanding becasue it takes us beyond intellectualization , beyond what we observe with out five senses...to "feeling". Feeling is the ultimate experience. It can take us to our soul.

The thing is, however,  most of us deny our feelings.  We believe they are useless things that get in the way of our productivity.  So we ignore them, push them down or numb from them so we can continue "doing"  in a reality that we see only as material. We don't see the compass with its big,  bold "True North" in our feelings, pointing the direction to what we really need and want....to go deeper beyond form, to living in  essence. 

When we close the door to our feelings, we close the door to the vital currents that energize and activate our thoughts and actions.   page 44

When we close the door on our feelings we disconnect from the possibility of knowing why we do the things we do, we disconnect from  soul, we disconnect from a reverence for Life, and we disconnect from one another. 

How can we share the sufferings and joys of others if we cannot experience our own? 

What has this got to do with physics? 

Uniform motion

Well without awareness of our feelings we live the first law of motion...we continue to remain in uniform motion.  We will go through  life in a state of unconsciousness uniform motion...just getting by...just running from everything we feel....doing but not there in our doing...attached to the wants of our personality all the while refusing to consider the needs of the soul.  This creates negative karma and a type of internal suffering that cannot be appeased by physical world gratification. It can lead to illness, severe mental illness, accidents, injury, and the death of an incarnation that did not realize Self, did not fulfill its mission for being here. So that negative karma will be taken to the next incarnation.  . Hopefully the balance will be found there. 

The Force

What we need to stop this uniform motion of suppression, repression, denial and avoidance of feeling is a force of some kind .  What would that force be?  That force is our choice to turn around and face the very thing we were running from. It is the choice to become more conscious and aware, to look deeply into our feelings and feel them.  It is like we were  in uniform motion running to stay two to three steps ahead of a train because we were afraid of the pain and unnecessary inconvenience it would cause, then finally realizing how futile that is and deciding instead to turn around to face it. Facing a train  would stop ya...let me tell ya.  Don't need to be a physicist to know that. But until then...until we stop and sit with what is inside us...we are in unconscious  motion and the only thing that will stop us is our choice to be aware, to look deeply into those questions about who we are and what Life is truly all about, to become conscious. 

What can lead us to the  Force

The very thing we were running from can lead us to the force that stops us from going through Life unconsciously.  Eventually our repressed, suppressed, denied and avoided feelings will lead to suffering and suffering is the best motivator to wake us up.

  The mind which is deluded by illusion lacks the kindness of heart, has no compassion for good and is indifferent to good or bad.  When it realizes what is good, then cowardice is replaced by courage; this world by Heaven. 

The Yoga Vasistha

Not Really Physics ?

Physics is evolving along with our personalities to see and understand our connection with soul.   We see this gradual  progression towards a deeper truth  in our scientists over the centuries.  We have gone from the ideas and discoveries of  of Ptolemy to those of Copernicus; from Copernicus to Newton and from Newton to Einstein.  We are now moving from the theory of relativity to the discoveries of Quantum mechanics. and quantum physics reflects a species that is becoming aware of  its consciousness to the physical world. page 52

All is well!

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Yoga Vasistha: Translated by Rishi Singh Gherwal ( 2021) Kindle Edition

Feelings?

 If, when the mind experiences something pleasant or unpleasant, it simply understands things as they are, then there is no suffering. 

Yuval Noah Harari

Question 48: What are feelings in Buddhist Teachings?

I was not happy with this answer I gave but as promised I put it up anyway.

All is well 

Brahman is Truth

 

What is the truth? 

'I have nothing to do with sorrow, with actions, with delusion or desire. I am at peace, free from sorrow. I am Brahman' -such is the truth.

'I am free from all defects. I am the all,  I do not seek anything nor do I abandon anything. I am Brahman'-such is the truth.

'I am blood, I am flesh, I am bone, I am body, I am consciousness, I am the mind also, I am Brahman' -such is the truth.

'I am the firmament, I am space, I am the sun and the entire space, I am all things here,I am Brahman'- such is the truth. 

'I am a blade of grass, I am the earth, I am a tree-stump, I am the  forest, I am the mountains and the oceans, I am the non-dual Brahman'- such is the truth. 

'I am the consciousness from which all things are strung and through whose power all beings engage themselves in all their activities; I am the essence of all things, I am Brahman'-such is the truth. 

This is certain all things exist in Brahman, all things  flow from it, all things are Brahman; it is omnipresent, it is the one self, it is the truth. 

From: The Supreme Yoga: Yoga Vasistha as translated by Swami Venkatesananda; 1976/2010 Google Books:  https://books.google.ca/books?id=agWmPwAACAAJ&pg=PR7&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false    Page 233

I found a translation of the Yoga Vasistha on line.  I am reading it now. I heard this today recited by Deepak Chopra during my meditation and I thought it was so beautiful I wanted to put it here. 

Who or what is Brahman, crazy lady? 

Brahman is a what, not a who. 

To understand this verse, we need to know what  Brahman is. Brahman is a Sanskrit word that can be translated to mean "that which never changes". It is the ultimate or absolute reality, binding everything in the world together as one. It is that which grows and causes other things to grow. In some traditions Brahman is said to comprise  both the individual soul and the cosmic soul. We are believed to be prevented from truly understanding Brahman through something called Maya: illusions based on our over identification with body, mind and ego. Yoga practice can help us get beyond this identification,  free ourselves from ego so we can truly connect with the ultimate of understandings that Brahman offers seekers. (Yogapedia)

Brahman, basically, is the truth we seek. It is everything. 

All is well! 

Yoga pedia ( July 2020) Brahman? https://www.yogapedia.com/definition/5274/brahman

The Supreme Yoga: Yoga Vasistha as translated by Swami Venkatesananda; 1976/2010 Google Books:  https://books.google.ca/books?id=agWmPwAACAAJ&pg=PR7&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false   

On Reverence

 Process is honored in reverence.  The unfolding of Life, the maturation process, the process of growing through and coming into your own empowerment, is a process that needs to be approached with reverence.

Gary Zukav, page 35

Hmm!  I am reading Chapter 3 now and it is about reverence.  In relation to what I wrote yesterday, I see that we, as humans, need to revere not only everything and everyone in our human experience but the unfolding of Life itself.  No matter what she gives us, or what shows up in front of us if we see the "deeper" significance of it, if we see the sacredness in it as part of our spiritual  evolution,  we will approach it with the reverence it deserves. We will honor our suffering and our joy. We will honor Life.

Reverence and Karma do go hand in hand. Actions and reactions in the physical arena set energy into motion, forming our experiences and revealing in the processes the soul has yet to learn.  A person who approaches Life with reverence will not be able to take part in actions or reactions that increase the karmic debt.  They will never be able to harm or destroy any aspect of Life.  They will approach it all with Non-judgmental justice. 

Most importantly, Reverence is engaging in a form and a depth of contact with Life that is well beyond the shell of form and into essence...is a perception of the soul. So when I look at the suffering of those around me, sometimes it is overwhelming and I resist it with all my judgement and perceptions  that it is "bad, wrong, and shouldn't be." I forget that Life knows what she is doing and that it is unfolding in front of me exactly as it is meant to, unfolding in front of those suffering beings I love exactly as it is meant to. It is not "bad, wrong, or shouldn't be"...on the deeper, often invisible level, it is purposeful, healing and exactly as it is meant to be.  It is a holy and sacred process that honors the essence of these individuals, even if it does not appear to appease their ego personalities. I have to remind myself that there is something beneath their personalities that is being served by their experiences. There is an essence there that sees and welcomes the sacred learning it is being offered...even if it seems unfair and overwhelming to the personality. 

Without reverence our experiences are brutal and destructive. With reverence , our experiences become compassionate and caring.

I don't know about you, but I prefer compassionate and caring.

All is well. 

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul.  New York: Simon and Schuster

It isn't personal! Don't Judge

 In order to become whole, the soul must balance its energy. It must experience the effects that it has caused. 

