It doesn't matter which plate we eat from as long as we eat. To get to the point of complete dedication, many different routes are available: hundreds of paths, religions and philosophies, all with one ultimate goal. It is immaterial what we do to acheive it as long as we achieve it.
Satchidananda, Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, pg 142
All is well in my world
Physical and mental toxins create stiffness and tension. Anything that makes us stiff can also break us. Only if we are supple will we never break.
Satchidananda
In other words we need to be able to relax into what is, both on the mat and off.
Serendipity again.
I was reading a little Indian story yesterday, found in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, about a weed and a big tree. The story was found in the description of Sutra 46 in Book Two: Asana is a steady, comfortable posture. Satchidananda was basically using the story to illustrate how we should not only relax, with flexibility and steadiness, into the uncomfortable postures of Hatha, but also into the "uncomfortable" situations of Life. We begin by removing the judgement "uncomfortable" and "comfortable". We need to remove all judgement.
Well, I thought of that story and contemplated coming here to write about it today. Morning came, and one thought after the other led me away from that intention until I heard Michael Singer mention the "Oak Tree and the weed" in his podcast. It was like a zap of lightening to my memory cells activating them all over again.
The story goes like this (my version):
The seed of a weed, picked up and blown randomly by the wind, landed near the trunk of a mighty Oak tree that grew on the bank of a fast-moving river. (Though the tree in the Indian fable was likely a Banyon tree, I will use the Oak tree in this story because Michael Singer used this type of tree in is analogy. I also have big Oak trees in my yard that deserve a shout out.)
Feeling awkward and displaced, the weed grew quickly, as weeds do, but even still it barely reached the first knot in the great tree's base when it was fully grown. One day the big oak tree happened to look down to see the weed standing so closely to its trunk that it brushed against it when the wind blew. The tree was outraged, "How dare you, puny, insignificant weed, stand so close to me, let alone have the audacity to touch my bark! Do you not know how mighty I am? Aren't you ashamed to have your meager weedy form touch my majestic strength and solidity?"
The flimsy little weed trembled beneath the breath of the mighty Oak as it looked up, way, way up the never-ending trunk that was so stiff and solid, "So sorry...so sorry. It was never my intention to get so close. The wind has dropped me here. I had no control over where it took me then and I have no control over how it blows me now. Forgive me." The weed, in shame, dropped its eyes and curled its limp body forward. "And yes, I am ashamed very, very ashamed when I see my puny self so close to such majesty and power. I know I am not as strong, stiff, and sturdy as you are. Please, please forgive my presence here, oh Mighty One."
The tree boomed back, "Well, there is not much I can do now, is there? It is your bad fortune to be so close to the likes of me. How embarrassing it is for you to be compared to my great strength and size, my solid, unmoving stiffness" snorted the tree as it flicked an annoying Eagle off its branch. " Not even an elephant can knock me down...but you...you can easily be squashed by a child's foot or eaten by the smallest rodent. The people and animals of the forest will laugh at you when they walk by. Such a poor pathetic mistake of creation you are."
"I know, I know said the weed." Its little voice barely heard over the rustling of the
Oak tree's leaves. "Please pardon my presence while I live out my lifespan here. Take heart in knowing, it will be much shorter and much more unnoticed than your own."
"Hmph!" the big tree conceded, "Yes that is true...but you better mind your place when you are near me, little weed!"
The weed agreed and did its best to stiffen and steady its little body whenever the wind blew. It struggled against the forces of nature that made it bend towards the tree, and it did everything it could to lean in the opposite direction whenever the wind pushed it toward the tree. Its efforts were useless. The little weed had no solid strength. It was at the mercy of the forces around it. It had no choice but to bend with the wind when the wind blew.
"Oh, I am so pathetic!" said the little weed one day when the wind was especially strong moving it this way and that way.
The big tree looked down at the weed and smirked, "Yes, yes you are," it laughed. "Just watch how strong I remain in this upcoming storm, pathetic little weed. How it cannot hurt me in anyway even when it destroys you. "
Just then a big clap of thunder filled the air and the dark clouds above their heads, now black and menacing, opened up to let a torrent of rain fall upon them. It rained and rained, and the wind speed picked up making the leaves on the Oak tree's branches screech in delight.
"Bring it on" the cocky Oak tree called out to the storm, laughing at how powerful and unmoving it was. It stiffened even more against the wind refusing to bend at all.
And the storm obliged. It rattled the big tree's branches even more. It tossed all animals and debris around in front of it. It stirred up the water in the river beneath them making rip currents that jumped up to lick the exposed roots of the big Oak, pulling down the soil of the bank into its belly, as it did. It pushed the weed this way and that way making it nauseous in the momentum.
The Oak tree just stiffened up more against the storm, showing off its amazing strength. The little weed looked up at it in awe.
Then in one big gust of wind the weed was knocked forward into the earth. It could not move. It could do nothing but relax into the soil in which it landed. The wind was so loud the little weed could hear nothing but its cry. It was sure it was the end.
"Goodbye Oh, Great Tree. I guess, this is the end of me." The little weed relaxed into the idea that these were its final moments on Earth, and it went to sleep.
It woke up when the storm had passed. The sun was shining kindly down on it warming it to the root, like it had never been warmed before. It lifted itself up stretching into the light. "I am still here, oh, Great Tree," it cried in delight, turning to where the tree once stood only to discover it was gone. A large piece of bank was missing.
"Where is the tree? How can such a great and sturdy thing be gone?"
From somewhere up the river the tree's reply could be heard. "Oh little weed, I have been pulled off the bank by the water because I was too stiff and rigid, too arrogant and unbending. I should have been humble, and simple, and supple like you. Strength, I realize too late, comes in bending and relaxing into Life. It comes with flexible allowing. Like you have done little weed, like you have done."
The tree was swept away and the little weed continued to grow strong, bending and blowing with the wind in the humble way it has always done.
All is well.
Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( June 09, 2025) Unconditional Love Is Who You Are. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3x3gJzVjG_Q&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=1
Our true self remains deeply hidden, incognito, submerged beneath a web of mistaken identities.
Stephen Cope
Exposing the True Self requires getting rid of the false ones.
Yesterday I wrote about standing in a basement of a house recently destroyed. When the walls and upper floors came down the messy basement was exposed, the insects hidden in the dark corners emerged and they were angry. The basement represents the stored consciousness of our psyche...well "my" psyche. (I used a lot of "me" "my" and "mine" yesterday in this analogy but it is a very universal experience as humanity goes deeper). The insects (Singer refers to them as cockroaches, I am more familiar with spiders) represent the damaging core beliefs I encouraged to hide in dark corners. I stuffed them away so well...I completely forgot about them and they were happy to hide. They were not too happy to have the light of conscious awareness on them. They came out fast and they bit hard.
Few things are as ugly and disturbing to the mind's eye as a partially destroyed house clinging to the remnants of its interior and frame,exposing what was hidden in the basement. About ten years ago, D.'s house got burnt partially down as a causality to some "drug war" that went on. (Yeah, even in these rural parts such things happen, and my stepson was caught up in it.). On a beautiful piece of once peaceful property, what was left of the house stood for many years. Tattered and blackened from the fire it gradually became smaller and smaller as the wind and rain washed pieces of it away and as scavengers pulled the salvageable from it bit by bit. It was such an eye sore. I kept saying to D...."Just tear it down!!! Bull doze it!! Put it out of its misery and let it die so something else can be reborn there."
For so, so many reasons, reasons he didn't even understand, it was hard for him to do that.
Well...now it is finally gone, all but the basement foundation. The land around it seems to be sighing in relief. My stepson is sober and straight now, by the way, happy and well in his new family. The ghosts and echoes of that time seem to have been carried away from that property by the winds of change. Still, it was that house I visualized at the funeral and that I wrote about yesterday.
I imagined being that broken, open, exposed, and ugly to others as I walked up to get communion. (My catholic conditioning was telling me I had no right to take communion because I hadn't gone to confession in way too many years and therefore wasn't "clean" enough. But my deeper Self was saying, "God really doesn't care".) I was so acutely aware of those now exposed and displaced core beliefs scurrying around and biting into my flesh. I felt singed and burned by Tapas; stripped of so much that once made me "me". When I compared myself to the sturdy and pleasant looking houses around me, I felt very broken.
