Sunlight Through a Pane of Glass

 Beauty streamed into my hand 

In sunlight through a pane of glass;

Now atlas I understand 

why suns must pass....

Hazel Hall(1886-1924), Sunlight Through a Window

Sitting here at my dining room table and the most gorgeous morning sun is shining in on me. I feel so blessed just to be able to experience these rays of light and warmth from something that is a 149 million Kilometres away. That is quite amazing, isn't it? It feels like it is shining  right there just for me...lol...when rationally I know I am just one of an infinite number of beings on this planet also experiencing  its life giving energy. Sigh!

This "me" (and this "I am" on which the "me" was created over) is touched by that light.  It is like it is forming  gentle fingers that  reach down to pull out some of the pain and relief  I have not had the time to express over the last week or so. My eyes are watering in response. There is so much I want to let go of.

Good news!  My sister was successfully weaned off the vent two days ago and she is recovering physically. So grateful.  Her life long recovery is just beginning, if she should choose to go there, but for now her form is stable.  Grateful to all. 

The others are "needing me" less  than they did a few days ago and though I know it is not over for them...every moment I am not needed I am momentarily relieved of  the shame and guilt that I am not able to fix it is all for them, that I am not able to end their suffering.

You didn't break it and you can't fix it is a really hard axiom for a parent to swallow. I just feel the suffering of others so intensely , I don't have the energy to deal with my own.  Even though I know that my own is the only thing I have control over and where I must go. This light streaming in on me is reminding me of that. "Heal first," it seems to whisper, "Heal first." 

Well the sun is lovely and I am grateful for it.

All is well in my world.

The Rarest Thing- Getting Out of the Way

 If you want to do something meaningful in your life, you create the rarest thing that could ever walk the face of this earth, which is a vessel of peace. You let God be here instead of you.

Michael A. Singer

Are you a vessel of peace?  Or are you like most of us: a twisted up and tangled up ball of suffering human mind and flesh? Do you welcome and honor all that unfolds in front of you or do you resist it with your preferences? Are you focusing on your own reflection or are you noticing and appreciating the bigger picture?  Who is predominantly there, in your awareness, as you tramp around on this planet...you, i.e, "little me"/ego.... or God?  Are you in the way?

The preferring mind is  the resisting mind and  resistance is in the way of  us experiencing Life the way we are here to. We need to stop preferring, stop resisting and Let Life do its thing. We need to let it all in, respecting disturbance as the teacher it is. We want God to shine through us, not our fear.

Some day, what your life will be about, every single second of it, is to welcome everything that could ever happen so you can practice not touching it? So you just sit back there, deep inside, and get out of the way.

Michael A. Singer

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe Weekly Talks ( March 13, 2023) Non Containment is Peace. https://tou.org/talks/

Relaxing Into What Is

 Sometimes letting things go is an act of far greater power than defending or hanging on.

Eckhart Tolle

What I was inspired to put together today after listening to Michael A. Singer.  Definitely long winded and full of goof ups ( I just went off the top of my head...not always the best idea) but it is there.  Actual practice  doesn't start until 9 minutes in. 

A Speck on a Grain of Salt Existing For A Blink Of An Eye

 Let the consciousness be the  consciousness, and the world be the  world.

Michael A. Singer

One of the most impactful talks I listened to was Michael A. Singer's, Just Be Aware linked below. Man it blew me away.  I guess, I just might be waking up a bit more and the words (pointers)  were able to sink in to those places they needed to hit to move me a little more towards conscious awareness?? 

A Speck On A Grain Of Salt

It takes me back to understanding the big picture thing I wrote about yesterday. That goes like this:

• We, as  a "me"-one separate human form, are one of 8.5 billion of one species,  out of a trillion  on this planet
• we take up about 8.3 square feet of space on a planet that is 26,000 miles in circumference (which seems pretty big in comparison to our space, right?)....
• yet, 1.3  million earths can fit into the sun...
• and the sun is just one of a billion stars in our galaxy...
• ane there are a trillion galaxies!!!
• That being said, as Singer puts it, We are a grain of salt in an ocean...if that.We are a tiny, tiny speck spinning on a grain of salt in an infinite ocean

A Blink of An Eye

And we think we are the only thing worth focusing on...that we are big and important when we are nothing but a speck on a  grain of salt. We think we are here to fix and control the world  around us that has been in existence and taking care of itself for billions of years.  Let's look at our time focus.

• In one given moment someone tells you off ( well really they were just yelling...venting whatever was happening in their form with their own self absorbed mind... in the direction of the 8.3 square foot of space where you were standing)  
• This is one, maybe five, minutes, out of the sixty that makes up the hour, out of the 24 hours that make up the day, out of the 365 days that make up the year, out of the average 80 plus years that make up your life span...one minute
• The dinosaurs walked on this very same planet where your minute of discomfort occured millions of years ago and the planet itself was existing long, long before them...billions of years ago and the universe was here for God knows how long
• yet you are focusing on this one tiny, tiny  minute in the span of infinite time and space as if it was eternity. Analyzing it to death, wondering what you could have "done"...what the other person "shouldn't have"  done etc. That one itsy bitsy minute becomes the ongoing focus of attention, at the exclusion of all the other billions of years that went on before you and will go after you.  Like really? Why do we do that? It was just, as I used to tell my students before the  tests they were about to write, "nothing more than a blink of an eye in a lifetime"...and something not even measurable in the span of universal  time. 

Yet, here we are:  tiny specks on a grain of salt in an infinite ocean, lasting no more than a blink of an eye in the planet's life time...and less than that in the universe's and we think...heck we  believe ....that it is all about us??? We believe our problems are worthy of universal consideration! And we also believe we are supposed to "do" something to make this world that has been taken care of itself for billions of years better ( i.e. more comfortable and suited to "little-me's preferences) .  We judge it as a wonderful world when our preferences are met, and as a bad and unfair world when what this tiny speck on a grain of salt happens to experience is what it decided it didn't want to experience  in the  tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of that blink of the planet's  eye, it has been allotted.  Hellloooo!! Does that not sound so bizarre?

We Don't Have To Do Anything! 

We actually think we have control??? That we can , no...that we should be doing something?  We are delusional.  The planet, like I said, has been existing for billions of years before we plopped down for our  blink of an eye term . It never needed us! Things are happening naturally without our assistance all around us.  Birds are migrating, trees are leafing, flowers are blooming, the earth is getting the water it needs, the animals are doing their thing, weather is happening, atoms are bonding, tides are moving etc etc etc.  All this is happening without any help from us. In fact, if anything,  we are only in the way. We don't even have any control over our own bodies.  The heart beats without any voluntary action from us, cells divide, cells die, oxygen gets into the trillions of cells to make energy and heat, our hair and nails grow  etc Our bodies are not ours; they don't belong to some seperate "me". They exist as a part of the whole. And the whole is perfectly okay without our interference! Yet we somehow think it is all happening for us and because of us.  That what we "do" is so important. Wow! It isn't.

These amazing things, we have little to no control over, are constantly unfolding in front of us and all we have to "do" is simply be aware of it as it unfolds.  Notice what every moment is offering us as we stand or sit or lie in that 8.3 square feet around us. and notice especially how we are are judging those things and "preferring" .  Notice when our mind or body says, "I like that" and "I don't like that."..."I want that and I don't want that." Then notice how the mind tries to get us to "do" something about it. Instead of following the urge to "do" whatever we can to fix or escape the moment, we simply relax into it.  That is the key thing , Singer tells us, to relax into what is , into the awareness of our preferences, the awareness of habit mind's tendency to want to do and into  what is actually unfolding in front of us.  Relax and become comfortable with what is. 

Hmmm! 

Please watch the video below for yourself. 

All is well!

Michael A. Singer/Temple of the Universe ( March 6, 2023) Just Be Aware. https://tou.org/talks/

Karma and Current in the Bigger Picture

But life inevitably throws us curve balls, unexpected circumstances to remind us to expect the unexpected. I've come to understand these curve balls are the beautiful unfolding of both karma and current. 

Carre Otis

 I would like to explore the unfolding of circumstance in front of each seemingly ( but not so) separate body and mind. Is it random? Is it just a chaotic, order-less dropping and plopping of events here and there? Is that why some people find themselves living in the streets of Calcutta, fighting off stray dogs for a morsel of food, while others are floating in big pools, eating strawberries and cream,  in front of their inherited mansions in California? 