Page 27

More  on Karma??? 

Chapter Two takes me to a topic I have been exploring in great detail lately: Karma. And the take away from reading it is that Karma isn't personal. We see a problem with Life circumstance when we personalize Karma...believing that our personalities are being pointed out and punished when we encounter less than favorable circumstances.  Not the case! 

If that personality does not understand that the experience of [whatever negative situation it is encountering]is the effect of a previous cause, and this experience is bringing to completion an impersonal process, it will react from a personal point of view rather than from the  point of view of its soul. Page 26

Suffering Has a Purpose!

Karma is simply how our souls balance the energies our personalities create in our  everyday affairs. Karma means that healing is taking place even if we cannot see it.  If we knew that we would let go of our judgments that suffering is unfair.  When we see ourselves suffering, or as I have been so  consumed  lately, others suffering from what seem to be unfair and unjust circumstances, or others causing suffering...we would realize the perfection in it.  We would understand that at a greater level something amazing is happening.  Healing and balancing is taking place. We would respond compassionately to the suffering of others but we would stop looking at it as if it was "wrong, bad, shouldn't be" which just adds to our sense of suffering. 

It is appropriate that we respond to his or her circumstances with compassion, but it is not appropriate that we perceive it as unfair becasue it is not. page 29

There is so much we do not understand underneath the obvious of our experiences and the experiences we witness others going through.  We cannot judge Life for doing what it does to help us evolve because we do not know the reasons beneath why bad things seem to happen to us or everyone else.  We just need to trust it and let go of those judgments and criticism that keeps us tangled up in the cause and effect of Karma. 

Non judgmental justice is a perception that allows you to see everything in Life [the good, the bad and the ugly], but does not engage your negative emotions. Non-judgmental justice relieves you of the self-appointed job of judge and jury becasue you know that everything is being seen-nothing escapes the law of Karma- and this brings forth understanding and compassion. page 30

Hmmm!  A lot of learning here. Let's let Life do what Life does. 

All is well 

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The sEat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster. 

The Yoga Vasistha

 Just as a silkworm spins a web and is caught in it, so do humans weave the web of their own concepts and are caught in them.

Yoga Vasistha (brought to me attention by Deepak Chopra)

I heard these words every morning I practiced  The Secret for Healing Mediation from Deepak Chopra and Adam Plack. They just kept catching me in their web each session. Every time I heard them I was tempted to stop and write them down, so afraid I would not remember them.  Today I did not forget them and went on a Google search to find their source.  All the poetic  meditation passages, Deepak Chopra tells us in the Preparation segment of the meditation,  including this one, come from Sutras of some Yogic text  I couldn't quite decipher.  I wanted to know that text, however...in fact, something in me "needed" to know. 

My search led me to information on The Yoga Vasistha, something I never before heard of.  I am  somewhat familiar with the Rigveda, The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali  and the Mahabharata, a preceding text that contains the Gita among other great Hindu stories.... but not this one.  The Vasistha was supposedly written sometime between the sixth century to the 14th but, like many great texts or scriptures,  no one is really sure of the date of its creation. 

The information about it that I received on Wikipedia ( and yes I like and trust Wikipedia) tells me that it consists of six books.  The books speak to an Indian Prince named Rama's frustration with human suffering ; the desire for liberation and the nature of those who seek it; how that liberation comes only through a spiritual life, free will and human creative power and the books  proceed to show how meditation can lead to enlightenment and liberation as it did for Rama.  (Ummm...does that not sound oddly familiar?) It also proposes that "the whole world of things is the object of the mind".  In its discussion of Yoga it also teaches about non-duality, and illusion. 

I think I am drawn to this text not only becasue of the beautiful poetry it contains that touch some deep part within me, but because it adheres to my desire to connect all the great religions together under one theme.  I see elements of Buddhism and Christianity even in this text. 

What I found cool about the information I found ( whether it is valid or not and  I won't know until after I read a translation of the text myself) is that it offers four characteristics that determine if someone is ready for their spiritual journey:

1. he or she  sense the difference between Atman and Non-Atman, the soul and the personality, the "little me" and the Deeper I" , "lower consciousness and higher consciousness" 
2. is past cravings and attachments for things of the material world (including relationships) 
3. seeks to live by the ethical virtues of equality, self restraint, temperance, quite stillness, patience, faith and trust and a desire for unity and peace
4. longing for meaning and liberation

I mean I know I  have a ways to go but I think I am ready to venture down this road, according to the Vasistha.  What about you?

Hmm! As I investigate my desire to know this text more, I need to go to the quote above and remind myself...that a written text is full of concepts.  As beautifully and poetically  as these concepts may be written...I do not want to get all tied up in them. What I am longing for is to be cut free from the trappings of dogma and conditioned belief, not tied up in its cocoon.

But I do feel compelled to read and as I do I will keep reminding myself of the above passage  and also this one: 

Even a young boy's words are to be accepted if they are words of wisdom, else, reject it like straw even if  uttered by Brahma the creator. 

I want to read these texts and see if they resonate a wisdom within me. 

All is well in my world.

Deepak Chopra and Adam Plack (n.d.) The Secret of Healing (guided meditation). Spotify 

Wikipedia (Feb, 2022 [last edited]) Yoga Vasistha. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoga_Vasistha

And Again: More on Anxiety.

 If you want to conquer the anxiety of  life, live in the moment, live in the breath.

Amit Ray

Question 47: Why is Anxiety Such an Issue? 

This video was filmed in 2021? It is now 2024. Though I don't always check to see how many viewers I have, this post was apparently read three times in the last 24 hours...not sure if it was with bot or human eyes lol...so prompted,  I checked the status of  this video. It  was viewed a whopping eight times. That is so funny!!! Why?  My daughter was recently involved in a tic tock video clip that so far has had 7 million views...7,000,000 lol. I can't even imagine. And I am happy with my three little readers ( if indeed they are human, I will never know) and my eight little views. 

"Maybe I got through to someone improving their experience just a bit with some hard earned learning." something in me shouts. 

 And I am happy with that.  

Yet, apparently my topics are not quite as interesting as my daughter getting slapped against the shins with a wild tree branch.  Oh my...life is a funny thing. All good! All good!

All is well. 

Evolving from Personality to Soul

 If I have a soul, what is my soul? What does my soul want? What is the relationship between my soul and me? How does my soul affect my Life? 

So I started with my deep dive into the book and so far I have yet to strike the bottom of a shallow pool...so that is good :) I feel resonate with much of the teaching...not because it is new and refreshing but becasue it simply taps into knowledge I have already assimilated within me. That leaves me embracing it, instead of resisting it.  So far.

Evolution? 

So chapter one speaks to the idea of evolution. Zukav compares our past reliance on understandings of physical evolution in competitive, Darwinian terms with our "  new age"evolution in spiritual terms.  Survival of the fittest mentality, he stresses, no longer fits (if indeed it ever did) with what we are here to do.  He is encouraging us to see that we do not have to put all our energy toward preserving our seemingly individual physical ( also our psycho social)  survival .  Our five senses, he tells us, are  simply there to help the body and the basic personality survive and they are limited in their ability to help us expand and evolve more.  We do not need to manipulate and gain power over  others, things and circumstances in our external world anymore.  This, he demonstrates with examples, leads to fear, violence, destruction, selfishness and unhappiness which is counter productive to our purpose here.  It goes against what we are here to do. Ego has been driving our vehicles for far too long.  It is important that we change drivers. 

Letting the Soul Drive

The new evolution of what he refers to as the "multi-sensory" personality takes us higher and deeper along the vertical plane of existence.  Our evolutionary goal, whether we accept it or not, is to  go beyond what can be seen with the eye or picked up with the other senses. We need to connect to the invisible, matter-less realm of the spiritual plane.  Here we let the soul, drive.  

