wisdom-blog

Transcending Arrogance and Insensitivity

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 15:41:21 +0100

My worst fear is being arrogant and insensitive, and I do all I can to be humble and sensitive. Yet, inevitably, there are times when I am arrogant and insensitive. What gives? Why does this occur in spite of my abhorrence of arrogance and insensitivity; in spite of my best efforts to avoid being this way? Is there something wrong with me? Am I weak? If you are like me you will identify with what you read here.

I just realized some things that answer these questions and bring me relief. Hence I pass them on to you in hopes that you may find this information relieving also.

I realized that anything not understood, or misunderstood is feared, judged, avoided and hated, yet anything understood is appreciated, accepted, and even loved. So, I wondered, what have I not understood about arrogance and insensitivity that makes me hate and fear them so, especially in me? And then it came to me! They are the effect, the expression of an insecure state of mind. That's all!

No one in a secure state of mind needs to fall back on the defenses of arrogance and insensitivity. In a secure state of mind we are spontaneously humble, available, and sensitive. We can afford to be. When we are feeling safe we can afford to be vulnerable and generous.

However, in an insecure state of mind we can't afford to take the risk of being vulnerable, and we become self-protective. We need to defend against the threat of attack, harm, and, at worst, destruction. Arrogance and insensitivity are some of the forms that our defenses take. The sad irony is that these defenses, intended to protect us from attack, actually evoke attack because they are misunderstood, and therefore feared and hated. Thus, the very thing they defend against they bring about, but only when misunderstood.

Hence, I write this brief piece. I hope to evoke some understanding, which is the foundation of a secure state of mind. When we can see our arrogance and insensitivity for what they are, we won't hate, fear, and attack each other, or ourselves, for being arrogant and insensitive at times. And when we don't attack, fear and hate ourselves or each other we don't need to fall back on these defenses.

On the other hand, when we do fear, hate and attack each other and ourselves for these defenses, we can understand that our disgust simply comes from our own lack of understanding that arrogance and insensitivity arise from an insecure state of mind, and nothing more. They are not statements of who we are. Rather, they are expressions of the state of mind we are in.

All hatred and violence (arrogance and insensitivity are violent) may be nothing more than the effect of our lack of understanding, or our misunderstanding, which, in turn, produce an insecure state of mind. And an insecure state of mind leads to these "hateful" defenses, keeping us caught in an endless vicious cycle until we do understand. To understand this may reduce or even eliminate our fear, judgment and hatred of arrogance and insensitivity, which, in turn, could bring an end to it. Is herein not the peace we all so much long for?

Getting All You Want and More

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 03:23:55 +0100

In this excerpt from "The Hathor Material" by Tom Kenyon and Virginia Essene, you will discover what it takes to have everything you ever wanted and more. It's a paradox. Read on.

You can ask, "What's in it for me?" and you can ask, "What can I do for the greater good in this situation?" The paradox is that when you ask the former you miss out and when you ask the latter you thereby gain more than you can dream. You can only have all you ever wanted, and unimaginably more, when you begin to approach your life in service to life.

Here is the excerpt:

"Living your life in service to life is a different context than living your life just for yourself. Living your life for life... will... affirm life, expand it, cherish it, and hold all other beings as sacred. When one begins the process of... living one's life for the benefit of life itself, one has entered a greater sea of possibilities, a greater ocean of opportunity. Life becomes much richer, much more fulfilling.... Once placed in its embrace - one sees, feels, and experiences one's own life as sacred - and all other lives as sacred too.

"[To] live your life in service to life itself... does not mean giving away your power to anyone else. This does not mean taking care of anyone else at your expense. This means being aware of the interconnectedness of all things, honoring all beings..."

"...all things are relative to the state of consciousness through which they are perceived. So what might seem like a negative situation at one level of consciousness, can actually be experienced as positive in another state of consciousness.

"As you begin to align yourself with the evolution of life itself, with the growth of life and consciousness, you will be lifted up in a way that you may not be able to imagine. For miracles occur! Opportunities open and your destiny is changed when you live in service to life.... The past can be changed and the future opened with possibilities beyond imagination.... When there is an opportunity to be kind to another human or an animal, let your kindness show. When there is an opportunity to show compassion to another, be compassionate.