At the same time, I knew that the fire was necessary; that the destruction of this shell I wore around this human and called "me" was a part of my growth. It had to go. Though the psyche that still remains is self-conscious from time to time, the "I" within is always Self-conscious. :) That day, as I often am, I was caught between experiencing both the 'self' and the 'Self'. There I was grabbing at the charred black tar paper flapping in the wind trying to wrap it around me in some semi-presentable way; and at the same time embracing the "falling a part" process. I was looking forward to the bulldozer rolling over the rest of this "me" to get it out of the way.
It was a very strange experience and the more I awaken, the more I have these strange visualizations and experiences. As ugly and painful as it all may be...I know it is healing. I know I am healing. In fact, the more "I am" can stand free from the shell that once encapsulated it, the better off I will be. The better off we all will be.
All is well in my world.
Michael Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( May 6, 2025) You Are Not Broken-You Are Just Full of Unreleased Energy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85m62GENSXU&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=2
You have got to be willing to die to who you are now to give birth to who you can become.
Les Brown
I had a moment yesterday where I could almost, nearly, so close...visualize what it would be like to be where I was without any semblance of this neurotic little me in the way. Getting there, I could see, meant breaking through a veil of thorns. It was going to hurt like the dickens, but I knew the thorns would pull what is left of this shell off ! I could also see...the more relaxed I remained...the easier the transition would be. Unfortuantely, it is not so easy to relax into the dying process.
What brought on this "almost clear" visualization?
I was at a funeral. I do not do good in crowds or busy social situations. The more I observe this "me," the more I realize how being around lots of people discombobulates me. I literally feel the emotional energy of others and it can be too much. Some call this being 'empathic' but I see it as more of an extra keen survival perception I picked up from being around some volatile and unwell people over the years. Anyway...I tend to soak up the emotional experiences of others especially when they share with me, to the point I am drained, and I feel absolutely awful in crowds especially when there is a lot of grief or chaos. I don't like being in crowds anyway. Funerals are not fun. I am extra anxious, awkward, uncomfortable.
I am also, as I have been saying, in the purification stage of my healing and waking up. I am having a lot of caustic samskara impurities coming to the surface to be released. They burn more coming up, I think, then they did going down. So, there is a fair degree of emotional discomfort to observe and experience. These impressions and stored memories are wrapped in some pretty nasty and self destroying core beliefs.
In the Basement of the Mind
It is really shocking and surprising to discover what has been creeping around in the cellar of my mind all these years...that which I couldn't see until the upper level was removed to expose them. I, as a person still over identified in "me," observe thoughts like: Everything I do is going to hurt people or be construed as wrong even when I try to do "good" things; People are going to think I'm weird if I step up or reach out. Well, they likely think I am weird anyway. Best to stay back; I shouldn't have done that which I thought was kind- I must have hurt them or insulted them some how. They will be angry with me or judge me as being "weird"from now on.
Even when I step back to distance as a witness to the experience of this human I call "me", I observe old messaging emerging to the surface as if others are talking about this "me" like: This human is so neurotic, backwards and awkward...no one would ever want to take the time to actually get to know her, let alone understand her, would they?; The others are all so "normal" and she is so "abnormal"; Look at her- she is so unworthy around others; A break? She doesn't deserve a break and will likely never get one. Her needs are not important...how dare she think of herself; She is here to suffer, to make up for some very thick karma; She needs to live this life as one big penance. She needs to be constantly punished for her endless sins. Heck she must be one big walking sin...no wonder why Life is so hard on her.
Pretty gruesome and brutal, right? These nasty beliefs have been hiding under so many pseudo layers of confidence, superficial belief, and a painted-on exterior for decades. With the upper levels blown away, the basement is now exposed. It isn't pretty but it is very healing. To see what I have to work with makes the process much easier. I can see what I was believing and disentangle myself from it. I can label it as "belief" and not who I am. Still, it is surprising to see what has been activating my life experience. I knew I had some core beliefs in me that were not life enhancing but I was not aware they were this bad until I got this deep into the excavation of Self project I am on, until I debrided so many of those upper layers of self-protective "me" away. What a mess I have in my basement. So, I was dealing with the mess at the funeral too.
Triggers
I was also still recovering from the samskara triggering that occurred the evening before. And some new triggering was happening at the funeral. There were people there who had received or would have been made aware of some of the projects I did out of what I believed to be kindness. This triggered the Everything I do is going to hurt people or be construed as wrong even when I try to do "good" things; People are going to think I'm weird if I step up or reach out. Well, they likely think I am weird anyway. Best to stay back; I shouldn't have done that which I thought was kind- I must have hurt them or insulted them some how. They will be angry with me or judge me as being weird from now on. I imagined these people were angry or judging me for what I offered. Those exposed and activated beliefs added to the inner chaos of the experience.
Dismantled Beliefs
And I was in a catholic church participating in the mass like I normally would do if I was still practicing. That felt familiar and soothing, at the same time it felt hypocritical. I don't believe everything the church says anymore. I see beyond it. These beliefs have truly been dismantled over the years and are piled up in the wreckage of the other layers. That added to the inner turmoil.
Anyway, so there I was at the funeral yesterday, standing in the basement of this flimsy psyche, with all these core beliefs crawling over me like giant spiders...biting here and biting there. The shell was gone, and I couldn't hide the mess anymore. It was exposed for everyone to see, it seems. I was aware, at least, of the exposure as I looked around at all the beautiful people with their houses still neatly intact around them, seemingly confident, happy and content to believe what they were believing.
I was having a very chaotic inner experience. I was witnessing the human I call "me" have a chaotic inner experience. I literally had the inclination to run out the back doors as fast as I could.
But I remembered:
If someone suffers, he or she is blessed, because by that suffering some impurities are turned out. Satchidnanda
I have to suffer a bit to get to where I want to go.
Dying
To be reborn, you have to die first. Lucien Carr
It was what was left of the dying "me", I suddenly realized, having the uncomfortable experience, not the Self. Though most of the upstairs and downstairs of the house that once protected me was gone..."I am" was and is still there/here. "I am" was standing undisturbed in the basement, perfectly still and unmoved, in the tattered and torn remnants of the frame with pieces of insulation flapping in the wind. Seeing that in my mind's eye, I suddenly imagined what it would be like to have all the outside layers gone.
Falling Back into Nothingness
I imagined falling back through those thorns for the final clearing away process. I imagined every bit of remaining neurosis, of people pleasing tendency, and personality being scraped off. I imagine what it would be like to walk up that aisle not one bit concerned about what others thought, not concerned about being homeless literally and figuratively, not concerned about ever being 'known' or seen for who I was, not having an ounce of anxiety, fear, or any of the other emotions that are brought on by activation of those core beliefs...of just feeling unconditional love and peace and joy. I imagined what it would feel like to be immersed in the present moment loving all of it no matter what it brought! It was amazing!
Though I may have scraped away a few rusty nails and old boards in that visualization, I didn't fall all the way through. I was too scared to die. So, I pictured myself still in the basement dragging it and this human I call "me" up the aisle for communion, with my not so friendly spiders crawling all over me and the little bits of remaining house frame being dragged behind. I pictured the Self not completely reborn but still in the so obviously imperfect dying self, in its very messy authentic vulnerability...possibly even hard to look at or at least to not judge harshly...I pictured the judgments and opinions of others over my open imperfections and I could see that none of it mattered...at all!! I could see for a second how none of that was important. I had a glimpse of true peace and that glimpse fed me.
It reminded me of my motivation and goal...to die to be reborn. It reminded me that there is a way out of all this suffering, and it is simply through. I do not have to do anything. I definitely do not have to run around to catch the flying pieces and replace them...I don't need to rebuild anything false and unsolid around me. I can let it all go, and I can simply fall back into what is. I can die to be reborn!
All is well in my world.
Yoga is for internal cleansing, not external exercising. Yoga means true Self-knowledge.
K. Pattabhi Jois
I pulled the last remaining concept from the jar yesterday and what was it? "Purification". Go figure. It is so cool how things like this happen. I was thinking, reading, and writing about purification over the course of the last few days and I was also acutely aware of "suffering". Reminded of how the two go together, I was given an opportunity to speak on it by drawing this concept.
Anyway, I am intent on purifying, and serendipity is hanging around to remind me that is my mission :)
All is well.
The mind too, must be washed, squeezed, tossed, and ironed. Don't think that if someone causes us pain that they hate us, but rather that they are helping us to purify ourselves. If we can think like this we are real yogis. If anybody hurts our feelings, we should just smile at them. "Thank you. I want more and more. I know you want me to become pure soon. Bring your friends also to inflict pain."