To me the above question is the key to this chapter.  Do you believe you have a soul? (and I don't care if you call it by another name.)  He stresses that we need to see and distinguish these two potential drivers of our human experience: the personality and the soul. It is so important , he stresses, to get the soul and the personality lined up so they work together.  For so long the ego personality, (based on the needs of body/mind)  has been driving our human vehicles. In this new stage of our evolution, it is the soul that needs to direct us forward with love,  peace, compassion, wisdom  and reverence for Life.We now want the personality to take a step back and to serve the soul.

Hmmm!  Well that is what I got from the first chapter in a nutshell. I agree with all of it.  It resonates.  Does that make it "true knowledge"?  No... Read it and determine truth for yourself , k? 

All is well.  

Gary Zukav ( 1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster

Questioning the Teacher

 

You are your own best teacher. My advice is to question all things. Seek for answers, and when you find what seems to be an answer, question that, too. 

Louis L'Amour

I read through it once and now I  am going to go more thoroughly into Gary Zukav's book, The Seat of the Soul. Before I do that I find myself asking questions about Zukav, as the teacher and needing to know more about the motivation and process that led him to teach what he is  teaching.

Why I Question the Teacher

Whenever I read or hear something that resonates within me, something I want  to believe as true for whatever reason, I like to examine and understand where the so called "truth" came from. Who and how did they, the teacher,  learn what they learnt?  What makes them an authority on the subject?  Credentials and years of related study or professional experience are out trumped by Life experience.  I, for example , would see much more expertise in a Buddhist Monk who gave up all his credentials to discover the end of suffering than I would someone who had a PhD in psychological research. 

Though I do separate message from messenger in the best way I can, I still like to understand how the messenger received the message they are teaching, to understand what they base their convictions on.  I want to understand what their motivation was for sharing it and if  during the sharing or after they shared it, did  they reap enough egoic reward to pull them off the path they are encouraging others to travel.  I want to  see that, if they are teaching the benefits of an ego-less journey,  they are living without the guidance of their ego. ...that they are practicing what they teach, living what they share as truth.  Now , I often feel  my bubble burst when I see ego dominated motivation in the teacher I was hoping was egoless...I tend to step away from their version of that teaching when I do. 

How Did the Messenger Get the Message

I know it is the message, not the messenger,  that resonates within me...and even if it comes from some unlikely source, if it resonates enough, it will stick.  I connect more to message than messenger. I am not a guru follower and will never be...but at the same time, I need to know how the message came to be. Who or what taught them? Where did their message originate?  I like teaching that is backed up by credible resources. .When they cannot  adequately explain how they came up with the information they have, I feel myself pulling away.  I want them to tell me where they  got this information they  are sharing, even if the means of receiving information seems so woo-woo and far out  for the reasonable mind to accept...mine is open enough to accept the "possibility" of  almost anything.  For example, A Course in Miracles was supposedly downloaded into the mind of the author, a Jewish psychology professor at Columbia University. Seems absurd...but heck...I tell myself if Milton believed that Paradise Lost came from a similar type of Divine download and he created something of significance...why could  this not  be the same thing?  The message relayed in ACIM is very significant, almost poetic and worth reading. Besides the author motivation did not seem to be dominated by ego: one  seldom hears of her and it did not seem she reaped any egoic rewards for writing this very complicated and detailed text.  In fact, it seemed she wanted little to do with it as if  she just felt compelled anyway to follow her compulsion to write and share the information that came to her.  I still don't know  the "truth" of this explanation.  I don't know if there was some personal or egoic reward involved.    I don't but the message is still worth hearing. 

Want My Teachers to be as close to Egoless as possible

When I see dishonesty, a lack of concern for the people they  are reaching, a self gratifying motivation or  a lack of sincerity...on the part of the so called teacher, I tend to lose interest in what they are teaching. If I see them wearing Rolex's and driving Hummers when they are teaching about the need to reduce our clinging and grasping for material world things, to  preserve the planet and to  feed the hungry, I find it a bit hypocritical and pull away.  To me true teaching does not serve ego in anyway. It involves an absence of ego. 

(Not that these individuals should not reap some type of material reward, give up everything,  for the work they do.  I am okay if they become wealthy with that but it cannot be the motivating factor if I am to be won over!)

So I am Checking Out the Teacher

So I do check out the teachers when I read a message I truly want to fall into. So I am checking out Gary Zukav.  I know he was on Opera 30? times and I like Oprah and her approach to understanding more. I don't know much about him.  I could not tell you if his ego was involved in the writing of this book or if he was coming from a higher place. I couldn't tell you if he actually believed all that he shared and if so why.  I couldn't tell you if he got pulled off the path by egoic reward, or if he was ever truly on it.  I questioned from the beginning of the book, though, where his authority and expertise came from.  He doesn't say.  He speaks with conviction, as if  for the universe and for the soul but he doesn't reveal how he got that conviction.  He uses a lot of teachings found in wisdom traditions like Buddhism, the Tao Te Ching, yoga  and even Christianity etc but there is no references...none...no crediting any resources.  So it leaves me hanging a bit. The teaching itself is powerful.  It hits home so that makes me lean toward it being sincere. 

For that reason, I  am going to go through the book again and read it carefully, questioning it like I do everything.  I will also do the study guide and then I will sit back and "feel" it to see what happens. I may regurgitate some of that onto this page.  Bear with me. 

All is well.

Seeds

 

I am thinking about seeds today. 

Seeds? 

Well it it is spring and in some parts of the world ( not in mine...we have to wait until June to plant because of frost), people may already be planting seeds into the earth for future harvest. That is such a cool thing, isn't it?  To plant a tiny seed into the earth and watch  it make its long arduous way from below the soil to the surface as it forms into something amazing, beautiful, and /or useful. Hmm!  Have you ever pondered the fact that the same thing goes on  in our minds?

I am also thinking of the seeds we have planted  in our subconscious minds  or what some would refer to as "store consciousness".  Within us are so, so many seeds...so many mental formations waiting to be.  There is the seed for Love, the seed for anger, fear, and blame.   The seed for kindness and compassion;  and the seed for selfishness and greed. The seed for enthusiasm, and the seed for sloth and torpor.  The seed for peace, and the seed for anxiety , restlessness and worry. These are just a few of the possibilities.  So, so many seeds deep in the soil of our minds waiting to be watered and nourished with the sunlight of our attention.  Hmm!

Seeds Grow Into  Mental Formations

Already on the surface of mind consciousness, we have mental formations...a host of different emotions growing and blossoming, getting  tangled up with the 60,000 thoughts a day scientists are saying we generate. Your mind may look a bit the way I assume mine does...like a messy, unattended garden. 

The Messy Garden

Do you know what is in your mind, right now?  Can you distinguish the different plants, feel them, name them? More importantly can you see each emotional energy as the harmless seed it once was?  Do you know how it got from store consciousness to where it is in your mental and life experience right now? 

A Gardener Who Buries Weeds?

Hmmm!  You might want to say that he made you mad, or she broke your heart. You might want to say that Life did this or Life did that and that is why you feel the way you do right now...that is why your mental garden is  such a mess. I hear ya!  I have been telling myself those things for as long as I can remember.  I have learned the hard way, however, that I am the gardener of my own mind, my own Life. 

You may also be doing what many of us do in response to the less than pleasant emotional energies that form into the many mental formations we experience.  You may be doing whatever you can to push them back down through the soil, burying them with your defense mechanisms so you do not have to see them or deal with them. Yucky!  Right?  That requires so much energy, so much work on your part but have you ever noticed what happens anyway?  Do those weeds or unwholesome plants  just find their way through the soil again and again into your mental garden ?  We really cannot get rid of our painful emotional energies by stuffing, denying, avoiding and numbing can,  we?  The seed, the plant once watered and nourished  continues to grow and grow. And if attention is the sunlight...the more we try to get rid of them, the more attention we are putting on them and the more they grow. 