So I take this question back to my little life...and I know it is "little"  as is this idea of "me, my and mine"  when I slot it into the big picture.  That is something we don't do enough, though, is it...slot our little slice of life experience  back into the bigger picture? 

What is the Bigger Picture?

Michael A. Singer pointedly describes it by explaining that, we as this "separate self," are one of 8.5 billion humans. Human beings are one species of trillions that live on this planet.  We take up about 6.3 square feet of this plane twhich has a circumference of about 25,000 miles. It takes 1.3 million of these planet earths  to fill the sun and the sun is only one of billions of stars in our galaxy.  This galaxy is one of trillions. Wow! Now that is the bigger picture.

Now looking at that, how much do our little  and not so little woes matter in the big scheme of things? 

I slot my itsy bitsy self into a space between the Calcutta street person and the pool floater. This experience that this "me"  is having seems loaded a little unevenly and my mind often leans me towards the less fortunate allotment...There seems to be a lot of challenging circumstances to deal with ...boom...boom...boom...but obviously there is not as much as that  starving person in India's allotment of hardship and circumstance.  I look towards the pool floater and think sometimes...if only, if only I had a bit of what you had ...man I would appreciate my life more.  

Now...I am evolved enough to know that the person floating in the pool is not necessarily happy and peaceful...They may be lying there on top pf their whale shaped floatable device contemplating how they are going to end their life because of something that showed up on social media or over the fact that they just  lost  a percentage of the family fortune  on some gambling venture they went on when they were drunk. Or maybe they are lonely and never felt loved.  The Calcutta person, however, once he gets his belly full,  may befriend the dog, sharing with it what was fought over, and  may be grateful and happy  over his good fortune and for the fact he made a new friend. Circumstances do not make us and they do not break us. It is all about the energy inside. 

Anyway...why?  Why was that person born into the life of poverty and why was that person born into a life of material abundance? Why was I born where I was? Why is "my" life unfolding the way it is? Is it random?  Why do so called "good" things happen to some...and so-called "bad" things happen to others?  

Of course, being somewhat of a yogi, I am going to answer with one word: Karma.  Karma isn't punishment or reward....It isn't "personal" and it isn't random.  It is pieces of curriculum offered to each personally created "me" to help with the "learning" of cause and effect needed to balance the energy along the entire "bigger picture". Well, that is what I tell myself as I sit here...not fighting off stray dogs or eating strawberries and cream as I float along...but as I ...as this "little me" ...recovers and reflects on the effects of  another seemingly "gruesome" 24 hours. Once again,   I lost my focus, momentarily drifting from the bigger picture, and narrowing it down to this tiny, insignificant one of 8.5 billion humans, I call "me".  When I do that, it seems that "i"  have been randomly slapped with complicated lesson after lesson in an advanced calculus class while "my" very limited personal  mind is still trying to figure out long division. I...whoever this "me" is...reacted to it with resistance and confusion and overwhelm asking "What the Fork am I supposed to do with this? This is unfair! Are you ever going to give me a break?" And instead of ringing the dismissal bell..Life just plopped  another lesson, and another lesson on "my" lap. 

All I can do now...is ask, "Okay....what am I to learn from this? Please show me." 

There really is no sense in resisting or complaining about any of it.  The lessons are going to keep coming until we learn them. The big thing is, they are not personal!! We don't just learn them so we can get out of school...we learn them for the sake of the bigger picture....for the sake of the person in Calcutta and the person in California also spinning around on this planet we share in one galaxy of many. 

What is the lesson we are to learn, crazy lady? We are to learn to simply experience it all, whatever we are given, relax and allow it all to just pass through us.  In the bigger picture there are no difficulties or problems.  It just is what it is and it all belongs.

Hmmm! I don't know.  I am rambling again, aren't I? 

All is well.

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( March 9, 2023) Moving Past Your Personal Limits. https://tou.org/talks/

A Quick Cry, Better than None

 

You know that a good long weeping session can make you feel better even if your circumstances have not changed a bit.

Lemony Snicket

I am so overwhelmed! I snuck out here before everyone woke up for a good cry.  I even sent out a text to my family explaining why I might not be able to make my scheduled visit to see my sister today.  I told them things they probably didn't need to hear about what transpired in the last few days.  My daughter's wisdom teeth extraction turned into a post operative infection that a round of IV antibiotics is not fixing. The swelling is all the way down to her chest and up around her eyes.  This is serious!  We spent the day...well she spent the day yesterday... while I looked after the baby...trying to contact providers for help and assistance...every avenue was closed for some reason...she left messages for the dental surgeon for emergency consult and they never got back to us, evist was full to capacity, night clinic bookings full to capacity, the dentist she normally sees here was closed for the afternoon. It was so frustrating!  As much as she hated to the only option was emergency and they diagnosed the postop infection and gave her a round of IV meds. Waiting for the pharmacy to open here before we can fill the script. She woke up this morning with more swelling.  I think it has to be opened and drained.  There is infection under the sutures. Worried ( and I said yesterday I don't want to worry or hope) about what this could lead to if not treated effectively.  It is getting worse. Man. Then I get a text from my other daughter, who is not doing well on a good day, and she  was told that her relationship was over with the person she was with for 14  years. I was expecting it but not "now". Then, this morning she calls me to tell me a friend, she often spoke about to me, was killed in a car accident last night. So, so sad! Oh man...all this when I am so tired I can't think straight. I can't see the sun. That is what it comes down to: What has this"me" that feels so beaten down by the influx of circumstances have to give these people in need.  This "me" is presently feeling burdened, resentful, frustrated, overwhelmed on top of feeling the pain of others. I want to help, I do, but "me" is just pooped out. I am soooo burnt out. I can't seem to get a moment's break...just long enough so I can catch my breath, get centered again, feel that positive lift like I did yesterday (the sun under the clouds),( yesterday's lift lasted for all of 2 hours maybe before it started to pour down on "me" again). (As if all these circumstances are just there to target "me" lol) Anyway...it is what it is.  I got a few minutes of "cry time" before the others woke up  and I had to deal again.  Sigh.  I want to say, "but it wasn't enough!" Oh well...I guess I did say it. It is what it is.  I can only deal with what is directly in front of me...one at a time....regardless how pooped little me may feel.  The "I" can deal...the "I am " never gets tired, does it?  "Me", like always is just in the way. Sigh! 

All is well

Some Days Must Be Dark and Dreary

 

Some days must be dark and dreary.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Rainy Day

I have been, what others described , as "off" the last few days. "You are not yourself." 

When they bring that to my attention  I smile and  think, "The last few days?  I have been off for the last few months and I have not been my 'self' for many, many years, if I ever was this "self"." 

But it is true...I have been especially off the last few days since I found out about  my sister. Even though she is comfortable and safe and well looked after despite the fact she is on a ventilator...I have been overcome with a dark heaviness. I have been feeling very negative and discontent in my moment...restless with a churning in my gut. I found myself tabulating all the hardships I have had over the years, (as if her situation was mine to add to 'my' collection of personal woes). 

I was reminded of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's words" Into each life, a little rain must fall.   And instead of being comforted by it, I found myself lamenting to my cat, who btw couldn't care less about what was going on in my life outside of feeding or patting her, "Well  someone better define how much a "little" is when they refer to Henry's take on precipitation. Is he  talking the odd shower, or this torrential down pour that has been pouring down on me for a bit too long?"  

 I couldn't seem to settle in the moment.  I was looking for something to "do" that would distract me but I was consumed by "sloth and torpor".  I didn't want to do anything. I was discontent with my environment, noticing every dust ball and thing needing cleaning or repair.  The more I noticed the more restless I got, the more my belly churned; the more my belly churned, the more  I felt I had to do something to fix it all  but I just couldn't get myself to do anything about any of it.  I was lazy with a capitol "L". 

The thoughts were negative . I spent my days expecting every thing else around me to go "wrong" or to "collapse" and ironically it seemed that it did...Every thing I touched, seemed to break (we are down to the minimum amount of plates right now) , the top of the air fryer popped off for no explicable reason hitting me in the face and I stubbed a toe or wiped out, I don't know how many times ( you know how that goes) . 

