Wisdom Insights
to Shift
Your Perceptions
Archimedes, a Greek mathematician and inventor who lived in Syracuse around 215 BCE, was challenged by King Hiero II of Syracuse to move, on his own, a free-floating fully laden ship that was in the harbor. Through the use of pulleys and levers, he was able to move it. He was so full of his own pride that he said to the king, “Give me a place to stand and I will move the world.” By practicing meditation, you create a powerful place to stand for yourself, a place inside yourself, a place to move your world. When I say move your world, I mean to look at your core beliefs and change the ones that do not serve you. In doing this, how you show up in the world and how the world shows up to you will change.
Once you’ve created a solid foundation and a sense of inner peace, you will find that you can use the Wisdom Insights in this chapter as fulcrums and levers to help diminish the impact of the distorted perceptions buried within you that cause discord in your daily life. It does not matter whether you meditate for ten minutes or sixty minutes, the important thing is to create that moment of calmness, peace, and stillness within you. When you come out of your meditation, you may want to reflect on one of the insights and how you can practically use it to help you change one of your perceptions and subsequently your behavior. Then go ahead and play—try implementing the insight for a day or a week.
Do not just think about the insight; try and feel it in your being. This may be easier to do after you have read through the insight and reflected on its implications in your life. Ask yourself, “Using this insight, what can I easily change about my perceptions and behavior [make it something easy and achievable—yes, like a SMART goal]?” Then, as your inner resilience grows through meditation and your ability to hold the Meditative Feeling at other times during the day, think about or reread the insight, then feel it again in your being. You can then identify even more challenging obstacles, and see how the insight can facilitate another, deeper change.
Introducing the Wisdom Insights
One of the books that I read and felt a deep connection to when I started walking down my spiritual path was Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. The term sutra originally referred to a rule or aphorism of Sanskrit literature, or a summary of Vedic teachings. I loved how this knowledge was distilled into a very brief insight.
I began collecting my own spiritual insights over the years. These insights came to me at different times spanning many years, and I used each one to guide my own personal growth. They seemed to come when I reached roadblocks on my spiritual path. One of the most important things that I learned from my experience is that if you become an observer of your thoughts and feelings and learn how to bring the inner peace from your meditations into your daily life, you too can experience those moments when your mind is more still than usual—these are the moments that enable those pieces of deep inner wisdom to come through.
I wish that I had had the foresight to record every insight that came to me during that time; I wrote down ones that had a major impact on my personal development. These were so powerful that I knew that I had to record them and use them to work though my own faulty perceptions. I still read through them from time to time, especially when I feel lost, and they always help me gracefully navigate around the daily obstacles in my life. In publishing the insights, I provide an elaboration on each to help fellow travelers on a spiritual path to understand them as I see them.
Keep in mind that the beauty of any poetic insight is that everyone can personalize the interpretation, but the goal is always the same for all of us—to become a better human. So, if your interpretation is different from mine, it doesn’t matter as long as the interpretation helps you to open your mind to wisdom and your heart to compassion for all life. Then, you will know that you are walking your soul’s path.
Our life on this planet is like the adventures we seek in computer games—sometimes easy, sometimes hard, and sometimes we think that we are going to explode with frustration, but we hang in there because we want to get to the next level, as well as find the hidden treasures along the way. Use these insights as your super powers to discover and apply to the special attributes of your character in this great adventure you’re living. Be prepared to win some, and to lose some, once you have created self-awareness of consciousness on your spiritual path, a loss does not set you back to the previous level, so be encouraged. Whether we play video games or not, we can all relate to a great adventure, and that is the true depiction of our journey toward personal growth.
We all have the power to change our distorted perceptions and points of view, no matter how deep they’re buried, so that our inner light can shine on everything we do. The first step is to ask ourselves why we think and feel this way. By not allowing ourselves the easy answer, “I do not know,” or by blaming someone else, we will force ourselves to go deeper into understanding rather than avoiding the questions.
Some of the insights contain the word God; I would encourage you not to get distracted by your interpretation of what the word may represent to you. The word as it comes through is meant to represent a higher being full of compassion, love, and wisdom. If you wish to replace the word with something of your own that contains the same characteristics of a benevolent being that has nothing but our highest good, then, go for it!
Wind is the breath of God testing my devotion to my path.
Just as the wind erodes the sand, losing its form,
so my devotion can be eroded.
Just as the sand has to be raked every day to keep its shape,
so my devotion to my path has to be renewed every day.
Earth is the ground along which I walk.
It forms the path along which I must tread,
it is onto which I am again born until I can be free.
Fire is the passion of my devotion.
It is the light that guides me on my path,
it is the life-giving sun that shines on my many lives.
Water is prana.
It is the movement of life,
it is the enviable flow of a soul toward enlightenment,
it is the silence between thoughts,
it is the thunder as a step is taken and the universe cries out in glory.
Elaboration
Wind is the breath of God testing my devotion to my path.
The wind can be blowing in our faces resisting our movement along our path or blowing from behind pushing us along our path. There are times when we need to walk the path on our own, pushing against the force of God’s breath. This is not resistance to stop us but resistance to temper our devotion and commitment. There are times when we are so weary that we have to stop and question what we are doing and the direction we are going in. That’s when we’ll get a gentle breath of wind behind us to encourage us to keep on moving; sometimes it might be so gentle that it’ll seem like a whisper in a noisy room, barely perceptible, and will make us question whether it was actually there, and other times it will be so forceful that we will wonder if we can keep up with it.
If we open our awareness, we will sense God’s breath as we feel the gentle warmth once again blowing on our faces. Sometimes it’ll be so strong a force as to knock down trees and we’ll barely be able to stand in one place but have to succumb to the will of God and either allow ourselves to get blown down or get carried along, stumbling as we try to stay on our feet.
Just as the wind erodes the sand, losing its form,
so my devotion can be eroded.
The mighty deserts of Africa are a visual stillness in the blackness of a starry night. Form within form, shape without shape, they hold life and death in a breath of wind. The desert wind caressing the leaves of a few palms surrounding the life-giving mirror of an oasis. Our devotion is as fragile as a moment captured in the rolling plains of a desert. The smallest bug moves a leg and a few grains of sand slide down a slope and the moment is gone, never to be the same again. So that is all it will take for our devotion to be stopped and lost. Our devotion from one moment to the next is like the rolling sea of sand, never the same, yet as the sand ebbs and flows but is always there, so should our devotion be.
Just as the sand has to be raked every day to keep its shape,
so my devotion to my path has to be renewed every day.
In a Japanese rock garden, the rocks are indomitable timeless features in an otherwise fluid sandscape. The sandscape can take many forms, just as our devotion can take many forms. However, the form is only as present as the stillness inside us. Just as a single breath of wind or a sudden gust can change the form of the sand, so our devotion can be released. Just as the form needs to be recreated every morning, so our devotion needs to be renewed every morning. The wind and the sand remind us every day we must renew our devotion not to some God or higher being but to ourselves and our path of spirituality that we all must walk sooner or later, and continue to walk.
Earth is the ground along which I walk.
The earth represents our lifetimes, ones which we have chosen to travel through. Our many and varied life experiences are like the firmness of the ground beneath our feet, which can be hard or soft and giving. Despite how it may seem, it is a choice we have made. We have chosen to be on this earth and experience all that it has to offer over its many cycles, even though our greater purpose may be unclear to us.
It forms the path along which I must tread,
Our path is rarely clear; at best, our lantern of awareness only shows us the path a few feet ahead. Only by walking those few feet will the next few feet become clear. This means that most of the time we do not know if we are taking the shortest path; we can only have faith that we will eventually come to the end. The path we walk can be flat, steep, or downhill. The choices we make in the present and from moment to moment decide our type of path. Through the eons what began as a sprightly walk becomes a weary tread toward release.
It is that onto which I am again born until I can be free.
The path we walk this time is part of a larger journey, the journey of a soul’s growth, from creation and separation to reunion. Our journey will consist of many, many paths, all with different experiences. Our births will be driven not only by a compulsion to grow and experience but by a settling of debts. This balancing of karma has been expressed in the phrase “What goes around comes around.” We are generally ready to believe in this if we feel we have been aggrieved. Sometimes we might look at someone else’s path and wonder, Why hasn’t the balancing happened, and will it ever happen? This balancing also applies to ourselves; we carry a debt created by our actions, a debt that we choose to repay. The tenacity of our debt is proportional to the strength of the malice behind it.
The earth represents our mortal, physical lives. These lives are our spiritual classrooms shaping the many forms of our spiritual path. Each life takes us further along our path; parts of our lives or the lives themselves will seem either light-footed or weary. In the end though, we must remember that we do choose to come back, so whether it be a light-footed skip or a weary trudge, find within yourself the grace to keep moving forward, but remembering each lifetime brings us closer to liberation from this mortal coil.
Fire is the passion of my devotion.
Fire—burning, cleansing, and destroying. Fire—a simple meditative or romantic flame on a candle. Fire—all-consuming, out of control, tearing through thousands of acres of dry forest. Fire—a waning imperceptible glow among the dying ashes on a hearth. Oh, how our devotion to our journey changes, from moment to moment, and from path to path. How like the many facets of a fire our devotion can be. How easily it can be rekindled from a glow back into a flame or into a blaze and then back into a glow again.
Fire and its heat, expressing the passion which we must have on our path and the essential role that the sun plays in creating life on earth. Each time we are born anew, the sun is still there like an old friend shining down on our next life, on the next stage of our path. Spiritual passion is the eternal burning flame of longing to connect to that spark of divinity that is inside all of us. This is the passion that St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, Rumi, and Hafiz talk about in their writings; the passion that no one belief is right or wrong; the passion that our soul’s growth is as personal as our fingerprints. Just as we are happy to acknowledge and accept that everyone has different fingerprints, so we should accept that everyone’s path is different. When you connect to that passion in your heart center, it will act as your guide for deeper experience with the spark of the divine inside you. Through thousands of years of human experience and growth, through the many incarnations of your soul on its path to release, the sun has always been there to shine on you, to shine on your path. Just as the sun shines on plants to help them to grow, so does the sun shine down on you to help you grow and to give life to all on the planet that needs to be there to support your material body in its experience.
It is the light that guides me on my path,
Thousands of years ago humans discovered fire, discovered it as a source of warmth, discovered it as a light in the dark. For the thousands of years since, the flame—whether its source is a burning brand, olive oil, a candlewick, or gas—has been our light in the dark. And so it is that the flame of our devotion is our light guiding us on our path through the day and through the night of our lives.
It is the life-giving sun that shines on my many lives.
Though our soul’s journey may pass through the many ages of man, and our habitat and people we meet during those times will change, we will always have the source of our light, of our nutrition, of our warmth as a constant companion shining down on us.
Water is prana.
Water is life, and is as necessary to all life as the sun. Our bodies are 60 percent water. In recent years we have sent probes to the moon and to Mars looking for water, two-thirds of our planet is covered with water, without water life as we know it would not exist. Prana is the life-sustaining force of all living things, just like our water. Our soul exists outside of time and space, never born, never dying, a nexus of the cosmic energy that is prana, permeating every cell, molecule, and atom in our universe. Prana is the energy that gives all life existence.
It is the movement of life,
it is the enviable flow of a soul toward enlightenment,
Life is created where water flows, whether along a riverbank or via aqueducts. Life grows where water flows. Sometimes the flow is broad and straight and other times a narrow meander; in all cases it always flows to its destination. And so our path to enlightenment can be straight or a meander, but it is always moving forward to release. Water represents continual movement, like the walk on our path toward enlightenment. Sometimes slowly, sometimes fast, but always moving forward. Water can be the stillness in a bend in a very gently flowing river, like the stillness we need to create between our thoughts. It can be thunderous like a huge waterfall, just like the cheers in the higher realms as our soul takes another step closer to awareness.
It is the silence between thoughts,
Even something as vast and deep as the great Pacific Ocean can be as still and flat as a mirror. What life is beneath that motionless surface, how is it different from one moment to the next, what hidden depths are there to be explored? Our sentences convey energy, our words convey energy; what can be found in our depths in the stillness between our thoughts? What hidden depths can we now explore in our own inner silence?
It is the thunder as a step is taken and the universe cries out in glory.
A single drop of rain lands on the Auyantepui plateau in Venezuela unnoticed among the hundreds of square miles of jungle. What’s the point? What has that isolated microcosm of life to contribute to the world, to existence? Like so many other drops it rolls off a leaf, collects with another drop, and their combined weight is just enough to roll off that branch, creating a trickle of moving water. The trickle joins other trickles that form a stream; that stream joins other streams, forming a river; and that river flows into the thunderous wonder that is the Angel Falls. And so no matter how small a step we take toward enlightenment, it will always end in beauty and a thunderous roar in the universe.
The first step in awakening
is to become the observer of your thoughts and feelings
Elaboration
If you want to connect to your spirituality, then nothing outside you can help you—it’s an inside job. You have to start finding out who you are, and that means the real reasons you think and feel the way you do and not the reasons you blame others for.
Whenever I read this insight, I always smile to myself; this has been true for thousands of years and will be for thousands to come. I often wonder how many souls must have come to this conclusion for themselves in the past and in what words and languages it must have taken shape.
When we awaken spiritually, it includes the realization that we are more than just a lump of flesh with a name. This awareness means that there is something greater than our ego doing the observing. The more that we can disassociate from our ego and connect to that greater part of ourselves, the more we awaken. The awakening process requires us to move away from the belief that we are only our ego and from the idea that we have little or no control over our thoughts and feelings. To start waking up, we need to ask: “What am I thinking right now? Why? What am I feeling right now? Why?” In the beginning you’ll get a superficial answer, but do not accept that as the total answer, because the blame will be placed on a reason or person outside of yourself; however, that is not the real cause. Look deeper. The first response to your question is the start of the trail. You then have to again ask yourself, “Why?” Now you are on the trail of digging beneath the surface of your thoughts and feelings.