Another Way to Tend Our Gardens 

Buddhist psychology teaches that there is another way of dealing with mental formations.  We can become aware, first of all, of the fact that we have all these seeds deep within our minds...seeds, harmless seeds that have yet to grow.  We can consciously choose to water and nourish the seeds we want to grow, that we want to see break through the soil and into our conscious garden  of living. We water the seeds that will lead to wholesome mental formations, skillful ways of being. We water and nourish the seeds of peace, kindness, serenity, compassion, joy and Love for example.  The seeds of clarity, wisdom, sincerity and faith also deserve our attention/our sunlight. Most importantly, we water the seeds of concentration and mindfulness so we know at all times what is growing in our garden.  So we are very much aware. 

How Do We Get Rid of the Unwanted? 

What about those less than wholesome or skillful formations that have already grown up into our minds and into our physical realities because we were not conscious enough? What do we do about them if we are not supposed to bury them or stuff them down again? 

We watered mindfulness, concentration, peace and compassion right? We watered joy and Love?  Well we check to make sure they have blossomed within us.  Do you feel, joy, love, compassion?  Are you mindful enough to see these wholesome emotions and feel them within you?  If so,  then we use them to wrap  each unwholesome thought, feeling or energy that is growing in our minds  in an embrace of pure awareness.  We see the unruly plant, name it, accept it, allow it in our garden, feel it,  embrace it and love it like a mother would love the child she gave birth to. We put all of this type of attention on it and before long, it will gratefully and gracefully shrivel up and return to the seed it once was in our store consciousness.  We process through each emotional energy until the energy is spent.  And all a awhile we continue to be mindful of what seeds we want to grow and what mental formations we have already  in our gardens. We choose what type of Life to live by the seeds we allow to grow.

All is well in my world/ in my garden. 

Plum Village App (August, 2020) Our Mind and Mental Formations/ Thich Nhat Hanh. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-copiRlX1s. 

Heaven on Earth?

Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal,but lay up for yourself treasures in heaven where neither moth or rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. 

Matthew 6-19:21

Question 46: What is Heaven and how do we get there? 

Man, I cannot get over the thumbnails.  I laugh a little every time I see them.Thank God, I have almost  transcended my concern about how I may appear to others. 

Please Note: I Know Absolutely Nothing!  I realize I  may have seemingly given off an air of authority in the above video.  I have none! What I give is my opinion, my learning, and what I have come to believe...but knowledge, sureness, expertise and authority?  I have none. I should have made that clear.

I am not dishing "religion"  either ...no one's...I just tend to look deeply into and question what I was taught and that means looking deeply into scripture and determining what it means to me.  I know to fundamentalists that is a major no-no. . .I won't  be making  the short list, according to them.

I included the above passage because when we think of the distinction between Heaven and Earth, we need to think of the treasures we seek in each.  Earth, to me,  is the horizontal plane and Heaven is the Vertical.  The horizontal plane offers treasures that are so enticing to the ego but worthless to the soul...things that will perish because they are at the mercy of time. Heaven, this higher and deeper dimension offers timeless treasures, those treasures which are worth pursuing.  I also didn't mean to dish the 10 Commandments...I follow those rules of being.  I just want us to be weary of the need we humans seem to have to do God's work of punishing, judging and determining who will "go to heaven" and who won't, based on these rules. We know nothing!  

Yet, if we tap into the higher and deeper dimensions within us, we tap into the eternal treasures: Love, compassion, kindness, clarity, wisdom and reverence for Life.  These are true treasures and living for them is truly Heaven on Earth. ( Well that is what I believe, but what do I know?) 

Neither shall they say " lo here!" or "lo there!" for, behold,  the Kingdom of God is within you. 

Luke 17:21 KJV

All is well. 

Keep Your Eye on the Ball

 Healing is the return to wholeness...The secret of healing is the secret of enlightenment.

Deepak Chopra

Do We Need To Know What we Are Doing?

I still wonder if I am doing what I am here to do.  It is the question that plagues me the most.  I just want to know if I am fulfilling the contract Zukav writes about in The Seat of the Soul, if there is such a thing. Am I meeting my souls needs?  When I have moments of dissatisfaction, moments I feel "stuck" or in a rut, I question , "why?" and I ask what I need to "do" to make it better for my soul and for my personality. .  

Lack of Satisfaction with Life? 

I know it is more important to "be"  than it it is to do.  I know that any dissatisfaction I have with Life has little to do with Life and a lot to do with my response to it.  I know that my relationship with Life is the problem, not Life.  If I have a problem with it, it is because I am making judgments about how it should be; I have expectations that are not being met and because I am too attached to a certain outcome.  If I seem "broken" ...it isn't life circumstance that broke me but my attitude and approach to Life that did.It is my desiring for Life to be the way I think it should be rather than the way it is that leads to my unhappiness.

Not Personal, Just Is

Michael Singer, in From Fighting to Harmony, explains how our lack of satisfaction with Life is the result of the  unhealthy relationship  we have with Life.  We create an idea in our minds of how things  should be for us, in order to make us happy.  We foolishly assume that Life is meant to make us happy when Life is not that personal at all.  What unfolds before us at this very moment has little to do with us and our puny needs  but with 13.8 billion years of cause and effect .  We just have the privilege of witnessing it, of being a part of it.

I do believe that any energy we put out there will add to this cause and effect but it is not just our energy that creates the circumstances before us...but that of every being on this planet, every force, every ripple. Life is going to go on doing with or without our approval and/or our input.  We get that right?

Life knows what it is doing....even if we don't know what we are doing.

We can find happiness and peace, satisfaction and meaning...not by manipulating the external world and putting all our effort into changing the world so it best suits our internal needs but by simply learning from it.  We need to go with the flow of Life rather than against it as we try to create our own individual realities. We need to ride the wave rather than swim against the current. We need to keep our eye on the ball, watch it, watch it, and simply go where it goes.  Let it lead us. Let's try going  where Life takes us rather than telling Life how it should be to suit us.  We should know by now, that any other approach just doesn't work.

Keep Your Eye On The Ball

In my healing, especially with the learning over the last couple of days, I know I want to work with Life, be in harmony with it.  I want enlightenment more than anything becasue I know  that will bring the  healing I may need.  So I need to carefully and mindfully watch Life unfold in front of me, watch where it is going and follow it. Enlightenment  comes from noticing,  accepting, allowing, appreciating , honoring and revering all that unfolds in front of us.  It involves being in awe of the fact that we are participants in this amazing dance. 

If we perceived Life with reverence, and understood our evolutionary process, we would stand in awe at the experience of physical Life and walk the earth in a very deep sense of gratitude. Gary Zukav, Page 39

All is well.

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster. 

Deepak Chopra & Adam Plack ( nd) The Secret of Healing. Spotify 

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

Helping Adult Children Maneuver Through Unhealthy Relationships

 In order for children to learn to do hard things, you have to let them go through hard times. There is no way to truly master something without experiencing it. 

Sara Bean

Question 45: How to Help Adult Child in an Unhealthy Relationship? 

Do you think these thumb nail shots could get any scarier lol? 

All is well! 

Is the Deepest Part Of You Engaged?

 When the deepest part of you becomes engaged in what you are doing, when your activities and actions become gratifying and purposeful, when what you do serves both yourself and others, when you do not tire but seek the sweet satisfaction of your life and your work, you are doing what you are meant to be doing.  

Gary Zukav, page 225

In hope of answering the question that plagued me yesterday:  Is this stuck feeling just a poke from a disgruntled ego that is losing its control  or is it from  my spirit telling me I am not spending my precious life in the way that I am meant to? I reached a point, after a lot of self reflection, journal writing, blogging, praying and meditating...where I just said: I don't bloody know!