My mind kept going back to old habitual patterns of looking for escape, knowing full well there was no escape. I was stuck in a series of moments I preferred not to be in.  It was a very yucky experience. I felt like Longfellow lost in "The Rainy Day": My life is cold, and dark and dreary..."  

It wasn't until I went down to the studio last evening and did a full practice that I felt the heaviness lifting and something remotely positive emerging. There was a learning in all this. 

It seems, that as these challenging  circumstances come into my life, I am less resilient to get past them. And I feel stuck in them.  I do not "like" that feeling of being stuck in them. Why? I am starting to see, as I reflect back,  that what I am experiencing is a triggering of samskaras that are already starting to resurface on their own.  Seeing my sister in the situation she was in was definitely  a big trigger for past wounding and a lot came up at once. My thoughts still cling to the mouldering past....So much so I couldn't intellectually make sense of it.  I just felt it emotionally and physically. It was overwhelming.

 These samskaras have to come up . I know that.  I have been praying for them to come up and out of me but when they all come up at once, it is a lot to deal with at one time.  What was stored in pain comes up in pain. Still, in order to be "free" we have to get these blockages out of the way.  So though it  all feels like a big messy puddle of emotional energy emerging...and I cannot make sense of it and it feels dark and awful...it is a positive thing! Clouds are moving!  Behind the clouds is the sun still shining. We just need to get beyond the blockages to see and experience the sun. 

Another thing I realized, as I experienced this, was that I no longer use the defense mechanism of hope. That is a strange and abnormal experience to be "hopeless".  Contrary to what I have been taught during my time  nursing on the psychiatric unit, "hopelessness" is not a bad thing. Though it does feel uncomfortable. Without that shield hope provides, there is an even intenser sense of vulnerability to what is.  Hope is a mental  escape from what life offers us in this moment. It seems to serve a positive purpose but what it offers us is not real....just a future projection that does not serve the moment. 

So when people asked me, "Are you off because  you are not hopeful, she will get better." I just shrug my shoulders and answer, "I don't know".  I really don't know what the future will bring and how any of us will be in it.  I don't need to know.  That is not where my mind goes anymore...I no longer use hope to feel better. I see it as just another mind game that takes us from being fully present to what is.  

The hopes of youth fall thick in the blast....

I use to be a big hoper...and that hope used to buffer me when I was discontent with what was. Not anymore.  I do not want to be dragged from my moment and whatever shows up in by fear in the form of anxiety and worry or by hope.  What was going on with me over the last few days had little to do with the future.  It was simply that my moments...right there  and right then...were very challenging.  I had a hard time accepting them.  And  knowing (finally-after years of practice) that mentally running away from the now, was not the solution, I did my best to settle into what was and allow all of it: the resistance, the restlessness, the discontent,  the samskaras, the pain, the confusion etc. That is what we get without hope...the reality of the rain.  Sometimes it feels like a refreshing shower.  Other times it feels like a soul soaking down pour. I was just experiencing a down pour.

Now, I feel differently.  Thanks to my yoga practice, I feel something emerging from deep inside me to the surface.  I cannot explain why I feel lighter...less soaked by darkness and more aware of the sun that is there...but I do.  The circumstances have not changed, something inside me has. That is the only way this works, right?  You get that? It isn't about what comes into us from our lives but what comes up from us, is Life.   If we are getting uncomfortably wet, it is raining inside, not outside.   We are blocked. A change in things out there is not going to make us feel better.  I mean, don't get me wrong, I do want my sister to get better but what is more important is loving her and loving Life right now, the way she and it is. It is only a problem when I cannot do that. 

Thy fate is the common fate of all

Anyway, all is well in my world. 

The Play of Samskaras

 Human life is full of the play of samskaras-tendencies developed by repeated actions,

Vinoba Bhave

I know it seems that things here got dark fast talking about life circumstances that are so real and possibly challenging to even read about. But this is the reality of human life. Hmmm! It is all good. 

All is well in my world.

Facing the Effects of Trauma For Self Realization

 Among the most poisonous consequences of shame is the loss of compassion for oneself. The more severe the trauma, the more total that loss.

Gabor Mate, page 30

I am feeling pretty unbalanced right now by life circumstances and the rumbling samskaras under my surface layer.  I often feel this way, especially lately.  Dealing with the reality of a very sick loved one and her very heavy pain is not made any easier by the mess that surrounds me in this household and the evidence of farther debt. This is brought on by the taking into "my home ( look at me still so attached to "my" and "mine") others in need. My space is crowded and impossible to keep clean ( of course, I am not the greatest house keeper anyway). I feel those old inadequacy samskaras bumping around as I look at the mess.  I hear the inner voices whispering to me that, I should be ashamed for not cleaning the house better and letting others live in this mess.  That it is my fault and that I am "bad" for letting it get like this." I seek the solace of my words, my solitude, my yoga, and my learning when these voices chirp up but there is so many interruptions and seeming demands on my time and energy. ...not to mention what it is doing to my finances, that I cannot seem to "relax" enough. Today I "had to"(that is the way I perceived , rather than it being a choice)   take 2500 dollars from my credit line so someone could get their wisdom teeth out. I have no idea how I am going to pay that back...none! And there is the other stressors that have been on my parenting plate for years...children suffering and I have no idea how to help them. It feels like arrows in the gut each and every time I am made aware of that suffering. I don't want to close my eyes to it or anything, I don't ...but man it is hard to observe. The body  holds onto these experiences in the core, tightening and doing God knows what to the GI track. There is shoulder pain and jaw clenching that leads not only to sore jaws but cracked teeth. I need to go to a dentist but heck...I keep telling myself , it can wait; what this "me" needs can wait until things around it calm down a bit.  They just don't seem to calm down for long. 

This, my dear friends, is Stress with a capitol "S".  It isn't trauma but it is stress. This stress , however, activates and aggravates old trauma wounds held within us creating a more "intense" experience than there really has to be. When these things get activated, old core beliefs arise and we often  base our perceptions,  decisions and choices on those wounding beliefs...One such belief many of us share is the belief that we are inadequate or even "bad" and we have to be nice and giving and work extra hard to make up for our badness, our unworthiness , to pay extra rent for being on this planet that we don't deserve  to be on. We therefore make other people's needs more important than our own.

It is obvious that I am doing that. It is obvious that I have lost compassion for myself.  Oh man, I can tell a tale of woe...not for self-compassion purposes but to gain  pity from others.  Pity, somehow,  my twisted mind will tell me, reduces the rent I have to pay for being on a planet I do not deserve to be on.  Sigh! It is challenging to recognize how pathetic and convoluted one's belief about "self" remains  becasue of old trauma wounding. ...even when we think we have done so much work. There is so much about our trauma we need to learn to face before we get close to Self realization.

Now, I know it seems that I am taking a step backward from all the amazing teachings I learned and shared here related to getting beyond "self" to "Self"; about getting beyond suffering by relaxing and  releasing all our samskaras and recognizing that we are not the "me" that was wounded. Right now, I am talking more about "self" than I am "Self" as I read Gabor Mate's wonderful book.  I feared this would happen but I also see the need for this to happen.  We do need to understand, to some degree, how "self" was created, how "self" was injured and how "self" perceives the world because it was injured , before we can heal at the deepest level ...taking us back home  to the unwounded Self. We need to see how the broken "self" is distorting our view and our appreciation of the moment.

We need to face our traumas...allow the samskaras to arise and release if we want to realize Self. 

Facing it[ the wounding of "me"] directly without either denial or overidentification becomes a doorway to health and balance.

Gabor Mate, page 35

All is well!

Gabor Mate ( 2022) the Myth of Normal. Knopf Canada: (Penguin Random House)

Beyond The Imperfection of Our Coverings

 We all need pathways of self-compassion in response to imperfection. We all need ways and we all need to  help each other to realize that these difficult waves we experience  are not our fault.  And if we trust the goodness we can actually become the being we want to be.

Tara Brach, Healing Shame: A Guided Meditation with Tara Brach

It is only our outer coverings that are imperfect. And we as the consciousness that is staring at this outer covering and identifying it as us and therefore identifying the imperfection on it as us, are perfect. Hmm! 