As we go through our daily routine, we react almost unthinkingly to situations, thoughts pop into our heads, or feelings suddenly surface, and we make almost instantaneous decisions to behave a certain way. With true self-awareness, we might not choose that action and instead select a more enlightened way.
Your meditation feeling will give you the place from which to be a wise and compassionate observer of who you are and why you are.
— Your History Does Not Mean Forever —
You have to look at yourself now.
Are you happy and at peace with who you are,
and what you are doing in your life?
If the answer is no,
then you have to look at all your thoughts,
your feelings,
and how you have behaved with yourself and with others,
because they have brought you to this point in your life.
If you want to change how you are now,
then you are going to have to change
how you have thought,
felt, and behaved.
Elaboration
You have to look at yourself now.
Are you happy and at peace with who you are,
and what you are doing in your life?
We live in an age where everything moves and changes so fast, from our many daily appointments that we try to squeeze in, to the electronics we use every day. Sometimes we can find it hard to slow down; sometimes we only seem to manage that when we are asleep or on vacation. Often a vacation can be packed full of activities and is more of a change than a break and a rest. It can be hard to slow down enough to take the time to look at ourselves and ask: Am I happy with who I am, and am I happy in my life?
If the answer is no,
then you have to look at all your thoughts,
your feelings,
and how you have behaved with yourself and with others,
because they have brought you to this point in your life.
If the answer to the question, “Am I happy with who I am and happy in my life?” is no and you want to change this situation, the next step is to find out how you got to this place. By tracing the path you took to get here, you can find decisions, thoughts, and feelings that you can change. By changing those thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and choices, you will find yourself in a different place, hopefully a place you would rather be, a You that you would rather be.
If you want to change how you are now,
then you are going to have to change
how you have thought,
felt, and behaved.
Sometimes when lost in a physical location, particularly if hiking in the wilderness, the only way to orient yourself is to backtrack. When you look at yourself and realize that you are not who you want to be or where you want to be in life, it is similar to being lost in the wilderness. However, it is not the physical you that is lost, but the true you; you have lost the connection to your soul, that part of you that brings happiness into you. The question is how to backtrack inside yourself to find a different path.
The first step to finding who you are is to question all your thoughts, feelings, and behaviors not from a self-critical standpoint but with a compassionate, objective, inquisitive mind-set. Why do you really think that way, why do you really feel that way, and why do you behave that way? Did someone else behave that way, and you learned it from them? Is your reaction based on an old story from your past that is now outdated? In doing this do not point your finger outward to blame someone else, point it inward and keep peeling back the layers of reasons until you get to the raw and deep original source.
Once you understand that you are thinking a certain way, sometimes through a clear, conscious choice, other times through subconscious programming that happened in your past, you can then start to undo the discordant programing (that you no longer want) and make the choices you do want, the choices that will help you be who you want to be and live a life you want to live.
Many of us still believe that who we are can’t change and that we will be who we are now, forever. We might acknowledge that we do not like parts of ourselves, and we might even be aware of the contributing factors that helped to either create or reinforce the discordant thoughts and feelings that live inside us. However, we must not look upon these discordant energies with disdain, as they have brought us to this point of change. We must be grateful for them bringing us to this moment of awakening. We can now choose to release them, as we do not need them anymore. By looking inward and cutting away the superficial thoughts and feelings with our scalpel of objectivity we can see how to change the way we thought, felt, and behaved. We are going to have to think differently and perceive differently, and these discordant thoughts are our guide as to what to change.
The past is in the past. You get to choose whether you want to live a future based on how you were in the past, or to make changes and create a future you desire. The shackles of our past are just that, shackles—the more we have, the more they can inhibit how we will be in the future. However, while they might be attached to us, they are not who we are, and if we choose to make the effort we can work at detaching them to free ourselves of them in the present … and in the future.
They are our history but not our future, if we do the work and make the choices to free ourselves.
Never give your heart to anyone.
First find it inside yourself,
hang on to it, feed it with joy,
then share it with those you choose.
A bit like a smile is shared but never given.
Elaboration
Never give your heart to anyone.
Many people give their heart to someone with the expectation that they will get the other person’s heart in return. This is giving with the expectation of receiving. If someone gives and expects something in return, is that really giving or is it trading? It puts a different spin on things. Instead of saying, “I give my heart to you,” we are saying, “I’ll trade my heart with yours.” When we look at it like that, where is the love? It sounds more like a business transaction. We often enter into this trade thinking it is love. If the relationship doesn’t work out well, then we feel that the other person reneged on the deal, on this secret trade, and we feel betrayed. Let’s stop for a moment: Why would we even consider creating a deal over our heart? Do we really value it so little?
First find it inside yourself,
hang on to it, feed it with joy,
How do you find your heart? A good first step is to feed your heart with joy. Take a moment to look at all the qualities, no matter how small, that make you who you are. To begin with, it might be easier to look for the wonderful qualities that others see in you. We are all unique, we all have a different combination of qualities and talents. Yes, someone might be just as good a dancer as you, but can they do all the other things that you can do? Works of art can be copied, printed, and even forged, but the copies are never quite the same as the original. You are so very unique—nobody has ever walked in your shoes or will ever again. That’s how unique you are. Feel joy at being who you are, find your own love for yourself and connect to it daily. This is not a selfish love where you exclude everyone else and shut yourself off from the world, but a healthy love for yourself. After all, why else would we have the expression “You have to love yourself first before you can love another?”
Then share it with those you choose.
Consider for a moment. You have some chocolate and offer it to somebody, so you are offering to share, and they say no—do you feel betrayed or rejected? Hopefully not. It is their choice if they want chocolate or not, and it’s not a reflection on you. Suppose they take a large piece and try a bit and then decide they do not want it and hand it back, do you feel betrayed? Again, probably not. You might think it’s a bit odd, but it’s no big deal. Suppose you smile at somebody and they do not smile back, do you feel betrayed? You most likely think that they are rude, or perhaps that they are having a bad day. Smiling at someone is not compulsory. Let’s face it, nobody is going to start a war because you did not smile. It’s about sharing, and as with anything that’s shared, reception and reciprocation are voluntary. Sharing is about giving without expectation of getting anything in return, and it is always your choice whether you want to share and just how much to share.
A bit like a smile is shared but never given.
Although we have the expression “to give someone a smile,” we only share it, we do not actually give it; it is still on our face. We share the smile, and perhaps we hope that we will get one in return, but if we don’t receive a smile in response, we don’t feel slighted, we just carry on. Ten minutes later we’ve probably forgotten that moment.
Let’s be clear. I am not saying do not love someone. I am saying share your love with someone and then just enjoy the sharing for however long it lasts. If the other person does not want your love any more, then that’s okay. You will probably experience a sense of loss, but you have plenty more love for others and especially for yourself. Remember, if you share and the other person decides not to accept any more, then you are still whole and complete with your love for yourself. Love should always be about sharing and not trading, not about needing, and not an attachment required for survival.
Light will not come into you to knock out the dark,
even if invited or prayed for.
You have to identify and remove the darkness yourself.
Only then will the light come in to fill the void.
Elaboration
Light will not come into you to knock out the dark,
even if invited or prayed for.
The light referred to in this stanza is peace, contentment, joy, and acceptance. The dark is our discordant thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that bring disharmony within ourselves or into the world around us. This sentence is about asking a higher power to save us from ourselves, which we all know does not happen. The reason that there is the word invited is because this is meant to imply an energy of a parting thought or a pensive wish as opposed to a prayer where there is a more impassioned request.
You have to identify and remove the darkness yourself.
Only then will the light come in to fill the void.
If you want to have more peace and contentment in your life, do not look outside for it; it will come into you when there is room inside you. If you have a one-car garage that you are using to store things, when you get a car, how is it going to fit into the garage? You have to first remove the items you were storing there, to make room for the car. You have many garages inside you, full of stuff that you do not really need. If you want to put lots of new exciting things, like peace and contentment, in these garages, then you’ll have to start cleaning out to make space for them!
To look at it another way, as much as parents want to be present all the time for their children, at some point they have to let them go, let them fend for themselves in the world. If parents do everything for their children, then they will never work through their struggles and grow to be all they can be. Sometimes, as hard as it is to say no, or not to help, it’s the best thing to do. If every time you asked for help on your math homework it was done for you, when exam time came around, how well do you think you would do?
This insight is also about taking ownership for doing the inner work ourselves. It is no good looking outside of ourselves for some miraculous fix. Asking God to save you from yourself is ineffective. If it did work, this planet would be full of saints. Only if you go in and hunt out the discordant energies and remove them will light then flood into the hole to fill it up. Many times after an intense and successful therapy session, the client has told me that they feel physically tired and yet lighter inside. The tiredness comes from the effort it took to move that heavy, stagnant, discordant energy, like walking thigh-deep in mud. The lightness comes from that heavy energy leaving and the light coming in to replace it.
There is no harm in praying. However, if you pray and nothing happens, then it is up to you to do it yourself if you want to get it done.
— Your Voice Is Your Consciousness —
So you speak,
so that is who you are.
So you speak,
so that is what you attract.
Your voice is the power to heal and create,
the power to injure and destroy.
Your voice is your consciousness.
Choose your words with love and wisdom.
Elaboration
So you speak,
so that is who you are.
Your voice is made up of three parts: the words you choose, the tone you say them in, and how you say them. We all understand that the words we choose and the tone we use are important, so let’s consider the last factor, how you might say those chosen words. An example of how you might say something could be very quickly and rarely pausing for breath, never allowing the other person to get a word in. If it is meant to be a dialogue, then there will be almost no interaction. Have you ever found that you can sit with someone and not get to say much while they talk away?
Think of all the different kinds of verbal communication: you are conveying information, you are sharing your deepest feelings, you are giving advice. Are your words floating on the air between the two of you, or are they being rammed down the other person’s throat—or somewhere between the two?
So you speak,
so that is what you attract.
Stop and think for a moment about people you know and people you have known. While there are no definitive categories with which to label people, it is easier to understand the message in this insight if we look at extremes. Take someone who is always saying negative things or seems to always project negative energy. How often do you see them happy? When something nice happens in their lives, do they really notice and appreciate it, or do they just see it as momentary relief from the grey feelings that they live in? Are they surrounded by happy, joyous people, or do they seem to attract people who like the negative stories, who provide “helpful” comments, confirming how negative the experience was, and have their own negative experiences to share? Have you ever been with someone and then related to a friend how that person seemed to suck the joy out of you?
Now reflect for a moment on someone who always has a happy word to say; someone who always looks for the silver lining, someone who always seems to be smiling inside as well as outside—how easy is it to be around them? Doesn’t their energy make you feel brighter? Doesn’t it make you also want to feel like that? Most people probably live between these two places, the negative and the positive, rather than completely in one or the other. Remember, we get to choose how we want to be and who and what we want to have around us.
Your voice is the power to heal and create,
the power to injure and destroy.
I remember back at the very beginning when I was trying to decide whether to stay in engineering or walk a different path. I was talking things over with a friend, when he suddenly said from out of nowhere (I say nowhere, because to this day he still doesn’t recall saying it, but it left such an impression on me that I will never forget it), “You know, Paul, the advantage of having a high income is that you can buy lots of toys and expensive vacations with which to drown out the stress of the job. Wouldn’t it be so much better to have less money and not be stressed?” That remark really got my attention. It would be one the few pivotal moments that helped me decide to follow a different route. In that moment his voice created a key piece of awareness for me and set me on a healing path.
Now take a moment when you might have said or heard someone say a cutting, careless, or hurtful remark that added to another person’s misery, and ask yourself, what did I—or that other person—get out of the situation from speaking that way? What part of me or them was fed by that behavior, by making the other person feel worse? Am I proud of that part of myself?
My friend’s words helped me to find healing. In the second situation, a person used words that hurt or destroy. If we were to think of our words this way, to consider the impact and the power that they have, I believe we would choose them more wisely.
Your voice is your consciousness.
Your voice expresses your current state of consciousness, who you are currently being. All too often we believe that we have to be perceived a certain way in order to make our point. In cases like that, our voice does not express who we really are. We have to decide who it is we really want to show to others, and then remember to use our voice to represent that goal.
Choose your words with love and wisdom.
A better choice of word than love would be compassion. When we think of love we think of family or friends. It is easy to think of loving them, but not so much the person at the checkout, or the person three cubes down from us at work, or the homeless person asking us for some change. Compassion would be a better word.
Compassion is something that we should apply to everyone, from our partner to the person who always seems to push our buttons. Compassion is a detached, nonjudgmental, yet caring feeling. When you come from that inner place of compassion and speak with wisdom, your words cannot help but enrich all who hear them. If you want to see how the energy that you put behind words controls what you attract, put compassion behind your words when someone is angry and in your face. Really feel the compassion in your heart for the other person. If they were given a choice they would not want to be in that discordant energy—there is a part of them that has temporarily taken control and taken them out of their heart center, so feel compassion for them, that they are in a place that they really do not want to be. This does not mean that you have to acquiesce to their anger, but that you can choose the third option.
One of my favorite things to do when I reach the checkout at a store is to look right in the cashier’s eyes, say, “Hi,” and speak from that calm, peaceful, Meditative Feeling. Or when they ask me how my day is going, I make eye contact and ask them in return how their day is going. Try this. More often than not, you will get a startled glance from the checker, as they will sense that something different happened; they are used to people rushing past them and not really seeing them. The cashier may or may not understand what just happened, but you can be sure that his or her spirit noticed it.
Every time you open your mouth to speak, think for a moment: How do I want to express? What do I want to show the world? Sometimes, something may have just happened and you might be feeling angry or frustrated, and in that moment, you may not care. We all experience the perfect storm of piled-up frustrations, when discordant events from the outside world trigger our hidden fears and angers, and we find ourselves plunged into that place of closed energy and discordant actions. If this happens, you must avoid beating yourself up because you failed to keep your heart open; instead, accept that we are all human. Understand that from time to time you will trip up, and focus your heart and your mind on doing better next time. But don’t cut yourself so much slack that you are always making excuses and stop really trying. Remember, it is the middle way.