Not Knowing

I don't know where this stuck feeling is coming from. I don't know if it is ego or soul that is dissatisfied with the way I am presently living my life.  Maybe it is both or neither.  How would I know? And I felt okay that I didn't know at this point of my life.  I don't know much anymore.  All I thought I knew at one point...pfff...gone.  I truly do have a beginner's mind.  I don't know what is true. And I think that is okay.  I do not have to struggle to come up with an answer.just to satisfy my analytical ego mind and to put an end to any unease I might be feeling over this confusion. ..I just have to sit back , allow the discomfort of confusion, look deeply into it even and trust that the answer will come when I am ready for it.  I will someday discover who is doing most of the directing in my mind.  I will make the distinction between what ego wants and what soul needs. 

If What is in the Book is True?

I just finished reading Gary Zukav's book The Seat of the Soul.  At the end of the study guide on the very last past, he asks us to repeat this question to ourselves everyday. How would I change my life if what were in," The Seat of the Soul", really were true? He doesn't ask you to believe what he writes about is true. He just says, "if" it were true. He seems to understand how the human mind that is addicted to empirical evidence works.  I kept asking throughout the book, Like how do you "know" this stuff Gary Zukav?  Where does this information and your evidence come from?  I mean everything he wrote of in the book "felt" like truth to me whether that is because of the convincing way he wrote or because of something deeper in me that just resonated with everything written. Regardless,  if it were true- I don't know if I am living the Life I contracted with the powers of be, if that be a real thing, to live. I don't know if I am honoring my contract, meeting the needs of my soul.  How would I change my life then?  I don't know.

There is still so much, "I don't know." 

All in a Day's Work

What is it that I "do" everyday?  I get up in the morning, feed all those who need to be fed, pour myself some tea and sit quietly in a favorite spot ( Whose favorite spot...personality's or soul's? ...I think it just feels right to both to be in a sunny yellow room surrounded by windows that open up to bird covered trees and a lovely landscape?) In this spot, (while I am usually surrounded by furry family members)  I read something inspirational, or listen to a dharma talk or some other secular teaching on awakening. I will often take notes so I can write about it later if inspired to do so. A second cup  of tea, some breakfast, some sun salutations, and often a bit of walking meditation around the house is added before I sit to meditate. Sometimes I meditate without guidance and sometimes I will meditate with.  I try to incorporate some breathing awareness or controlled practice in there as well. This solitary practice  takes up about 2-3 hours of my morning depending. Lately my solitude has been interrupted by the needs of my children, or of my four month old grandson ( and Nana's need to hold him as well). I will do a bit of housework...maybe...tidy, dishes, bread in and out of oven, laundry in or out, bed making etc. before I come to my office to write.  I usually start writing in my devotional journal, record my dream snippets from the night before, and then I sit down to my blog.  I do often veer off from writing into reading what was read by others in the last 24 hours.  I like to check for grammatical errors and confusing sentences etc., to see what I have learned from these entries, and to evaluate if others could learn from them. Then with my notes in front of me I write an entry and possibly post a video.  I just allow what ever thoughts are there to come out.   When I am finished with that I usually feel quite satisfied and too often my writer's need for expression is satiated.  It is challenging then  to go to other writing or prepare for submission of other stuff. ...but I try.  I will get outside with the dogs either for a walk in the woods or out in the yard.  I will try to incorporate  walking meditation in there.  I will return inside, possibly do a video or work on my book or something I am preparing for submission.  I prepare supper for all, text, email, ( no social media...I refrain from that) and check in with everyone to see how there day was so far. I either do a private yoga practice in my studio or have a class in the early evening. After that, if I haven't already I will eat supper, do the big clean up, and finish up some writing stuff before retiring to the living room with D. to Netflix binge for a couple of hours while I knit.  Then I  shower, prepare for bed and read. That is my life for the most part.  I do get to visit my daughter, sisters  and other grandchildren somedays. I do go to appointments .  I am not a shopper so I seldom go to the stores for anything besides groceries.  Sometimes I will go out for a meal....but that is it.

Boring???? Productive?? Enough?? For Whom?  Soul or Personality? 

I suppose someone reading the details of my day would say,  no wonder you feel stuck crazy lady? Still my stuck feeling has little to do with what I do in a day (or the lack of doing).  If I don't fill my mind with comparisons to  others or with  expectations about what I should be doing...I am perfectly okay with the flow of my day.  I am not one to feel bored too often and if I do get bored I am usually okay with the feeling and do my best to learn from it by looking deeply into it for a cause. My "contentment" with this day to day flow makes me wonder, however,  if there is something wrong with me lol. Is there not more to Life that I should be wanting? Should I be "doing" more? Is this enough for my soul?  My personality? Neither or both? 

The Soul is Engaged

As silly as it may seem I can say that I feel the deepest part of me is engaged fully in my daily  practice and my writing. My spiritual practice, my yoga, and my writing/teaching in some awkward way feels purposeful and gratifying. I feel very satisfied when I learn something new about connecting to the deeper part of me, when I can write about it or share it.  I feel the compulsion to come to my blog every morning as if it were the classroom I was heading toward again. It is like my work. My day does not feel complete unless I get an entry in. It never seems tiring to me.  It is deeply satisfying even though I do not get an ounce of external gratification for it. My intention is to have it serve others but I am not sure if it does.  It does , for sure, serve me in some deep way I cannot explain.  So yeah...as boring and unproductive as my day may seem to others, I am doing what I am meant to be doing. Hmm!

I would say my soul is engaged but is my personality? 

The personality that is engaged in the work of its soul is buoyant.  It is not burdened with negativity.  It does not fear.  It experiences purposefulness and meaning.  It delights in its work and in others.  It is fulfilled and fulfilling. page 225

I guess, I am feeding my soul but is my personality bouncing along happily with it?  It is much more buoyant than it ever was but is it light and buoyant enough? It is not "burdened" with negativity but it is still certainly negative at times. Though I do my best to confront fear and have subdued it so much over the course of my life, especially with the help of  my daily practice, fear is still lingering around. Though my personality does love to write, practice yoga, teach, and it does find fulfillment and meaning in it,  it also likes to get paid, to be externally rewarded, read etc. Sigh.  It is not delighted in the fact that I have little to no readership,  and that I am struggling to get by financially. 

How would I change my life if what were in," The Seat of the Soul", really were true? page 331

I guess I would find some way to make my personality more buoyant and in line with what my soul wanted. So maybe the question for me would be, How can I gratify my personality while I continue to meet the needs of my soul? 

This excerpt gets me thinking: Yet what if what you are doing is more appropriately regarded in a social sphere rather than an economic one? In other words, what if the enterprise that you seek to develop is more appropriately a way to an avenue that you have not yet recognized? It is now deadlocked because it cannot go down its appropriate path, for you have your hand on a door you insist upon opening that will go nowhere? page 227

I might not need to get my personality on board. Maybe the Universe has something in store for my writing that the personality cannot even consider.  It may never be rewarded externally but it may still be  taking me somewhere.  Maybe it will take me, if no where else, to the one thing I really want, awakening.

Will have to think about that one for a while. In the mean time we all need to follow this  advice: 

Let go of what you think is just reward. Let go. Trust. Create. Be who you are. The rest is up to your non physical teachers and to the universe. 

...Thy will be done! page 228

All is well. 

Gary Zukav (1989/2014)The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Stuckness and Doing

 If you are doing all that you can to your fullest ability as well as you can, there is nothing else that is asked of the soul.

Gary Zukav

Doing

I have been thinking about "doing" again.  Of course, my primary goal these days is to establish a Life of "being"...being in this moment, being aware, being clear and wise, being responsible, being loving and compassionate, and being aligned with what the deeper part of me needs. That truly, truly is my main objective in Life.  Yet, I still think about "doing".  

Stuck!