We Are The Light

We, who we really are, are consciousness. Consciousness is the light that shines on an object.  The object we are, too often, shining on is our outer surface, which is nothing more than a self-created covering over all that is.  We are staring at it so hard and so intently, narrowing our focus to it,  so much so that we do not see all that is around it, all that is behind it. We think we are it.  (Michael Singer, 2023)

Focusing on the Reflection of the Mind

We, like Narcissus did,  are shining down and illuminating  one tiny reflection of who we think we are  in a vast lake and we are so consumed by it we cannot take our eyes off it to see that it is nothing more than a mere reflection. We see it as everything. And of course, the more light we shine on it, unlike Narcissus, the more imperfections we are going to see. We may beat ourselves up for each  imperfection that we notice, feeling responsible and guilty for them. That is when we may feel shame samskaras rising from the depths to the surface. The dreadful shame experience  then becomes the focus of attention pulling us down into this image until we are completely lost in our inadequacy. When we focus on this cringing feeling of shame , we begin to see ourselves as "shameful", inadequate, wrong, bad etc. 

Self Compassion When We Feel Ashamed

I am not sure who said this, but I heard that self-compassion was the antidote to shame.  In the below linked  guided meditation from Tara Brach, we are asked to show self compassion for our imperfections and are reminded that we are not at fault for them, not to be blamed, and there is no need for self-punishment when we see our imperfections. What is needed is compassion for every blemish we notice on this outer surface we call "me". Being human is tough! As Alexander Pope said, To err is human..." There is so much "out there" beyond our control, that will mark us and bruise and scar our outer surfaces. We have been molded and conditioned by all our past experiences to act a certain way, to react, to relate, and to make choices in order to survive. We make mistakes in our natural inclination to exist and keep existing!  We naturally suffer from the consequences of our choices. We do not have to hurt ourselves more with self-hate and shame.  We need to, instead, interject kindness when we catch ourselves responding or reacting to blemishes on our surface covering. 

Trusting the Goodness

Most importantly, we have to trust the goodness. What goodness? The goodness of who we really are beneath this surface covering we are so focused on. We are light.  We are consciousness.  We are all that which is looking down at this imperfect reflection.  We are not the reflection, not the object of observation...we are that which is looking. This light is pure and perfect, untainted by any of our human errors. We are consciousness. Michael Singer reminds us, in the linked talk below, that the light that is shining did not do anything wrong, it is just shining on something that did. It, does not get dirty or blemished just because it is looking down on something that appears  a bit dirty or blemished for whatever reason. This light of consciousness is pure and it will stay pure. 

Focusing On What Doesn't Matter; On What Causes Suffering

The problem is we use this wonderful light to shine down on things that don't matter. We then identify with what it is shining on.  We use it to shine down on the reflection of "me" creating a spotlight around it.  So focused is it, we cannot see all the gifts of Life we were given to experience outside that spotlight. A character emerges in the focused light and we call it "me"  and it becomes our everything. If an imperfection shows up on or around this "me" we freak...saying it shouldn't be; it is wrong, bad and so are we for having it. We increase our suffering ten fold and so unnecessarily when we react in this way. Shame can be merciless and it doesn't have to be.  We can remind ourselves of what we too often forget when we are in the throws of it.  We forget that we are not this little mind created entity with all its problems and imperfections. We are the light that is shining on it, observing it, witnessing it, and super-focused on it.  We are the light, not the object dancing around like a chicken with its head cut off in that light. If we are the light, we can, therefore, decide where we shine.  

Refocusing the Light

Yes, self compassion is so crucial in dealing with shame and other emotional energies  when they emerge upon noticing imperfections on these "me" coverings...but more important, is the need to refocus the light. We can start by dimming it some, so we are not so focused on the blemishes and imperfections on this "me" ( self compassion can help us do that). Then we slowly open up our focus, spreading  it farther and farther until we can barely see the "me" at all amongst all the other things we are noticing.  We then open up the light of consciousness, our awareness and attention, to all we have been failing to see when we  were in spotlight mode.  We use the light to experience Life fully and completely. We can use it, Singer reminds us,  not for freedom  for the self, but for freedom  from the self. Freeing the Self from self is the  most compassionate thing we can do. We can become the beings we want to be! 

Anyway, how I ramble.

All is well in my world.

Tara Brach  (2021?) Healing Shame: A Guided Meditation with Tara Brach. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlyuGSwaZQ8

Michael A. Singer/Temple of the Universe ( 2023) I am One With Thee. https://tou.org/talks/

Where God Is, You're Not!

 You do not have to struggle to  reach God, but you do have to struggle to tear away the self-created veil that hides him from you.

Paramahansa Yogananda, Autobiography of Yogi

I am getting so close to finishing, living untethered. I am reluctant to write the last few quotes here because I don't want to put it down.  Sigh! It was one of those books that I truly needed to read.  It offered exactly what I needed on this lag of my Life practice. Michael Singer's teaching resonated with me in a way few have.  (And I have done a lot of reading and studying over the years...so that is saying something.) I do have another book waiting for me: The Myth of Normal by Gabor Mate. Though I am so excited about reading it, I know it won't give me what this book I just finished did. I think it might take me back to body and mind focus...whereas  Singer took me beyond that.  Of course, I don't know.  I was called, sort of, to read Gabor Mate's book  too.  I knew I had to get my own copy; so I did. We will see what transpires.

So I opened this with a quote from Yogananda, a virtual guru, so to speak, of Michael Singer's and someone who fascinates me as well.  I actually had a copy of the book here before I heard Singer referring to him but when I went to get it I couldn't find it.  I am using a Kindle edition as I read this book along with living untethered. 

So I am still in the process of removing the veil, and as one can tell from reading my previous entry...it is not an easy thing to do. I as "me" have to get  out of the way. With every ego sting I experience, I am reminded "me" is not out of the way. Will it ever be? I don't know but I will keep trying. Will I ever be completely free of the need for the good opinion of others? I don't know. Will I ever be awakened enough to feel like a drop of water merging with the ocean? I don't know. Will I ever be enlightened? I don't know but I will keep trying.

I will never,  I know , be  awakened like the true masters, but if I can gain even a bit of peace, a bit of freedom, all this struggle to get through this veil will be worth it. 

Now for the final words of wisdom offered so eloquently by someone  who I would deem to be a master teacher :

Surrender to the flow. Give your Life to it. Merge into it, and it will take you the rest of the way. That is the final surrender....

If you let go of yourself on a daily basis, under all circumstances, you will find what is greater than yourself. That's the way it works: Where you are not, God is. Where God is, you're not.

Michael A. Singer

It is with great appreciation and a certain sadness that I close the cover of this book that has been such an important part of my Life practice for many months. Please, please read it for yourself. 

Thank you Michael Singer for sharing your free flowing Shakti with the world. 

All is well.

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

Paramahansa Yogananda (1st published 1946) Autobiography of a Yogi. Kindle Edition

A Practice Full of Slip Ups

 

Like most things in life, these deeper spiritual states take time. Just do the inner work, and the energy will start flowing. Once the floodgates open within you, you will have all the help you need for the ascent.

Flood Gates Yet To Be Opened

Well, I guess things are bothering "me".  I mean..."me" is bothered by things. I realized last night that  these little hands inside are still doing their routine of clinging and pushing away, while they continue to attempt to push down the old samskaras as they emerge. It is funny how that works.  I think I am doing so great in my Life practice (that is what I am going to call it from now on).  I think I am so much more advanced than I actually am.   I think things are just flowing through me...the little things like other opinion and the bigger things like the suffering of others I am so often made aware of. I intend it to flow through but at three in the morning I realize...nope ...it didn't get through.  It is still there, tangled up in the mess.  I am bothered. I am closing up."

 On its journey through me, stuff still gets snagged on whatever is built up inside me. Just like blood gets caught up on the uneven plaque build up in a vessel lumen, forming clots and other blockages, these outer world observations, thoughts and emotions  keep getting snagged on their way through me. I feel the new experiences bumping against the old stuff and it hurts. Despite my motivation and my assumption that  I am "handling it", the old tendencies of pushing down and away or clinging to, still transpire.  Old voices emerge from the depths, "You need to please everyone and when you don't you are failing. You are inadequate, not enough therefore you have to "do" more in order to earn your rent here on earth. If you can't fix it..."Run! Just run from this job (you are not doing any good there,anyway),  run from the people who need you...just run! ""  Totally irrational , but those are the common, universal voices we may hear when we are aware and listening. These voices and core beliefs are mixed up in the repressed and suppressed emotional energies rumbling inside too many of us. 

