Who am I?

When I was at the Mantra concert a couple of weeks ago, some of my blockages got triggered.  The discomfort was very intense but I stayed with it, breathing and relaxing and letting the feelings have their space.  I said a heartfelt prayer "help God" and let it be. After a few moments the feelings subsided and I felt at peace.  (It kind of reminded of me of an exorcism, or, the childbirth experience of riding through waves of pain so that new life can be born.)

As I go through these kinds of experiences I am becoming more and more aware of who I am not (this egoic self with all of its beliefs, preconceived notions, feelings, desires) and I am becoming more and more curious about who I really am.  Of  course my ego still tries to orchestrate my life and I often get caught up in this, but I am seeing that this is not me.  Sometimes I am spiritual, sometimes kind and loving, other times irritable or jealous or anxious...  Michael Singer says that these are experiences that we are having but they are not who we are.

The reality is that I really have no idea who I am.  Adyashanti talks about sitting with a question such as "Who am I?"  This one can't be figured out with the brain.  It involves letting go of who I think I am (moment after moment) and letting Truth show up.

I am committed to this process.  My intention is to do my best each day to be aware of what I am experiencing in each moment, to relax in the face of my discomfort/fears/pain, and to be open to whatever God intends for my life to be.

"What happens to one who walks this path toward God?...imagine what would happen if you started feeling tremendous love for all creatures, for every plant, for every animal, and for all the beauties of nature.  Imagine if every child seemed like your own, and every person you saw looked like a beautiful flower, with its own color, its own expression, shape, and sounds...The process of judging has simply stopped.  There is just appreciating and honoring." (TUS, p. 176-177)

It is possible to reach this consciousness because others have done so.  I believe that this is what we are all here to do.  Let's join together (through intention, through prayer, through action) and make this our reality.  And so it is.

"Show me the way God, show me the way."

I recently attended a wonderful concert with chanting by Karl Anthony called “Mantra.”  Very powerful.  I highly recommend that you check out the link (http://www.KARLANTHONY.com) and get thee to a concert!  Karl mentioned a dark period in his life when he found himself sitting in a dark room not knowing if he would ever be able to perform again.  He started chanting which brought him out of his despair and lead to the idea of the Mantra concerts.

As most spiritual teachers tell us the darkness is often (maybe always?) a part of the awakening process.  Perhaps in the dark we can't see as clearly with the egoic eyes.  It seems as if we are closer to our true essential nature when we are in touch with these raw emotions.  I had an experience a number of years ago as I was walking a labyrinth at the CSLCV.  During the first third of the labyrynth I was concerned with whether I was "looking spiritual" enough (the year before when I walked the labyrinth someone said 'you were on fire in there' so I was concerned about doing that again), then as I entered the middle third of the labyrinth my feelings went deeper and I experienced the emotional pain related to the ending of a relationship, and when I reached the center of the labyrinth those feelings had passed and I felt the peace of Spirit. Can we trust the process of our lives...accepting what we are experiencing in each moment knowing that we are being lead back home to God, love, peace?

I have been experiencing a series of reoccurring feelings as I continue with my spiritual practices.  First it was pain, then shame, and now fear seems to be the feeling of the month.  As these feelings arise I am learning to let them be.  I’ve talked a lot about releasing and letting go of feelings based on Michael’s writings.  It is not necessarily letting go of the feeling (and expecting the feeling to disappear) but it is letting go in the midst of the feeling that can allow whatever healing or insight is ready to appear to show up (like perhaps the idea to create the Mantra concerts).

At this point my spiritual journey feels like a dance.  It seems like I am swaying back and forth between feeling the love of God, and, experiencing the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings associated with what life is presenting to me (i.e., samskaras).  I am learning to let go and trust.     

As Karl so powerfully sings “Show me the way God, show me the way.”    

"you can't outrun yourself"

I spent some time this week thinking about my story and the conclusions that I have drawn from this story (e.g., how I got the message that I am not able to freely express myself for fear of being rejected).  Understanding how these fears developed helps me to see that they are based on illusion...another person's pain causing them to act in a way that I gave personal meaning to which resulted in my pain.

