Are You Tired of Being Knocked Off Your Center by That Old Pattern?
Man can find every truth connected with his being if he will dig deep into the mine of his soul.
—JAMES ALLEN, “AS A MAN THINKETH”
I BEGAN TO DISMANTLE MY SACRED TORTURE BACK IN the early 1990s one fateful night while hanging out on the Santa Monica Pier. Back then, numerous burger and beer joints and a wonderful health food eatery broke up the long row of funky little shops selling tie-dyed T-shirts, incense, and posters.
I was hanging out with my friend Nirvana. This self-chosen name was a definite sign of the times. The crowd I hung out with was looking for nirvana—that state in spiritual development where one becomes free of suffering. How appropriate that one of my greatest inner fitness lessons related to suffering happened in the company of my friend Nirvana.
We were walking past a shop, and I was drawn to a provocative poster in the window by Richard Avedon showing the actress Nastassja Kinski lying nude and intertwined with a Burmese python. It was a fascinating photo, and I gazed at it for maybe five minutes. Taking it in. I locked in on every component of its composition. I particularly liked the pops of color. The proximity of the snake’s red tongue to her ear made me stick my baby finger in my left ear and wiggle free of the willies that had crawled in.
Then I noticed that a small crowd had gathered in front of another poster. One of the gazers asked her friend, “Can you see it?” Everyone was tilting his or her head from one side to the other, clearly trying to find the “right” position. Another person excitedly said, “I see it!” Then another, “I’m in!”
Nirvana was part of the staring crowd. “What are they looking at?” I asked. He explained that “hidden” in the 2-D poster of a Paris street scene was a detailed 3-D experience of the same scene. If you looked at the scene long enough, from the right perspective, the flat, 2-D image literally “popped” into an intricate 3-D image. I looked at the not-so-special 2-D poster, and it was hard to believe that simply by staring at it, a whole other world could pop into view. But Nirvana had seen it.
After I had spent a few minutes tilting my head from one side to the other, grumbling, he reassured me, “It’s there. Keep looking.” I returned to the poster with fierce focus . . . nothing. I moved closer to the poster, hoping that would help me see what everyone else could see. Nothing. I backed away from it . . . still nothing.
I am a competitive spirit at heart. I was determined to stand there looking at that poster FOREVER if I had to. If other people were able to see this fascinating 3-D world, then I was not going home until I had joined their club.
Then it happened. Suddenly, for a flash, the 3-D world popped into view. Only for a second or two, but I saw it long enough to know that what the others were saying was true.
Those two seconds were not enough for me to feel satisfied and head home, however. I planted my feet and looked at the poster again, telling myself to surrender because I had no idea how to make it happen. But this time, as I looked at the poster I had no doubt about the intricate world that was hidden in that piece of paper. I knew it was real. This time, when I looked at the Paris scene, I did so knowing it would become three-dimensional.
And it did. Soon after I began to look, the 3-D world popped up again, and this time it stayed for a longer time. I stared at it in rapt fascination, more absorbed than I had been observing every detail of the Nastassja Kinski poster.
I don’t remember my drive home once Nirvana and I said goodbye. I was inside the world of that 3-D poster, walking its streets past shops and turning down corners. It was so real. I was mesmerized by how detailed the 3-D version of the poster was and how quickly one minute it was there and the next minute it had vanished from view. One blink, and the 3-D image could become a simple flat poster again.
Each time I lost the 3-D perception, it took a while to find my way back in. Reentry was not a science. There were no guaranteed steps to follow. But each reentry took less and less time, and I could hold on to the 3-D scene longer and longer. I can say that seeing the 3-D scene was enabled, at least in part, by a shift in my perception of the poster. From the moment I saw other people in front of that poster talking about something I could not see, my perception of life in general widened. I believed in a world I couldn’t see. I trusted my ability to enter it. The more glimpses I caught of that 3-D world, the more I looked for it and expected to see it.
I became so committed to the 3-D image that I could not look at the 2-D poster as I had before. I knew it did not represent the whole truth. It was limited.
Of course, this is a metaphor for spiritual awakening. Spiritual teachers throughout the ages from Jesus and Buddha to modern-day enlightened thinkers like Michael Beckwith, Joe Dispenza, and Ken Wilber tell us there’s a bigger reality behind the world we see and that our problems and challenges are a matter of perception. Shift our perception, and we can literally change our world. Also, like with the poster, once you have caught a glimpse of the spiritual world that the physical world sits in, you cannot look at the physical world in the same old way.