Swami Satchidananda; Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, page 43
My mind is stuck on the agitation cycle of this big washing machine Life provides. I am not yet a true Yogi. I felt that agitation yesterday.
There are some "old friends" who have caused so much pain to my family and I over the year ( now I realize years). They have lied, publicly slandered, manipulated, controlled, and have actively and even aggressively attempted to take away from us that which is most precious. They have done it all while wearing a cape of self righteousness and in an attempt to make themselves look like rescuers and saviours in a story they created. They publicly and unjustly villified us so they could play the heros. It was brutal and oh so cruel!
I was so, so hurt; felt so betrayed. It broke my heart. I was angry and I even hated for a while. I did not want to carry those unwholesome things around in me. So, I tried to forgive and even have to some extent. "They know not what they do." That is the mantra I repeated to myself over and over again. at the same time I questioned, "Or do they?"
They may not yet see the error of their ways. One may never. One, I realize now, might lack that capacity for seeing clearly through compassion...though they will profess to be the most compassionate person on the planet. The other is so manipulated into believing the story that seeing clearly now may make life too uncomfortable for him. Sigh! The one person who I always felt had a right to be hurt by what happened, and whose acting out I accepted, understood, and even attempted to support at the cost of my own well being...is the one that may be seeing clearly now. I suspect she is being encouraged not to see clearly....but still, yesterday I seen a simple act of kindness that warmed my heart. I forgave her completely with that one act. I had great compassion for her. It felt so good to feel compassion instead of anger and hurt.
Anyway, I didn't realize how triggered I would be upon seeing her parents last evening. The tears welled up behind my eyes. I couldn't look at them. There was such anger towards one...such a deep seething anger. I was so angry. I was also disappointed in myself for being so uncomfortable. I just wanted to stay as far away from these people as I could. But mostly I was just so hurt.
I accepted the feelings, understood them, but I didn't want to keep them in me. I could see clearly the past and present "friendship" that was never really a "friendship". I could almost see so clearly how that self righteous mind in front of me was operating...I remembered so much...years and years of my feeling so inferior made sense. That shame based personality I identified as most of my life was no match for a self righteous one. See now what I didn't see then. Her behaviour angers me but it has less of a surprise element to it so it doesn't hurt in the same way. It was his behaviour that hurt me the most becasue it surprised me. Regardless, there is so much stuff and tangled up emotion that comes up when I see them. That, I believe, is why the tears began then and continue to flow now. So, much I stuffed away from this year's experience and so much I stuffed away from my 16 -20 year old experience. It needs to come out.
I wish I had the strength yesterday to stand up to them and say, "Thank you for helping me to purify." Because, though they have no clue or no intention to do anything kind for this "me", they are helping me to purify and I am grateful for that! I am! But I didn't have the courage...I was too much of an emotional mess. Maybe someday...maybe someday, I will be strong enough to do so. Until then...until this washing machine hits the rinse cycle...I just have to stay away from them. They are not good for my soul.
All is well.
Hope is being able to see there is a light despite all the darkness.
Desmon Tutu
I realize that Debbie Downer and Negative Nellie have been chirping away in my psyche again and from there they are making themselves known on the page. I am not going to beat myself up for that. I see where it is coming from. The physical, energetic, and mental body has been a little squashed down by circumstance on the outside and are burning a bit from the tapas rising to be released on the inside. It is like having really bad heart burn at the same time dealing with a full body second-third degree sunburn. Ouch! :)
The wisdom body and of course the Ananda body are not one bit disturbed by this burning. Infact, despite the whining from Debbie and Nellie... wisdom body is getting a bit more wise and Ananda body is becoming a bit more obvious. I know this is a healing thing!! I do!!
Right now it just sucks a bit, that's all. It is still all so good.
And, I am still looking "out there" for evidence that the universe has my back. I am grasping at every bit of evidence I can find. I felt "hope" yesterday for all of an hour when a remote, potential, nothing secure or definite by any means possibile solution for the money concern emerged. It was like a little stream of light coming from a tiny crack in cloud cover and man...was I there to grab it. I lay under it. I rolled under it. I sucked every ounce of it up. I felt like Life may actually have my back or at least it was not out to trample me down into the ground. That little bit of "hope" (and you know how I am not big on the hope thing) replaced the chirping of the depressing duo with a big fat, "Maybe?"
That "maybe" was all I needed. Mind became less depressing, emotions rose up the scale, energy lifted, and the physical body felt lighter. I found myself back at the book I was neglecting writing and just streaming along from one chapter to the next. It was like it wasn't for nothing anymore. That "maybe" there, I thought, might move into a "maybe" here....and that motivated me.
I felt up! I felt "positive" for the first time in so long.
Though I know the solution to all problem is internal not external, and know full well where suffering is taking me in terms of growth and learning. (I even accept that! I do!!.).. did I ever need some sign from the universe that it wasn't just going to be "all suffering and challenge" for me from now on during these final learning lessons, that I was going to get a break here and there. It is all just too heavy and dark. Hope, as much as I see the unsolid nature of it, is giving me that light I need to keep going.
I am at a very, very challenging portion of the"advanced and excelerated growth" course I signed up for. The learning is tough. I have been so curled forward into the complicated studies, it seems, it got very dark around me and I didn't even notice. I needed/need light. I needed/need a recess outdoors. So, though it may only be a five minute one and I may be called in as soon as I step outside (this is not an actual solution but just a hope derived, remote possibility shining on me) it is something better than what I had. So, I grabbed it.
I appreciate the lift so much!!! I do...regardles of the actual outcome. I realize that which the hope is pointing to may never come to pass. Just to be lifted out of this negative onslaught for five mere minutes, however, is a blessing. Thank you Universe!
In this game everyone needs a break to refuel, recharge, and jump back in full throttle.
Helen Edwards
Oh wow! This waking up is not as easy as it looks, is it?
All is well in my world.
There is nothing out there that can fix what it is wrong in here....
I heard this from Michael A. Singer today and it reminded me of the so called decision I feel I have to make. I feel like I am in desperate need for external change.
I have been getting really, really good at accepting what is and allowing Life to make most of the decisions for me. I am really nolonger that attached to outcome...
but...
Once again here I am wondering what major changes I can make in my life to make me feel better in here. So convinced am I that it is the external varibles causing this so called "overwhelming sense of suffering". Don't get me wrong...things are tough: from what my body is doing from literally the feet to the head...to the day to day stressors that hit me...big ones...that I can't seem to get a moment's repreive from...my future is not so bright that I have to wear shades lol...sorry Cory Hart. External circumstances are not appealling to my physical, energetic, or mental body. I feel almost crushed by these circumstances at times and I fear what will happen to this human I call me if she/I stay where I am allowing all these things pile on top of her/me. ...So that leads me to this idea that I have to make changes soon.
How true is that idea?
At the same time I see the heaviness of these external situations, I have to ask these questions: Is my desire or need to make change a form of resistance? Will change fix what is really broken or will it just distract me from it? Is it my life circumstances that are the true problem or is it something in me that is the root of the problem?
Of course, it is something in me that is the real problem, it is the attachment to this idea of me that is the problem. I know life events are just triggering my samskaras and stirring them up...causing more than a bit of burning (tapas). Because of my practice these samskaras are all coming up, it seems, at once.
Celebrate when the stored energy starts to come up...
That is not so easy to do. It feels absolutely terrible. So bad that my human self just automatically goes into resistance mode seeking a way "to make it stop!" It is programmed to search "out there" for the solutions.
At the same time I am in the agitation cycle of the cleaning process-samskaras are coming up for me to deal with and release...Life is throwing one circumstance at me after another to possibly stir up and speed up the process. I am being hit with the pain of the samskaras at the same time I am hit with the pain of the life events happening right now. Feels like I am being punched from inside and outside at the same time.
The very stuff you think is terrible some one else thinks is wonderful
Wonderful? This isn't fun!!!lol I can tell myself, "This is a wonderful thing...Life is just trying to clean me out faster..." but I don't always believe it. I find myself believing I need to make external world changes to survive. It is like I keep returning to the default browser my human mind is set on.
I know...I know...I know. The first thing to do is remind myself of my Life mission. My Life mission is not to have an easy, pain free life...it is to purify. It is to stop stuffing and storing and to allow all the stuffed and stored stuff to come out. I am trying to clear the way for an unimpeded shakti flow. I, therefore, have to be willing to "feel" and "experience" the pain of what I stored and is now being released.