Just keep letting go. No matter what happens, keep letting go.

I know they are there in this version of a human being. I want them out! I want all these samskaras to come bubbling up to the surface in some volcanic explosion, no matter how painful it might be... I want that pressure gone.  I am so sick of all the triggering and the rumbling and the earth trembling. Just release already! 

Bring It On!....On Second Thought....

And part of me looks at these experiences, when I observe that I am not pleasing others for whatever reason, when I feel the activation within me of old stuff, the "sting" ...as a positive thing.  I do.  I know, intuitively,  every opportunity like this offers a release of some of this trapped stuff. I catch myself even saying (and meaning, at the time), "Good!  It is happening. I feel the "sting".  It is coming up and I am going to let it. What a wonderful opportunity this experience is giving me to heal. Bring it on! "  

I think I am letting it all go until three in the morning when I catch myself ruminating, catch myself wondering what I can "do" to "fix" this in the future...not fix the insides but the outer world situation that is triggering me and how I can avoid feeling this way again. Then I realize, "Oh shoot!  I am doing it again. Those little hands inside me are at it again. They have not let go." 

These states are not going to happen all at once and then stay there. You'll get rushes from time to time because something opens up. Its okay if it closes back down; don't worry. You still have work to do.

Lots of Work Left To Do

So last night I noticed my mind, I noticed what my body was doing in reaction to it...that tightness in the solar plexus, the clenching of the jaw and the ticker acting up in the way it does. Everything felt so dark again, heavy.  So I sat up and I meditated...focusing on breath, focusing on the sounds I was hearing around me/near me/ in me. Then I did a body scan.  The reactivity kept pulling me back in ...away from my body focus...but I came back again and again to breath, to my body, to the moment.  My intentions was not to resist the mind stuff, it was just not to let it pull me away for too long...to keep coming back, to relax.  I got pulled away but I came back again and again and again until I felt I was "relaxed" enough to allow all of it. Then I did this thing where I breathed in an intention for "an opening" and breathed out an intention for a  "release".  I really wanted that release. There was so much intention in each out breath,  but all that came up were a few tears... a trickle rather than a volcanic explosion  But, on a positive note,  I could feel myself relaxing into all of this emotional experience brought on by the outer world ones. When I was done relaxing, I fell back to sleep in no time. So I guess, if we are measuring progress in my Life practice...that is progress. A trickle of samskara release is better than nothing, is it not? I am more mindful of what my mind is doing...that is progress too.  I guess we should expect  to take a step back for every couple we take forward in any type of practice, right? And Life is a practice!

Above all, I know, I really know,  that there is nothing "wrong" with anyone  or anything out there in terms of my experience...therefore there is nothing to fix out there. Whatever is happening to me, is mine...all mine and I need to go inside to fix it! I know, without a shadow of a doubt, both intuitively and rationally, that it is all about the samskaras. I want them gone.  But I am also realizing it is not something that is going to happen over night for me. I need patience in my practice, renewing my commitment for  true healing and realization every day. My Life practice is no different than any other practice I take on....it isn't going to perfect and it isn't going to be easy.  I am going to slip up and fall back again and again and again.  I can learn from every slip up and keep going.  

Hmmm!

Be diligent but give it time. Eventually, the upward flow will never leave you. You will become a knower of your soul, a knower of spirit. 

All is well in my world.. 

Michael A. Singer (2022) living untethered. New Harbinger/ Sounds True. Page 201

Serve The Moment With All that You Are

 The highest life you can live is when every single moment that passes before you is better off because it did. 

Michael A. Singer, page 197

Serving the Moment

So in the final chapter, Singer explains how Life is really about serving the moment in front of us, and not worrying about whether or not it will serve us. We can serve it  by simply noticing what is in it without judgement or preference, allowing it and appreciating it.  Or we can "do" something that will raise the energy of it as it passes by which could mean smiling to a stranger, dropping  a kind word on someone who needs it or offering a helping hand. We just need to remember the moment is not there to give us something ( though it does), we are there to give it something...and that something, is who we are. 

When we do something to  raise the energy, like  picking up a piece of litter off the street, as Singer offers as an example, we do not do that to satisfy the "little-me's" puny needs and desires ( that never get met anyway, right?...at least not for long) to be thanked and recognized. We do it in a spontaneous and authentic desire to make the world a better place. How wonderful the world would be if we are all self actualized in that way.

Self Actualized?

Self- actualization is the top of Maslow's pyramid and though he tended to stick to the psychological realm in his definition of that achievement, I see it as a crucial step towards the Self- realization that takes us beyond the psyche.  In  order to achieve self actualization , he often explained, one needs to be absent of the need for the good opinion of others. We don't serve others to get something back when we are self- actualized or self realized...we serve for the sake of serving,  spontaneously, authentically, and for the sheer joy it brings to us and to the world. I want that and that is the step in my life-practice where I am now. And of course, Singer teaches how our willingness  to practice relax ing in the face of less than positive opinion can speed this process along.  

Looking For Unconditional Positive Regard? 

This little job I took on helps so much in that area. There is no self esteem building based on positive recognition, let me tell ya, when one is  standing before 13-18 year olds who have absolutely little regard for your position or you for that matter. It is even questionable if they see or hear me  and others who do what I do lol. It is very, very humbling. I went into this position more than a little arrogant, thinking that I could use my years of experience and education to handle the situation and gain respect like I did in my previous position. Ha! Eye opener! I picture Rodney Dangerfield, spitting out his "No Respect!" Speaking about respect,

If your motive is to let go of yourself and serve the moment in front of you, you are worthy of great respect. 

Michael A. Singer, page 198

It is my motive to let go of "me" and serve...it truly is but "me" is not gone yet. There is still a hint of reactivity in me when I see this "lack of respect" from those I am attempting to serve.  There is still a bit of a sting. There is a triggering of old inadequacy wounds. In the beginning the ego felt the sting a lot more intensely but I am  learning to relax into it.  I am able to look out at the many before me who are dishing out the less than positive regard, and then look inside myself to see how my energy is being affected.  Many times I am shocked to realize that I am  not offended or bothered by it.  In fact, I sometimes find myself saying "Cool! This is good. This is what I need for my growth" and I find myself cooly and calmly just slipping into observer mode...not judging...just gently questioning to myself the "why" of the behaviors I am witnessing.  I don't react.  I respond, I state my expectations. I go around to each and see if those expectations are being met. I observe.  I record.  ...without judgment...and I constantly question.  "What is missing here in the service I am providing?  Why is it being resisted? What can I learn from this? Have I done everything in my power house ?  What can I do differently? Is there something I am doing or not doing that is contributing to the resistance? Am I helping or is it even my job to help or simply offer help? You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it drink " etc. I keep reminding myself of that and I keep giving it back to them in my round about way by basically saying, "I am here to help in the limited way I can in one day  but it is up to you to accept that help. Please know that I am not judging or blaming but I will record all that I observe. You own your behavior and your choices,  not me." 

Most importantly, I observe myself and ask, "Now that I am clear and nonreactive, is there something I can do to raise the moment as it passes by?" page 198.  Of course, I don't say it exactly like that. 

Anyway, I can see how I would never have been able to do this ten years ago.  So attached was I to the good opinion of others. I see growth in me and that is amazing. I am trying to make the moments that pass before me better.  Whether or not I am is left to be seen but at least I am trying.

It is all good.

All is well in my world. 

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

When You Get There:

 

When you get there: 

If you look out into the world, you see what's there-not what you don't want to be there.  The experience of the outside doesn't simulate any preferences inside of you.  It just comes in, passes through, and leaves you as it found you-in a state of ecstatic well-being. 

Michael A. Singer, living untethered, page 195

For Love's Sake

You don't need anything from a relationship, but love loves to express itself.

Imagine loving without expecting anything back, without needing the other person to say a certain thing, do a certain thing or be a certain way other than what they are.  And imagine,  just loving for the sake of loving.  I think that would be so freeing!

It doesn't mean we don't have relationships.  We just don't have "needy" ones. We realize that love is not something we "get".  It is what we are. 