"When there is an opportunity to listen to someone, grant the grace and listen. Listen fully and deeply without wanting to impose your views, you own agendas. As you listen to hear and receive the other, you will see your relationships being vastly and quickly transformed. There are miracles waiting for you when you ask the unasked question, 'What can I do here that will serve the greater good? What can I do here that will serve life's deepest purpose through me?'...

"While living your life in service to the greater life, to the evolution of consciousness as it expresses through you, you assure yourself a secure footing on the stairway that leads to heavenly realms."

Wisdom About Dreams

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 04:29:53 +0100

In this excerpt from A Course in Miracles you will find deep wisdom on dreams and the nature of dreaming. You thought we only dreamed while sleeping? Look again, and you will come to see that we are also dreaming when we think we are awake, and you’ll know why.

“Does not a world that seems quite real arise in dreams? Yet think what this world is. It is clearly not the world you saw before you slept. Rather it is a distortion of the world, planned solely around what you would have preferred (emphasis added). Here you are ‘free’ to make over whatever seemed to attack you and change it into a tribute to your ego, which was outraged by the ‘attack’. This would not be your wish unless you saw yourself as one with the ego, which always looks upon itself, and therefore on you, as under attack and highly vulnerable to it.

“Dreams are chaotic because they are governed by your conflicting wishes, and therefore they have no concern with what is true (emphasis added). They are the best example you could have of how perception can be utilized to substitute illusions for truth. You do not take them seriously on awakening because the fact that reality is so outrageously violated in them becomes apparent. Yet they are a way of looking at the world, and changing it to suit the ego better (emphasis added). They provide striking examples, both of the ego’s inability to tolerate reality, and of your willingness to change reality on its behalf (emphasis added).

“You do not find the differences between what you see in sleep and on awaking disturbing. You recognize that what you see on waking is blotted out in dreams. Yet on awakening, you do not expect it to be gone. In dreams you arrange everything. People become what you would have them be, and what they do you order. No limits on substitution are laid upon you. For a time it seems as if the world were given you, to make it what you wish. You do not realize you are attacking it, trying to triumph over it and make it serve you.

“Dreams are perceptual temper tantrums, in which you literally scream, ‘I want it thus!’ And thus is seems to be. And yet the dream cannot escape its origin. Anger and fear pervade it, and in an instant the illusion of satisfaction is invaded by the illusion of terror. For the dream of your ability to control reality by substituting a world that you prefer is terrifying. Your attempts to blot out reality are very fearful, but this you are not willing to accept. And so you substitute the fantasy that reality is fearful, not what you would do with it. And thus is guilt made real.

“Dreams show you that you have the power (emphasis added) to make a world as you would have it be, and that because you want it you see it. And while you see it you do not doubt that it is real. Yet here is a world, clearly within your mind (emphasis added) that seems to be outside. You do not respond to it as though you made it, nor do you realize that the emotions the dream produces must come from you. It is the figures in the dream and what they do that seem to make the dream. You do not realize that you are making them act out for you, for if you did the guilt would not be theirs, and the illusions of satisfaction would be gone. In dreams these features are not obscure. You seem to waken (emphasis added) and the dream is gone. Yet what you fail to recognize is that what caused the dream has not gone with it (emphasis added). Your wish to make another world that is not real remains with you (emphasis added). And what you seem to waken to is but another form of this same world you see in dreams. All your time is spent in dreaming (emphasis added). Your sleeping and your waking dreams have different forms, and that is all. Their content is the same. They are your protest against reality, and your fixed and insane idea that you can change it. In your waking dreams, the special relationship (emphasis added) is your determination to keep your hold on unreality, and to prevent yourself from waking. And while you see more value in sleeping than in waking, you will not let go of it.