Try expressing yourself (for a day or a weekend as an experiment) by being true to the consciousness that you would like to project into the world. Do not make it life or death but a fun experiment. It will feel very unfamiliar in the beginning, but we can stay true to our better selves and still express our point. In the beginning you might not fully feel it inside, however continue onward and watch carefully how things start to change in your life. They’ll be small at first, and then as the momentum builds they’ll get bigger and bigger.
Develop your consciousness, express it through your words of wisdom and compassion.
As I listen to the silence between my thoughts,
a distant pulse can be heard.
As my mind quietens the pulse becomes louder.
It is the heartbeat of the universe.
Elaboration
When we first start meditating, we will be aware of our surroundings through our five senses, and also through our physical body with its tensions, aches, and pains. As we quiet our minds by using one of our physical senses to hold our focus on our breath, or a sound, or perhaps a chakra, we will start to sense our surroundings fade into the background. As we go deeper, our aches and pains then start to fade until it feels as though we are just a consciousness observing everything around us, including our body.
Even as you go even deeper into that place of stillness inside, even as you feel detached from the physical surroundings, even as your physical senses seem to separate from you and you seem alone and adrift in the emptiness of the universe, that’s when you feel the energetic connection to all, animal, mineral, and plant. It seems like a place of supreme isolation, and yet it is one of supreme connection. It is home.
Energy is energy.
The more it is labeled the more it is constrained.
Elaboration
We give inanimate objects a gender so we can relate to them better. For example, sometimes a sailor might refer to his boat using the terms “Isn’t she a beauty?” In day-to-day living there is no harm in this, and in fact it enriches our experience with the objects. However, this all changes when we start to work energetically with them. As soon as we apply a gender or characteristic to something, we constrain it with those qualities; it can no longer be anything else. By not applying a gender or any other label, we open ourselves to a deeper understanding of what an object is and what it is not.
We may have deep subconscious ideas about gender; other ideas and reactions may be much closer to the surface. Even a word like mother used to express the idea of a nurturing Mother Earth will be tainted by our own experiences of mother figures in our lives. If our own mother was not nurturing, then that idea is not communicated, but a different one is—the new experience has been constrained by an old one, simply by using a label.
All labels constrain. Even calling a tree a tree puts boundaries on our experience of the tree. Try sitting with a tree and just interacting with it, without labeling, naming, or constraining the experience in any way. Try to project yourself into the tree, but rather than imagining with your mind that you have roots and branches, use your physical imagination to create in your body the feeling of roots and branches. Then try to look out of the tree at yourself sitting there connecting to it.
I was talking to a friend about her metaphysical experiences and she made a comment about “sister moon.” I was not surprised to hear a comment like this. Many times I have heard people give a gender to the earth, moon, etc. But in that instant of hearing my friend say those words, this insight came to me. Initially it came to me as a simple metaphysical insight, but on reflection I found it had far-reaching implications. I was often confused why the higher energies had to be split into male and female aspects—divine male, divine female, sister moon, mother earth, father sun. Just because we have two sexes on this planet does not mean that higher energies have to fall into this distinction. After all, is the wind male or female? Is the ocean male or female?
We now laugh at such questions, but how far back into our history would we have to go before such questions would not have been laughed at? In order to describe things in the metaphysical realm we are sometimes limited by our earthly vocabulary, but we must be aware that in using labels to describe something we are constraining it, and thus are distorting what we are perceiving. Another interesting viewpoint is to consider that the word energy also now refers to feelings and then extrapolate this interpretation. It can open a whole new understanding of how we interpret our perceptions of our feelings.
Stop for a moment and reflect on a discordant feeling, say, frustration. When we feel frustration, we behave a certain way and interact with others based on that currently dominant feeling. Sometimes we hold onto the feeling until the source has gone or enough time passes that the feeling naturally fades away or is at least greatly attenuated. Just imagine how much more easily we could eliminate that discordant feeling if, rather than label it, which often serves only as a way to hold onto it, we just let it go without applying a label. It would be like finding a piece of fluff on our clothing and, rather than trying to analyze where it came from or what it was exactly made of, we just picked it up and threw it away.
Change is a bitter medicine.
The medicine is always good for you,
it just never feels that way at the time.
Elaboration
Change is a bitter medicine.
The only thing that is constant in the universe is change. In our lives when changes occur they might be good ones; for example, getting married. These changes we are all too ready to embrace. However, how do we feel about the changes that we would rather not go through? We all have our comfort zones. These zones are where nothing too unpredictable occurs and where we can manage the events. When something happens outside that zone, it puts us in a place where life can seem very bitter indeed, and it is all too easy to wonder if what we are going through is really going to be better for us in the long run, or if it will merely take us from a place that we can manage to a place where we have little or no control.
The medicine is always good for you,
it just never feels that way at the time.
I am sure that we can all remember, especially when we were children, taking some medicine that tasted disgusting and our parents telling us that it would help us. Perhaps we might even have been given a sugar cube afterward to sweeten the aftertaste. As bitter as the medicine might have tasted, deep down inside we knew that it had to be done if we wanted to get better. We are never as helpless as we might think we are, especially during unplanned changes. As bitter as the change might seem, try to look for the benefit in the change. It will always be there; we just have to be alert and observant to find it.
There is so much change in our lives. We have to deal with instability in our jobs, partnerships, health, family, finances, and beliefs. It can seem that the only thing that is consistent from one day to the next is the sun rising and setting. Some changes allow us to feel better, and we are happy to welcome them into our lives. We can be reluctant to move with change that is not so obviously positive. When going through this type of change, remember that painful, negative change can take us to a new direction in our lives, one that is more fulfilling, and one which we might never have found without that push.
When we are caught in change, sometimes the reason for the change will be completely clear, or it can be a game of hide and seek as we try to find out where our life path is to go next. Undesired change tastes like bitter medicine at the time, but our growth tends to happen in times of hardship, when we are being pushed outside of our comfort zone—this is where we can discover that we are so much more than we think we are. When changes happen that are not of your choosing and the discomfort starts, remember that it is just like medicine. It takes a little longer to go down, but down it will go, and once the bitter aftertaste has faded, you will come out of it and be better for it.
I remember when I got laid off—it seemed terrible at the time. How was I going to live, pay the mortgage, eat, et cetera? Had it not been for the layoff, letting go of my old life would not have happened. I could say it would have been harder, but really, I can’t imagine how I could have got from there to here without that abrupt disruption in my life. Generally speaking, as a species we are lazy. It is not that we are incapable of adapting, but we really do not want to make the effort it will take to change. Often it is only when we are backed into a corner with no wiggle room and have said “enough is enough” to ourselves that we look inside our box for a solution, and if we find nothing there, then and only then will we consider solutions outside our box, and only then if pushed really hard. Just look at what I experienced. It is easy now to look back and wonder how I could have ignored all those flashing neon signs and alarm bells going off outside my box. But my world was so constrained by my box that anything outside it seemed not real. So trust me when I say that when we do our utmost to resist change, it is the resistance that can cause the discomfort, and not the change itself.
Often we can look back and see that we have found something wonderful as a result of something that was uncomfortable.
It is okay to want the sun, the moon, and the stars.
It is how one behaves when one does not get them,
that dictates the quality of who one is.
Elaboration
It is okay to want the sun, the moon and the stars.
In our materialistic society, to a greater or lesser extent we want things to make our lives comfortable and fun. At its most distilled, the Maslow Triangle describes how we aspire to live; but at its most extreme, greed-driven aspiration is not a good thing for anyone, including the person whose aspiration it is. So the question now becomes “Is it okay to aspire, to innovate, to challenge ourselves, to want to better ourselves?” Yes of course it is. Otherwise who would we be as a species?
It is how one behaves when one does not get them,
that dictates the quality of who one is.
We all dream about what we want. We dream of material objects, houses, cars, jobs, or careers. We dream of the perfect relationships we would like to have with our friends, families, and partners. Sometimes, we do not get what we want. How do we behave at those times? With grace or in some other way?
Reflect on how you behave when you don’t get something you wanted. This is how the world sees you. Does this behavior match what you want the world to see, does it match who you want to be? You might not see the bigger picture at first, but with hindsight, you might be able to understand why you did not get what you wanted. Try asking yourself if it was something that you really needed or just something that you wanted. Take a moment then to focus on what you already have that can be nourished, and choose to show the world your grace.
So the question is, who is deciding what you want? That depends on your perspective. If you are coming from your personality, your ego, it will be that energy driving your wants. But what is it that your soul needs? The soul is a challenging concept, since on the surface it can be conceived as abstract, unseen, not much help in our world of bills that need to be paid and roles that we must play.
This is where your meditations can help. As you meditate, you are able to feel the “something different” inside you. This is you connecting to your spirit. This is your direct experience. From this place of stillness and peace ask yourself what is it that you need, rather than what you want. Feel that place and understand, know, that there is a bigger picture for you.
I have always disliked the expression “When one door closes, another will open.” I’ve always thought that’s all well and good, but I see the door in front of me right now closing and I do not see the other one opening. When is it going to open? If I hear this line of reasoning starting up in my head I reflect on something that I am very grateful for, and then start to backtrack on the breadcrumb trail of events that made that thing come into my life. Noticing the events that had to happen, and those that had to not happen, in order for what I have now to be in my life. It can be quite fun. Of course one of my biggest breadcrumbs (more like a loaf than a breadcrumb) was getting laid off. At the time I thought it was the end of the world, especially with all the financial commitments that I had. When I now look at what I have, and especially who I am, I would not reopen that door for the world. Reflecting on that trail always helps me to nip any discordant energy, related to a door closing in my face, in the bud before I start to spiral further down into it.
Thoughts have life,
they will fight to survive,
they feed on self and others’ pain.
Despite what it may seem like,
they are not insurmountable.
The persona and the shadow come from the same source.
The brighter the light, the darker the shadow.
One cannot have one without the other.
Looking for the thoughts in the shadows,
calling them by their true names,
is halfway to giving you control over them.
Understanding their stories liberates you from them.
Elaboration
Thoughts have life.
It is easy to think that once we have had a thought, then like a breath of wind passing in front of us it is gone for good. And yet some do get stored, they are kept alive somewhere inside us, otherwise why would we be able to say, “I remember thinking that!” Some thoughts are perhaps what we might call general thoughts, perhaps even happy thoughts; others are more destructive. Since we do not choose or perhaps admit to owning the more destructive thoughts, they are stored in the corners of our mind, some of the corners being so dark that we might call those areas our subconscious. These are perhaps some of the thoughts that could have been formed by our experiences growing up.
They will fight to survive,
they feed on self and others’ pain.
The ferocity of these thoughts can overpower the more peaceful and joyful ones. Like anything that lives, these thoughts need food, need fuel, to survive. What is the fuel that feeds these discordant thoughts and feelings? It is the same emotions that were felt when the thoughts were initially created. The emotions can either be drawn out of someone else (we behave in such a way as to create them in the other person) or created inside us by our own actions.
Despite what it may seem like,
they are not insurmountable.
In our life we can be aware that at times we are behaving in ways that do not bring us peace and joy. These behaviors are a direct manifestation of our conscious and unconscious thoughts. An excuse for these thoughts that we might say to others and particularly ourselves is “That’s just the way I am.” When we think like that or say that, we define the thoughts as part of us, something that will not change, and we accept that they are permanent. Perhaps it is that we don’t know how to change them, that we don’t have the tools. We can turn and face them, but how do we eliminate them? How can we conquer something that is a part of us? If we think of them as part of us, “just the way we are,” it would be like our own hand trying to strangle us and we have no control over it. As permanent as they might seem, there is a way to confront and eliminate these discordant thoughts. However, in the words of Carl Jung: “Not over, but through.” They are conquerable with the right tools.
The persona and the shadow come from the same source.
The persona that I am talking about in this context is the good part of ourselves. The shadow part of ourselves is the more destructive side of us. When we project our shadow onto the world around us, these hidden destructive thoughts and feelings results in us seeing a tainted world. Yet both the persona and shadow come from the same source, and that source sits above them both—that is our spirit, our soul.
The brighter the light, the darker the shadow.
One cannot have one without the other.
Consider a computer adventure game. In the beginning the monsters that you fight have a certain amount of power, and likewise the treasures you discover have a relative value. The deeper that you go into the dungeon, the more valuable the treasure and the more fierce and tenacious the monsters that you battle. So the greater the prize in your quest, the fiercer the monster that you must battle.
Here you have the light and the dark; in order to access the highest parts of you, you also have to see the darkest parts of you. We all have both. It’s OK. It doesn’t make us terrible, we just have to understand and work with them so that the shadow doesn’t control us directly or indirectly.
Looking for the thoughts in the shadows,
Many of our most powerful thoughts are hidden from us. Here they are referred to as being “in the shadows.” Another way of saying this is that these thoughts are in our subconscious. Our subconscious contains both our personal subconscious and a collective unconscious. The latter was first proposed by Jung. When we walk into a well-lit room containing many objects, there will be shadows created by the objects. Our eyes will be drawn to the objects and the lighter areas of the room, skipping over the darker parts. If we were to look deeper into the shadows we might be able to perceive the presence of an object within that shadow. However, determining its shape and form will not be easy; finding the details, even harder. Where better for something that does not want to be found to hide, or for us to put something that we wish to forget about, than in the shadows of our mind?
Calling them by their true names,
is halfway to giving you control over them.