The fear itself is not the problem, it is when I let the fear dictate how I operate in my life that problems arise.    It is when I let the fear and pain keep me from really opening to others in an undefended way that I remain stuck. This is not the way I want to live and I realize that the only way out is through...through the fear and pain. (This same message permeates The Untethered Soul, especially when Michael talks about samskaras and in Part 4:  Going Beyond)

Adyashanti says:  "There has to be a willingness to feel that fear again, feel the hesitation, feel the tendency to recoil -if it's there- and to have the willingness to move into it, to actually become intimate with the fear itself.  Union with fear isn't something that many of us consider when we think of intimacy and relationship.  But when you are willing to be intimate with your resistance, closer than you imagine, then you will see that your fears are not your enemies; they are your allies."  (falling into grace, p. 154)

Adya says that being intimate with fear involves feeling it and then staying with it, not running away from the feeling.  The tendency will be to recoil but that is not possible because "It's a fear that's created within your own being and you can't outrun yourself." (falling into grace, p. 156)

It seems like I am being inundated with these messages:  let go of the mind/psyche/ego, walk through my fears, open my heart, connect with others because we are all One.   Although it may seem like we have forever to do these things, our time on this human plane is limited.  It is time to move through the fear,  experience life as it is showing up, and let God take over the reigns.

beginner's heart

Adyashanti talks about how we all crave intimacy and deep closeness with others, yet at the same time we are frightened by this closeness.  That is because we opened ourselves up to others as children and were wounded...therefore we close down in order to protect ourselves from further hurt.

Adya also says    "Somehow, we must find the willingness and the courage to open ourselves to true relationship, so that we can become once again open to true intimacy.  Whether through a relationship with another human being, with the environment, or even simply with our own self, the invitation is to come into this true intimacy, this profound sense of human connection." (falling into grace, p. 152). 

Being intimate with others "requires a depth of insight and a deep willingness to be open to fear- to be willing to see the parts of you that don't want to open." (falling into grace, p. 153).  This requires not only being in beginner's mind, but also being in beginner's heart.     

The questions that I ask myself are 'Am I willing to be open and vulnerable in relationships so that I can find  where I am blocked (i.e., where my inner thorns are that I am protecting)?'  'Am I willing to face the pain when it arises so that I can let go of these blocks and move into a deeper realization of Self and a greater intimacy with others?'  This is a daily practice and every moment is an opportunity to become more intimate with myself, my environment or others.  It all boils down to whether I am willing to experience the pain in the short run in order to have freedom and the intimacy that I crave in the long run.

Michael on Oprah

It was great to see Michael on Oprah today!  I was reminded of the chapter on the inner thorn and the idea that on this spiritual journey life shows us our inner thorns (any time you feel even the slightest inner disturbance, you have found a thorn).  We can choose to either protect them (which means we keep them) or remove them (which is painful but then they are gone).  As Michael said to Oprah, all that we have to do is relax in the face of our inner disturbances and they will heal themselves, just as a splinter would work its way out of our body if left alone.

Michael shared a personal experience: His company was indicted for fraud and during the 6 years that the case was being investigated he never once blamed God nor felt that the situation was unfair even though he knew that they were innocent.  Instead, he used it as an opportunity to let go of any remaining sense of personal self.  He let go of concerns about what others thought about 'Michael Singer.'

We can do the same.  This self that we have developed is not real.  These thoughts that we hold onto in order to maintain this self, have no meaning (other than the meaning that we give them as the Course in Miracles says).  The thoughts only serve to get in the way of us experiencing Spirit, Joy, Peace, and Love.  I saw that clearly this week.  For years I have held on to a belief about how one family member was being treated by another and what that family member should do about it...basically distance herself from the other person.  She didn't and now the other person is changing his tune in a positive way.  My thoughts, my judgments about this were really just wasted energy.

As Michael reminded us today, all of our thoughts are just ideas that have been programmed from our past, they are not real, we should not listen to them.  My new mantra:  my 'self' does not know anything.  There really is no self but that is too much for my little brain to grasp all at once.  I will start with letting go of thoughts.

