It was suggested to me that I post some of my musings from Facebook onto the blog so here goes:
We are encouraged by society to have a strong sense of ourselves as individuals; to be unique, to stand out, to be well defined. And while this is a great ideal to live up to, we have somehow misconstrued this "strong sense of ourselves" to be synonymous with solidity, with rigidity, with immovability, with being static.
To have a strong sense of identity is quite the opposite. It is to see ones...elf in more fluid, changing, evolving, dynamic and flexible terms.
When we look towards our minds and our thoughts to provide us with our self identity, we are really working with ideas and images that are outdated and frozen in time. Who you are and who you think you are is always out of synch, because your image of yourself is no more than a screenshot in time whereas your reality is perpetually evolving in real-time.
Most of suffering generates from constantly trying to reconcile the image in the mind with the reality we see. The image is frozen. Like a glacier in the winter. Whereas reality flows like a river.
When we are able to stay more present in our day to day lives, when we are relying less and less on those mental images we compulsively hold on to, then we begin to connect with a sense of identity that is less clearly defined. It is based on an awareness that is purely spontaneous, fresh and immediate. It is not burdened with the weight of concepts and expectations which make it sluggish and solidified like ice. Rather, free of past and future projections, it is fluid and flexible like water.
Then the only rational response to any circumstance in life is no longer resistance/struggle but an immediate acceptance without blame/jedgment followed by fluidly adapting to whatever challenge the circumstance brings forth.
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Open, vulnerable, curious, trusting, spontaneous - this is our natural state. None of these implies ignorance. Ignorance is the result of a narrow mind, defensiveness, lack of curiosity, mistrust and premeditation.
Whether we are willing to admit it or not each and every one of us is ignorant to a degree. So before judging another's ignorance are you willing to take a look at your own? When we ar...e able to own our own ignorance with grace and humility then we may be able to accept the ignorance of another.
And in those moments when we feel superior, more compassionate, more civilized than those who are more ignorant than us and cast judgment on them from high up on our moral pedestals, let us reflect back on our own ignorance. So that we may see that we are all just blind men and women fumbling about in the dark. Just because someone is blinder than us doesn't somehow make us superior.
We are all just afraid of the darkness within our own hearts. That is what makes us turn on ourselves and each other. When we stop fearing the darkness of ignorance is when the light of compassion can begin to shine.
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Your name is changeable, your body is changeable, your mind is changeable, your feelings are changeable, your faith is changeable, your ambition is changeable, your work is changeable, your dreams are changeable, your relationships are changeable, your sexuality is changeable, even your gender is changeable. There is nothing about you that is immune to change. To resist change is to oppose your very nature.
Everything that happens is an aspect of change - positive and negative - it is all change. When you prefer and give value to only the positive in yourself you disown all that is not. The very nature of flux, of change, is ebb and flow, is crest and trough, is positive and negative. To embrace change is to embrace the entire movement not just the crests, not just the high tides.
When you can embrace change in its totality, only then are you be able to see that within yourself that remains unchanging, eternal and constantly present. That deep acceptance where everything that is, is permitted to exist without judgment or favor. It is a vast open space of unconditional love. When you can begin to give this gift of clarity to yourself, you will simultaneously bring it into the world around you.
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Love is not just a feeling, not just an effect, not just something external that happens to you. On a deeper, more fundamental level, Love is a perspective, a cause, that source inside you from which every thought and action has the capacity to transform all that you come in contact with.
Picture the Mind and the Heart to be the right and left lenses of the glasses through which we see the world.... Through the experience of living these lenses get scuffed, scratched, chipped and cracked. And each imperfection in the lens causes a distortion in reality - in the way we perceive life, the world around us and ourselves.
Every grievance we hold for another is a judgment we hold of ourselves. The distortion and the blemish go hand in hand. It is unavoidable.
Lost in the haze of our own imperfections and a world of distortion we are on a perpetual quest to feel better, do better, find better - to somehow fix these lenses consciously or subconsciously. To repair this Heart, to perfect this Mind.
Love is the clarity with which we see when we are no longer disturbed by the flaws and distortions of the Heart and Mind. It is the realization that we do not become perfect in the absence of our flaws but have always been perfect in spite of them.
Our true identity is not in the lenses but in the eyes behind them that see unconditionally. When we can reconnect with the miracle of sight - that is love. Then there is only an unconditional acceptance: of ourselves, of the world, of this moment just as it is - imperfect, distorted and infinitely beautiful. See more
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Comfort, joy, anger and fear - these are the changing weather patterns of the mind. Passion, happiness, boredom and melancholy - these are the cyclical seasons of the soul. Each day's weather brings a different experience. Each season represents an opportunity for growth. It is possible to find comfort in the midst of melancholy like a clear sunny day in the middle of winter. Or to feel anxiety in...the midst of happiness, like a summer storm that drenches the heat.
We may have our preferences of weather and season. Yet, the weather and seasons follow a deeper intelligence, one that is not contingent upon our whims and fancies. Each experience of the mind, be it sunny or cloudy, is an experience worth having. Each season of the soul, be it summer or winter, is a lesson worth learning.
And while, the weather may change and the seasons me come and go, the Sun that is your true nature, will continue to shine everyday regardless of whether it can be seen. It is the one constant that has never forsaken you. It gives you the capacity to love and the courage to endure.