When we go looking into those shadow areas of our mind we might find a thought related to a past experience. That thought creates a feeling, for example, anger. Anger, however, is always the superficial manifestation of another deeper feeling, a feeling that we do not want to feel because it hurts us in a way that we perceive as a weakness; for example, being helpless or unworthy. These feelings may seem unfamiliar to us, but with an open mind and a Meditative Feeling as a foundation on which to stand, we can feel safe as we start to look past the superficial manifestations to these deeper feelings that are the power behind the throne.
Do they really have that much power? When we react to a situation in an instinctual way, without question or observation, we may think we are behaving naturally. We are certainly doing what comes naturally in that moment. When we examine the deeper thoughts that are creating those behaviors, we uncover the forces that are hidden within us. It is those thoughts and feelings that we are allowing to control our current behavior. If we allow them to remain within us, we are giving them the power; they are ruling us, and we are enslaved to them. Just as in the description “the power behind the throne,” once you understand where the power lies it is easy to bypass the “king” (the superficial thoughts and feelings) who seems to have the apparent power and to deal with the real power. However, finding the real names of the faulty thoughts and feelings does not immediately mean that you are rid of them; you still need to understand more about how they were created, but you are partway to freedom.
Understanding their stories liberates you from them.
There is more to this insight than just finger-pointing at the event or events in your past where you created the faulty thought and its associated feeling. Understanding the story that led to their creation means reliving the event, but this time being fully aware of the original single most powerful thought and feeling that were created in that moment. You also understand what was going on in your mind at the time. One way to do this is through a guided meditation with a therapist. The soul must find the tenacity and fortitude to go into that dark and very painful place to be able to feel what it is that was actually experienced, and then step back into a place of compassion and wisdom and move through the event, releasing and forgiving all involved.
The consequences of the discordant thoughts and feelings that make up our shadow can best be summed up by this quote from Robert Johnson in Owning Your Own Shadow: “Any repair of our fractured world must start with individuals who have the insight and courage to own their own shadow. Nothing ‘out there’ will help if the interior projecting mechanism of humankind is operating strongly. The tendency to see one’s shadow ‘out there’ in one’s neighbor or in another race or culture is the most dangerous aspect of the modern psyche.” 3
When we go searching for these thoughts in the shadows, they will not show their true identity; they do not want to be found. So, they will show themselves as familiar and less destructive feelings and will allow us to get bogged down trying to resolve the superficial diversion. For example, when you get angry at a situation, ask yourself why you are really getting angry. If your partner forgot to buy you a birthday present and you are angry, what is the feeling underneath the anger? Was it that you felt unloved? Then why do you feel as though you have to feel loved? Where is your self-love? Do you feel worthy to feel your own love? This chain of self-analysis allows you to pinpoint and identify the source of the discordant energy.
It was during my RoHun Therapy training that I came to understand how our thoughts and feelings about our past experiences are not ethereal abstractions or inactive snapshots like a photograph, but are movies very much alive and running. The movies that we are aware of in our conscious mind are probably only a small and inconsequential part of the movies we are playing in our subconscious mind. It’s the ones that we aren’t aware of that have the most impact on our perceptions and consequent behavior.
Our feelings about an event in our past are alive and they supply the energy for the thoughts that control us. These discordant thoughts and feelings want to live just as much as anything else that has a consciousness, and they will fight to survive if left unattended. The root feeling, which initially created the discordant thought, such as unworthiness, helplessness, or fear, does not care where the energy to keep it alive comes from. The discordant energy is developed inside us by our perception of a situation or by saying or doing something to someone else that induces that discordant energy in them. Negative energy is negative energy—the discordant thought does not care where it gets its energy.
It is easy to think that all might be lost at this point. After all, how are we expected to go into our own subconscious mind and find those thoughts lurking in the shadows? Meditation is a great starting point, and then learning to objectively observe your own thoughts and feelings is a great next step. Insights, your own or others’, will provide the tools with which you can then challenge these faulty thoughts and feelings. But remember that the insights must lead us to a place of compassion, harmony, and wisdom for ourselves and with others. This insight is to give hope and an understanding of what it takes to be free of our subconscious thoughts that take the peace and joy out of our lives. Yes, the path is not an easy one, yes it’ll take tenacity and fortitude, but it IS worth it. Take courage and go on the greatest adventure you’ll ever have, the one to the most wonderful prize, the one inside yourself. No monthly subscription required!
When you can see God in a flower and time in a grain of sand,
when you can see life in a becalmed ocean
and love in your enemy’s eyes,
you have touched the heart of God.
Elaboration
This insight is about seeing the divine in and all around us. The first line highlights two aspects of God, creativity and timelessness. The first being the complexity that makes up a flower, its aroma, its colors, the shape of its petals and how they interweave with each other, complementing rather than competing.
As humans our time is bounded by the day we are born and the day we die. The tasks we undertake are defined by the minutes, hours, day, months, and years it takes to complete them. Even our longest endeavors, such as raising children, are bound by our lifetime. Living into one’s nineties is considered getting to a ripe old age. In contrast, God’s time is endless. This timelessness is expressed when we consider how water and wind can erode a mountain into sand. The thousands of years that had to pass to create just a single bucketful of the sand is but a moment to the Divine.
The second sentence covers two hidden aspects of God. These are represented by the apparently lifeless expanse of a flat, endless, becalmed ocean. An ocean without wind used to mean death to sailors, who relied on the power of the wind, yet beneath the surface is a world teaming with life, from the huge whales to the microcosmic krill. Often, we forget to look for the divinity in the world around us, and yet it is right there in front of our eyes, if we choose to just look a bit deeper.
The second hidden aspect is the spark of divinity that exists inside everything. While we can readily accept the hidden life in the becalmed ocean, it takes a great deal of courage to acknowledge that within the person you most hate, behind the mask of your enemy, is a spark of light just like yours. This is a high level of perception that calls us to rise out of our own story to see the world and the sparks that surround us. To see that the spark of light is our common connection to something beautiful and amazing, and that through our enemies’ most unenlightened behavior we are still all one, all the same.
These aspects are all part of the divine, as are we, so whenever you look at something, no matter what it is, always remember that it is a piece of you, that it is touching the heart of God.
Whether a meditation is successful or not is based on a single criterion:
whether you meditated or not.
Elaboration
It can be hard to create the discipline to meditate regularly. So when you do sit down for your practice, congratulate yourself for creating the time to do so. Whether it was a particularly good meditation (much meditative energy was created) is only a secondary consideration. Do not put pressure on yourself to excel at meditating, just enjoy creating the time for yourself to experience what comes. Don’t fixate on what it should be like, but remain open to Spirit in its many forms.
We are taught about being successful from an early age. We have exams in school, we are graded, there are competitions, perhaps athletic or a spelling bee. Leaving school we enter into the world trying to become successful. Many people experience anxiety about a high school reunion—what do they have to show for their lives so far, how will they measure up against their peers? I remember being told at a very early age, when taking part in sports, that it was not the winning or losing that mattered but the taking part—right, like I actually believed that. My peers didn’t seem to either.
Meditation, however, is different. It really is all about taking part and not looking for a goal to be achieved, unless the goal is to “just do it,” as Nike says.
In my meditation classes, people always ask me how long they should meditate for. I tell them as frequently as you like and for as long as you can, until you get bored. Without any expectations or constraints, people then just flow into it at their own natural pace. As little as five minutes will make a difference; it will help you establish a regular practice, which will grow. Over time, that five minutes will turn into ten, and then fifteen. You will become more fluent, and the more you practice, the easier it will be to use that meditative energy and call it up when you need it. Therefore, a successful meditation is one where you made the effort to meditate.
There is no such thing as designated sacred ground.
A piece of ground is sacred
Where ever and whenever a person
touches that spark of divine light inside them,
through prayer,
meditation, word, or deed.
Elaboration
There is no such thing as designated sacred ground.
As humans we like to get together in groups. We like to build places for our group meetings—it could be a bar, a coffee house, a restaurant, a sports stadium, a friend’s house. We always look back with fond memories at those places, especially if they are no longer standing. Yet we accept that these places were just bricks and mortar and we have no more attachment to them than our fond memories. However, that all changes when we bring our beliefs into the mix. Suddenly what once was just bricks and mortar now becomes something more, something that we will kill to defend, that can be insulted, something that has to be respected. What happened to our core values as humans, to those values that bind us all irrespective of race, creed, or nationality? How is it that we can so easily toss them aside for some bricks and mortar? How sacred is a piece of ground when one day it can be consecrated and the next unconsecrated, when someone will kill another human, breaking one of their own sacred rules, because in their view some bricks and mortar were insulted? Where is the universal truth in that?
A piece of ground is sacred
wherever and whenever a person
touches that spark of divine light inside them,
through prayer,
meditation, word, or deed.
Shouldn’t a piece of ground be considered sacred by our momentary actions as we interact with another human from our place of compassion and wisdom? Isn’t this what the good Samaritan did by the roadside? Didn’t he directly manifest the inner sacredness of his creed across a religious and social divide?
It’s my belief that when you act from your heart center, from your source of compassion for a fellow human being, no matter where on the planet you are connecting to that piece of Divine inside you, that ground for that moment will become sacred.
If you truly believe that a piece of ground can be sacred, then manifest it by doing something that is alive, do it in your actions across the divide. Sacredness is something that is alive; it lives through our interactions with all life and not in inanimate objects.
Rumi summarized it beautifully, “… I searched for God among the Christians and on the Cross but therein found Him not. I went into the ancient temples of idolatry, no trace of Him was there. I entered the mountain cave of Hira and then went as far as Qandhar but God found I not, neither in low nor in high places … Turning to philosophy I inquired about Him from ibn Sina but found Him not within his range. I fared then to the scene of the Prophet’s experience of a great divine manifestation only a ‘two bow-lengths’ distance from him’ but God was not there even in that exalted court. Finally, I looked into my heart and there I saw Him, He was nowhere else.” 4
If anyone is offended by a thing,
then they are insecure over that thing.
They should then confront that insecurity inside themselves,
and work through it.
Elaboration
If anyone is offended by a thing,
then they are insecure over that thing.
When you feel offended by something, remember offense is just a relative term. That is, what one person finds offensive another just brushes off. So if you find something offensive, look inside yourself and try to understand more deeply what it is that you are insecure about. Why are you offended? What is underneath the offense? Why do you feel that way about it? What are the thoughts that accompany the feeling?
They should then confront that insecurity inside themselves,
and work through it.
Once you see clearly the chain of thoughts and feelings that are resulting in the feeling of offense inside you (remember to start by getting into your Meditative Feeling), you can then start to unravel the root cause and move through it, releasing it as you go.
If I were to tell you that you had really bad buoyancy control (remember, I am a SCUBA instructor) and you either were not a SCUBA diver or did it so infrequently that you did not care, would you be offended? Or would you just brush it off? You might be offended if you were deriving some sense of self-worth from the idea of having great buoyancy control, and the idea that prowess in that area says something about you as a person. If you already had a strong sense of self, good self-esteem, then my statement on buoyancy control would pass by you like a leaf drifting over a road, inconsequential. You might even welcome it as an opportunity to increase your skill level.
Ask yourself: Why is it that some things offend me and not others? What is the difference within me that makes one important and not the other?
One day I was reading a news article about how some people were offended by a particular program that had just been broadcast on TV. I was amazed. If it offended them, then why watch it? Change the channel, turn off the TV, read a book, go for a walk, listen to the radio. What in their ego was being fed by the need to complain about something, a need to take a stand, when they could simply have changed channels and let it go?
As I reflected on these thoughts, I realized that unbeknown to them they were being given a gift. What they saw pushed a button inside them, and with a bit of self-awareness they had the opportunity to look at a part of themselves and work on healing it. The world that we see is a mirror of what is inside us—how we perceive that world is our guide as to what to heal within ourselves.
Intrigued by this idea, I ran a little experiment. I knew of a hand gesture used by Italians involving their chin. I must admit I do not fully understand its meaning, but I knew that Italians consider the gesture impolite. So when a group of friends came to visit, I used the gesture and asked them if they were offended. The blank stares that I got back told me that they had no idea what I had just done. I then made up an explanation of the gesture, telling them of the harshest and rudest thing I could think of. At that point one or two mentioned that it was not like me to be so offensive and what was going on? I asked them why they were so offended now, when a minute ago they just thought that I was brushing my chin in a weird way. What had changed in their perception that made them now offended? At that point they realized the point that I was making and smiled as I explained the insight.
You do not sharpen a sword by waving it in the air,
you press it against a grindstone.
Your soul is the sword,
and your life’s trials are your grindstones.
Elaboration
You do not sharpen a sword by waving it in the air,
you press it against a grindstone.
You sharpen a sword to bring it to its purpose. The edge of a sword can be anywhere from blunt to razor sharp. In all cases, the sharpness is generated by pressing the steel of the sword against a harder material in order to grind down the steel to a sharp edge. Anything less than the hardness of the steel would only wear away the grinding material without changing the steel’s edge.
Your soul is the sword,
and your life’s trials are your grindstones.
The sharpening that you are doing to your soul is its education, not academic education, but education in life and how to be a better human, full of wisdom, discernment, and compassion. Just as in any educational situation, we might learn about the principles of that subject in a classroom. It is not until we are out in the real world with all its challenges that we can first apply and then adapt those principles in order to grow, using what we have learned in the classroom. In this way we add to our personal knowledge and experience. So if our life trials are always ones that we can easily manage, then where will be the growth? There will be little and we may stagnate. Some trials will be easier than others, but we must always look for the deeper lesson to take from the experience and not the one that we think it is by only looking at the surface.
In any difficult situation, try to look at it for what it is. Not a punishment for you but a deeper lesson for your soul’s growth, which means that you’ll have to contemplate the higher purpose that you are to take away from the experience. Standing in your meditative energy while contemplating the experience will give you the perspective with which to see the lesson.