I need to relax...into the samskara release and into what Life is giving me. That is the second thing I need to do. Relax and allow.
Then, thirdly, I can make external world changes if I need to from a calm inspired mind. Life is going to make a lot of these decisions for me anyway. I don't have to decide to lose the house...lol...it will go if I don't pay the mortgage. But...with a relaxed allowance of what is...I can make decisions on how I lose the house and to whom.
Letting go of that which we have no control is the most healing thing we can do. We need to remember that whatever comes up from our storage cellars and whatever Life throws at us cannot hurt us. It is just energy, like wind, blowing through or by.
These energies can't hurt you if you let them pass...if you hold on, however, they become turbulent energies...trapped energy inside you.
Suffering comes when we refuse to let Life be Life, when we don't let the wind pass through or by, when we resist the emergence of our painful samskaras or resist what Life gives us.
You do not need to suffer...
We can be cleasned and free.
All is well.
Michael Singer ( June 5,2025) You are Not Broken-You're just full of unreleased energy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85m62GENSXU&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=1
The direct meaning of "tapas" is to burn....When we burn we feel some heat and pain. We undergo suffering. So, "Tapas" also means to accept suffering. If someone suffers, he or she is blessed, because by that suffering some impurities are purged out.
In order to make our minds clean and steady we must accept suffering, pain, and poverty. It is even more beneficial if, at the same time that we accept pain, we bring happiness to others.
Swami Satchidnandanda ( 2011) The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Integral Yoga Publications (page 138)
I am burning. I am burning from the tooth right now ( date set for the 18th...not sure how I will make it to then or how I will afford it if insurance doesn't cover some. Crazy expensive!) ...I am burning from other discomforts going on in this body. I am burning from any lingering fear or worry about these things ( though that fear no longer runs my life)...burning from the decision making process that will involve major changes in my life...I am burning from the thoughts of impending loss....burning from the suffering of those around me. Yeah, I am burning a bit. And it is all good. When I think about it all as purifying me, I say "bring it on!" (Then I quickly curl up and say, "but please be gentle." lol)
Now...I need to focus more on bringing happiness to others.
All is well.
Your mind is a garden
Your thoughts are the seeds
You can grow flowers
or you can grow weeds.
unknown
Here I am again weeding this messy garden in my mind...attempting to pull all egoic weeds out ( I am learning to be a little more gentle with that process) and I am attempting to water the more wholesome seeds that contain the "ether" of all that is.
My ego, especially the negative thinking/believing part of my ego is still lingering around and it has much too much control over my life. Its weeds are hard to tame.
I still check the stats page everyday to see if I am getting through to anyone and I don't even know who that "anyone" is suppose to be- a population out there I cannot see or just me? Does it matter? I truly am less attached to outcome but I am not completely detached. The thought of having more readership does lift my spirits a bit. Yeah it does. The thought of connecting and having like minded people understand and appreciate what I have to say adds a little lightness to the heaviness I feel sometimes.
Anyway, the numbers are very high again...but the engaged readers are very low. I wonder then why are these numbers from Brazil, Singapore, and Vietnam showing up on my page? What do they get from doing that? Why do bots do what they do? As long as they are harmless I do not care. ...but I am curious. What do the directors of these bots want by hitting obscure blog pages?
There is always this moment when the numbers begin to rise when I feel a certain, "OMG after the twenty some years I have been blogging...maybe...it ( whatever 'it' is) is happening ." Then...negative mind steps in and taps that core belief inside me...the weed flourishs. I realize I do not quite trust that Life has my back and that it will pour blessings upon me. Infact, I don't even trust that bad things won't happen, that I as a writer of this blog will remain unharmed. That deep core belief that life, systems, others, circumstance will add much more suffering to this human I call me's expereince before the final curtain gets tapped again and again arises.
It surprises me and saddens me to see how I let that one belief rule my life. How so many of us operate under such beliefs.
Maybe that is why I don't submit a lot. I am all confused about my writing. I work endlessly on "safe" projects...like the Learning English book or the books I wrote for my kids at school on writing. I then tell myself until these books are completed and out there exactly the way I want, I won't tackle my novel again or this non fiction book I am re-writing on getting beyond fear and shame. I won't submit any poetry. ( I have soooo much poetry). Then...I don't get to these children's non-fiction pieces enough. I open them up and find a thousand different reasons why I have to close them down. (Literally, I could finish and have these books up in one day or two.) There is some sick procrastination and avoidance thing going on. Crazy.
This core belief that not only will I not receive blessings, especially as a writer, I will be punished for it in some way is always there in the background. Maybe it is related to some sick belief that I shouldn't be doing that thing that brings peace, joy, and meaning to my life...that I don't deserve joy or fulfillment...therefore I definitely cannot expect any of the "added ons" when I write??? I realize how absolutely cra-cra that belief is but there it is.
So, I end up embracing obscurity a bit. I feel safer standing in the shadows than I do on the dance floor. I feel better when I "don't try hard" that way it is less frustrating when I fail or get more suffering as a reward fro my work. It's crazy...but all this comes up when I see that someone/something out there is using my special writing place to park their bots on.
Hmmm! I am not sure if the bots have to go...but this belief has to go! I need to dig down to the roots (gently), disentangle those roots from that the roots of that which I want to grow, and pull it out once and for all. I need to clean up this garden
Do you have any weeds in your mental/life garden you need to remove?
All is well.
We can see how the "bright ones" became merged into one principle; and likewise in the ideas of the cosmos we find the ancient thinkers going higher and higher-from the fine elements they go to finer and more embracing elements, and from these particulars they come to one omnipresent ether, and from that even they go to an all embracing force, or Prana; and through all this runs the principle, that one is not seperate from the others. It is the very ether that exists in the higher form of Prana, or the higher form of Prana concretes, so to say, and becomes ether; and that ether becomes still grosser and so on.Vivekananda
To begin, the Rishis looked at the dense matter around them and began to question what it was made of. As they reflected in the "laboratory of cell research" they could see that there was something deeper hidden beneath the surface of this physical phenomena that seems so real. According to Vivekenanda, this is what they discovered as they went deeper as that energy frequency went higher :
All is well.
Vivekananda (n.d) 2.6 Practical Vedanta and Other Lectures. Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda. Kindle
That which is the fine cause in all these things, of It are all these things made.That is the All, that isTruth,thou art That, O Shvetaketu....As a bee...gathers honey from different flowers, and as the honeys do not know that they are from various trees, and from various flowers, so all of us, having come to that Existence, know not that we have done so. Now, that which is that subtle essence, in It all that exists has Its self. It is the True. It is the Self and thou, O Shvetaketu, are That...
As the rivers, when they are in the ocean, do not know they have been various rivers, even so when we come out of that Existence, we do not know that we are That. O Shvetaketu, thou art That.
A vedic passage relayed by Vivekananda in his Complet Works (Kindle Edition)
Give up all these mad pursuits, and then play your part in the universe, as an actor on the stage.
An actor on the stage?
Yes, we need to remember that this that we are experiencing isn't real compared to that which is experiencing. Life is one big stage we get to play a role on. Remember what Shakespeare wrote in "As You Like It?"
"All the world's a stage, And all men and women merely players."
When we see this that we are experiencing as just a part of a script we wrote and are starring in, and see ourselves as actors choosing to play these parts, we are not so attached to the drama. Are we? Even if we play the part of beggar (that I might be casted for soon lol). It is isn't real. It is just a part and a script we are temporarily getting to participate in.
The actor knows his beggary is not true, but that he has assumed it for play, while the real beggar thinks that it is his too familiar state and that he has to bear it whether he wills it or not.
We do not have to be so invested in these roles we are playing. We are much better off if we do not get lost in character. We can also look out at the world as less threatening than they appear to be to the one lost in character. We can see it for the beautiful, awesome,temporary experience it is.
The whole universe is changed, and instead of an eternal prison this world has become a playground; instead of a land of competition it is a land of bliss, where there is perpetual spring, flowers in bloom and butterflies flit about. This very world becomes heaven, which formerly was hell. To eyes of the bound it is tremendous place of torment, but to the eyes of the free it is quite otherwise.
Wow! We need to know the costumes we are wearing can come off anytime...so we can look at the world with the eyes of the free.
All is well.
Vivekananda (n.d.) Complete works. Kindle
Crow's lesson is to work...walk without fear even if the way is not clear...trust your intuition and the animals that cross your path to guide you...