Last night I caught myself looking around at my so called life and saying, "WTF(fork) ? You are in such a rut!  You are stuck!  And you are attracting other people and circumstances into your living situation that are also stuck.  You are surrounding yourself in stuckness. You are not "doing" enough with this precious Life you have been given.  Where is the adventure?  The joy? The travel? The service? The reaching out to others?  The laughter, that you so miss? You barely leave the house.  You are spending up to eight hours a day in front of your books or computer. Sure you are learning and that is important but what are you doing with that learning...you know the deal with learning is  the writing and teaching, right?  You are doing that yes but to whom?  Where are your readers, your students? You are not getting the learning out there!  Your writing is all over the place. You are not connecting with nature the way you so love to do. You don't visit the woods much anymore (in all fairness to this thing I call "myself", since COVID I had not the physical energy to be pulled by three hyper dogs through the trails or to chase after them should I let them off-leash.  So I have reduced my outdoor experience to walking around my yard).  You have not picked up your camera in months!  You have even reduced your yoga practice and have not had a class in over a month. When is the last time you had a face to face conversation with someone outside your household?   Man...lady...you are so broke and need to make money.  You have others dependent on you again.  Get your act together.  Get out there!  "Do" something!!!" 

Who Is Stuck? Ego or Soul?

It shocked me to have that revelation.  And I am not sure where that voice came from.  Was it my ego reprimanding me for not following its program?  Or was it spirit, reminding me of the contract to act like a human being while here? I don't know.  I really don't. I was just overwhelmed by this idea that I was stuck and not expanding in the way I was meant to.  This energy of "stuckness'', I know,  is partially responsible for the situations I am encountering in my life, my relationships and my sense of imbalance between personality and soul need. It is affecting everyone around me.  It is affecting what happens with my creations.  I do write for the sake of writing but that which I write may not be flowing where it is meant to flow....blocked by this energy of stuckness. Hmmm! 

This sense of stuckness brings about a feeling of reactivity,  heaviness and fear marked by periods of boredom, irritation and even anger.  Tolle explains this is often what propels us toward the question: "What can I do to make me feel a little better?" (finding Your Life's Purpose.) Doing...becomes a compelling desire in hope that it will  make us feel better.

No Reactive Doing!

Of course,  "doing" re-actively is not the answer to this experience of being stuck. Maybe I do have to do more but only after I check in with "soul" and get a little more clarity on this matter.  Is soul stuck or is it just the outer shell of me stuck, like a garment caught by a thread  on something as it slips off? I need more clarity. 

Clarity is the ability to see the soul in action in the physical world. It results from choosing to learn through wisdom instead of  through fear and doubt..  Zukav, page 218

Then I can respond with inspired and wise  action or attempts to change my external environment, if they are required. 

Yes being is so important.  My goal to move towards the Deeper part of Self, the still spaciousness of awareness is worthwhile. To do that  I need to look deeply into and through  my emotional experience here and ask , "What is it my soul needs right now?" 

It gets tricky cause ego is so determined to get  its needs met.  Those needs are often very different from those of my soul. Sometimes, however, I can not tell the difference...and I really do not know if Soul that is trying to tell me that I am not "doing enough" with my life, or ego.  I only want to listen to soul. 

I need to think a little more on this.

All is well in my world. 

Eckhart Tolle/Meditation (March, 2022) Finding Your Life's purpose. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj5hyLytsIY

Gary Zukav (1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster

 

Though I write to write and see all other effects as "add ons" should they come my way, I still have the desire for publication. .  Not sure if I am being  hypocritical after what I wrote earlier today.  Publication is not an authentic need but a harmless desire as long as I do not write for that reason, right?  Hmmm ! On a mission to send some poetry out there into the big scary world.  Will see what happens.

All is well! 

Projecting Suffering Into Violence

 

Human nature is complex.  Even if we have inclinations toward violence, we also have inclination to  empathy, to cooperation, to self control. 

Steven Pinker

Question 44: How do we deal with suffering that is projected into violence? 

All is well. 

Writing and Authentic Versus Nonauthentic Needs

 There is a natural give and take in the course of every human life.  Each human being has authentic and non authentic needs, ...  You begin to learn to give and take as you begin to work through an understanding of what your real needs are, and learn to compromise and give and transcend those parts of yourself that are not genuine or do not enhance your development. 

Gary Zukav, page 207-208

I love looking deeply into my mind and my behaviours to understand "why?"...Why I think the way I do, why I feel the way I do,  why I speak or write the way I do, and  why I act the way I do. Why? 

Why do I write? 

I especially like to examine my writing motivation.  I often ask, out loud, why I come here to write everyday when ego is so resistant , fearing my topic matter  will expose me as some quirky want a be that will never be taken seriously as a writer.  I ask why I  feel so compelled at times to sit  down and let a poem slip out of me , exposing myself like a woman giving birth in front of the general public. 

It is not just the writing of this blog or of poetry I question. I don't know why I write anything I write anymore really?  I "think" I have some sound reason for starting a project but it seldom goes as planned.  I am all over the place with my latest book/proposal.  I am not sure what I want it to do with it.  I tore the original up and began again at a different angle.  I sit down with the newer version now and do up some semblance of an outline but then I find myself going  in one direction, then another, back to the first.  It is crazy...it is all so crazy. 

Authentic Need

Yet, I couldn't stop writing if I tried.  If I lost all my fingers in some freak gardening accident ( trying to picture how that might happen ..attacked maybe by a bunch of disgruntled and mutant worms that grew teeth...not so easy to imagine  but at the same time I know, with my luck these days,anything  is possible. lol ) ...I would still write,  with the stubs  where my fingers were or with my elbows or my toes. With my nose, if I had too.  I would find a way. ...because I need to write!  Writing is a need so great in me, so natural and innate , it is like breathing. I may be a heavy , sloppy and noisy breather but I still need to breathe.  And I don't breathe so people will recognize me, applaud me, pay me lol.  I don't breathe so I feel better about who I erroneously think I am, puffing up an ego that is nothing more than in my way. I breathe because I need air. 

As far as the poetry goes...have you ever stopped a baby from coming out of you when you are at the pushing part of your labour? Impossible! It comes out. I am just some type of surprised surrogate who has no idea she is pregnant until late in her labour.  This tells me that writing is a process of creativity, of  soul expression.  The written stuff  comes from a deeper place and I cannot help sometimes but to bow my head and show reverence for this process ( not necessarily the poems lol.  I am not saying they should be revered, just the process). It is truly amazing. 

The Nonauthentic Needs of Ego 

Writing is an authentic need for me. I know that.  I honour that. Yet, the artificial needs still pop up and  try to  get in the way.My egoic mind still  says, "Write poetry?  Are you nuts?  Who writes poetry any more? Who  reads poetry besides you and why on earth are you showing the whole bare naked process to the world when you are not even sure what will come out of your private, meant to be hidden, parts...a grossly deformed baby or a half good looking one. You will just be laying it all out there when you pop out a poem on your site.   And for what, you crazy nut?  There will be no money, no recognition or societal success.  There will be no rewards."

This is where my true learning comes in. 

Know yourself deeply and clearly enough to recognize what is a legitimate need of you as a human being and of you as that part of yourself that has created needs for certain other reasons-such as to gain external notice, or prestige, or to become a distinguishable individual.   page 209

A Barrier to What I Truly Want and Need

When I reflect on this, I know ego is still lurking around the background of my writing experience trying to get me to pursue what it feels it needs from my writing: recognition, praise, money and success. I still go there sometimes. But I also see these are all adopted, artificial and nonauthentic needs, creating a barrier between me and what I really, really want and need...a connection to that which inspires me to write: my soul, my Deeper "I", my true Self, my higher consciousness...whatever you wish to call it. 

Getting recognized and paid are just "add ons" and if they come (and if I am ready to deal with them without getting lost)...great.  If they don't come my way, that is okay too...because I know that they are not what I really need from my writing. I want and need air.

All is well! 

Gary Zukav ( 1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York:Simon and Schuster

Are You Sure?

 Are you sure?

Thich Nhat Hanh

Are you sure there is nothing more than this? That what your five senses pick up is all there is to reality?  That for something to be real it has to be visible or something you can hold in your hands? Are you sure?