“[Wisdom], ever practical…accepts your dreams and uses them as means for waking. You would have used them to remain asleep…the first change, before dreams disappear is that your dreams of fear are changed to happy dreams. That is what [Wisdom] does in the special relationship. [It] does not destroy it, nor snatch it away from you. The special relationship will remain, not as a source of pain and guilt, but as a source of joy and freedom. It will not be for you alone (emphasis added) for therein lay its misery. As it… [was] kept…a thing apart, it…will become an offering to everyone.

“Your special relationship will be a means for undoing guilt in everyone blessed through your holy relationship. It will be a happy dream, and one which you will share with all who come within your sight. Through it, the blessing [Wisdom] has laid upon it will be extended. Think not that [It] has forgotten anyone in the purpose [It] has given you. And think not that [It] has forgotten you to whom [It] gave the gift. [It] uses everyone who calls on [It] as means for the [healing] of everyone. And [It] will waken everyone through you who offered you relationship to [It]….

“Let not the dream take hold and close you eyes. It is not strange that dreams can make a world that is unreal. It is the wish to make it that is incredible. Your relationship with [each other] has now become one in which the wish has been removed, because its purpose has been changed from one of dreams to one of truth. You are not sure of this because you think it may be this that is the dream. You are so used to choosing among dreams you do not see that you have made, at last, the choice between the truth and all illusions.

“Yet [healing] is sure. This is no dream. Its coming means that you have chosen truth, and it has come because you have been willing to let your special relationship meet its conditions. In your relationship [Wisdom] has gently laid the real world; the world of happy dreams, from which awaking is so easy and so natural. For as your sleeping and your waking dreams represent the same wishes in your mind, so do the real world and the truth of [healing] join…. The dream of waking is easily transferred to its reality. For this dream reflects your will joined with the Will of [Wisdom]. And what this Will would have accomplished has never not been done.

“You who have spent your life in bringing truth to illusion, reality to fantasy, have walked the way of dreams. For you have gone from waking to sleeping, and on an on to yet a deeper sleep. Each dream has led to other dreams and every fantasy that seemed to bring a light into the darkness but made the darkness deeper. Your goal was darkness, in which no ray of light could enter. And you sought a blackness so complete that you could hide from truth forever, in complete insanity. What you forgot was simply that [Truth] cannot destroy [Itself]. The light is in you. Darkness can cover it, but cannot put it out.

“As the light comes nearer you will rush to darkness, shrinking from the truth, sometimes retreating to the lesser forms of fear, and sometimes to stark terror. But you will advance, because your goal is the advance from fear to truth. The goal you accepted is the goal of knowledge, for which you signified your willingness. Fear seems to live in darkness, and when you are afraid you have stepped back…join quickly in an instant of light, and it will be enough to remind you that your goal is light.

“Truth has rushed to meet you since you called upon it. If you knew Who walks beside you on the way that you have chosen, fear would be impossible. You do not know because the journey into darkness has been long and cruel, and you have gone deep into it. A little flicker of your eyelids, closed so long, has not yet been sufficient to give you confidence in yourself, so long despised. You go towards love still hating it, and terribly afraid of its judgment upon you. And you do not realize that you are not afraid of love, but only of what you have made of it. You are advancing to love’s meaning, and away from all illusions in which you have surrounded it. When you retreat to the illusion your fear increases, for there is little doubt that what you think it means is fearful….

“…when you joined each other you were not alone…. In your relationship is this world’s light. And fear must disappear before you now…. Be tempted not to snatch away the gift of faith you offered…. You will succeed only in frightening yourself. The gift is given forever…. You cannot take it back. You have accepted [Truth]. The holiness of your relationship is established…. You do not understand what you accepted, but remember that your understanding is not necessary. All that was necessary was merely the wish to understand. That wish was the desire to be holy. The Will of [Wisdom] is granted you. For you desire the only thing you ever had or ever were.

“Each instant that [you spend with Wisdom] will teach you that this goal is possible, and will strengthen your desire to reach it. And in your desire lies its accomplishment. Your desire is now in complete accord with all the power of [Wisdom’s] Will. No little, faltering footsteps that you may take can separate your desire from [It’s] Will and from [It’s] strength....