A difficult situation might last for an hour, a day, or several months. While it’s going on, we can easily get caught up in the swirl of negative energies that we create inside. We have to remember the higher perspective—we are here to grow our perceptions and minimize the creation of discordant energies inside ourselves. Our soul allows or attracts these situations into our life in order for us to learn from them and to grow. Rumi has a beautiful quatrain: “If you are irritated by every rub, how will your mirror be polished?” 5
How do we know when we have learned the lesson? When we are in the situation and no discordant energies are created inside us. When we are just observing the situation like someone watching a movie. When there is no attachment to outcome. This might seem like we are extracting ourselves from the world and from caring about people and what is happening. This is not true. What we are doing is extracting ourselves from being controlled by these situations. We are not allowing them to permanently create or reinforce negative energy within us.
That is not to say that we are not allowed to react to difficult situations. What is important is how we have changed once we’ve been through it, what we have moved inside us as a result of the experience. Did we sharpen our sword, or dull it?
Spirituality is the empirical discovery of our divine nature
by the shedding of who we thought we were.
Elaboration
The dictionary definition of empirical is “verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic.” This insight suggests that we can experience our divine nature though real-world practical objective experiences. However, unlike experimentation in mathematics or physics where the answer is correct or incorrect, experiencing our divine nature comes in degrees or shades. We connect to that spark of divinity within us not by trying to will ourselves to be like it or praying for it, but by releasing who we are not. What is left is the real part of who we are, our divinity.
I am sometimes asked about my understanding of the difference between religion and spirituality. For me, religion is about belief and faith, and spirituality is about practical personal objective experience. Connecting to our divine nature is like a strenuous hike. There will be parts that are flat, parts that are downhill, and parts that are up a very steep incline. It is our tenacity that drives us to continue walking. We need fortitude to go inside ourselves where, from our objective place (our meditation place), we can start to understand what it is that we are not.
My first introduction to the ancient wisdom of self-awareness and spirituality were the Dhammapada, the Upanishads, and the Bhagavad Gita. Those books explained to me what was inside me, my spirit (for want of a better word) and my ego and the battle between the two. As I started to read other books, among them Ascent of Mount Carmel by John of the Cross and The Interior Castle by St. Teresa of Avila, I found that other souls had deepened their connection to that spark of divinity by going within. The techniques they used are not so different than the ones on offer today for self-analysis. They went inside to find out who they were not, and thereby discovered who they were and their spirituality.
It was during my RoHun training at Delphi, combined with my meditation practice and reading books by others who had hiked the trail before me, that I started to understand, to feel, my divine connection deepen. Of these three things it was the RoHun therapy that was the main process through which I discovered who I am not and therefore who I am. There are many alternative therapies out there, including Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) and Yoga for Trauma Recovery. Find one that works for you by measuring how your behavior and perceptions change toward yourself and others in a more enlightened way. Do not believe that one method has all the answers. Just as we have a coat for cold days and another for warm days, use a process if it helps and put it aside if it doesn’t. If it ceases to help move you forward look for something else that will work, your next stepping stone. However, as you decide which process will help you now, do not be frivolous. As the old crusader said in the Indiana Jones movie The Last Crusade, “Choose wisely.” Sound advice!
One of the most self-limiting things anyone can say about themselves is “That’s just the way I am.”
Elaboration
In the last few years as I have walked my spiritual path, I have found that strangers have felt more open to talk to me about themselves; not everyone of course, but a majority, and it has surprised me just how open people can be.
During the conversations I’d start to ask more pointed questions about how they saw themselves, and I found that many were aware they had emotional and mental discordant traits. For some it didn’t occur to them that they could change a particular thing because they perceived it as part of them, like an arm or a leg—so they said, “That’s just the way I am.” Others wanted to change, but didn’t know how—they didn’t have the tools. Some people were afraid to change because it meant they’d have to look at something that was very painful and uncomfortable; they would have to make changes, and not everyone is ready for that. So, many just accepted the status quo and said, “That’s just the way I am.”
This does not have to be the case. If you truly want to be free of your history, becoming the observer of your thoughts and feelings is the first step to ridding yourself of these parasitic energies. The choice of the word parasitic is deliberate—these energies do feed off us to survive. Most parasites don’t kill the host, rather they take just enough to survive and to grow. If they kill their host, their source of life dies, so they too die. Our parasitic thoughts and feelings suck the joy, peace, and richness out of our life.
In our society we are often working to create something new, such as a piece of software, a clothing line, a smarter and faster phone or car. Next year there will always be another version of the software, a new fashion trend, a better car, and a new gadget with even more functions. We accept that what we buy now will become old next year or the year after. We accept what we own today will be replaced or upgraded later. So why aren’t we prepared to look upon ourselves with the same expectations of change?
There is an old saying: “The only constant in the universe is change.” There are many methods out there for people to use to change; use your discernment in finding what works for you now, and when that loses its effectiveness (and it might), look for the next stepping stone. Do not just flit from one thing to the next; choose carefully where you put your focus and energy. Be like a bee going from one flower the next: only move on when all the useful pollen has been collected from that flower—in other words, when you can see no more overt change occurring within you and your interaction in the world around you. The opportunities and the means to change will not come gift-wrapped, we have to be vigilant and thoughtful about what we choose. There will be times where internal fortitude will be required and times when the going will be much easier, but we must keep moving forward.
The first step is not to believe that who you are today is who you have to be tomorrow. If you use your Wedge of Awareness to alter one small behavior in your life, whether it’s always remembering to put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher (and yes, my wife always calls me out on that one, but I am getting better) or not getting angry when another driver cuts you off, then you have changed. Who you were a few weeks ago is not who you are now. Wouldn’t it be amazing to find just how far you can go with change? So if you ever hear yourself saying, “That’s just the way I am,” and it’s something that puts you in a box and defines you as “less than”—challenge yourself to work on it and release it.
With great awareness comes great responsibility.
Elaboration
As our awareness grows, we start to become the observer of our thoughts and feelings, and with our new Lens of Perception, we develop a new way to look at ourselves, other people, and the world around us. Our responsibility now becomes making sure that we do not stand in judgment of others or ourselves.
The way we may end up judging others can happen in three stages, and it is all too easy to fall into one or all of them. The first stage is to become judgmental of others for the energy of discord, the energy of pain, the energy of unconsciousness that we see entrapping them. The second is to try to help by educating them into waking up, either through subtle comments or blunt, critical analyses of their situation. I am reminded of the quote from the Bible that talks about pointing out the splinter in someone else’s eye all the while ignoring the plank in our own. The third is that we look at others with pity for where they are, and not with compassion, like the compassion we might feel for someone who is struggling to adjust to a difficult life change. The struggle might be subtle or frenetic, conscious or unconscious; it can be a yearning without a direction; it can be the clinging to a familiar if troublesome burden because the unknown without it can be scary.
With our new awareness we have to step above these judgments and remember how asleep we were and what we had to go through.
The responsibility is acknowledging to ourselves that we all are where we are, and we’re all doing the best that we can. We are here to help if we are asked, and willing to accept that others are who they are.
I remember watching the first Spider-Man movie, and in one scene Peter Parker is told that with great power comes great responsibility. It was one of those “Wait, what was that?” moments. I stopped the movie and suddenly reflected on my new growing awareness of who I am and the world around me. I thought, What new responsibility, if any, must I take on with my growing awareness?
If you become a mirror to reflect back to the people around you their discordant thoughts, feelings, and behaviors,
then the reflection is only as clear as the mirror.
Elaboration
If you become a mirror to reflect back to the people around you
their discordant thoughts, feelings and behaviors,
This line speaks to how we are all too ready to judge and point out to others their shortcomings and reflect back at them our perceptions of their flaws.
Then the reflection is only as clear as the mirror.
Just how clear is a reflection if the mirror is cracked, or covered in dust and grime? That is the state of our mirror when we comment on others’ discordant behaviors. We are setting ourselves up as a clear, clean mirror, but we are anything but that. With our own discordant perceptions corrupting what we observe and tainting what we say, who are we to reflect back at others our perceptions of their flaws?
Whenever you notice yourself making a judgment of someone else and you feel the words arise within you, ask yourself, “Just how clear a mirror am I? I know how clear I would like to think that I am, but is that really true? Do I really need to say the words that are just waiting there on the tip of my tongue? What feel-good factor am I looking to get out of this at someone else’s expense?”
It was precisely a situation like this that I found myself in a few years ago, and it was while the words were just waiting to leap off my tongue that through the dark, thick fog of bad energy came a shard of awareness.
This planet in its history has had some of the most wonderful souls incarnated to teach us how to grow toward spiritual awareness, so over the thousands of years of recorded human history, why are there so few souls who have achieved these enlightened perceptions? Why do people struggle to follow in their footsteps? As society has grown we have managed to do the easier enlightened things; for example, to go to our religious places regularly to be with others for an hour or so, not kill, not steal, perhaps even volunteer at a charity event—so what are we missing?
It was when the shard of awareness pierced the fog that I asked myself: “If I am going to walk my talk, then what do I want to reflect back to people; who do I want them to see when they see me and sense my energy? What type of mirror do I want to be, cracked, distorted and dusty, or as whole and clean as possible?” I also then realized that only when people put more value on walking their talk than anything else, will we have a world that will grow into its full potential.
— Acknowledgment Does Not Mean Forever —
When facing a deeply ingrained faulty thought taken on by
experiencing something or doing something,
one must remember about the thought:
“It is something that I have experienced or done but not who I am.”
Elaboration
When facing a deeply ingrained faulty thought taken on by
experiencing something or doing something,
More often than not we will perceive who we are by our current and past experiences and thoughts. While on an initial level this seems to be true, we must remember that our past experiences and thoughts do not have to define who we are in the future; they are precisely that, in the past. Do not believe that a chalkboard that is full of words means that there is no room for anything new; all we have to do is to start erasing that which we do not want and write what we want in the newly created space.
Imagine for a moment a young child whose parents shouted at them when they were angry. Also imagine that on this occasion it was more about the parent’s life, rather than something the child did. Perhaps the parent was unhappy in their job, or not fulfilled in their relationship, and ended up acting out on the child, in that moment. Of course a child isn’t likely to be privy to their parent’s deep inner thoughts; the parent may not even be aware of these thoughts. The child would see and feel the anger being directed at them. As a consequence of being on the receiving end of repeated outbursts over many years, the child might shrink back into themselves whenever a voice was raised, especially if it was directed at them. They may realize over a period of time that this is what a parent does; it may seem like normal behavior. The lesson the child might learn from this is that when a voice is raised, retreat into yourself behind a wall and stay there until that situation is over. This becomes a thought that they believe will keep them safe.
Let’s travel forward in time. The child is now an adult working for a company that involves travel and meeting many new people. In a meeting with a new client, they put their point across and the client immediately counters with a raised voice, waving their hands around, clearly emotional and confrontational. Having never learned how to deal calmly with someone in an emotional state, rather than waiting for the emotion to abate and then reiterating, rephrasing, or elaborating on the point, this adult retreats behind a wall and backs off from their point, giving in. They are subconsciously behaving in that pattern learned all those years ago.
One must remember about the thought:
“It is something that I have experienced or done but not who I am.”
You have to look at your own thoughts, feelings, and behavior with a great amount of awareness and remember that just because you have always behaved that way does not mean that is who you have to be going forward into your future. You can change. Our personal history has made us who we think we are, but we are so much greater than those discordant thoughts and feelings. Connect to your Meditative Feeling, hold on to it, and behave from that connected place and you’ll see for yourself, who you truly are.
As we move through our consciousness, past our superficial faulty thoughts and feelings, and into our subconscious, it gets very difficult to step back from what we find there. It could have been with us for many years, something so deeply ingrained it will seem like it is a part of us, defining who we are. We might even see some benefit from it; for example, we may have drawn on the feeling of anger to change a situation in which we felt helpless. The problem is that the helplessness seed is still there and so is the anger that was created by it. It is deep down in our subconscious, and it is not dormant. The seed of helplessness will be creating other thoughts and feelings and drawing situations into our lives that are not for our best benefit—that is how this helplessness feeling will survive.
This insight is about facing those deep subconscious thoughts and giving yourself a higher perspective, an understanding with which to release them. The important point to remember is not to use this insight to smother what you find or bury it under deeper layers of denial. It is to be used as part of the releasing process. To create a separation between you and the thought, and then to peel away its layers to understand how it was created. At that point, release it.
You are like a tree.
Just grow yourself, and your shade, your love,
will provide shade for others.
Elaboration
A tree’s only mission in life is to grow. It does not think that it has to grow to provide shade for others, it just grows to fulfill its purpose in life. The fact that it provides shade for others is a benefit that others get from it.
People who are on a spiritual path try to project into the world their wisdom and their compassion with a mind-set of “I’m feeling great, everything is amazing in the world, you should have this too, do what I tell you and you can have it too.” At this point they are telling their friends what to do and probably getting some pushback, as nobody likes being told what to do.
This insight is about being a role model, which will provide a positive influence in the world. As we personally grow, we may be tempted to try to help others, even if they do not ask for it. Of course nobody likes to be force-fed anything, even self-awareness. Focus on your work, take care of your inner peace, and this will start to show through. People will notice the change in you, and they will sense your inner peacefulness. If they are ready for further growth, their souls will prompt them to ask questions.
Take a moment and reflect on a meeting you had with someone who had really peaceful energy. That good energy that you sensed is that person’s shade, i.e. their compassion and the inner peace that exudes from them.
The more that you work on yourself, the bigger the shade that your inner peace will cast and the more people will benefit from your own interest in personal growth. Our task is to focus on our own growth and let our behavior and our countenance shine out for others to enjoy and appreciate. In the words of Gandhi, “Be the change you want to see in the world.”
People say that trying to live a spiritual life
in this world is very difficult.
The impinging forces of the day-to-day pressures
of existence and living can be overwhelming.
Reflect for a moment on the commitment
an athlete must make to train for the Olympics.
They create the inner strength and discipline to strive for their goal,
so must we.
They are role models showing how to prioritize things in life
to reach our spiritual goals.