But this profound spiritual metaphor was not my most important lesson that night on the Santa Monica Pier: I began to see my sacred torture like I saw the 2-D poster—present, but not the truth.
* * *
The habit of seeing life through the lens of our sacred torture conditions us to see ourselves in the same limited (two-dimensional) ways. We come to expect, and make room for, the fear or discomfort associated with our sacred torture. For example, if we are used to feeling a certain anxiety, or queasiness in the stomach, or stress somewhere else in the body, the two-dimensional perception has us habitually expecting that experience whenever we encounter similar situations. We automatically define our experience in the same old way; and when an issue is not actively harassing us, we often go looking for it.
Take note of how, during stressful times, you wake up feeling just fine, free of any burdens, and then all of a sudden you remember that you’re “supposed” to be worried. You literally wonder Where is my worry? as if it’s lost and you’re trying to find it. On cue, worry and stress drop right back in. Sri Ramana Maharshi, considered one of the most significant spiritual teachers to emerge from India, explains that when we first awaken from sleep, unconscious of burdens, we awaken as our real Self.
The 3-D version of the Paris poster represents the Self—intricately detailed yet seen only by those willing to challenge the reality of the 2-D world. Like the poster, we lose sight of our 3-D image—our Self—and the two-dimensional world of fear, worry, survival, and judgment grabs hold of us and pulls us in.
Our sacred torture wins because we have not learned to look at it long enough with calm to see through it to the other side. Our sacred torture makes us uncomfortable, so we run from that discomfort. We are so busy running from our discomfort that it winds up dictating our lives—such as a person who is afraid of elevators going only to places that have escalators. Our sacred torture tells us how we feel and which people and conversations are “safe.”
The more effective choice is to challenge the discomfort by looking right at it—for as long as it takes. When I stood before the 2-D poster that night, I was determined. I was willing to stay there for as long as it took to see the 3-D world the others knew. Standing there, I perceived that the 2-D world was not a fixed reality—and neither is my sacred torture. Inside every sacred torture is a 3-D version of it waiting to be seen. Standing in front of our sacred torture and observing it, determined to see it morph, is a way to begin to dismantle its control over our lives.
That night I put my sacred torture on notice that I was ready to believe in a reality greater than it. I began to look at the old torture, fully expecting it to transform. And from that point forward, I had to practice my resolve over and over again. I made the pact with my Self that whenever I started to forget that I am more powerful than my challenges, something would happen to remind me . . . and something always did (and still does). This made me feel like the universe was listening to me and had my back.
I got into the habit of no longer seeing my challenges and fears as fixed “forever” states. When the habit of thinking in my old way surfaced, I would literally shake my head “no” and correct my thinking. Over time I began to see my challenges as overindulged thoughts in need of correction. I began to give those old challenges less attention. Instead, I allowed myself to contemplate freedom from any burden.
Here are steps you can take to begin your journey to freedom from your two-dimensional world:
* * *
A therapist once told me that when we’re being chased in a dream, we should stop and turn around and look at what is chasing us. This advice is counterintuitive to how we usually deal with threatening things. We run. But when we can stop and let all the feelings we are running from catch up to us, this bold action dissolves the scary picture, changes the perspective, and drains the power out of the thing that’s been chasing us.
Throughout the ages spiritual teachers have taught that reality shifts when we shift our perspective. That evening on the Santa Monica Pier, watching the poster image change from 2-D to 3-D, I came to see the 2-D picture—and any sacred torture—as yet another subtle distracting lie—a falsehood—that tries to control our sense of who we are. This realization was so clear that for the first time in my life I knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that a shift in perspective regarding any issue is possible.
* * *
Your sacred torture is a lie. Dismantling it is possible. Deconstruction starts by being courageous. Get to know your Self. Then stand in front of your burdens centered in your Self, and tell your small surviving self the truth:
I am bigger than your small idea of me. I expect freedom. I will stand here for as long as it takes.
Inner Fitness Practice
The Big Lie
The two-dimensional world is all there is.
The Truth
There is more to life than what you can see. When you stretch to see more, that effort changes everything.
The Possibility
Seeing your life in bold detail and discovering new possibilities and power that are already living inside of you.
Try This
When it comes to dismantling your sacred torture, do not run from it or be indulgent of it.
Standing up to old patterns lets every cell in your body know that you matter to your Self.