“In your relationship you have joined in bringing [healing] to [each] who hid in darkness. You have been willing to bring the darkness to light, and this willingness has given strength to everyone who would remain in darkness. Those who would see will see. And they will join…in carrying their light into the darkness, when the darkness in them is offered to the light, and is removed forever….

“You who are now the bringers of [healing] have the function of bringing light to darkness. The darkness in you has been brought to light. Carry it back to darkness, from the holy instant to which you brought it. We are made whole in our desire to make whole. Let no time worry you, for all the fear that you and your brother experience is really past. Time has been readjusted to help [you] do, together, what your separate pasts would hinder. You have gone past fear, for no two minds can join in the desire for love without love’s joining them.”

The Gifts Forgiveness Offers

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 13:44:01 +0100

Here is a beautiful description from A Course in Miracles of the gifts forgiveness offers. There is nothing you could want that forgiveness cannot give.

Forgiveness offers:
•    Peace
•    Happiness
•    A quiet mind
•    A certainty of purpose
•    A sense of worth and beauty that transcends the world
•    Care and safety
•    The warmth of sure protection always
•    A quietness that cannot be disturbed
•    A gentleness that never can be hurt
•    A deep, abiding comfort
•    A rest so perfect it can never be upset
•    The only gifts that are worthy to be sought in a world that can give no gifts of any value to a mind that has received its gifts
•    The answer that will answer everything
•    The answer to the hell we made, but where we would remain no more
•    The perfect answer, given to imperfect questions, meaningless requests, half-hearted willingness to hear, and less than halfway diligence and partial trust
•    An answer, clear and plain, beyond deceit in its simplicity
•    The power and the majesty to make disappear all the complexities the world has spun of fragile cobwebs
•    The changeless, perfect plan for our healing that cannot fail, standing changelessly before us like an open door, calling from beyond the doorway with warmth and welcome, bidding us to enter in an make ourselves at home, where we belong.
•    A view of the changeless in the heart of change, of the light of truth behind appearances

Forgiveness:
•    Sparkles on your eyes as you awake
•    Gives you joy with which to meet the day
•    Soothes your forehead while you sleep
•    Rests upon your eyelids so you see no dreams of fear and evil, malice and attack
•    Offers you another day of happiness and peace when you awake
•    Lets the veil be lifted that hides the face of Love from those who look with unforgiving eyes upon the world
•    Lets you recognize your true nature
•    Clears your memory of all dead thoughts so that remembrance of your Source can arise across the threshold of your minds
•    Is the means by which a happy world of safety and of peace comes to take the place of hell
•    Is the key we hold within our hands
•    Rises up in quietness to greet your open eyes and fill your heart with deep tranquility as ancient truths, forever newly-born arise in your awareness

There is nothing you would want forgiveness cannot give; no fancied value, trivial effect or transient promise can hold more hope than what forgiveness brings.

The Formless Truth

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 00:39:00 +0100

Truth is formless because it is limitless.
When we gave it form we limited it,
and limiting it, lost sight of it as limitless.
All form contains the truth,
yet no form is the truth, for it is limited
and truth is limitless.
Enjoy the form, yet
forget not the truth.
You are the truth.
You are limitless.

Overcoming Fear Through Forgiveness - The End of the Road

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 01:30:05 +0100

This is a powerful passage from A Course in Miracles that shows us a way out of our terror. At the end of our journey we must "raise our eyes and look on terror", but we can do this with no fear at all when we see each other for what we truly are and thereby forgive each other. May this move you as it did me.

“Forget not that you came this far together, you an you brother…. The Guide Who brought you here remains with you, and when you raise your eyes you will be ready to look on terror with no fear at all. But first lift up you eyes and look on one another in innocence born of complete forgiveness of each other’s illusions and through the eyes of faith that sees them not.

“…No one can stand before this obstacle alone, for he could not have reached this far unless his brother walked beside him. And no one would dare to look on it without complete forgiveness of his brother in his heart….