This is how we need to look upon our efforts to grow.
Elaboration
We have walked this planet for thousands of years. Heroes have come forward to do battle in times of war to bring order back to this earth. Other times another sort of hero has arisen, a hero of awareness and enlightenment: Krishna, Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed. They forced their awareness to step away from the current societal beliefs of the day, they showed by living their teachings what has to be done to create greater inner peace and respect for all life. They did not find it easy. They did not force themselves to conform to society by being the square peg in the round hole, but saw that they were different and made the choice not to fit in the wrong-shaped hole, but to live and explore the shape that they in fact were. They created the inner tenacity, fortitude, and discipline to become something greater.
In these times our day-to-day heroes are our Olympic athletes. They have the same drive, the same commitment to attain their goal. In order to excel at their sport they must pay attention to every tiny detail of their performance in training. Only then will the whole be greater than the sum of the parts.
We must pay close attention to our smallest thoughts and feelings, with the understanding that if they are not in our highest interest for our growth, they should be faced, changed, or eliminated.
If we truly want to evolve into all that we can be, then we must sweat the small stuff of our thoughts, feelings, and behavior, every moment of every day. For example, at the checkout, when asked how our day is going, we have many options as to how to answer. We can ignore the question, or say okay and then check our smartphone again just in case something has changed in the last minute. Another option is to reply and then ask the cashier how is their day going, while still checking the phone—well, it has been thirty seconds now since we last looked! Or you could be in your enlightened awareness and maintain eye contact while replying fully and ask them about their day, all the time remembering that there in front of you is another soul walking their own path, facing their own trials and tribulations as they grow. We are all comrades in arms in the fight against our own discordant thoughts and feelings.
There is no nail and blame in a spiritual awakening.
Everything that happens to us is attracted by us to further grow.
Always look for the diamond in the coal.
Elaboration
There is no nail and blame in a spiritual awakening.
When we start to wake up to growing our spirituality we soon realize that as convenient as it might be, it is not going to be delivered in the mail, but will take a bit more work than that. That work takes the form of looking at why we think, feel, and behave in ways that are unenlightened toward ourselves and others. In the beginning of this reflection we might start to blame others for what they did to us and how their behavior has caused us to be who we are. It is human nature to point the finger at other people for things happening in our lives that we do not like. A common example is “My relationship would be great if only my partner would change”—of course we assume that we are perfect and it’s all their fault! However, rather than blaming we have to scratch the surface of whatever we are looking at and understand what’s hidden beneath.
The expression “nail and blame” refers to nailing something down (perhaps like the pins used to mount butterflies in a display case) so there is no room for the subject to defend itself, and the blame is about pointing an accusing finger. As an example, we might say to ourselves that we behave a certain way because our parents (the nail part, especially if they are not alive) did not do something for us (the blame part). If we now scratch the surface of this particular instance, with our adult awareness, we will realize that when we were young we did not have the awareness to understand that we had a choice how to behave and we thought that all our behavior was someone else’s fault. Now, as an adult with growing awareness, we can look back and understand that the way we behaved then does not have to be how we behave now. We have greater awareness, and with that comes an understanding of choices that can now be made.
Everything that happens to us is attracted by us to further grow.
Newton’s third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. A simple example of this is to imagine that you are floating in space and want to move five feet to your left; unless you have something to push against you will simply be waving your hands while floating in place (looking rather funny) and nothing will happen. You need something to push against.
You will not learn to become a good painter by fixing car engines, or a good cook by just heating up microwave meals. You have to be practicing and learning in the actual subject or skill that you want to become proficient in. We are made up of so many unenlightened perceptions. Along with our life’s trials and tribulations these are our objects, our specific subjects, to push against, moving us toward deeper spirituality. So for example, if you are an impatient person, then by pushing against your impatience you will discover in yourself the quality of patience. It was not that you had to create it; it was always there—you just had to peel away the layers of impatience to find it within you. This is your diamond that is talked about below.
Always look for the diamond in the coal.
While you are in the midst of a difficult time and are trying to see what you are pushing against to grow, look for what you might be moving toward—this is the diamond. Sometimes you might understand what is happening and other times you might not. There will always be a diamond in the coal. It might not be easy to see, as it might be covered in coal dust, but it will be there. It might appear not to be there because it might be something new that you are discovering about yourself. On a deep level you will not be completely clueless; somewhere inside you, you will know what the diamond is that you are moving toward. Remember, if it is not what you are used to seeing in your box, do not dismiss it as not a part of you and leave it outside the box. Make your box bigger and include it. Even if it means putting it in an obscure corner, at least it is now inside.
Sometimes we have to find self-worth outside ourselves in order to know what it’ll feel like inside,
but this is no more of a permanent solution than taking a painkiller because you have a bad tooth.
Sooner or later you have to get the tooth fixed.
Elaboration
Sometimes we have to find self-worth outside ourselves in order
to know what it’ll feel like inside,
There are times in our lives when we might go through a period of very low self-worth. It could be in childhood or when we start to date (perhaps unsuccessfully), or even later in life when we get laid off and find it hard to get another job; perhaps our marriage fails and we feel rejected. In these times, when our self-worth is so low and we look inside, there is no hope to be found. There is nothing to make us want to get up each day. How do we dig ourselves out of this deep, dark, bone-chillingly cold, lonely hole that we find ourselves in? How do we create a kernel of self-worth with which to start rebuilding ourselves? A simple start might be to use something outside of ourselves to create a kernel.
When someone compliments us, either for something we did or how we look, we feel good about ourselves. It gives us a nice feeling inside and we feel special. Sometimes we might not even have to hear a compliment. If we are wearing some new clothes and we notice that people are glancing at us because of how good they think we look, that can also create a nice feeling inside. Or we are with others doing something as a group and they compliment us on our contribution.
There is a difference between feeling good and having self-worth. Feeling good is a nice emotion to have and we can enjoy it for however long it lasts, but it does not fundamentally affect who and how we are. A lack of self-worth will seep into every one of our perceptions and as a consequence every aspect of our life. So even if something happens that is nice for us, then it will either be ignored or its full joy will be muted.
But this is no more of a permanent solution than taking a
painkiller because you have a bad tooth.
Sooner or later you have to get the tooth fixed.
This feeling we get from outside is the feeling that we are looking to have inside us all the time. We can use it to remind ourselves what we should be feeling all the time inside. These days with so many social media sites, many people derive a sense of being valued from external sources—by how many likes they get for a self-portrait photograph or how many followers they have. However, we must remember that we need to create the feel-good factor internally. The dependency on external input to create self-worth is only a temporary stopgap, a reminder to help us start creating our inner kernel.
The emptiness that we feel inside due to lack of self-worth can never be permanently filled if we depend on external sources; eventually we have to fill the void ourselves from within. One way to do this is to do something that will make you feel good that does not depend on someone else’s positive feedback. For example: cleaning up that room that you just never get around to doing, or tracking your fitness routine and noticing your progress, or cooking yourself a healthy meal from scratch rather than heating something up in the microwave. The key is to find something that you recognize as something good for you that does not depend on anyone else knowing about it.
Spirit does not care whether you try and succeed or try and fail,
as long as you care enough to keep trying.
Elaboration
Spirit does not care whether you try and succeed or try and fail,
Our society often judges a person by their achievements or failures. We are praised when we succeed and criticized when we fail. At times, when we succeed we end up resting on our laurels and do nothing more. At the other extreme, when we fail we may give up and do nothing more.
In our life there will be obstacles that we have to overcome; some of them might be small and others, like addiction, huge. One could argue that overcoming any obstacle is enough for one lifetime and why do any further self-development? But that will not satisfy our spirit, our soul.
As long as you care enough to keep trying.
This speaks to me of nonattachment to success or failure, either of which can distract us from walking our soul’s path. With our failures we beat ourselves up, which leads to discouragement; with success we develop comfort zones from which we do not want to move.
As these insights came to me, I strove to keep them alive in my conscious mind. Some days, in some situations, I was more successful than others. When I tripped up I would get frustrated and reproach myself. There would be times when the frustration would last for days. There would be times when I just thought that I had done enough already and I was going to not do any more work to grow. I would sit around and stew for days. During those times, eventually I would remember this insight and pick myself up and keep moving forward.
No matter how many moments of glory or moments of darkness there are, the show goes on. In our case, the show is our spiritual path.
Keep your insights alive by keeping them in your memory,
by acting on them.
They will then bloom and grow.
Just like training for a marathon or studying for your exams,
you must keep training, keep practicing in order to achieve the goal.
Elaboration
Keep your insights alive by keeping them in your memory,
by acting on them.
They will then bloom and grow.
We all strive to grow in our awareness but do not succeed as much as we would like. We might read a quote on Facebook, a passage in a book, perhaps one of the insights, or perhaps have an insight of our own that really resonates with us, that inspires us to perceive something in a more enlightened way. We hold it in our awareness for some time, and then the effort to hold it alive becomes tiring and it drifts away from us.
Holding something in your awareness is a good first step, but taking a moment to reflect on how you will change your behavior based directly on the quote will cement it into your psyche so it can become a permanent part of you. Your behavior is a direct manifestation of your inner perceptions—if you want to change your inner perceptions, then a powerful way to track your progress is to see how your behavior is changing.
Just like training for a marathon or studying for your exams,
you must keep training, keep practicing in order to achieve the goal.
In the beginning it will not be easy to act on the insights; you have to keep practicing. Seeing results in the form of changes in your behavior will encourage you to keep doing it. Once you have seen one change and that has started to feel like a new addition to your life, you can take on another and grow that.
Treat the insights like seeds that you are going to grow one at a time. If you can grow more than one at once, that is good, but do not take on too many. It can be like a house of cards—just putting on that one more additional card might cause the whole thing to collapse, and that’s discouraging. Try an insight for a day, week, or month to see how you change and others change—and make it fun. Keep a journal to track your growth. If you trip up, do not get discouraged. If you are hacking your way through a thick jungle and trip over a log you can either stare at the log, not believing how you could trip over it, berating yourself: “That log was so big, how could I have missed it?” or “Look at that tiny twig, why couldn’t I have just stepped over it?” Or you can pick yourself up and keep on hacking, keeping an eye out for logs, but also for the streams and rocks! There is always a faulty thought to trip us up, and spiritual growth is as much about how quickly we pick ourselves up and our frame of mind afterward as it is about avoiding the obstacles.
Judgment is like an iceberg,
10 percent above the surface is judgment of others,
and 90 percent below the surface is judgment of ourselves.
So next time you judge someone,
wonder what part of the 90 percent you are judging of yourself.
Elaboration
Judgment is like an iceberg,
10 percent above the surface is judgment of others,
When we are young and we see a picture of an iceberg for the first time we assume that it, like a piece of wood, is just floating on the surface with nothing much beneath the icy waters. When we are informed that there is a great deal more actually under the water, in fact 90 percent of it, we find it hard to believe that so much could be there and yet the iceberg doesn’t sink. It is precisely this awareness that there is more beneath the surface than the obvious that we need to bring to our judgments of others.
There is a difference between an observation and a judgment. A judgment has a feeling behind it; that feeling needs something, it needs to be fed. It feeds on a similar feeling, and it has to create that feeling within you, so it can be nourished, so that it can stay alive. This sounds very parasitic; unfortunately that is exactly how these very deep discordant thoughts and feelings survive within us. The feelings could be of superiority, inadequacy, fear, to mention a few. An observation has no discordant energy behind it. A very simple example is noticing a shooting star and pointing it out to someone.
And 90 percent below the surface is judgment of ourselves.
In therapy we learn that a very powerful insidious thought is the judgmental one. It is the judgmental thought that tells us that we are helpless, a failure, or unworthy. The judgmental energy is very deep in us. Generally, it manifests itself by spawning other self-defeating thoughts such as “I’m a failure,” which in turn expresses itself as anger or self-doubt when someone questions our ability. These judgments rise from our depths, and as they move nearer to the surface they express themselves directly as our judgments of others. These self-judgments are very powerful multifaceted feelings that, if left unchecked, reinforce themselves throughout our life.
So next time you judge someone,
wonder what part of the 90 percent you are judging of yourself.
When we are being judgmental of others, a mirror has just been held up to our faces, and if we have the willingness, tenacity, and fortitude to look into it, we have just found a piece of ourselves to heal. So when you make a judgment, look at yourself and see what you are getting out of it, what discordant thought is getting fed, and most importantly, why. That will guide you as to what you can next heal in yourself.
It is not the situation that is important,
but how you behave in the situation.
Elaboration
Life sometimes throws chocolate at us and sometimes rocks. Learning a lesson for our growing awareness while eating chocolate is always wonderful; however, how are we to think, feel, and behave when a rock comes our way? Do we just allow ourselves to give up our inner peace and our higher prospective and jump with both feet into the bog that is our ego, or do we remember that it is easy to be peaceful and aware when everything is going our way, but the resilience of those qualities can only be tempered in the forge of the trials that we face?
We will ask ourselves why are we being given such hard situations, and sometimes they will seem intolerable, but there will be a reason that they are in our life. We might not know what the reason is at the time or perhaps even in the near future, but we can be sure that acting with grace and allowing the story to play out will make things easier and might even help us to later discern the lesson we were being taught.
How can I tell if I am detaching from the human condition or just retreating into a bubble away from it?
Elaboration
Part of our growth is to detach from the influence of the outside world, referred to in this insight as the human condition. Detachment means being able to hold our own feelings and not allow them to be influenced by whatever is happening outside us, unless that is what we choose. For example, imagine you are driving along a freeway in a good mood and someone cuts you off. Detachment means staying in your good mood and letting the incident flow by you without getting angry.