Soul Wolf Journey?
The story of (not the reality of) this Life I call "mine" hits me every morning when I wake up. I slip from perfect awareness of the present moment's reality: the gentle sunlight pouring through the cracks in the curtain, the smelll of new apple blossoms carried on the breeze, the wagging tails and trusting eyes of my pets, the miraculous function of this body as I get out of bed and stretch...and right down into the "ugh!" story in my head. Sigh!
I have recently been hit in the face with some other big "woes" and though I am handling these things better than I would in the past, (they consume me much less than they would of)...they are there and I wonder, like I did this morning, "Now...how am I going to get out of this mess, this time?"
Once again, I am at the verge of losing the bit of material stability/identity I have left...been losing and clinging...losing and clinging for almost 15 years now...since the time I had to go off work and later reduce my hours because of health issues. This really isn't a result of poor money management on my part...I am able to do amazing things with little. I don't need a lot. This is a result of giving too much of "me" away before Self was ready to let go, before I truly understood what letting go meant. It is a result of being mixed up...confusing selflessness and service with people pleasing. It is a result of putting the needs of others (mostly their egos) above my own.
I have been clinging so long to this house, to this bit of whatever I have left materially for others, and now I am tired of clinging. A big change has to come. I have to let go of what I have been clinging to and let others find their way. I think I could survive any outcome...I really do...what held me back was always the question, "Can they?" I have been buffering suffering and creating more suffering in return. Suffering is something people need to learn to go through...by understanding it at its roots. The only way out is through. I wasn't helping anyone by doing the suffering for them, least of all myself.
Anyway, I ramble. I mention this because this was on my mind for a few weeks weighing me down. I know a big change is needed to be made. Well, during this time of contemplating change, I befreinded a crow. I have been feeding the crows for years now...I usually start the season off with one, then two, and then before I know it there is a murder appearing on my line cawing at me to feed them. Well, for now there is one...a juvenille maybe? I am not sure. He knows me. He comes to me when I call if he is around. He will make these little swoops right over my head before settling on a branch an arm length away. I can get really close to this guy. I can look up at him and talk and he listens. If anyone else comes near he flies away. Though I haven't a word out loud regarding my worries, somehow I share them in those moments connecting with this crow.
Anyway, he also always sees me with one of my cats who loves to be outdoors. Anything with any emotional intelligence would recognize there was a bond between this cat and I if they were to see us together. I ws very surprised to see how much emotional intelligence a crow has.
Well, my cat got chased up a tree yetserday by the neighbor's dog...high up a tree. (This happens quite frequently). So, I went out with D. to coax her down. The crow, I think was flying overhead with a new mate possibly? and spotted us. He turned around and landed on a tree nearby. His mate landed on a tree further away before flying off.
We needed to climb the tree to get to Sylvester. I was holding the ladder and D. was climbing. The crow flew to a tree closer. I continued to speak to my cat in an attempt to coach her to come down. She wouldn't move. The crow flew to a branch on a tree right next to the tree Sylvester was on and began to caw and caw. It was not a threatening caw or anything...Sylvester did not seem one bit disturbed by it but she did look at the crow as if she was listening. She attempted to move down to the next branch and stalled again. The crow flew to the branch she was on ...a hand breath away from her...and began to caw again. Sylvester seemed to listen and moved down a little lower before getting scared and moving back up to the secure branch. The crow flew to the branch right above her and just sat there. Then he flew off and I watched as he circled the sky above our heads as if warning would-be predators to stay away. He came back and sat on a tree beside the tree the cat was on and watched and waited. We got my cat down. I watched , afterwards, as she scurried off somewhere to get her bearings. I then looked over my left shoulder and there was the crow on the branch behind me...so close I could easily reach up and touch him. He was just sitting there watching. I smiled and thanked him. He flew off. I went into get him some peanuts as a thank you. I called him and he came back to eat the peanuts. I knew that crow was trying to help us get the cat down! More importantly, he was offering me a vlauable lesson. He showed me the reality of Life without the story.
Anyway, I bring that up because it filled my heart with light to see this sense of cooperation and interbeingness in a crow. It put a renewed trust in nature and Life into me. Everything is helping everything else even if we can't see it happening. I knew at that moment that though I would hate to lose my yard with these amazing creatures in it...I would be okay; we would all be okay. We will get down from this tree and we will get universal support to do so. Life has the back of all beings including me.
Trust the animals that cross your path...
I absolutely love crows!!!
All is well.
Mind can be the greatest gift, or the greatest curse.
Michael A. Singer
How is your mind treatin ya? Is it a gift you use to explore, in awe, the miracles of this world? Or is it a creator and source of great suffering for you?
My mind has been a great source of suffering for me for most of my life. Much less now that I have discovered it is the cause of the suffering and have backed away from its stories, its lies, its crazy mixed up tales of reality. I have backed away but I must admit it still pulls me back in from time to time.
Just this morning, for example, I woke up focusing on the fact that this human I call "me" has been through so much crap in her 61 years on the planet. I was questioning why things were so difficult for this "me" and heard myself actually uttering the very same words Singer used in his podcast,
"Nothing ever happens that is good for me."
I knew as soon as those words came out of my mouth that that wasn't true but the thought did enter my mind. It is true that, for some reason I do not understand completely with this limited mind, this human has encountered one situation after the next that put it in survival mode. And it got stuck there. In this mode there is little room for fun, joy, adventure, growth, and expansion in terms the outer world would deem as such. The focus in on "How do I survive?" More importantly, "How do I assist and ensure the others around me stay alive and survive?"
Say what, crazy lady? You were never in a war zone or living on the street. How can you say that?
That's true. It is. I have been so blessed in many ways but a lot of the circumstances I encountered, despite the culture of abundance, ease, and comfort in which I grew up... threatened survival, in one way or another, of the body (mine and others), of the householder "me"- I came very close to losing everything after I got sick, and right now I am just clinging to what I have left of a material life, and of of the psychosocial me. If I wrote a list and shared it... about the things this human dealt with throughout this life span to date...people would shake their heads and say, "Oh I don't want to hear that. I don't want to know about that. You are being dramatic!You are focusing too much on the negative and feeling sorry for yourself" or "That's just fiction. Those things don't happen around here."
Oh, they do and they did. Life circumstances, for this "me", were more than a bit bizarre and accumulative.
I, therefore, lived with an overworked amygdala and still do. My fight or flight reactions, though sometimes overexaggerated, are getting plenty of opportunity to do the job they were designed to do. They had plenty of opportunity for practice. This constant "practice" of my body's alarm system left me either in active emergency response or languishing in stuckness when there was no crisis to deal with. This is certainly not a mentality built on "flousrishing", is it? It is not a healthy mind.
So, yeah I often catch myself saying, in a moment of extra weakness, "Nothing good ever happens to me." Sometimes my frame of reference is so tiny, focusing only on survival.
We often define our frame of reference into tiny nothings...we limit it to the few personal experiences we as seperate humans have in life
So, it is true my mind has been a curse...when I got lost in this tiny frame of reference...but it has also been a gift.
I think I personally (though there really is not personal in this) have an amazing mind. It is this mind that allowed this human to survive as long as she did. It is this mind that made "me" extra perceptive and I developed an amazing survival intelligence. I learned, early on, what others might be feeling or thinking based on their outward language. I became very perceptive. I learned to discover what was going on in my body when others were too often telling me that "nothing was going on"...keeping it going. I learned about the suffering in the world and how maybe I could help a bit. I learned how to survive with so little and remain loving and giving. I learned about what was truly important and what wasn't.
This mind we all share is a compassionate mind. It showed me how we are all inter being so I connect with the world in a gentle, loving way. It allowed me to see and apprecaite all the little intricate details of nature, of human behaviours, of expereince and of Life. It opened up creativity to me, and the magic of words...As if it handed me a canvas and amazing colours (words) and said , "Go paint!" . It made me a questioner of everything...it offered me so many big, beautiful questions which left me exploring some amazing mysteries in my attempt to answer them.
It allowed me to experience "awe"...not just the "Awe!! Not again. Why do I have to deal with yet another crisis?" but..."Awe!!! Oh My God, This world is Absolutely Amazing!!"
Use your mind for something greater than you-the personal self.
