Notes and articles tagged with “challenges”
Filed under Notes on 26. August 2007 » [2]
What we are all looking for, in one way or another, is freedom from limitation. Freedom from the world; being able to do whatever you want, free from anything on the external level that could make you uncomfortable or limit your movement in any way.
The easy answer to this of course is money. And recognition perhaps, fame, celebrity, universal approval, but first and foremost we think that financial independence is the key to becoming free of the world. And in a way it’s true; with unlimited funds you could arrange your external situation in a way that is relatively limitless, on that level.
But this is the big misunderstanding. It is true that we want freedom from the world, but we make the mistake of looking for freedom exclusively on the external level. We think that freedom from the world of form can be achieved on the level of form, and that overcoming worldly limitations is to conquer them on the external level. And this is certainly what we are taught to believe, that one can achieve freedom from the world through external means.
What we are not told, however, is that freedom from the world has nothing to do with anything on the level of form at all. Being externally free of limitation can give the illusion of what we are seeking, for a little while, but the real salvation and what we are actually looking for is inner freedom from external limitations. Real freedom from the world is to be in a state of inner non-attachment to it, and this does not require anything in particular of your external situation. You don’t need to change anything on the level of form in order to become free of it.
And in fact, being faced with severe limitations on the level of form is for many people the key to freedom. Paradoxically, somebody who is completely free from limitations on the external level is much less likely to find real freedom from the world than someone who is neck-deep in worldly challenges. You are much more likely to find freedom in prison than a five star hotel.
When you realize this, you may even begin to feel grateful for the limitations in your life situation. They offer an opportunity for you to align yourself with what is, and keep you from getting pulled into the illusion that one can find fulfillment on the level of form. If all the worldly desires of the ego are met, it is very difficult not to get lost and completely identified with it. But when the ego is met with things not working out, the world not respecting its plans and ambitions, you are given an opportunity to go beyond the illusion of ego.
And what more could you want from the world? Indeed, we could see this as the only real purpose of the world of form; to present you with challenges and limitations so that you can overcome them. If you expect something other than that from the world, like fulfillment and salvation, you will suffer. But if you see the world of form for what it is, a teaching device of sorts, you become free of it without needing anything to be different from how it is right now, in the present moment.
Filed under Notes on 30. June 2007 » [3]
And indeed they do. A week ago, the hard drive in my laptop gave up the ghost. I had everything more or less backed up, so suffering was kept at a minimum, but it reminded me of how we always expect things that work to stay the same. If things are going well, in our judgment, we feel that they should continue going well. And if things are going badly, we want them to change.
Although it may sound overly dramatic in relation to the hard drive failure, and really it has nothing to do with that as such, but there is one thing we know for certain: things change. That is the law of the world of form and time. Things change; either for better or for worse, as we perceive it. Things go wrong, things get better. It is an endless cycle of growth and dissolution, same as the cycle of birth and death, the sea and the seasons.
And despite it being such a well established pattern, a fundamental law of nature pretty much, we are still surprised when things change. We try to control how they change: pushing things along when we're dissatisfied with the current state of something, and then resisting change when we finally get things to be as we want them to. Pushing and pulling, attempting to manhandle the universe according to our personal preferences.
This stubborn way of approaching things can go on for a long time, and even after a lifetime of having little or no control over things a person may still keep resisting the inevitability of change. Sometimes, and you can see it very clearly in old cats and dogs, after years and years of change from this polarity to that, there comes a point of surrender to what is. Not a defeatist shrinking back from life, but a recognition that what is simply is as it is. Pithy enough for a bumper sticker, and as simple as simple gets, but seemingly near-impossible for most people to realize.
Surrendering to what is — it is a way of being in alignment with life. You can still act and attempt to change things, but only when there is no attachment to the result of that action are you in alignment to what is. The default attitude of our conditioning is to argue with what is, hoping in some way that the world will feel guilty and change things back, but in order to be at peace with the law of continuous change, or birth and death, growth and dissolution, one must step back and allow things to do as they will. Taking action if needed, but in a humble way that more resembles a suggestion than an order.
And maybe that is a good way of looking at it. We can make a suggestion, but never issue an order to the universe. Knowing this, we are at peace with the world.
Filed under Notes on 7. June 2007 »
If we look at the thought patterns of the ego, most if not all of them are characterized by a tendency to want something other than what already is. Whenever the ego is not completely preoccupied with future-projection and fantasy, and actually takes a moment to stop and look at what is, the usual attitude is to think that “this should be different.” There may be a fleeting pause here and there of thinking that the situation is finally perfect, but the major flaw in how the ego works is that no situation or configuration of events can ever satisfy it. Nothing is ever enough, because the sense of lack is built into the structure of how the ego operates. Which means that whatever content is added, sooner or later there will be a need for more.
Saying yes to now, yes to what is, can be a powerful way of snapping out of this habitual attitude of “no.” Complete acceptance of what is signals the death of the ego, because the ego thrives on having something to resist. It feeds on complaining about what is, feeling offended by what is, being angry at what is, and simply being against what is whatever the cost.
However the idea of accepting what is can be misinterpreted, and the ego can, with great subtlety sometimes, twist it around for its own purposes in order to remain in control. There are two main aspects to this misinterpretation; to mistake the yes for a no in disguise, and to mistake what is for a story about what is.