As we walk along our spiritual path, and connect to that spark of divinity inside us, it can be very easy to look out from that place at the world and humanity around us and not want to come out and play. After all, most of what we read or hear about is not conducive to feeling happy and enjoying our life. As our inner peace grows, we also gain a higher perspective and our awareness grows. It is very easy to retreat into that peaceful place and live in a bubble, judging the world outside as crazy and hostile. I believe, though, that we are not meant to retreat into a survival bubble, but to operate from that place—to maintain a core of peace and wisdom while still functioning in and impacting the world.
As I started to feel and live these insights, I could feel myself becoming more detached from the world around me. This insight came to me one morning as I contemplated who I was becoming and noticed myself moving away from the human condition, moving away from the daily discordant energies of others that we all seem to swim around in.
In fact, a friend mentioned that it seemed that I was retreating into a bubble away from the world. I wondered how I could tell the difference between detachment and retreat, so I asked Janice, one of my teachers at Delphi University, for her view. Wanting to be able to validate my elaboration of the insights, I also asked her how one’s behavior would differ in these two states. The reply I got back was so beautifully phrased and succinct that I asked her if I could use it here.
“Detachment is being very present in your caring (love) without being invested in the outcome. It is holding events and people in your heart without a rush to fix, but with patience to see how, if in any way, you are called to assist or engage. Detachment is warmly allowing things to be as they are without manipulating or being afraid of the outcome. It is allowing everything to be as it is and being unafraid of the emotions involved. It is fearlessly calm and present, holding space for others without calling attention to what you are doing. Someone’s behavior would look like this: compassion, caring, willingness to share with no urge to do so unless it is for all concerned appropriate. There is no personal identification; no personal ‘hook.’
“Retreat is closing off, shutting down, becoming aloof and uncaring, distant and unreachable until triggered. It is a protective measure born of fear that something more than you can give will be asked of you. Someone’s behavior would look like this: mental gymnastics, debate, discussion without caring, cold, aloof, separate and uninvolved, dismissive and ignoring. The outcome is vitally important, and they are manipulative, needy, expectant, and judgmental. There is a hidden underlying emotional involvement (fear), which, when let loose, erupts as anger or tears.”
Live in your bubble of peace and wisdom, but do not retreat into it; use it as your anchor and belay from it as you walk out into the world, and not a fort whose walls you hide behind.
What is the difference between what I have faith in,
what I have belief in,
what I have heard and what I know?
Of these, which are permanent and which impermanent?
Of these, which one should I choose to build my world around?
Elaboration
What is the difference between what I have faith in, what I have
belief in, what I have heard and what I know?
This line is about clarifying the difference between these four terms. While I appreciate one could argue for a different interpretation of the words, it is the definitions themselves that are important. Belief is a personal opinion, like believing that your favorite sports team is the best in the league. Faith is belief with trust; for example, believing that the surgeon who is about to operate on you has the required skills to do the job, and trusting him to do it correctly. Hearing something is just repeating a piece of information; for example, I have heard that it’s going to rain in York today.
Knowing is direct, objective, personal experience. When you objectively know something, it is either a universally accepted fact, e.g. gravity, or a direct personal, objective experience. The emphasis here is on the word objective. Remember, if the experience is not actually objective, as opposed to subjective, then our experience could be distorted by our perceptions. So, for example, I could say that I stepped out of my house yesterday while it was raining and got wet. There is nobody on the planet who could persuade you that you did not do that or experience getting wet. It is something that nobody can validate (as you were alone), however there is no faith or belief required. It was a personal direct experience that can never be taken away from you. A subjective addition to this observation might be that you got very wet or that it was pouring.
Faith and belief can be lost—“given up” is another way of saying this, as we never truly lose them but choose to let them go. The difference between losing something and giving it up is that with the former we do not choose for it to happen while the latter we have a choice. Although we say “losing one’s faith,” we actually choose to let it go. When you know something, that knowing can never be taken away from you.
Of these, which are permanent and which impermanent?
Many things in our lives are impermanent: our surroundings, our experiences, even the cells in our bodies. There is an old saying: “The only constant in the universe is change.” Even the place where you are sitting to read this book has changed; although you might think that it has not moved, it actually has. Consider, the chair in the house, in the city, in the state, in the country, in the world has moved, because not only has the world revolved, it in turn has moved around the sun, and the whole of our solar system has moved within the galaxy, which has moved within the universe. So the question is, what in our lives is permanent? Even some of our old religions change. I remember my father being expected to only eat fish on Fridays as dictated by his religion, and now that is no longer stipulated for most people. When you reflect on the four terms in the first line, which ones are personal and impermanent, and which are universal and permanent?
Of these, which one should I choose to build my world around?
I live in California and when I see a new building being constructed I am still surprised by how much foundation work needs to be done to protect the building against earthquakes. To enable it to withstand what our earth might decide to throw at it, our earth, on which so much of our very existence depends. So why should our inner foundation be any less substantial and capable of withstanding what this current age might throw at us? As we move through life, we should strive to build our understanding of who we are and the world around us on a solid, objective foundation and not on subjective shifting sands. We all know that the world is not black and white, but many shades of gray. In trying to discover who we are, if we settle for what is impermanent, then we’ll never find the truth about ourselves, and therefore the truth about the world around us.
Too many people spend too much time trying to change things outside
of themselves, and not enough time changing things inside themselves.
Elaboration
We know that money cannot buy happiness, and yet we still try, through money spent on clothing, cosmetics, and whichever fitness trend currently captures our imagination. Our world puts great value on external change, on constant upgrading and improvement. Just look at all the advertising that feeds our dissatisfaction with what we have, and conditions us to believe that spending money will help us get closer to our ideal life. Look at the multitude of ways we try to avoid looking inside ourselves. Sometimes it seems like the world is a planet-wide supply of ways to escape from looking within. We have had thousands of years to create ways to escape, and do we have peace within ourselves? No.
One common definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. We have done the same thing for thousands of years with no difference in the results; there is still no peace within us. How far do we have to be pushed before we say enough is enough, before we stop looking outside and turn inward?
One person changing inside and then going out and reflecting that change to the world through their thoughts, feelings, and behavior becomes the only reliable instrument of change.
Only when someone finds peace within themselves will they find it in their world around them.
Elaboration
The word peace that is referred to here is not the peace between nations or religions, but in an individual’s world. That world consists of our families, friends, and work environment. Consider for a moment some things that would normally push your buttons or stress you, creating discordant energy in you. Now imagine that one of the things that pushes your buttons occurs, but you suddenly find that it does not affect you as much, if at all—couldn’t that be considered as having inner peace?
If you have this inner peace, then the outside events just flow around you. You could almost say that you are immune to them and you would not consider them as troublesome any more. If there is nothing troubling you in your inner world, then your outside world also becomes peaceful.
There will always be events in our lives that are challenging for us, but it is our inner world that defines whether we flow through them from a place of peace or chaos.
Revenge is about hating something so much
that you choose to become like it.
Elaboration
Revenge, at its fundamental level, is about holding onto our anger for a deed that aggrieved us. For some, it uses the guise of seeking justice, and for others there is no such mask.
Revenge does not have to mean physically reacting to the instigating event. It can be more passive, like withholding normal interactions, for example in a matrimonial or family or work environment.
Revenge is about allowing the event to bring out the discordant energy within our ego and temporarily or permanently change us to become something else. To become something that is so self-destructive that the enduring effects are more damaging to us than the initial deed.
Revenge is about hurting so much inside that we have the false belief that the pain will go away when we seek reprisal. It never goes away. At the end we will hold ourselves accountable, and then we will also have to face the sadness as we realize that we chose to turn away from our spiritual self.
Complacency is the worst enemy of a soul’s path to growth.
Elaboration
Walking the spiritual path can be tiring, like walking through very deep snow or a very muddy field. It is all too easy to look back on our progress and think, I have come quite a distance, that’s enough for this year or for this lifetime, and then just stand there knee-deep in the mud or snow and stop.
It can be very easy to become complacent with our progress toward connecting to the spark of divinity within us. After all, as a species we are resistant to change and love our comfort zones. However, a path is a path; it is meant to be walked. Yes, there are moments where we can stop and admire the vista, but only moments. The intent must always be to keep going, to keep growing. We are not here just to build nice memories, consume, procreate, and then die; we have a much greater role to play. The role of our soul’s growth.
A sacrifice is not a sacrifice unless one knows, one understands,
and experiences completely what one is giving up.
The greatest sacrifice is not your money,
something for your children,
something for your partner,
your career,
your love,
your life,
not even something for your God.
The greatest sacrifice is your personality, your ego.
That is, everything that makes you feel good,
that makes you feel bad,
everything that makes you who you are.
You must become nothing inside,
only then can you see who you truly are.
Get to know who you are all the way to the very bottom,
and then sacrifice it,
burn it all on the altar of enlightenment.
Elaboration
A sacrifice is not a sacrifice unless one knows, one understands,
and experiences completely what one is giving up.
Let’s contemplate here for a moment the difference between giving something up and sacrificing something. In both the Christian and Islamic religions (I am sure that there are similar instances in other religions, but let’s just consider these for now) there are times when people give something up for a period of time. In the Christian tradition the time is called Lent, and it is the individual’s choice as to what is given up; in the Muslim tradition it is called Ramadan, which stipulates that eating must be forgone from sunrise to sunset. In both instances there is some personal discomfort, but neither would call it a sacrifice. People give up smoking, something that perhaps they enjoy, but decide to give it up for better health. Nobody would say that they are sacrificing their smoking pleasure. So what is a sacrifice? The easiest example is sacrificing one’s life for another. No one would argue that to give your life for another is not a great sacrifice. So, a sacrifice implies great personal cost to yourself for the benefit of another.
The greatest sacrifice is not your money,
something for your children,
something for your partner,
your career,
your love,
your life,
not even something for your God.
There are many things that we value, perhaps even treasure, because we hold them very dear to our heart. Money is an obvious one; there are people whose lives revolve around their money and how to make more. People like this might consider giving any money away, let alone all of it, a sacrifice. A clearer and more widely performed sacrifice is when parents choose to forgo something for the benefit of their children, perhaps vacation travels or a larger home, using the money instead for clothing, toys, and education.
You could be offered a job in a different location, which would require moving. This could be a great opportunity for you and your career, but it will have an impact on your partner and family. If you take the job, it could be that your partner has to sacrifice something (their job, being close to family and friends, and so forth) in order for you to take this next step. If you decide not to take the step and move, it could be because that was too much of a sacrifice and instead it is the opportunity, that particular career step, that is sacrificed.
The greatest sacrifice is your personality,
your ego.
That is, everything that makes you feel good,
that makes you feel bad,
everything that makes you who you are.
With all of the sacrifices above, there is one thing that we keep, one thing that we cling to, and that is who we believe we are. We consider ourselves to be made up of good and not so good qualities. We would be more than happy to get rid of our not so good qualities, if it meant growing in awareness, but it is quite something else to give up what we consider good qualities.
To give up the good things is even harder because we want to feel good, we want to feel useful, and we want to feel wanted. This neediness taints our actions, and it is this neediness that we need to release. We gain understanding of how to release our neediness by questioning our deeper motives for being needy in the first place. Even if we identify with something that is entirely good, without any ulterior motives, it is still a label, still an attachment that we need to release.
Imagine erasing everything, all our good characteristics and all the not so good ones. What is left? Nothing? Everything that creates our identity is gone, so who are we now?
You must become nothing inside,
only then can you see who you truly are.
Get to know who you are all the way to the very bottom,
and then sacrifice it,
burn it all on the altar of enlightenment.
Only by looking deep into ourselves and finding the courage to gain back control from those thoughts which are the “power behind the throne,” thereby burning them on the altar of our growing awareness, will we make the greatest sacrifice. As we look upon the dying ashes of our identity and as the last tendrils of smoke rise into the universe, in that moment of stillness we will find our true identity. Who we really are. We have to release the fear that we will not be anything.
Only by consciously and willingly going to a place where we believe that we will not exist are we able to see what it is that we have to release. In that place, where we believe that we will be nothing, we will see that we are connected to everything and everything is a part of us.
Whenever and wherever something is true to its nature,
it is expressing its Buddha consciousness,
is connected to its spark of divinity inside it.
Whenever something is connected to that divinity,
to that consciousness, and creates something from that space,
from a hole in the ground to bury a bone for a dog,
or a picture from an artist,
all contain Buddha consciousness and divinity,
as all are an expression of consciousness,
of the divinity that created it.
Plants, rocks, and animals are already awakened Buddhas,
as they only express their true nature.
As humans, it is our responsibility to catch up to them.
Elaboration
Whenever and wherever something is true to its nature,
it is expressing its Buddha consciousness,
is connected to its spark of divinity inside it.
I was reading The Gateless Gate, a book on Zen philosophy containing koans, which are mental riddles designed to help draw our minds inward. One of these koans raises the question of whether a dog has Buddha consciousness. As I contemplated this idea, this insight came to me.
These first lines are about connecting to our true divinity, called our Buddha consciousness. When we are connected to that spark of divinity we are connecting to our true nature.
Whenever something is connected to that divinity,
to that consciousness, and creates something from that space,
from a hole in the ground to bury a bone for a dog,
or a picture from an artist,
all contain Buddha consciousness and divinity,
as all are an expression of consciousness,
of the divinity that created it.
These lines are about looking at the world around us from a different perspective. Take a look at how things are created, the space from which they are created. When we are connected to our Buddha consciousness and create from that space, then we are creating expressions of our Buddha consciousness. Whether we plant a seed in the soil from which a life will grow, or we create something artistically, all will be expressions of our Buddha consciousness.
Plants, rocks, and animals are already awakened Buddhas,
as they only express their true nature.
As humans, it is our responsibility to catch up to them.