“…This is the place to which everyone must come when he is ready. Once he has found his brother he is ready. Yet merely to reach the place is not enough. A journey without a purpose is still meaningless, and even when it is over it seems to make no sense. How can you know that it is over unless you realize its purpose is accomplished? Here, with the journey’s end before you, you see its purpose. And it is here you choose whether to look upon it or wander on, only to return and make the choice again.

“To look upon [terror] does need some preparation. Only the sane can look on stark insanity and raving madness with pity and compassion, but not with fear. For only if they share in it does it seem fearful, and you do share in it until you look upon you brother with perfect faith and love and tenderness. Before complete forgiveness you still stand unforgiving. You are afraid…because you fear your brother. Those you do not forgive you fear. And no one reaches love with fear beside him.

“This brother who stands beside you still seems to be a stranger. You do not know him, and your interpretation of him is very fearful. And you attack him still, to keep what seems to be yourself unharmed. Yet in his hands is your [healing]. You see his madness, which you hate because you share it. And all the pity and forgiveness that would heal it gives way to fear. Brother, you need forgiveness of each other, for you will share in madness or in [sanity] together. And you will raise your eyes in faith together, or not at all.

“Beside each one of you is one who offers you [forgiveness] for [Wisdom] is in him. Would you hold his sins against him, or accept his gift to you? Is the giver of [healing] your friend or you enemy? Choose which he is, remembering that you will receive of him according to your choice. He has in him the power to forgive your sin, as you for him. Neither can give it to himself alone. And yet your savior stands beside each one. Let him be what he is, and seek not to make of love an enemy.

“Behold your Friend,…Who stands beside you…. He holds forgiveness out to you, to share…. This ‘enemy’, this ‘stranger’ still offers you salvation as His Friend….

“This is your brother, crucified by sin and waiting for release from pain. Would you not offer him forgiveness, when only he can offer it to you? For his redemption he will give you yours…. And he will give it truly, for it will be both offered and received. There is no grace of Heaven that you cannot offer to one another, and receive from your most holy Friend. Let him withhold it not, for by receiving it you offer it to him. Redemption has been given you to give each other, and thus receive it. Whom you forgive is free, and what you give you share. Forgive the sins your brother thinks he has committed, and all the guilt you think you see in him.

“Here is the holy place of resurrection to which we come again; to which we will return until redemption is accomplished and received. Think who your brother is before you would condemn him…. Join him in gladness, and remove all trace of guilt from his disturbed and tortured mind. Help him to lift the heavy burden of sin you laid upon him and he accepted as his own, and toss it lightly and with happy laughter away from him. Press it not like thorns against his brow, not nail him to it, unredeemed and hopeless.

“Give faith to one another, for faith and hope and mercy are yours to give. Into the hands that give the gift is given. Look on your brother, and see in him the gift…you would receive…. Behold the gift of freedom…. And be you free together, as you offer…the same gift. And giving it receive it of Him in return for what you gave. He leadeth you and me together, that we might meet here in this…place, and make the same decision.

“Free your brother here…. Give him the self-same gift, nor look upon him with condemnation of any kind. See him as guiltless…and overlook the sins he thinks he sees within himself. Offer your brother freedom and complete release from sin, here in the garden of seeming agony and death.

“….This is the journey’s purpose, without which is the journey meaningless. Here is the peace…. Here is the rest and quiet that you seek, the reason for the journey from it’s beginning. [Healing] is the gift you owe your brother, the debt of gratitude you offer to [him] in thanks for what he is and what [he was] created…to be.

“Think carefully how you would look upon the giver of this gift, for as you look on him so will the gift itself appear to be. As he is seen as either the giver of guilt or salvation, so will his offering be seen and so received. The crucified give pain because they are in pain. But the redeemed give joy because they have been healed of pain. Everyone gives as he receives, but he must choose what it will be that he receives. And he will recognize his choice by what he gives, and what is given him. Nor is it given anything…to interfere with his decision.