All is well.

If there is someone special, you shower them with love day and night, expecting nothing in return. Love is a very unique gift-it is just beautiful for both the giver and receiver. 

Michael A. Singer (2022) living untethered. New Harbinger/Sounds True, page 193

It Will Be Fine!

 Once you are being fed by the inner flow, your outer life will be fine. Before you cleared the blockages, you needed the world to be a certain way for you to be okay. This created a struggle with life on a daily basis. When you let go enough to clear the inner energy flow, the struggling ceases. You realize through direct experience that everything you ever wanted is flowing inside you, and the battle will pretty much be over. 

Michael A. Singer, living untethered (2022, New Harbinger/ Sounds True), page 194

All is Well!

What We Do Inside and Outside

 You might wonder why you would be motivated to do anything if you're already content. Why bother having a job or even a relationship, if you are already filled with love and happiness? The answer is simple: love wants to express itself and enthusiasm wants to create.  Once the energy is unblocked and is flowing freely, personal needs are no longer your motivation. Your actions are the expression of love and gratitude for life.  Your whole life becomes an act of service.

Michael Singer, page 193

A New and Better Motivation

Love wants to express itself and enthusiasm wants to create....imagine living with that motivating force directing our every move.  Totally new ball game, eh? If what we do no longer comes from a place of lacking and need and desperation, than man it will have a totally different impact on the world, won't it?  I so want to be unblocked. I want to live in that higher state. 

Practice Getting to the Higher State

In his podacst, Working Inside to Raise Your Inner State, Michael Singer reminds us that the way to get to that higher state where our motivation is to simply express and create this  love, enthusiasm and joy within us is to stop working so much outside to fix what is broken inside. We need to, instead, do the inner work of noticing our tendencies, and relaxing into them and what is without judgement, blame or shame. It is a practice. We are bound to screw up a bit in the beginning and must also learn to notice, and relax into that as well. We really do not have to do anything but that.

There can be moments of disturbance but you don't have to do anything about them. They come and they go and they don't affect your energy flow, unless you let them. You'll come to realize that this energy inside you knows what it is doing. It is not only beautiful it is intelligent. If you let it, it will fix everything. The uprising energy will do all the inner work for you. Your job is to not  interfere- to surrender.  Singer, page 193

All is well.

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

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( February 25, 2023) Working Inside to Raise Your Inner State. https://tou.org/talks/

Must The Rain Fall? Must Some Days Be Dark and Dreary?

The Rainy Day

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary.

It rains and the wind is never weary;

The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,

But at every gust the dead leaves fall,

And the day is dark and dreary.

 

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary;

It rains, and the wind is never weary.

My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past,

But the hopes of youth fall thick to blast,

And the days are dark and dreary.

 

Be still, sad heart! And cease repining;

Behind the clouds is the sun still shining.

Thy fate is the common fate of all,

Into each Life some rain must fall.

Some days must be dark and dreary.

 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 

I was reminded of this poem when Michael Singer used the infamous line in the below linked  podcast.  It also seemed to flow indirectly but somehow perfectly with what was on my mind after reading this line in living untethered. :

No matter how high you get, you can always get much higher. Don't believe those who say you cannot enjoy happiness unless you also know sadness. That is not true.  That is what Life is like if you are still blocked. page 192

Hmm! So would Singer say that Longfellow was still very blocked? 

Now, I am one of those people who believe in the  natural  balance of  10,000 joys and 10,000 sorrows.  Of course, we are going to have dark and dreary days and we are going to have sunny days.  These days, this weather has nothing to do with us. (Singer, ironocally, often uses the analogy of  accepting and relaxing into the rainy day. ) The circumstances that enfold in front of us have little to do with us.  Now, Longfellow is quick to point out that rain comes into every Life...and depersonalizes its occurence when he says, "Into every Life some rain must fall" .  He is not blaming the rain for falling but he is blaming himself for reacting to his depression brought about by clinging to the"mouldering"  past. He is obviously experiencing a slump in energy at the time of writing the poem...a lower state. Then, when he recognizes what he is doing,  he reprimands himself by telling his heart  to stop whining and feeling sorry for itself. He reminds himself that the sun is still shining behind the cloud and that rainy and dark and dreary days are nothing personal.  This rain will fall in everyone's life at some point. Of course the rain also represents our less than positive emotional states that we , as humans, often experience. The sun, I see, as our higher Self . And that is always there. What seems to be a very depressing poem is actually a very uplifting and wise one, isn't it? 

So is Longfellow blocked?

Maybe but only temporarily...he is able to recognize so clearly his own reaction to life circumstance and then he is able to use positive thinking, and maybe mantra  "behind the clouds is the sun still shining"  and "thy fate is the common fate of all" ...to lift himself out of his reactivity.  A Buddhist might say he is using wise mind. But a yogi, like Singer, might argue that he is not fully evolved and consumed by the higher state yet because he still suffers from depression, clings to the  past  and the need for  hope. Right? But he is trying to get there, isn't he?   I think he is, in that poem,  where I am on this journey right now...knowing , understanding and trying to break through old habits of reactivity so he can experience the sun full time (even if the literal sun is covered by cloud) .  This begins with accepting what is as it is...the rain, the less than favorable emotions etc , the ten thousand sorrows and seeing the impersonal nature of it. 

Do Some Days Have To Be Dark and Dreary?

For the unevolved being maybe, but eventually, Singer reminds us, there will be no more dark and dreary days. 

We can go higher than this.  We can always go higher...but first we must recognize our tendency to react to life circumstance as if it is something personal, our tendency to to cling to the past, our tendency to allow this "me" we created to whine and complain about what is, and then we need to be willing to stop doing these things. We need to stop stuffing new samskaras on top of our old ones through our resistance of what is. Then and only then will we experience this: 

Once you are unblocked, you will notice that the energy is always beautiful. It is an ever-new rush of uplifting joy that raises your heart, your mind, and everything inside you. page 192 

I wonder if Longfellow ever reached that state of uplifting joy.  I hope he did.  I hope I do too.  I hope we all do.  

All is well in my world. 

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

Michael A. Singer ( February 6, 2023) Relaxing Your Inner Hands of Resistance. https://tou.org/talk-archive/

The High State of Enthusiasm

 As the blockages release, the energy takes you to higher and higher states. You already know what the higher states are. The higher states are about love.They are about being really enthusiastic about your job and anything else you are doing. The higher energies are beautiful. 

Michael A. Singer, 192

I am trying to absorb the last few chapters of this book. So I may be quoting a little too much from it to be considered copyright okay.  Well I suppose I already infringed on those rights. Any time we quote like this we should have permission from the author, which I do not have.  I am simply "assuming," that he, as an evolved teacher, won't mind if one unknown, inconspicuous and unimportant student sitting way in the back of the  classroom shares her notes with someone else in class. :) 

The Course is Set?

Anyway, these last two chapters are important because they speak to what Life can be like when Shakti is finally free to flow. I know I set "Peace from Purification"  as my Pole star, the thing I am aiming for as I travel along these rough waters but sometimes it seems more like a lofty dream rather than a real possibility. It is good to hear that it is possible to attain this peace and to be told about what freedom from our samskaras really entails. I want those higher energy states in me. What about you?

I mean, I have tasted glimpses of them.  For example, before Christmas I felt these energies starting to  whir inside me.  I was sailing my boat like a pro it seemed...happy and peaceful, full of love for everybody and everything.  I could see my Pole star perfectly and felt I was right on course. I attributed some of this joy and enthusiasm , once again erroneously,  to what was happening in the outside world.  I had started a new little job and I was so enthused about it.  I was needed once again and I could provide a service that was worthwhile while I met some of these personal physiological needs...(income) as well as the unnecessary psychological needs ( esteem, and purpose). It was exciting! Even though I knew better, I allowed myself to believe this new enthusiastic high was due to the fact that things were working out for me "out there".  I made it conditional.