So, though my mind is still operating on survival mode as Life dances in front of this human, dropping off at its feet whatever it drops off...so many challenges and so many blessings, though it still creates a convincing tale of suffering that still has the capacity to draw me in from time to time...I am grateful for my mind. I am learning to transcend judgement and practice compassion no matter what Life enfolds in front of me.
Afterall,
It is not personal! It's just Life!
All is well!
Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( May 29, 2025) Expanding Beyond the Personal Mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N30LfzR2J1c&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=1
But everyone who hears those words of mine, and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.
Matthew 7:26
The sand in this bible could be the frozen wavelets of thought and self concept in the mind that Michael Singer speaks of in the below podcast. The shallow sandy earth or the frozen wavelets upon the ocean...on which we create our comfort zones and choose to live...is not sturdy. We need to dig deeper into rock and build a more substantial foundation. We need to recognize where the wavelet begins...know that it is meant to move up, down...and be gone. Each wavelet is just something that happens on the Ocean. Thaw it out, let it fall back to that Source and build a more substantial foundation. Go deeper!
Otherwise...
The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against the house, and it fell with a great crash! Matthew 7: 27
Micheal A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( May 26, 2025) Wavelets of Consciousness: The Field of Mind Explained. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_ttjiduq-w&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=1
...things have been perceived and realised and then written. This world spoke to the early thinkers. the birds spoke to them, animals spoke to them, the sun and the moon spoke to them; and little by little they realised things, and got into teh herat of nature. Not by cognition, not by the force of logic, not by picking the brains of others and making a big book, as is the fashion in modern times [1984], not even as I do by taking up one of their writings and making a long lecture, but by patient investigation and discovery they found the truth....
It is practice first, and knowledge afterwards.
A thought is just a little wavelet in the field of mind...
How do you freeze a wavelet? You focus on it. Your consciousness is an [energetic] force.[we froze a lot of wavelets and they took over the mind]. ...
Why do you [as consciousness] focus on the wave when there was a whole ocean in view?
Michael A Singer
Go home to Self where there is no more suffering....Suffering and happiness are not enemies...they inter-are. We can't have happiness without suffering. We cannot have suffering without happiness.
Thich Nhat Hanh (maybe not exactly as said but close enough! :))
I was listening to Thich Nhat Hanh as I was soaking in the tub last evening. These words were so impactful that I was able to remember them until I could jot them down.
Where is this Self Thich Nhat Hanh is talking about?
We as conceptual beings like to be able to visualize our destinations, don't we? We need directional terms to help us do that. Whereas Self is likely nothing more than empty space...we can, maybe, satisfy the intellectual mind by saying it is to the inner most layer of who we are that we must return to. It is the "ananda body", the fifth kosha that is home.
So in directional terms we can say we need to go inward and deeper in order to go home and get to Self. We need to work our way through the first three koshas. Let's imagine drilling a big tunnel through the physical body, our energetic body, and our mental body. We are drilling through the suffering layers to reach the happiness layers.
Huh?
Let's make the distinction between pain and suffering before we begin. Pain and challenge are natural parts of life and suffering is resistance to that natural flow. When we learn to accept and allow in a way we can become active participants in the dance...we can find happiness. Most of us spend our lives, however, resisting, especially in the first three layers, therefore we suffer.
Physical Kosha is Not Home
The Self is wrapped by four other bodies. The most outer layer is where most of us, in the west, are stuck. We see the physical body as being all there is. Some of us are so identified with this belief that only matter and physicality is real that we never go deeper. There is a lot of suffering on this layer...a lot of tension and physical resistance to the painful or unpleasant...a lot of attempts made to create comfort and safety for the body. We live in survivalist mode, resisting pain, disturbance, challenge when we identify only with the physical kosha and assume it is home etc. We seek happiness in all the wrong places-"out there." We struggle against the world to get it. We suffer.
The Energetic Body is Not Home
Some of us may move into the energetic body which many of us in the west fail to understand. We just want to feel "good" to feel that energy up. We will play with our energy fields in an attempt to maintain that sense of "feeling good". We will reach for substances, activities, outer world pursuits from the physical layer to keep this energy going. We see this false euphoria that never lasts, that breeds craving as home.We suffer.
The Mental Body is Not Home
Some may move a little deeper into the mental body. This is the part of us where the conceptual mind reigns...where emotionality reigns. We settle into our beliefs, our dogmas, our doctrine, our ideas, our judgements, our thinking, and our feelings here. We create a home called "me", a psyche, a personality, a persona we display to the world. We do everything to build and defend it. We do everything we can to make this home comfy...to make the "me" happy. But the trouble is we look in the wrong direction for that happiness. We see happiness as a pushing away of pain and challenge and a clinging to anything "out there" that makes it remotely comfortable in here. We live in very, very messy and chaotic homes when we do that creating agreat deal of suffering. We suffer.
We need to realize in this layer that our so called homes are a mess, that this idea of happiness seeking and suffering avoidance is not the way. We have to see that neither our suffering or our happiness is dependent on the conditions of the outer world. We have to see that there are deeper layers to explore, and that the conditions of happiness lay within those layers. This external world and these first three layers are not home.
The Wisdom Body is Not Home
When we reach this point of realization, instead of digging we fall into the fourth layer...the jnana or wisdom layer. We can call this home briefly. Here we begin with concepts to explore the possibility of our beingness. We begin to ask "Who am I"? As we ask these questions we begin to realize that they cannot be answered with more concepts. Realization is a "felt expereince". We suffer much less here.
The Ananda Body is Home
We fall from wisdom into the Ananda body...where we expereince Self...where we realize we are and always were home. This is not just the end of suffering; this is not just the finding of happiness...this is bliss. Home is Bliss...More precicely it is Sat Chit Ananda: Existence Consciousness and Bliss.
All is well in my world.
A miracle contains the gift of grace, for it is given and received as one. And thus it illustrates the laws of truth the world does not obey, because it fails entirely to understand its ways. A miracle inverts perception which was upside down before, thus it ends the strange distortions that were manifest.
ACIM: Workbook: Part II: Chapter 13: 2:1-3
It is said that when a yogi reaches true samadhi they may attain extraordinary powers called Siddhis.They may be able to manifest things out of the air, be in two places at once, read minds etc. Siddhis may be seen as false displays of a woo-woo impossibility to a materialistic scientist; and they may be perceived as miracles to another more open bystander witnessing the use of such a power. To a true yogi, however, they are not parlor tricks or miracles. They are simply considered natural by products of advanced states of consciousness. They are the expression of normal capabilities of consciousness that the majority of the population have yet to tap into.
These powers are not miracles, Michael Singer tells us in the below linked podcast. They could and should be normal to our human experience. They are possibilities we could all tap into when we fall back into that higher state of consciousness we are. He reminds us that our minds are conduits for extraordinary power. Thoughts are manifestations of that power. Our minds, he tells us, can pick up high frequency energy that scientists have yet to develop the scientific tools to measure. Our thoughts are amazing examples of this energy and power.
You have the ability to create an object (thought)on a higher frequency plane that cannot be measured by any scientific instrument.
Thought is such a high frequency occurence that takes us out of the limits of physicality. It is actually the vibrating wavelets on which everything in our universe is created, is it not? Every tech advance, every medical cure, every beautiful creation started where? In the field of the mind. Where do all these inspirational thoughts originate? They must come from one high frequency Source...the field of infinite possibility?
Even when we have yet to awaken fully as the true yogi's have, we still experience this what I call "miracle of the mind". I am always writing here about my "kooky coincidences"; how I may be thinking about something only to discover how someone much more advanced and evolved than I am is thinking about or addressing the very same thing at the same time. Singer reminds us that we are picking up thoughts all the time and doing kooky things with our thoughts. We all have this thinking ability. It is not a strange super power. It is supposed to be normal.
A Miracle?
Singer keeps saying it isn't a miracle. The "normal" power of our minds is simply not experienced yet when we are in these less than evolved states nor is measured yet in the scientific world.
Everything is a miracle until you understand it. We just have not developed yet the instruments to measure it scientifically.
I agree to some extent but then I ask what is a miracle? According to ACIM, A miracle inverts perception that was upside down before.
A miracle then is just a new way of seeing...a correction of wrong perception. Could it be that what the advanced yogi experiences in samadhi is actually the "right" perception? Is it that they are finally immersed in the "laws of Truth" that most of us do not yet obey? The miracle is not woo-woo unreality. The miracle is just real perception of truth. The Yogi, through their advanced practice, has inverted a perception that was upside down and are now truly experiencing what is. The unlimited potential is what is real. Most of us are seeing through a distorted and mixed up view...staring forward and down, as Singer says, at something which keeps us from experiencing who we are and realizing what we are capable of.