"You came this far because the journey was your choice. And no one undertakes to do what he believes is meaningless…. Here is the only purpose that gives this world, and the long journey through this world, whatever meaning lies in them. Beyond this, they are meaningless. You and your brother stand together, still without conviction they have a purpose. Yet it is given you to see this purpose in your…Friend, and recognize it as your own.”

Seeing Your Innate Health

Sat, 03 Mar 2012 18:37:37 +0100

I have come to see that we all have innate mental health. No matter how confused, ill or lost we get, we all have access to wisdom. Sometimes we just need a little help or guidance to get back to it. I see it as my job to provide this guidance in a supportive, non-judgmental, sensitive, playful, and sometimes firm way that allows people to feel safe and at ease.

There is no mental, emotional, psychological, or spiritual distress that wisdom cannot heal. Our suffering comes from nothing more than losing touch with our wisdom, and accessing, instead, our "contaminated thinking". We have access at all times to this healing wisdom, it is just that we "look for it in all the wrong places" until we "look within". No one has any more wisdom than anyone else. Some are just more aware of and pay more attention to it than others.

I agree with the Byron Katie's statement, "Sanity never suffers". Wisdom, common sense, clarity of mind come with a feeling - a nice feeling of ease. Whenever we lose touch with that nice feeling we've lost touch with our wisdom. Our feelings are like a compass that let us know when we are on or off track.

How to Change, Not by Doing, But by Understanding

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 13:02:43 +0100

In my work as a mental health therapist I meet people every day, myself included at times, who feel frustrated, hopeless, helpless and demoralized by their inability to change. Blaming themselves and believing that something is wrong with them they fall into depressed self hatred and self punishment.

Why is it so difficult to change? What does it take to change? If people understood this they would not hate and denigrate themselves for failing to change. This is why I am writing this article.

I continue to be as unable to change as ever. However, since the day I realized why I could not change and what it takes to change, I hardly ever feel despair or self-hatred on this account. Hopefully this will help you out of you despair over not being able to change in spite of your best efforts.

One way of understanding our failure to change and what it takes to change is alluded to in the saying, “what you resist persists; where there is no resistance there is no persistence.” All martial arts are based on this understanding. Rather than oppose a force, move with the force and step out of the way. When we oppose a force we add energy, but when we step aside no energy is added and the energy dissipates.

Psychologically, this amounts to rejection or acceptance. Our rejection is resistance or opposing the force, while our acceptance is non-resistance, and therefore, adding no energy. This is the basis of Marcia Linehan’s statement, “all radical change is based on radical acceptance”. What a paradox!

Our desire to change comes from rejecting the way we are, rejecting what we are doing/failing to do, and rejecting what we are feeling/experiencing. This, paradoxically, makes change impossible. Resisting/rejecting our experience opposes it, adding energy to it, and making it chronic. However, if we were able to accept what we were feeling or experiencing and just “step aside”, the energy would soon dissipate and the feeling/experience would pass.

When looked at developmentally, it is easy to see how acceptance helps children mature, learn and grow, while rejection hurts them and obstructs further growth. Why? Because when we feel safe and supported we naturally explore, learn, take risks and grow, but when we feel threatened we tense up, constrict, and withdraw – not a good platform from which to learn and develop.

So why is acceptance so difficult? It may well be due to fear. I commonly hear the belief that acceptance would lead to passivity, and to lack of change. It is ironic that people don’t register that their continued resistance and rejection have failed to bring about the desired change, so they persist in “doing the same thing expecting a different result” – Einstein’s definition of insanity.

But for their fear of not changing, people may be quite ready to accept the way they are and what they are feeling/experiencing in the moment. I like to point out that they need not worry, as they are already stuck and not changing in spite of their best efforts.

I invite you to try accepting the way you are, your experience, your feelings just for a week, or even a day. You can always go back to rejecting, even though it is not helping you change.

If someone who has spent their life rejecting themselves and their experience were to accept themselves and their experience, even for a day, this would be a radical change.