Does a tree try to be anything but a tree? Does an eagle try to be a swan? Does a rock try to be a flower? No, they are true to their nature and nothing more. They are not aspiring to be anything but themselves. As humans, when we get caught in our egos, we are not being true to our nature. Our true nature comes from spirit, from our soul, from that spark of the divine within all of us. The closer we are to that, the closer we are to our true nature. The more involved in our ego we are, the further away from our true nature we are. This is not the same as when we say, “That’s just the way I am,” which is accepting our ego as our truth. We can use the trees, rocks, eagles, and many other things we see daily as inspiration. Observe how true they are to their own nature and let that inspire you to get closer to yours.
In the beginning there is silence.
Then there is a voice, if that’s OK?
Then there is a voice, and it’s your issue if you do not like it.
Then there is a voice with compassion and wisdom.
Elaboration
In the beginning there is silence.
Many times people will not say anything for fear of confrontation, so while they might have an opposing view that should be heard, they remain silent. Their rationale is that it is better to be silent than to have to defend their view against what could be felt as a personal criticism. Staying silent can also be preferable to possibly triggering a situation worse than the suffering that they bear with their silence. Or perhaps they hope that if they do not say anything, then the situation will go away. Which of course it never does.
Then there is a voice, if that’s OK?
The next stage from total silence is where someone expresses an opinion but almost apologizes for expressing it. They will most certainly not fight to defend it; hence they are in a sense asking permission to express their opinion. If their listeners are open to hearing them, then the interaction can be fruitful, and providing that the listeners are careful about probing for clarification, a productive dialogue can ensue. People in this position will not necessarily care if their view was considered, but simply that they actually said something out loud.
Then there is a voice and it’s your issue if you do not like it.
When a person moves from the second to the third stage, this is usually considered as “standing in their power.” They express their views and do not care about the fallout from their words. They might also fight vehemently not only to have their view heard but to make sure all comply with it, even if it is not necessarily the best one. Perhaps there is also no consideration for whose benefit the words are being spoken, the speaker’s or the person the words are aimed at, or even if the person will hear what it is being said. Are the words being said without attachment and with compassion for the other person? It is very easy to believe that you are saying something for the purpose of helping, but are you really saying it for your own benefit? Or because you want to hear yourself come from a place of authority and recognition?
Then there is a voice, with compassion and wisdom.
Then there is an awakening, a discovery of the light that’s inside us, and later, a connection to that light. With the light come wisdom and compassion. An understanding, a wisdom of how we are all connected, and a compassion for those who have yet to find and feel their own light. This awareness tempers your words.
This fourth option, also known in the vernacular as “taking the higher ground,” is hearing without emotional attachment what’s being said, listening to the words and understanding the complete picture that the speaker is trying to communicate. And then responding without emotional attachment. I imagine a great example of this would be an attorney in a court of law questioning a witness. Although the attorney might not be in their meditative energy at the time, they are very much in tune with the words that are being uttered, without attachment and standing in their wisdom. Just imagine the effect on the trial process if attorneys let their emotions control their interactions and words. Being in your meditative energy is feeling connected with wisdom, compassion, and respect for all life. Some might argue that being in your meditative energy and using words that emanate from your compassion and wisdom is behaving like the great spiritual teachers of old.
All the strength that you need to find your wise and compassionate voice is within; you just need the courage to seek it. Know that it is there, and it will take you baby steps to find it.
While to forgive someone is very hard,
and for some people just getting to that point
is a Herculean achievement,
there is a higher perspective.
Forgiveness implies judgment,
implies that someone is wrong and someone is right.
If one can agree that we are all just souls,
trying to do the best we can at our own spiritual growth,
then the higher perspective would be acceptance,
just accepting that the person did the only thing they knew what to do,
and that there is a soul inside them,
trying desperately to enlighten the ego,
to guide the ego into waking up,
to strive against the ego’s faulty thoughts and feelings.
Elaboration
While to forgive someone is very hard,
and for some people just getting to that point
is a Herculean achievement,
there is a higher perspective.
Forgiveness is one of the hardest things we as humans can do. The more that we feel aggrieved, the more we will cling to the memory of the reason. That reason might be financial, a personal slight, or a wrongful death.
A famous dying insight is when Jesus is on the cross and says, “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.” He did not say just to forgive his persecutors, but he also gave a reason. That reason was a crucial piece of wisdom from a higher perspective. He did not say, “Forgive them because they are wrong.” He could see that they were acting from a place of ignorance, not of the specific act that they were doing, but from unawareness of the wisdom and guidance that they were taking away from themselves by killing him.
Forgiveness implies judgment,
implies that someone is wrong and someone is right.
Consider, when somebody says or does something, it gets filtered through your Lens of Perception, and depending on how it gets distorted, you decide whether you have been aggrieved and to what extent. The judgment that has been made is that someone was right and someone was wrong. However, judgment is a perceptual concept that depends on our societal and cultural background: family, peer group, religion, nation. If it is perceptional, then how can a judgment be made as to the truth of what happened?
If one can agree that we are all just souls,
trying to do the best we can at our own spiritual growth,
then the higher perspective would be acceptance,
just accepting that the person did the only thing they knew what to do,
and that there is a soul inside them,
trying desperately to enlighten the ego,
to guide the ego into waking up,
to strive against the ego’s faulty thoughts and feelings.
Orcas (also known as killer whales) sometimes play with seals by flipping them into the air with their tails. They bounce the seal among themselves with their tails, not to kill it, which they could do in one bite, but for fun. After the seal is dead or they have had enough fun, they just leave it.
Some humans might not judge this behavior as cruel, as they would argue that it is the nature of the whales to behave that way; they do not know any differently. Do we judge the orcas, do we forgive them for what they have done to the seals? Of course not. It is not good or bad, it is just the way that they behave naturally.
Now take that analogy and work up the levels of the animal kingdom. Humans are a little different than the other animals. As humans we perform a spectrum of behaviors that animals do not, for example, revenge. Imagine God, with a much greater awareness and knowing than humans, as we have a greater awareness than orcas. It’s not difficult to see that from this higher level of awareness, there is no judgment, no forgiveness, just understanding and acceptance.
If we withhold our forgiveness from someone, then what we are choosing to do is to hold onto the discordant energy that was created within us in the moment of the event. Why would we choose to do that? Holding onto that energy is not hurting the other person, it is injuring us. Yes, they might have behaved in an unenlightened way, and yes, we might have chosen to disengage from them in that moment, but it is what we then choose to do after the event that decides whether we take the soul view or the ego view. Using the word choose is very important, because it is easy to believe that we do not have a choice and that we have to hold onto our angry unforgiving feeling; after all, the other person behaved in an unenlightened way, so shouldn’t we be allowed to behave in the same way? There is a choice. Who do we want to be from now on? Not for their benefit, but for ours. Are we walking a spiritual path with all our resolve, or are we going to allow ourselves to behave from our ego?
If we acknowledge that we have a spark of the divine inside us and that we are with all our tenacity and fortitude trying to connect with and deepen the connection, then why should we not acknowledge that everyone else has that spark? Who are we to judge their behavior? After all, we have not had the luxury to walk a thousand miles in their shoes.
If we decide to wake up to our soul, and want a greater connection, then we must acknowledge that everyone around us also has a soul, a spark of the divine inside them. Everyone is trying to dissolve the ego to start looking inward. Even if we think they are more asleep, that is no reason to point at their behavior and judge them.
Faith, like trust, is earned, never given.
Faith is give and take.
Spirit gives a bit and takes a bit.
Stepping out in faith means no matter
how much self-doubt or apprehension you have,
you only need a fraction more courage to take the next step.
Faith grows with self-work.
Faith is not about material acquisition and growth.
Faith is about spiritual acquisition and growth.
Spirit does not care whether you live in a tent or mansion,
it is who you are being inside that counts.
Faith is a walk through a dark moonless forest,
not knowing where the end is,
with your lantern only showing the path two meters in front.
You measure the amount of faith you have,
by the resilience of your inner peace.
Elaboration
Faith, like trust, is earned, never given.
Faith is give and take.
Spirit gives a bit and takes a bit.
This entire insight seems to contain conflicting lines and can appear confusing, however the underlying principle is summed up in these three lines. When we reflect on many of the religious conflicts that have occurred over the years it seems that people did not stop and question if what they were doing was right insofar as honoring another’s life, independent of color, creed, or nationality. People who kill in the name of religion do not question themselves or others and what they are being told, wondering how their behavior makes sense in terms of becoming a better human. This makes their faith seem like blind faith, without compassion or wisdom.
Think about this for a moment. As an adult, if you were told to do something and did not understand why you were being asked to do it, would you do it without question? Or would you ask why? Many people seem to be quite happy to suspend their questioning minds and their common sense when it comes to their faith. Imagine that you are an angel and are trying to help a human do something enlightened. You are doing whatever you do as an angel to help steer your charge in the right direction, when they suddenly ask you, “Why?” Would you really say, “Because I said so?” Or, having had a human experience yourself, would you try to help your charge to understand the reason?
If we remember that praying is talking to God and meditating is listening, then if we meditate we might just hear the reason. This is give and take. There will be times when we have to “just do it” as Nike says and not be quite sure what is going on, and there will be times when we’ll be told the reason. A better phrase than “told” might be to have a feeling why it is happening. Doesn’t that sound more helpful and collaborative than just blindly being led by the nose? Spirit wants collaboration, because that leads to much more effective spiritual growth. However, we must remember when we are listening to make sure that what we are hearing is not being tainted by our perceptions. This comes back to doing our inner work and to connecting to our Meditative Feeling.
Stepping out in faith means no matter
how much self-doubt or apprehension you have,
you only need a fraction more courage to take the next step.
These lines speak to the times when Spirit is “taking” and you might not know or have a feeling of knowing why life is taking you down a certain path. It might not feel as if it is something that you want to do, but there are no obvious other avenues, so this is the one you are taking whether you like it or not! Have courage, these are the times when it might be better for you to simply go down the path with grace. It can help to reflect upon the times when Spirit has helped you. All you need to do is to find that little bit more courage than doubt to continue walking down the path.
Faith grows with self-work.
Faith is not about how much we laud our belief system over others or how much we help at that fundraising event or how many times we attend the community building or how often we badger others to join our belief or how much killing and destruction we impose on others in the belief that we are right and all others are wrong. Faith is not about putting the beliefs of our religion on a pedestal and looking up to them. Faith is about being the best human we can be by doing our inner work and dissolving our ego.
Faith is not about material acquisition and growth.
While everybody needs to pay the bills and keep a roof over their heads, for some their belief system has become a product. This product like any other needs to be marketed and the income maximized as much as possible. But in doing this, the balance between earning an income and accruing as much money as possible is lost. And not only has the balance been lost, the depth and soul in their teachings have been tainted with a new god, money.
I am reminded of a pastor in the San Francisco area who predicted the end of the world in May 2011 and received millions of dollars in donations from his followers. When it did not happen, he kept all the money, with an apology that he must have got it wrong.
Faith is about spiritual acquisition and growth.
Faith is about deepening your Meditative Feeling and from that place growing your objective spiritual experiences. Experiences that only you might be aware of, and others that are shared.
Spirit does not care whether you live in a tent or mansion,
it is who you are being inside that counts.
Your spiritual growth is not dependent on the size of your house or bank balance, but on who you are being inside and letting that inner light shine into the lives of others, enriching them.
Faith is a walk through a dark moonless forest,
not knowing where the end is,
with your lantern only showing the path two meters in front.
These lines refer to a story I once heard. A man was walking through a forest one moonless night with his flashlight, when suddenly the battery died. He stumbled along for a short time in the pitch black, when suddenly he saw a light from a cottage window gleaming through the trees.
He walked up to the door and knocked. An old lady answered and invited him in out of the cold night. He asked her if she had any more batteries for his light, to which she replied no. However she did have a lantern that he could have to light his way through the forest. He took it outside and looked at it. He said that it was no good as it only provided enough light to see two meters in front of him and no further.
She looked at him, smiled gently, and said, “Look in the light for the path two meters in front of you: when you have walked that distance, the next two meters will be shown to you.”
You measure the amount of faith you have,
by the resilience of your inner peace.
Measuring the strength of our faith is a bit like asking how long is a piece of string. Hundreds of years ago the strength of people’s faith was usually shown by giving up their lives; those who did so were called martyrs. Nowadays, thankfully, that sort of metric is not as common. Faith is not static like a badge, but an organic, living, growing experience, like a tree. We can watch the development of a tree by watching its growth, by measuring its height and its breadth; however, there is a hidden aspect that we do not see. An aspect that helps the tree to flow with grace through nature’s seasons: the tree’s roots. Roots that give it nourishment and help to brace it against the wind. Our faith is like the part of the tree above the ground, the part that everyone sees. The vitality and strength of our faith is only as good as our roots. The nourishment for its roots comes from our self-work, but the roots themselves are made up of our inner peace.
As I sit here writing this and listening to “New Divide” by Linkin Park, I am all too aware what this great new divide was for me. I have always seen faith as blind compliance, to believe without question (as my father once said to me), to let others’ beliefs tell you what to think and do, to let other religions do the work for you, to put your penny in the religious insurance slot expecting your reward to come later after your death.
In the first four years of my journey along this path, Spirit gave a bit and took a bit. During that time I received many signs and experiences, and now I am being asked to step forward in faith. You would think that I would leap forward, not stand in paralytic fear. My crutches have been taken away and now I am being told to walk!
The faith that I am being asked to find is not in someone else, not in a religion or belief system, but in myself and what in those quiet moments of stillness I sense is my path to growth.
It is in moments of deepest fear that I remember all I need to do is to find that fraction of more courage than fear to take the next step, and that’s what I do every day, find that fraction of more courage. Trusting that all I need to see is the path two meters in front, and having walked that two meters, the next two meters will be shown to me.
3. Johnson, Robert A. Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of Your Psyche. San Francisco: Harper, 1991. Page 27
4. Mian Mohammad, Sharif. A History of Muslim Philosophy.Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1963.
5. Helminski, Camille Adams. Rumi Daylight: A Daybook of Spiritual Guidance. Boulder, CO: Shambhala, 1999.