Winds Picking Up; Waters Getting Rough

Then opportunities suddenly slowed down at the same time  this "me" slowed down.  It was a double whammy. My body started acting up again, Life started acting up again...the suffering of the  people around me intensified and I was called in to somehow "fix it" or at least alleviate some of the pain.  I couldn't but the pressure to do so was suffocating. Others, at the same time,  had to move back into this house  increasing the demands of this "me" to provide and sacrifice "my" time, energy and space for. I was suddenly struggling financially again...and I  recognized how this "me" was no longer needed as much in the small services I was providing.  The little adventures I was so excited about only weeks before seemed to lose their oompf for me.  So even when the calls came in...and they were few and far between...I began to play with reasons why I could not accept them ( Most of them legitimate). The samskaras which were naturally making their way up and out, as a result of this increase in energy flow, started getting triggered and bumped around. It seemed like too much. There was this growing resistance to the Life experience unfolding in front of me, as a result of all this. Then, I began to resist the resistance...loading my psyche down with guilt and shame over my inability to provide, and my unwillingness to accept and allow all the unwanted in. It became very messy, stormy and chaotic in here again. 

Forgetting How To Sail

Now, I realize that this disturbance in me had little to do with what was happening out there.  The high energy had stopped flowing because I closed down. I closed down because things were not the way I preferred  them to be.  I wanted things to be a certain way and they were not that way. My mind judged what was unfolding in front of me as bad, wrong and shouldn't be and in my attempt to push it away, I added even more samskaras to my samskara filled heart...I did this even though I am well aware  of the mind's tendency to do this, knew the consequences of doing so  and had committed to not doing this.  I slipped. I went back into old mental patterns quite quickly when things got a little challenging on the outside. I realized that  I really didn't know how to handle my boat on rough waters.  I can easily open and stay open when things are going even a bit "good" out there but when the waters start getting a certain degree of rough again , I realize I am, as of yet, not a very skilled sailor. (Thus the poem a few days ago).

Anyway, reading about what Life is like when we let go of all these blockages so Shakti can flow freely through, has inspired me again to recommit to my journey, to do whatever I can to stay on course. I want to be able to handle my boat on bumpy waters , the same way I handle it on smooth. I don't want the waters to matter. Hmm! I want to stay open no matter what, allowing it all in!  Why? Because I want the high states. I want that enthusiasm! I want it for you as well!

As you open up, life is no longer about seeking nonnegative states; it is about allowing ever-increasing positive states. Growth used to be about not feeling anger or anxiety anymore. Now it is about feeling so much overwhelming love when you wake up that you have trouble getting out of bed. Then the feeling of enthusiasm is so strong that it pulls you out of bed and propels you through your day. That is what it feels like when the energy is flowing. 

Michael A. Singer, page 192.

I intend  to stay open so that enthusiasm can flow through me once again, taking me higher and higher..  

All is well.

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

Getting Our Needs Met?

 You used to make satisfying your needs your priority [before awakening]. Most of our modern needs are psychological. Psychological needs are actually unnatural, as they indicate that something is missing or wrong.

Michael A. Singer , living untethered, page 191

I had a discussion yesterday,  something about "my"  psychological needs.  In this person's mind it was very natural and healthy for me to honor these needs and to set limits to protect them.  We used Maslow's hierarchy as an example. My desire to reach a state of complete peace through awakening and  Self Realization might not have been understood but the human drive towards Self- actualization could be understood.  It was  pointed out that a person can not reach the top tier of the pyramyd without having the needs for food, water, shelter, safety met right etc. That is obvious...if I am starving to death or dying from dehydration,  Self actualization might not seem that important (  Though I believe we do achieve a certain realization when we are dying).  Then the need for love and belonging was brought up.  Can we get there without that?  Do we need to be in healthy "special relationships"?  My wise mind says of course not...if I am Self realized ( Self- actualized) it wouldn't matter who I interact with, who I am with.  I will feel love because that  love, I know, comes from me not the other person. And what about esteem? I don't attempt to have my esteem.needs met anymore.  It seems too shallow. ..I see esteem as something that helps the ego get to the top but if the ego gets to the top it isn't true actualization, is it, because we are dealing with the "little self" and not the greater Self? I did not know how to explain this perspective to this individual.

The conundrum arises for me when I see how the "me" is suffering...efforting to survive financially and physically and constantly, it seems, having those efforts thwarted. This "me" has psychological problems. I talk to this very empathetic and caring person about this issue and it is all great and good until I mention  how this is probably a good thing becasue I want "me" out of the picture anyway. I want "me" out of the way because it isn't who I really am. I realize how far off that goal seems to most people...how "insane" maybe.  I am telling this individual that I should not be attempting to have this "me's" needs met anyway...but  she calmly and nonjudgmentally asks, how do I  get to Self actualization/Self realization unless I deal with one pyramid level at a time? 

These psychological problems, Singer reminds us, are just a result of blocked energy flow.  The problems are something my mind up and are non-existent to the greater Self. Both the problem and the solution are internal. How would I explain that to someone who genuinely wants me to be more assertive in getting my physical and psychological needs met, who is encouraging me to surround myself with other people and external circumstances that support "my" needs so that I feel love, joy and enthusiasm? How do I explain it to myself when I see how unnatural these needs are but at the same time I seek to meet them?  So bloody confusing. 

Psychological needs come from your  blockages. When the energy is freed, what you feel is love, joy, enthusiasm, which are just different words for uplifting energy...When your energies are liberated, you don't need energy from anybody else. 

Michael A. Singer, page 191-192

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

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( February 6, 2023) Living From a Higher Place Within. https://tou.org/talk-archive/

The Gift of Obscurity

 Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,  and waste its fragrance on the dessert air. 

Jane Austin, Emma

Obscurity seems to be what Life is unfolding before me to handle and deal with.  It sometimes seems like a "karmic punishment" but I am reminded by some voice deep within me that it is a gift...a gift of learning that I so desperately need. 

Obscurity actually has two meanings.  The first one, according to Oxford Languages  is, a state of being unknown,inconspicuous or unimportant.  That is where I am finding this "me" that identifies as a writer and a teacher. I have a few readers now and again ( and I am grateful for your readership) and I have a few loyal and committed  students showing up on my pages or in my yoga classes but not enough to take me above the level of obscurity.  I, as a "me" that writes and teaches am for the most part unknown, inconspicuous and unimportant.  The ego stings a bit with that realization but with that sting I am reminded that what doesn't serve the ego, often serves the spirit. And it is the higher Self that I am devoted to serving so that makes obscurity  a positive thing, doesn't it? If I had notoriety instead of obscurity unfolding before me...I most likely would get lost in ego stuff again. I know how I feel when I do get recognized for my writing ( published) or when people compliment me on my yoga classes. I open up and feel the energy of enthusiasm  flowing through me...which in itself is a wonderful thing...but that energy can, when dependent on the good opinion of others and directed by ego, turn to a certain arrogant expectation, even a sense of "superiority" that leads me off my path.  I don't want to water those seeds at all. Obscurity waters the seeds of humility and that keeps me humble and helps me to stay on the path I want to be on. I think, then, that while ego is still active in me obscurity is a gift to keep me on the trajectory I need to be on. This whole journey, after all,  is about getting the personalized little self out of the way, isn't it?  If this personalized self is not given the lime light or is considered to be "unknown, inconspicuous and unimportant" it will be diminished. Diminishment of "me" is what I truly want. 

Obscurity also has another meaning. the quality of being difficult to understand. Hmm! This "me" is difficult to understand because  it isn't who I am ...but even more difficult to understand to the unevolved mind is who I am and always was beneath this "me". Though this Self is definitely not unimportant, it is often unknown and inconspicuously hidden behind this veil of "me" . I want the "me" to fade out of the light and the light of Self to shine forth.  Hmm! What is also challenging to understand is all this stuff I write about and teach about.  Few people I talk to about it understand.  In fact they think that I am crazier than a bag of hammers when I speak or write about such things as "awakening", the "true Self". Sigh ...Obscurity could   be the  natural consequence of  what I choose to do and the path I choose to take. 

Regardless obscurity is neither good or bad...it just is.  It is what is unfolding in front of me and I will allow it, embrace it, honor it and be grateful for it. So I decided last evening as I left my class...I will continue to put 100 percent into my writing here, into each class I teach.  It doesn't matter  if 100 people are standing before me listening/reading  or if it is just one.I will continue to serve the Greater Self, no matter how much the little "me" cries out becasue it doesn't like obscurity.  It is all good.

All is well in my world. 

Oxford Langauages https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/

Get Out of the Way!