It is an intriguing fact that “wrong-doing/wrong-feeling” can be repeated over and over with obviously distressing results, but without loss of appeal. Guilt makes the “wrong-doing/wrong-feeling” seem real and punishment seem justified. Punishment but validates the “wrong-doing/wrong-feeling”. Thus we get caught in an endless downward, vicious cycle that leads to worse and worse feeling and worse and worse action. Hating yourself and feeling miserable are truly poor platforms from which to attempt change.

If you could change your point of view from one of “wrong-doing/wrong-feeling” to one of seeing your “flaws” as mistakes you would not repeat them. You’d simply stop making the mistake. We don’t repeat mistakes once we see them as mistakes, and mistakes never call for punishment, just for correction. It is wrong-doing that calls for punishment, not error.

However, even the smallest hint of guilt, lets you know that you have not really shifted perspective. You are still viewing what you are doing or feeling as “wrong-doing/wrong-feeling”. Making a mistake might make you feel momentarily embarrassed, but never guilty. No change for the better is possible until you shift your perspective from “wrong-doing/wrong-feeling” to seeing that you are simply “making a mistake”.

Tragically, I meet people all the time that mistakenly believe they need their guilt to keep them from doing bad things, failing to notice that their guilt not only fails in this but leads to the vicious cycle described above. I will never forget the day I deeply pondered living without guilt (I have not succeeded) only to run into my terror that without guilt I’d become a violent, mad, unethical, corrupt, disloyal thief and cheat. I asked myself if I truly believed that without laws, morals, and ethics I’d become a mad man. I cannot express the relief and freedom I felt when I realized that morals, ethics and laws do not stop humans in any event, and the reason I don’t behave this way is that I don’t want to.

Another barrier to change is our unconscious terror of never changing. I like to say that the fear you put behind you and refuse to look at comes back to haunt you, while fear that you stare down disappears or becomes irrelevant. Being terrified, again, leads to fight, flight, freeze responses which offer a horrible platform from which to try to change and promote your natural learning and growth.

Getting past your worst fear involves coming to peace with the possibility of living out your worst fear. What is the worst that could happen if you never changed? Have you not been living with your unwanted, reviled “flaws” up to now? So what if you did continue living with them the rest of your life? You’ve managed live with the way you are up to now. Why couldn’t you continue living this way, especially if you stopped judging yourself for “failing” to change? Is you self-criticism not the worst of it? What would your experience be if you no longer judged, or believe your judgments? Imagine this. Let it in. Take your time.

You may have noticed that I have been alluding to learning, growth, and development as the real source of change. Change by an act of will is unreliable at best and impossible at worst. True change, is based on development and learning. I am not talking about intellectual learning or adding information. I am talking about realization, insight, revelation or epiphany. These experiences change our level of understanding permanently, and when our understanding changes we change, that is, the way we are, what we do, and how we feel are different once we see things differently.

As I stated earlier, when we feel safe, supported, relaxed and at ease, we love to explore, take risks and learn. When we are at ease, our minds quiet down, and we are more open and receptive to new ideas and perspectives.

Thus, the key to change, learn, and grow is to feel safe. And safety can only come in a supportive, accepting environment. Guilt and punishment create a hostile, threatening environment that produce defensiveness, constriction and withdrawal – a poor platform from which to learn.

“In rejecting it you hold it to you, in accepting it you let it go.” And when you let go, you let life grow. Happy changing!.

Healing Shame

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 04:18:23 +0100

As I write this piece, I notice that I am subtly, almost imperceptibly, pondering my motives in writing this. I am aware of a subtle, almost imperceptible resistance to noticing that beyond my desire to help I want to be noticed, appreciated, liked, admired, adored even!

And as I admit this, my shame becomes all-too-obvious; almost overwhelming. While I am tempted to avoid, push away, and ignore the elephant in the living room, I won't.

In my shame I am tempted to abandon this writing, abandoning, also, my desire to help. What to do?...

I will continue because I feel quite convinced that my desire to help is as genuine as my desire to be noticed. What does that make me? What does that mean?

I assume that you, the reader, share my experience. It is hard to imagine that I am all alone in this. Is this experience not familiar? What does that make you?

Now I am seeing the possibility of "forgiving" my need for adoration, not only in the service of pursuing my desire to help, but because I can see that my desire to help is made no less genuine by my need for attention.

