On Seeing Clearly And Taking Action

On Seeing Clearly And Taking Action

EXPERIENCE has taught us that each of us is in some way obsessed with self-improvement: trying to be better, always trying to have more, trying to be fixed, trying to help either ourselves or someone else; trying to appear different. There are hundreds of variations on this theme; some are very misleading and can be quite confusing if we take them only at face value. 

Frequently, we use those scripts and beliefs to trick ourselves into believing that all is well in our world, often in spite of overwhelming evidence that it is not. 

If we ever stopped to examine the reality of it all, we might just notice that things are not so good. 

Really!

Things I have learned:

There are a few things that I have learned on this journey and one important one is, Awakening is Not Analyzing … or … Analyzing is Not Awakening …  this one confused me for some time … I thought that if I knew, then I would know and if I was in a place of knowing then all would be fine in my world …

The problem with that is that I never got this theory on knowing to work all that well … but lord knows I tried …

I basically tried every variation on a theme …

I analyzed for the sake of analyzing … I analyzed the analysis … I look closely at my waking state and I analyzed what it was that I thought I did to keep me from being fully awakened into my world … whatever that meant … and understanding it … all at the same time.

What I discovered was Awakening is Awakening … and it has nothing to do with my understanding of it … oh there is an understanding that comes with it … but understanding will not bring it on ... no matter how hard I tried to make it work for me in that fashion …

Freedom and Happiness is not what it appears to be:

Working mis-Definition of Freedom and Happiness:

What most people call freedom is simply their willful ability to satisfy their desires. The call of I want more freedom, is the hue and cry of the false self’s need to fill an emptiness it senses within itself and has no idea how to fill. 

What I have come to understand about the statement: I want more freedom is; I want to be able to have more of what I want, when I want it, and in the fashion that I believe I want to have it in.

From both my practice and my own practices I have to argue that the process of wanting what you want as often as you want it … More … is not freedom, it is in fact a kind of compulsion that keeps one hooked into the delusion that more is better, or more is best, or more defines wellness; when in fact, it is truly the defining quality of our discomfort in the first place. The very thing that more was supposed to remove is defined by the need for more.

Circuitous and puzzling all at the same time because the very thing that we are taught is the answer to the conundrum is in fact what is driving the conundrum to continue endlessly.

A Working Definition Of Freedom can be summed up as:

Being able to have or not have what you want, without being lost in the drama of what appears to be happening in the unfolding process of having or not having.  Thus not having to react to life and life’s situations and defending yourself from the experience you are trying to have. 

Life does not have to be a Polar Bear Dancing Lesson