Are you sure that you are just a body with a mind? That your personality adequately describes all that you are? Are you sure?

Are you sure that your life is measured by what what you do?  That you need to be productive and successful by society's terms in order to have had a successful life?  Are you sure? 

Are you sure that death is the end of you and all you are?  That there is nothing of you  that continues after your body dies?  Are you sure? 

Are you sure this physical plane is all there is? That there is nothing deeper? Greater? Grander? Are you sure?

Are you sure that the events of your life create all your problems or lack of?  That you are a victim to meaningless, random incidents?  Are you sure? 

Are you sure that everything I have written here to date, and all the teachings I have picked up from teachers over the years and shared with you, is  just woo-woo nonsense? That there is absolutely no truth to what we have to say? Are you sure?

"Are you sure?",  is a question we all should have on placard at our desks, on a sticky note on our mirrors or on our license plate. It is a question we should ask ourselves 100 times a day.

What are we sure of?  Absolutely nothing at all.  

I don't know anything.  I really don't.  I am just, at this point, beginning to "feel" my way through Life rather than analyze my way through it.  I know nothing.  I am sure of nothing!  And that is perfectly okay with me. My mind is open to all possibilities and my heart will do the understanding.

All is well

Inspired by

Plum Village (June, 2019) Science and Spirituality Hand in Hand / Neuroscience Retreat with Br. Phap Linh https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY946jZdFPg

Anxiety and Thinking

 My anxiety doesn't come from thinking about the future, but from wanting to control it. 

Hugh Prather

Question 43: What is the relationship between anxiety and thinking? 

All is well. 

What The Piano Player Needs

 

The body [and mind] is the instrument of the soul. If the piano player is sick, does it help to repair his or her piano? ...In some cases, a broken instrument can be repaired, but a repair at that level cannot cure what caused the breakdown. Gary Zukav Page 175

Learning from A Coughing Fit

Yesterday, in the grocery store I had a coughing fit.  My body has always had  a very dramatic cough reflex that gets activated when I have a virus. When it starts I know it will last for about ten to fifteen minutes.  There seems to be nothing I can do to stop it once it starts.  I  will have to cough and cough until I am literally blue in the face.  I will gasp for air in between each cough. I mean, I struggle to breathe at those times. I have to bend over.  I will often vomit. I won't be able  to speak or explain to others what is going on etc. It is not pretty and often very scary for people to watch.  It can be scary for me too. I absolutely hate when it happens in front of other people.   What I have done in the past is st run to some quiet secluded spot, usually the bathroom, so I could allow the coughing fit to do what it was going to do without my permission anyway, in private  and let it run its course. 

Well it started over the produce aisle yesterday when my daughter and I were shopping. It surprised me because  I thought I had recovered enough to go to the store at least.   It came on quite quickly and dramatically like it often does.  I panicked. My daughter could not understand what was going on and I did not have the breath to tell her.  I knew I had to leave the store and find a secluded spot.  This need to seclude myself was even more important. With the COVID anxiety all around, this type of coughing is not something one wants to display in a  public place. Yet I couldn't tell her what was going on. She, and my sister in law, who just happened up the aisle,  could see me fighting for breath and  changing colour and knew something was up.  I ran out of the store to the car.  It got bad enough for me to call D. to tell him in some barely spoken way between the coughing and the gasping to come which he did. By the time he arrived it had stopped and my breath was returning to normal. I was absolutely exhausted for the rest of the day. 

This incident  took the wind out of me and it took a great deal of positive energy out of me.  I began to worry about what my body was doing.  For a moment, I even wondered if  my time was coming and mentally checked to see if I had my affairs in order. I wondered if I would be one of those COVID patients that ended up on a ventilator.  All this from a coughing fit, that had little to do with COVID, and more with how my body responds to a cough. 

Just a Random Body Thing? 

"You just got COVID, crazy lady, like the majority of the population in this pandemic.  Let it go!  Get over it!  Stop making it into something, it isn't." I can hear my ego mind, the shamer part of it, chirping away as  write this. I would have agreed with this statement completely a decade ago, so body focused was my perspective.  I would have seen an ailing body as both the cause and effect of this experience. I mean, I would have reluctantly added on the mental variant as well because I have always been a student of the mind and would have  questioned the psychosomaticity of this. I would have pondered if it was primarily my mind or my body that "did this"to "me". In fact, I still very much see body and mind  as a part of my illness experience.

Without Meaning? 

However, I also see now too, so clearly, that physical and mental dysfunctions do not occur without meaning.  I was not one of the many to get this virus for no reason though it seems so random.  I do not have this crazy dramatic cough reflex for no reason either.  There is a meaning for all physical dysfunction. Sure, stress plays a significant part in physical illness and I have been mentally feeling "stressed". We can take it farther though. . I want to see and understand my experience beyond the level of body and mind.  I want to ask what my soul needs to be healthy 

Are the numerous ways that physical dysfunctions occur without meaning? Health for some people is a matter of the heart, for others a matter of what they can digest or eliminate in the course of their lives, for others a matter of the head, and for others a matter of being able to hear, or to see, or to move through their lives flexibly, or to stand on their own, or literally to handle the experiences of their lives. These are the issues that must be addressed directly and openly and honestly in the creation of health. Page 176

My instrument might seem to be sick with COVID because my mind is sick with "stress" but only because the player of both  is in need of something.  It is the soul that is crying out to be heard. Repairing my body and/or mind , without understanding what is ailing my soul, will do little good in the long run. 

I suggest now that we go beyond body and mind to understand what is truly needed for health.  What does the soul need? 

It is the health of the soul that is the true purpose of the human experience. Page 177

All is well. 

Gary Zukav ( 1989/2014) The Seat of the Soul. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Yoga Beneath the Ripples

 Here is, in  truth, the whole secret of yoga, the science of the soul, the active turnings, the strident vibrations, of selfishness, lust and hate, are to be stilled by meditation, by letting heart and mind dwell in spiritual life, by lifting up the heart to the strong, silent life above, which rests in the stillness of eternal love, and needs no harsh vibration to convince it of its true being. 

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali

(Is this the quote I originally put here?)

So many feelings in me these days.  Thank God...today I finally have the sense that I am being taken somewhere with all this confusion and chaos I have been experiencing lately.  I feel like after being stuck in an Eddy I am back in the flow.  Man I have no idea where I am going lol but I feel a certain confidence that I am going in the right direction...the one Life decides. Why?  I happened across a guided meditation today from Deepak Chopra on seven Sutras taken from Vedic and Yogic tradition.  Just listening to that I felt reconnected to what is really  important. I cried. Hmmm!

So much going on and I have been less than well physically that I got a little caught up and lost. The COVID was both a cause and an effect in my experience. You know, I have not done  so much as a round of salutations in a week and have not had a class in over two weeks.  I miss my yoga :) Well ...I miss the Hatha component. Yoga is such a part of who I am I can never be truly separated from it. Though, I have not been on the mat, I have still been practicing yoga with every conscious breath I take.  Every time I am aware I am breathing in and every time I am aware I am breathing out, I practice yoga.  Every time I close my eyes and sit with stillness I am practicing yoga.  Every time I become aware of my body experience as a witness of it, I am practicing yoga.  Every time I am aware I am in this body...yoga. Every time I am aware of the natural world around me ...yoga.  

The ripples in my mind just got in the way of me  seeing the Yoga that is there. 

All is well. 

Two spirits/One Soul ( July, 2017) Deepak Chopra- The Secret of  Healing Meditations and Transformation and Higher Consciousness https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaiP9RARZDs

The Five C's of Writing for Writing's Sake

 

I write not for the sake of glory... but for the sake of my soul. 

Beth Nimmo

A few days ago I wrote about realizing that my  "intention" to manifest a certain success in my writing did not materialize and how my questions related to intention and abundance were not answered.  I didn't get a "sign" from the universe within the time frame I selected for my experiment.  Now what I failed to relay is how that proved to be a very positive thing for spirit even if it felt like a blow to the ego.  