Enlightenment is simply a tapping into what is real, what is true. It is not so much something you do, he says, but something you stop doing.
What do we need to stop doing?
We need to stop staring down in front of us at the horror show of a mess we made with these amazing creative minds. We have spent our energy building stories and feeding those stories of "little me drama". They were so compelling that this amazing, infinite, and all powerful consciousness got lost in the virtual reality of this story. We forgot who we are. We are the yogi who is experiencing Samadhi, Sat chit Ananda, and possibly Siddhis. We just don't know it because our attention is on the story...so much so we identify with it.
Remove your attention from the story and what happens? You fall back into what and who you really are. Then you too may see that what you deemed as impossible in your upside down perception is actually more than possible when that perception is righted. We eliminate the strange distortions that were manifest for the truth of our unlimited nature.
All is well.
ACIM https://acim.org/acim/workbook/what-is-a-miracle/en/s/764
Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( May 24, 2025) Beyond the Mind: Escaping the VR of Thought and Emotion. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5s4zc7Yuz4&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=2
Don't let the 'self' in you get trampled down by the 'selves' in others.
A Wise Woman I know
I just had a conversation with someone, who is not another yogi, about my desire to make changes in my life. I told her about how "stuck" I feel here and how I fear for my own mental and physical health. I explained that in no way at all is the "me" of this human being served, despite how much is expected of this "me. I am serving others but "me" is being trampled down. I also explained that I believe that might be a good thing. I told her I find it hard to leave or make changes because I believe this might actually be the perfect environment provided by the universe for my practice. My spiritual practice, I explained, is all about, not only denying the needs of "me", but getting rid of this "me" altogether?
She paused, hummed and hawed a bit before asking,
"So, you need to sacrifice your personal needs, your ego for the needs of other egos? "
It was like a light went on. I am "stuck" here in this life situation partly because I am confusing the self-diminishment goal of Self. I stay because I think I am serving others and therefore serving Self by pushing aside the needs of this "little me". The spiritual goal is all about getting beyond ego. Yet, what I am actually doing is feeding and making stronger the egos of other people. I am allowing my own little ego to get walked over, run down, and trampled on in the service of other egos. It is still all about the ego. Duh? That's not a healthy practice! That is not a healthy living or working situaton!
Yes, let go of the ego to realize Self but remember selflessness is not about giving up your ego to serve other egos. It is about getting beyond ego altogether.
I am not serving the Self in all. I am serving ego. That is why I am stuck here. I am feeding a bunch of hungry egos, just not my own. Between a mixed up spiritual mission and a core belief that says the needs of other personalities are more worthy than my own, I kind of got my tires stuck in the mud. I am tired of being stuck. I am tired of spinning my tires. I am tired of serving ego. I need to make a change for Self.
It's been a long
A long time coming, but I know
a change gon'come
Oh yes it will.
(Sam Cook, A Change is Gonna Come)
All is well!
Growth comes from chaos, not order.
Rakesh Jhunjhunwala
I, as this human I call me, live and move in a state of apparent chaos. I have all my life. I can see that chaotic energy pattern so clearly lately and I realize that if I am seeing it, others are seeing it. And those who are less than aware are likely judging it as a "negative thing" and this human as "weird, crazy, a failure etc" . I am fully aware of that judgement as well...on an intuitive and energetic level. More importantly, I am aware of how I judged and still continue to judge this energy pattern as something that is bad, wrong, or shouldn't be. Why? Because it doesn't fit the ego's definition of normal and validation worthy.
How did and does this energetic pattern impact your life, crazy lady?
I lived a life of chaos in the form of both external and internal struggle and challenge. It wore me down. :)
I stood on a bleacher platform the evening before last watching my son graduate from adult learning. My grandchildren were running around me, the people in the audience were looking up at us because of the noise they were making...my ex husband was sitting on one side, D. was on the other. I was a mixture of stress, anxiety, and exhaustion after trying to control the little ones and keep them safe....and I had the usual feeling I get in crowds...discombobulation...I felt that chaotic energy and I just wanted to escape this moment or get it over with.
But there I was watching my son in gown receive his diploma...something I have been praying for for ten years... and I felt such a rush of emotion...pride and relief...and happiness for sure...but also a question, "What did I do or didn't do that led to this pain inducing ten year delay?"
I imagined the people I knew in the audience asking the same thing. I started to shame and beat myself up a bit...but suddenly my life flashed before my eyes and I witnessed "me" as this human in a drama called "chaos".
I watched this human I call 'me' proceed through 6 decades of life. I could see how chaotic the external circumstances I was born into were. I could see how the hyper sensitive energy body I was born into added to the chaos. I could see the physical, mental and emotional challenges this human endured and overcame. I suddenly had the greatest empathy and compassion for this being as I watched in my mind's eye all the things she had to endure...all the chaos she had to move through. Despite everything she kept moving; she kept giving; she kept loving. Sure, she may appear to be a mess on the outside and she is...at the physical, energetic, social, and mental level...but this human really is something else. She loved and transcended through so much! She deserves much more than the judgment and assumptions she may be getting from others because of what appears. She may never receive it. That's okay too. The world doesn't need to know her story...others can believe what they want about this human. She knows...she knows what it was like to walk through such challenge and chaos.....to experience life through these eyes. Maybe, as others purport, I even asked for all this chaos before I came down into earthly form because I knew at the deepest level ... the perfect value of it? Who knows?
My son has learned and grown through his challenges and he set himself on the path again. I see, too how I have learned and grown along with him. In a way, it is me up there holding that diploma too. I cannot help but to love him and that which made him who he is. I cannot help but to love this human I am and the experience of life she offered me. Yes, so much hardship and challenge and chaos...but finally...there is also so much learning, so much growth.
All is well.
Synchronicity is a special kind of connection that cannot be explained by cause and effect.
Carl Jung
Coincidence! Coincidence! oh Coincidence! I had a lot on my mind yesterday ...well better said consciousness was focusing down on a monkey driven mind yesterday lol...so I didn't notice another kooky and cool coincidence. Yesterday morning, I did begin the Michael Singer podcast...I was listening as I was writing some Vivekananda quotes that took this attention the night before, into this blog. I didn't pay full attention to the podcast but I was listening...I wasn't, however, taking down notes and I didn't finish the video...told myself I would finish this morning. When I came home from work, I had a very important engagement in the evening so I was focusing on that but I wanted to pass the time so I decided to do a video. I pulled one of the many concepts from the jar to discuss. What was the concept? Chit Shakti. I rattled on way past the time frame I try to set...twice...because it was one of those rare situations that I repeated what I recorded. I put it up anyway. It wasn't until this morning that I realized the kooky coincidence. I randomly drew the same topic and spoke pretty much the same message that Michael Singer spoke of in his video the same day. It was like... Wow!
Of course, you do not have to believe me that this was not planned, at all. You do not have to see anything but complete randomosity (if that is a word lol) in this. I, however, see some sort of weird connection that goes beyond the understanding of this very limited human mind. Go figure!
All is well
Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe/ Sounds True ( May 20, 2025) Understanding Shakti: The Flow of Conscious Energy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlW7Q_usvig&list=PLyOuAoSmZkKoESr2acNWwhznusbBkKXsT&index=1
All the powers in the universe are already ours. It is we who have put our hands before our eyes and cry that it is dark...
As soon as you say, "I am a little mortal being," you are saying something which is not true, you are giving the lie to yourselves, you are hypnotising yourselves into something vile, and weak and wrteched. ....
...in the Vedanta there is no attempt at reconciling the present life -the hypnotised life. this false which we have assumed-but this false life must go, and the real life which is always existing must manifest itself, must shine out....
...That is what we are doing all our life, getting frozen from the feet upwards and yet wanting sleep. Therefore you must struggle towards the ideal, and if a man comes who wants to bring that idea down to your level, and teach a religion that does not carry the highest ideal, do not listen to him.Teach men of the strength that is already within them...
..."You are pure and perfect and what you call sin does not belong to you." [according to the Vedanta].Therefore the first step for us to take is to teach the truth to ourselves and others.
Vivekananda (n.d.) 2.6 Practical Vedanta and Other Lectures/ The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda/ Kindle Edition
And that is why I am here. Sigh!
All is well
Be independent of the good opinion of other people.