 Over time, you will find that there is a place inside  you that is behind the commotion of the storm.  You can simply relax and fall into that place. This is the place from which you are noticing the inner commotion, and this place is still, quiet, and there are never any storms. That is the Seat of Self. You don't find your way back to Self-you simply cease to leave. 

Michael A. Singer, living untethered, page 188

Behind the veil of the mind, is who we really are...the True Self, the Atman, the Soul, the witness consciousness...whatever you want to call it ( I don't care if you call it Fred) ...The point is, there is someone or something in there, in you,  that knows you are noticing all that is happening. There is an awareness of you being aware of awareness. ( Sounds like a riddle, eh?) .

So we have a "you"...a psyche, mind, personality with your name in your body, taking on your roles on this planet.  This thing called "you" thinks and feels and is so lost in those thoughts and feelings it identifies as them.  "I am depressed!" you will say.  "I am a person with great problems,"you  might also say.  This "you"  may say, "I am a happy house wife" or a "contened plumber". "I am cursed" or "I am blessed." All theses things it says it is are just "thoughts" and feelings...Yet...we believe it when it says, "This is who I am". .  We believe what the mind says even though it can change on a dime.  

This "me/you" is where we put most of our attention and energy.  This "preferring" entity of ever-changing thought and feeling is what we feed.  We spend most of our lives grabbing whatever we can  from the outside world to give it what it tells us it needs or we strive to protect  it from the things it tells us will make it  unhappy or unwell. This thing comes to build its separate being based on all the things we have been through in life and its tendency to judge what is good for it and what is bad.  

B.F. Skinner said, according to Michael Singer,  that the psyche ( this entity of "me/you") is nothing more than the sum of all your learned experiences.  The experiences you select to store within you becasue they were too unpleasant to deal with or too pleasant to let go of...is only 1 percent of all that unfolds in front of you.  So it isn't a very "significant statistic" according to Michael A. Singer, in his podcast, The Veil of Mind. Yet this collected data, you allow to determine the quality of life you experience as this identified "me".  Just a bunch of thoughts and feelings ...nothing substantial, nothing real. It makes your life a living hell full of storms and commotions.

Yet, this thing we made is not the only thing inside us.  There is something Greater...something behind the veil that doesn't change, doesn't get disturbed, doesn't collect data ...that simply allows all of life to come into it and then it lets all of life  go...clinging to nothing.  Just peacefully and joyfully observing and experiencing.  It is this Self that we are.... It is here  where we long to be.  

The only thing in the way...is this veil we created...this veil of "me"/"you"...a temporal, not long for this planet, ever-changing and samskara ridden entity. It is blocking our awareness of the space in the background and it is blocking all the wonderful light from that space from coming through.  What we forget is we are that which is back there...we just need to get the "me" and all its samskaras out of the way.  We need to let go of that which we cling to and fall back into this Seat of Self.

The thing is, we are already there right?  We never left. This thing we created is not real...it is just something we made up and decided to believe is us.  So we really didn't leave the Seat of Self, we just "thought" we did.  Freedom comes when we realize that we are not that "me/you" we thought we were, fall back into the Seat of Self  and decide never to leave again...never to get so lost in mind stuff that we forget who we are again. We observe Life from there ...letting it all in and letting it all go. No preferences! 

Hmmm! Anyway...that is the way I see it. Thanks Michael Singer...for helping me realize this Life changing stuff. 

All is well.

Always remember, it is spirit's job to liberate you from yourself. Shakti wants to be free, but you're in the way. 

Michael SInger, page 186

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

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( February 12, 2023) The Veil of  Mind. https://tou.org/talk-archive/

Unfavorable Winds

 

Unfavorable winds

Unfavorable winds too often  hit my craft, blowing it here and there

And I, an  unskilled  sailor,  will  hesitate as my sail  tatters in the air.

Do I angle this broken sail to catch more wind or do I take it down?

Do I steer the rutter against this current or do I let it go around ?

Do I gear up to fight the storm or do I batten down the hatch? 

Do I send out a mayday or do I succumb as loser to this match?

Do I allow this gail to take me from my trajectory and  out into the sea

Or do I hold the course no matter what, determined  to be where I must be ?

With every nasty wind that blows my way and every bit of strife

I am reminded that I am an unskilled captain on this boat that is my life.

©Dale-Lyn, February 2023

Listened to the below talk from Michael A. Singer and this popped out.  Like I am not 100 percent clear  as to what my destination might be.  There has been a lot of nasty wind and a lot of windless states that I am not sure how to handle and therefore  I have no idea if I am still on course. .  What about you?  You know where you are going? You a good sailor? Do you know how to handle the unfavorable winds?  Or are you like me, still learning? 

All is well.

Michael A. Singer ( February 20, 2023) Navigating the Ocean of Life. https://tou.org/talks/

Attadipa Saranam

 Over time, you will find a place inside you that is behind the commotion of the storm. You can simply relax and fall back into that place. This is the place from which you are noticing the inner commotion,and this place is still, quiet, and there are never any  storms.  That is the seat of  Self.

Michael A. Singer, living untethered (2022; New Harbinger/Sounds True), page 189.

Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us of the Buddha's phrase,  " attadipa saranam" which means: Taking refuge in the island of Self. This I believe is the same thing Singer is referring to. Singer tells us we can not reach the Seat of Soul unless we relax and release while Hanh encourages us  to breathe mindfully and this will bring us back to the island. 

Breathing in, breathing out.

I am water reflecting what is real, what is true.

And I feel there is a deep space inside of me.

I am free.

Thich Nhat Hanh, peace is every breath (2011; Harper One), page 37

All is well

Transmute

 You are the Self. You are the conscious witness to all that happens before you. You dwell deep inside, and nothing in there is more powerful than you. You have free will; use it to accept what already happened rather than letting past events mess up the rest of your life. Free yourself from these samskaras. Transmute your blocked energies into a powerful spiritual force. 

Michael A. Singer, living untethered ( 2022, New Harbinger/Sounds True)  page 183

Molting

 

Molting

The transformation has started.

Tight and constricting, 

strangling the flow of life in me,

this outer shell I wear is

ready and needing to come off.

It is a slow and  painful process.

Though I may long for outside fingers,

to reach down where I, 

in contorted shape,

lay, writhing and twisting,

to rip the skin  off in one painful swoop

so I can breathe for the first time,

I know there is a process I must follow.

I must allow myself to molt.

Ego’s drying carcass, 

with all its likes and dislikes,

freckling and speckling  

in the beautiful patterns 

of reds and yellows,

  I once wore so proudly

to let others know who I was

will, I am told, 

peel and slide off me

naturally and effortlessly,

leaving a perfect form 

of what I never was behind me…

if I am willing.

I think I am willing.

They tell me  that,

as I continue to make my way through

these tall grasses of life circumstance,

I need do nothing but allow.

I will do my best to allow.

 

Molting….Self is  molting.

It is a slow and painful process,

impacted by my ambivalent readiness.

Part of me longs to be free 

of this  restricting hold.

The other part is much too attached

 to these beautiful colours

 and the way the world seems to 

fear and respect me for them.

I have grown accustomed 

to the defensive safety they provide.

How naked and vulnerable I fear,

 I  will be without my outer shell,

at the mercy of Life and all 

that unfolds in front of me.

Yet, as shiny and attractive as it may be,

I know Ego offers a flimsy protection 

from the predators on the outside

and a tight and choking 

prison for my insides.

I must just let it go.

Breathe, I tell myself, breathe.

Relax, I tell myself , relax.

I stop my writhing and resisting

and I lay back to  notice, simply notice….

 the slow progressive peeling

of what I  thought I once was,

 from the being that I am.

I breathe and I relax,

settling into the transformation

that will save me from myself.

I learn to let go.

© Dale-Lynn, February 2023

Sigh! Listening to the  below talk as I continue to process these teachings and the inspiration for this comes up and out like a hiccough. 

Anyway, just a few more chapters of living untethered. I am getting these teachings.  I am absorbing the learning, and am so very grateful for all of it.  I will eventually move on from it but never completely away.  I will just add more teachings and more teachers as I continue to pursue  my Masters of Life degree. Someday I might even graduate.  Do you think?

All is well.

Michael A. Singer ( February 19, 2023) Shedding the  Ego. https://tou.org/talks/