Why was it a positive thing? It reminded me of what I really want. My intention is to write for and from the deeper part of Self.  Yet, ego often steps in looking to get fed by some idea of "success". This experiment showed me, I am still "hoping" , despite all my practice, for the external world to be different than it is. I was  hoping that some form of success or validation for my writing would change my financial, social, and emotional reality.  Most importantly, I was hoping  it would change the direction of  my mental energy flow.   I assumed if this type of success were to come, I would be able to call myself a "writer", feel productive by society's terms and maybe even make money to get me out of this hole I am in. Just "hoping" for that put a spring in my step. When it didn't happen, this bubble of hope I was riding on burst and I had to come down to earth. 

I always loved hope.  It was a word I grew up on.  Every spring my father would repeat again and again..."Spring brings new hope."  He taught us to live  with hope...when things were bad we were taught to  look to the future and dream about the "whens" that hope provides.  "When we get more money, we will get this, that or the other.  We will go there and do that." And we depended on that hope...putting all our eggs in one future basket. Hmm!  We were taught, so very innocently, to ignore, step over, push aside, and use the moment we were in. I don't want to push away this moment, I want to see the beauty in it. So whenever the hope bubble bursts I am reminded of that. 

The only way I am going to have any success as a writer is if I write now. And I do not have to wait until I am successful by society's terms to write.  I just have to write. In a dharma talk on right diligence, Brother Phap Lu'u teaches that there are five C's in ensuring our effort is used wisely for the good of our  spiritual growth.

Those five C's are: confidence, calm, clarity, concentration and courage.  I can apply this to writing for writing's sake. I did not manifest external writing success to date because...besides the fact it is not what I truly need or want ...I have been lacking a certain confidence in myself.  I know I can write but I am not sure I write well enough for publishers to pick me up.  I am not always calm when I am writing...sometimes I feel the pressure to follow every inspiration I get and I have a lot.  This leads me with a chaotic and unfocused approach and  feeling a bit overwhelmed and panicked to complete one of those tasks.  I lack clarity as to where best to focus my intention...so many projects on the go and I flitter and flutter from one to another...not sure what I should focus 100 percent of my concentration  on. And I lack the courage to be myself, knowing that my writing topic may not be what others care to read about. Sometimes I am afraid to put myself out there....to submit. This video made me reflect on the effort I put towards writing for Spirit's sake. 

Hmm!  Anyway, just thought I would share that. I am very much inspired to get back to my writing...not because of what I might achieve in terms of success but becasue I simply love to write.

All is well! 

Plum Village (Jan, 2017) Right Diligence Part 1-Brother Phap Lu'u https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxxUfArBNO8

Karma? Again?

 

Each moment of your life you perform action- physically, mentally, emotionally and energy-wise. Each action creates a certain memory.  This is karma.

Sadhguru

Question 42: What is Karma?

Karma means your life is your making. Karmic accumulation can either be a boost or a burden- that is your choice. 

Sadhguru

Sick?

 

Tis healthy to be sick sometimes.

Henry David Thoreau

Recovering from COVID.  It hit me harder than I ever imagined it would. In fact, I was so sure I would not get it and if I did , I told myself, it would be very mild. So I busied myself looking after those who who were ill in my household and probably did not take the precautions I could have. I got it.  

Maybe I am just a wimp lol, but I could not call what I had mild.  My immune system, I believe, has been on the back burner while I dealt with the few crisis' that have landed on my lap recently.  I was exhausted. So...my body  responded very strongly to the virus when it entered.  What others would have experienced as mild cold symptoms was not my experience.   Fever, chills, sweats, digestive issues , body aches, fatigue, palpitations, SOB on the least bit of exertion, dizziness, cough and cold symptoms like runny nose and eyes was my experience.  After seven days, I just have the cough, runny nose and eyes. The fatigue lingers.

Now I am not telling you this to complain or whine but as another example of some learning. Don't you ever wonder why we  get sick when we get sick? Like what the real reason is? I see so much learning reminders when I attempt to understand why I got sick:  

• Caught a virus that many people had: that is self explanatory, right? 
• Reactivity: This was a reminder to me of how connected body and mind are and how "reaction" impacts both.   The body responds to the mind and if the mind is "reacting" to life circumstance  with any amount of resistance the body will react as well.  The body got sick because the mind was reacting to life circumstance. I had a few crisis to deal with. Though, I was well on my way to responding from higher awareness,  I slipped away from this greater understanding I, as the deeper Self  was grasping , to little me  "reactivity" at the physical and mental level.  That is how we evolve I believe...taking a few steps forward (responding from Self), slipping (reacting from ego), observing how we are reacting, choosing a better way, getting back up, taking another few steps (responding from Self) , another slip backwards (reacting from ego) etc etc until all we do is respond. 
• Stress Effect on the well being of the body: My body and mind, as "little me" seeing itself on the level of form, as consumed by problems,  was "stressed" and my body concerned more about "fight or flight" pushed aside the body functioning it did not feel like it needed to keep itself running or fighting, like immunity.  I became a vulnerable potential host.  The body got sick.   This is a reminder that I am touching the fringes of the exhaustion stage of the General Adaptation Syndrome.   
• Core beliefs: Now I have a really mixed up set of core beliefs when it comes to illness...I have some of the basic core beliefs about illness, many of us have.  I believe I am susceptible to illness. ...but...I also believe I will get sicker than most people because I deserve to be punished but I also believe I will  never be able to convince others of how sick I really am.  I will, therefore, never receive the  basic consideration and recovery time others, more deserving, will receive.  I also believe, that others are right about me, if they tell me I am not sick even though I feel sick.  So I do not trust my symptoms and overly depend on objective measures that prove to me and others that I am indeed ill when ill. To prevent any judgement from others...like being called a lair, or a hypochondriac etc, I also believe, I must down play my symptoms or not share how ill I feel.  Obviously, I am working on these core beliefs because I am telling you and others that I am ill. The core beliefs are still impacting on this experience though. I still  do not trust my symptoms and question if I am really as sick I think I am. I do not have any faith that you or others will believe that I am ill (which in a round about way is a very positive thing...helping with dismantling this universal limiting  belief that we are all susceptible to illness) .  I was so convinced that my test result would be negative...again as proof of my "lying". And was shocked when it came back positive. My getting sick the way I got sick and the unique experience I had with it is definitely impacted by my core beliefs.
• Sense  of confusion as I awaken: Man, I have been writing here about how confused I am about so many things I am learning and questioning like  the power of my thoughts and beliefs on what I experience;  who I  really am- like who is getting sick? ;  and karma and everything else I am learning.  I am at a very challenging part of this awakening where I am not sure about anything and what I was once sure of is no more.   I often feel "down" as a result.  "Hope" no longer works to get me through because hope is a future orientated thing and I am choosing to experience Life now. I am not the self I once thought I was...so man its confusing, existentially so. I have added that existential crisis to the physical world crisis' I have been dealing with, which have been piling up adding to the stress I have been experiencing. ..therefore exhaustion...therefor...my susceptibility to illness.  
• Karma: Maybe it is just karma.  Karma is just cause and effect right?  The cause: Coronovirus, people I am living with out and about maybe not taking enough precautions; my experience of "stress", my acting on a belief that other people's needs are more important than my own and my confusion . The effect: Me getting sick and having this experience.  The lesson to be learned: (Karma is here to teach us about responsibility, right?):  The virus is still around-be careful, I need  to set limits and stuff within my household; I need to look deeply into my experience of "stress"; I need to  look deeply into and  dismantle core beliefs  that are not serving self or others;   I need to focus some of that compassion and love I direct to others towards Self; and I need to continue learning, letting go and awakening (The fog of confusion will eventually lift) 

Well that is what I learned from all that besides what type of tissues are easier on the nose, lol.

All is well.