Abraham Maslow
Do you need external validation for the things you do?
I believe most of us in human form seek that, don't we? It has something to do with how we are wired to survive as we tramp around the planet in these space suits. We, as social animals with an innate sense of 'inter-being' that we cannot even understand, need to belong, need to contribute, need to be of value to the groups we belong to for safety and security reasons as much as emotional.
I like to think of myself, especially as I evolve, internally validated with the things I do, and free from the need for the good opinion of others. I like to think of myself that way, but I am reminded again and again that I am just as much externally validated as I am internally validated. I still seek, much to my spiritual ego's embarrassment, some form of validation for the things I do. I still look to others, to life circumstance, and to the Universe to tell me or show me that what I give to the world is beneficial or worthy, or, at the very least, "enough".
For example, I still check the stats pages everyday. I receive little to no feedback about my blog here other than stats telling me if what I wrote was read. Though the stats page numbers are high, Google shows me that only a few people are reading it and I sigh in relief. I feel somewhat validated, even when I am not sure if it is being read by a human or a bot, to see the possibility of legitimate readership. Where some are dependent on readership in the thousands or even millions range...I feel uplifted with what might be 2-10 legitimate readers a day. When I see an increase in numbers, I feel a rise in energy because I sense external validation...when I see a decrease, I feel that "fatal resignation" I so mix up with acceptance creeping in.
I still also check the videos I put up to see how many viewers and subscribers I have. My far-off goal/dream, unlike other vloggers, was never 500,000, or 5000, or even 500 subscribers. It was 50. And I now have 50. There was a lecture hall where I worked as a nursing educator for many yearsth, that I loved to lecture in. It was small (small college) and it only sat 50 but there was something about standing in that lecture hall, doing what I considered was my best stuff, serving in a truly meaningful way, that always fired me up. Much to my surprise and amazement, I received so much positive external validation in my role as an educator. It fed me. To be able to hold the attention of 50 people at one time and explain complicated stuff in a way they could understand also validated me externally and internally. For some reason, having 50 subscribers reminds me of standing in that lecture hall reaching others in that fired up way I did then. It reminds me of how much I love to teach. So having 50 subscribers is like having the universe tell me that I am being validated for what I love to do. It is a sweet external validation.
I, like most unknown writers in the world, do not receive a heap of external validation for my writing but I still have a writer's ego that wants it. I want someone out there to say, "Yeah! You can write. Keep doing it!" Even when I write books for the pure intention to serve, as I did with the Learning English book, I find myself secretly looking over to see if what I wrote was okay. For months and months, I didn't get any of that...none. I put it out there. Nothing. I even gave it to friends who helped in some small way with the learning I shared in the book, and they openly admitted they never opened the cover. I offered it where I thought it was needed and instead of receiving even an acknowledgement that it was received...nothing. Instead of feeling good about my sincere desire to help, I began to feel that I did something "wrong". I became very embarrassed, even ashamed, about my creation or at least my putting it out there. Then one day, I received an email from a newcomer who I was sending unpublished chapters to in hope it would help. She expressed her appreciation and explained how much it helped her. I felt uplifted for a few weeks before that fizzled out. Then another friend expressed her appreciation for the book, and I felt that unquenched need for validation being soothed a bit more. Next, a young student who saw a copy on my desk wanted to save her allowance to buy one...I gave her a proof copy and she literally carries it around with her. And someone reached out to me this week, after months of hearing nothing, to give me positive feedback on the book I sent, stating that it would be a beneficial resource. I felt that thirst even more soothed. I also have a few buyers and four subscribers on my You Tube channel related to the book. I even receive little hearts as comments from one of the subscribers. That feedback might not seem like much to some, but it was all the external validation I needed. But sigh...the fact remains, I still needed it.
Why? I thought I was more evolved than that.
I can set out to do something for the purest of reasons: to experience the joy of the creative process, to honor wholesome internal compulsions, and to help and serve without, it seems, any attachment to outcome. That is a genuine and often actualized motivation in this human I call "me" whenever I take on a project or pursue an action. I have little expectations of how what I do when I begin, will be received by others or how it will impact the world. I have little to no expectations or attachment to what I, as this "little me", will get from it. "As long as it is wholesome", I tell myself. "It doesn't matter. It is just an honest and sincere expression and use of whatever gifts, talents, or skills I have been given in order to serve the human group and the entire world".
Yet, that pure motivation often gets disrupted, by not only the innate need we all have for love and belonging, but by my own internal scarring. I realize sometimes that this pure and wholesome internal validation, this desire to express, to serve, and this "nonattachment to outcome" is contaminated by a not so wholesome messaging from the battling duo: Shamer and Redeemer Ego. A core belief is still oozing through the trap door of my subconscious that whispers as it slithers into my day-to-day life, "Remember you are just doing your penance here. You must serve, sacrifice, and give more than anyone else. Don't dare expect forgiveness, let alone any positive rewards for what you do. Do not expect others to notice anything but a sinner pathetically trying to redeem themselves. Don't expect Life to be kinder to you because you do a few selfless acts. Expect ridicule or disdain for your pitiful offerings. You should be embarrassed about what you give and offer the world...not redeemed."
And Redeemer will chirp in and say..."No! Keep going! You can get recognition and reward for what you do with your gifts to prove to the world and yourself that you do deserve to be here. Do more and keep doing it better. Then keep watching for that external validation from the universe. You need it. It will save you from your shame. It will save you from who you are."
This battle goes on in my psyche despite the sincereness of my motivations. The duo wrestle, stumble, roll around over the pureness of my intentions, knocking things down, destroying what is good and decent as they battle each other, drowning out my true internally validated nature, my sincere desire to serve. They make a mess of this life! Sigh.
Pretty sad and pathetic, crazy lady! Why would you share that?
Yes, it is sad and pathetic, and I share it because I am strongly convinced that I am not the only one whose life experiences and intentions to serve at the highest level are being thwarted by such core beliefs. I bet, if you are truly, truly honest with yourself and are willing to look deep inside those trap doors of your own psyche, you will find some of that same messaging. You will discover these twins battling it out...at least to some degree.
Many, many of us are living 'unfilled' lives despite our pure intentions to evolve because we are ignorantly being dominated by the core beliefs stored inside us. We can't see, beyond these dark veils of conditioning, that the universe has our back. We can't hear that it is constantly saying "Good job! You are on the right track!" when we attempt to serve with the purest of vibrations. We are stuck in certain stages of our development and are unable to expand consciously because we have this big fur ball of belief of our 'undeservedness' caught in our sushumna. The energy is not flowing beyond the low frequency level we seem to be trapped in. We do not operate in the belief or knowing of our potential....so we may not tend to get from the universe that which may help us to live more fulfilling lives. We may not receive enough validation for our greatness.
Often our goals and dreams feel bigger than we are. We want them but almost instantaneously think, "Who am I to think I can have that?" and "How can I possibly achieve that?" But if we don't believe something-if we don't own it-means we are not tapped into the energy of it or that its energy is not really alive inside us. And as we know, if it's not there,in our core, and in our energy field, either it won't happen at all, or it won't last. Dr. sue Morter, page 254
I know my open expression of what I see inside me is off putting to some. Believe me. it is much worse when we are not even aware that these damaging core beliefs are there. At least, when we are aware of what is hidden in the trap door of our psyches...we are not taken by surprise when Life doesn't seem to be recognizing our gifts or rewarding us for them; when Life doesn't seem to be giving us what others are getting for theirs. We are less likely to see a lack of external validation and reward as a form of deserved punishment. We are less likely to see the messages from these twins as being the truth; less likely to believe that there is something wrong with our gifts, that we are meant to sacrifice in obscurity, that we are not worthy of either internal or external validation. The more we are aware of our core beliefs, the more we are able to release the hold they have on us, and the less dependent we become on external validation. Our inspiration will become pure again, free of ego contamination when we begin an 'extraordinary project'.
When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds: your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction, and you find yourself in a new, great, and wonderful world. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and you discover yourself to be a far greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be. Patanjali
I do want to be free of my need for external validation. I want to be free of my battling ego twins. I want to be free of those core beliefs that hold my energy down and therefore my life back. I want to expand consciousness, transcend limitations and find myself in a new, great, and wonderful world. I want all my talents and sleeping faculties to come to life as I remember Who I am...a person far greater than I ever dreamed myself to be. I want the same for you. I want the same for all...that is why I share the mess in my own mind so openly.
All is well!