I want to give help and get help with healing shame, that is, understanding shame, and where it comes from. I want to heal my relationship with shame and all my other "negative" experiences, for that matter.

In the interest of helping/getting help, I proceed and dare to "go where even angels fear to tread". I notice that not only shame, but fear arise in me when I dare to look at my need for admiration. I fear what my need for admiration means. Whatever that is, it can't be good, right?

Beyond my need for admiration, I can see, not wanting to, many other things for which I feel ashamed, and I am aware of a strong urge to run. Yet I choose to proceed. I need to heal and help you heal. I am also ashamed of:
•    hiding,
•    sneaking,
•    lying,
•    stealing,
•    cheating,
•    lusting,
•    criticizing,
•    condemning,
•    holding others in contempt,
•    being arrogant,
•    striking out,
•    wanting revenge, and above all,
•    failing - failing to be rid of these "flaws".

On their own, these would be impulses to fear and be ashamed of, but next to these "vile" impulses do we not also long for, intensely desire, and struggle to be rid of these? I can clearly see these in me, and I take for granted that you, too, can clearly see them in you when you stop to notice. Haven't we been trying to overcome these impulses for a very long time? (I will take up why we fail in another piece). The point here is not that we continually fail, but that we persist in trying to be rid of these in spite of all the failure. So what does this mean? What does this make us?

If you pay careful attention you may notice that beyond your terror of being bad, and therefore deserving of punishment (harm)* because of these impulses, there arises a kind feeling of tenderness, empathy, and compassion for yourself, for us all, when you realize that as much as we have these "evil" impulses, we all struggle to be rid of them. This just seems to be the human condition.

It is easy to notice these "shameful" impulses. Do you just as easily notice the revulsion, dismay and rejection of them; the impulse in you to be free of these impulses? If not, why not? And how do you react when you are not aware of the total cycle of the arising of the "shameful" impulse and the revulsion toward it?

What happens when you do see the complete cycle? You may notice compassion arising for yourself and for us all in our struggle to "be good" (as if we were not!).

*The idea that we deserve punishment/harm or that it is useful in any way will be taken up elsewhere.

Getting What You Want

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 15:24:40 +0100

A dialogue between me and you

Me, “We should all get what we want!”

You, “Then, why don’t we?”

Me, “We do!”

You, “What do you mean? I don’t want pain and I have it.”

Me, “You do want pain, you just don’t want to know that you want it.”

You, “I can see not wanting to know I want pain, but why would I want pain?”

Me , “To justify your misery.”

You, “But pain came first, then my misery.”

Me, “That is a question of the chicken and the egg; which came first?”

You, “Well, I don’t want pain, or misery, yet I have both.”

Me, “You do want both; you just don’t want to know that you want them.”

You, “Why would I want them?”

Me, “Because you think they are the appropriate response to what you see in the world. Imagine being joyful at all times. You and people would think that you are crazy.”

You, “Oh, I see. Well, that is why we need to change the world, so we can by happy.”

Me, “There will always appear something in the world that you think deserves pain and misery. You need to look beyond the world of form if you want to be free of pain and misery.”

You, “There is nothing beyond the world of form.”

Me, “It is apparent that you are convinced of that. And you think that, too, justifies your pain and misery.”

You, “Well doesn’t it?”

Me, “See what I mean when I say, you want to be miserable; you just don’t want to know that you want to be? When you no longer want to be in pain and miserable, you won’t be. There is no reason, in reality, to be in pain and misery. You can be joyful and at peace no matter what appears. You just have to want that. But who would want that when it would set them apart and even make them look crazy in this world?
    Knowing that unconsciously you want to experience everything you experience, to do everything you do, is the key. And this includes knowing that you don’t want to know this fact, as this keeps you feeling helpless (and, yes, you want to feel helpless).
    Knowing that you are doing and experiencing exactly what you want at every moment would make you feel more than empowered. It would make you realize that you are cause, and what you experience and do is effect.
    Are you ready to know this?”