As I hold thoughts lightly and let them go, what I often experience is the fear, pain, and other feelings that I have been trying to avoid.  This is why we have created the false self in the first place...to help us navigate "comfortably" in life.  To let go means we have to face the pain that is involved with removing the thorn.  Ultimately, by letting go of this personal self altogether we will have to face the fear of the unknown.  The alternative is to spend our lives protecting our thorns.  Remember the description of the bulky apparatus that Michael described in TUS?

More about feelings, including Adyashanti's teachings about 'beginner's heart' in an up-coming blog.

The Bond

(FYI, Michael Singer will be interviewed by Oprah at 11:00AM this Sunday August 5th on the Oprah Winfrey channel OWN!  As far as I am aware this is a first because he does not usually speak outside of his center in Florida.) 



"What matters is not the isolated entity, but the space between things, the relationship of things.  The Bond."  (Lynne McTaggart, The Bond, inside of the front cover)

In "The Bond" Lynne McTaggart Lynne cites an abundance of evidence from both the physical and social sciences that we are all connected.  She talks about the idea that our true nature is to connect not compete.  Survival of the fittest is not an accurate reflection of human nature.  Wanting to belong, to give, and being altruistic are our true nature.  Lynne provides numerous examples of people putting others first, even if it means putting their own lives at risk (For example, the Air France Airbus plane crash where passing motorists safely pulled out 309 passengers moments before the plane burst into flames).  Could it be that we do these things because at our most basic level we are all one?  Might this also be why we long for love and acceptance?

This is what Michael Singer and Adyashanti have been saying when they talk about letting go of the individual self.  It is only the egoic self that thinks it is separate.  It is the need to protect this self-image that interferes with our innate urge to connect with others.  The egoic self compares itself to others, judges, worries that it is not enough or that it is not getting enough, competes, feels superior...  The egoic self cannot love because it always needs something in return.

Lynne cites studies that show that people are healthier both physically and emotionally when they are connected with others.  We need each other.  Period.  Others are not a threat...but to the ego, they can be.  To the ego, some people are shunned because they are different or weird.  The ego is all about impressing others not connecting with others.  As we have been talking about, we are not our egos.  This individual self is something that we created to navigate more comfortably in life yet it keeps us in bondage (Remember Michael Singer's analogy of the comfortable but boarded-up house built in the middle of the beautiful field of light?)

In Truth, we are here to support and love each other.  Opening to others is what we are meant to do.  Michael Singer says (and I am paraphrasing loosely) that eventually we are going to have to open our hearts to the whole world.  Why not start now by recognizing our true nature and letting go of the fears and insecurities of the egoic self?  We have tools to do this.  Witness and release for one.  Another, holding  thoughts lightly.  I have found judgmental thoughts to be the biggest block to my connecting with others.  

 A phrase that I heard repeatedly growing up in the Catholic church comes to mind: "We are One Body in Christ."  Whether the perspective is physics, biology, psychology, sociology, religion, or New Thought philosophies the same conclusion is being reached: it is the relationship between things that matters, not the individual.  Now, let us bring this awareness to our moment-to-moment interactions.      

holding thoughts lightly

It has been really useful for me to hold my thoughts lightly, and, see the world through innocent eyes.  Sometimes it can be hard to "let go" of a thought, but when I hold a thought lightly it no longer seems as meaningful or important and I find that I let it go more easily. 

I realize how much weight I have given to my thoughts.  I now know that these thoughts are conditioned responses based on my past experiences and not necessarily an indicator of how I need to live my life.  Of course we have to think about things in our lives, but I am seeing that my thoughts and emotions (which I will focus on in the next blog) do not need to run the show.  I now choose to hold them lightly and allow a deeper Truth to come forth.

 

This reminds me of the Bible phrase “You can’t put new wine into old wineskins” and the idea from Einstein that you can’t fix a problem with the same consciousness that created it.  I am ready for a new Consciousness.  I will hold my thoughts lightly, thus making room for Truth to express in, as, and through me.