The former has to do with equating acceptance with resignation, of saying “yes” with an attitude of resistance and underlying negativity. In this way the yes to now is seen as being defeatist, something along the lines of saying “oh all right then, I accept that I am fat and miserable. C’est la vie.” Which might look like acceptance on the surface, but in reality it comes from an attitude of negativity and resistance that has absolutely nothing to do with saying yes to what is.
Which leads to the other aspect, namely the mistake of thinking that you must say yes to a story. I remember Eckhart Tolle taking a hypothetical example of an unemployed actress working as a waitress. She had a story about how she had failed as an actress, and how she must now do something that she resents while being deprived of what she really wants. This is the story of a personal self and a certain configuration of concepts, and has nothing much to do with reality at all. So the mistake in this case is thinking “okay, I accept that I am a waitress because I failed at being an actress.” Which is not really accepting what is, because none of it is real and so has very little to do with what is. The only reality it has is as a current of noise running through the mind, which you can then accept as part of what is at this moment.
So now there’s the usual concern; if you give up resisting what is, will anything ever change? In the above example, will she now just be a waitress for the rest of her life because she said yes to what is?
This is yet another misconception, or rather just another aspect of the big misinterpretation of what it means to say yes to what is. The truth is that things can only really change when you accept what already is. Saying yes to now might seem passive, a resignation to leaving things stagnant, but in fact it is just the opposite.
To realize what the words are actually pointing to, it may be helpful to play around with them a little, even if only just to shake the old thought patterns loose to make room for a clearer interpretation. For example, contemplate the idea of dynamic acceptance of what is, describing an attitude of saying, “this is what is; now what can I do with it?”
This is also vulnerable to misinterpretation, because the ego can go into the pattern of seeking the next thing and projecting into the future, but at least it shakes things up a bit. When you think of it in this manner, you go from the habitual stance of being in resistance to what is to being aligned with it. Approaching the present moment with an attitude of asking “what can I do with this?” gets you beyond the old pitfall of thinking “this shouldn’t be as it is.”
It is important to keep in mind when practicing this that the focus is on the process and not the outcome, because otherwise the ego will jump right in there with future projection and attachment to results. Asking “what can I do with this?” is not about what you can get out of it, or what you can achieve through it, but what you can do with it.
Saying yes to what is is about aligning yourself to reality. You see what is, accept that it is already so, and then go from there.
Filed under Notes on 7. May 2007 » [6]
A defining characteristic of our conditioning is a stubborn, illogical and counterproductive habit of resisting what is. The ego always wants to be against something, and the default mode of approaching the world is that of resistance, denial and avoidance.
Among spiritual seekers, this can manifest as a desire to use the spiritual path as a means of escaping or avoiding challenges they are faced with in the world of form. It can be subtle, sometimes so much so that it turns into a difficult obstacle. The mind is very clever when it comes to future-projected promises of salvation, some magical solution to all your problems that will get you to a point of arrival or “making it” sometime in the future, and the spiritual path can be seen by the ego as a means to that end.
It can be seen as a way of constructing a safe story for yourself, basically the same old “story of me” but without all the problems. And in this way, you approach the spiritual path as an alternative story line you can use to replace the old one.
And in a certain way this is true; spiritual awakening is indeed the end to all problems. But not in the way the conditioned mind thinks of it though. Becoming free of problems is not about one day finding yourself living in a world where you are free of the polarities of gain and loss, birth and death, success and failure. Things will continue to come and go, but it only becomes a problem when viewed through the filter of conditioned thinking. To quote Shakespeare again, “nothing is either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
I will go more into this later, in-depth, but for now let me leave you with a little exercise that deals with the issue directly; a pointer that shifts you from being in a mode of resistance, which is more or less our default response to challenges in the conditioned state, and on to being able to work with whatever you are presented with in the world of form. What this entails is simply to act as if you had chosen whatever arises in the moment. It already is, and so you might as well work with it instead of resisting it.
In this way, you can face all challenges completely without turning them into problems that you then want to avoid having to deal with. When you face everything fully in this way, you will begin to see solutions and opportunities instead of problems and obstacles. And so not only will the challenges seem lighter and less serious than before, you will actually be much more able to deal with them effectively.
Practicing this is particularly useful to overcome the obstacle we talked about earlier, of wanting to use the spiritual path as a story device, and can help you shake loose from what can sometimes be a very subtle trap of conditioned thinking.
Filed under Notes on 15. April 2007 »
Lately, and you may have noticed by the dip in my writing output, I have been busy with things. I've had my attention occupied with things coming, things going, things changing — all the while feeling this vague sense of discomfort and absence, for lack of a better word, that comes with having your attention consumed by the world of form for too long. It is a draining sense of being away from home somehow, so I guess you could say I'm feeling a little road weary.
When you’ve been away from home like this, the return is so welcome and comforting that you wonder why you ever went away in the first place. But this is what we do. We leave home, leave ourselves, first of all as we grow up and take on the burdens of social conditioning. This is what most people must go through, and then try to find their way back. Back to innocence, you could say, or back to their natural state of being. Whatever you want to call it, it feels like returning home. And this is what all spiritual teaching is about; to lead you back to that place, providing signposts that point the way back to where you came from.
This process of becoming lost in the world, the process of growing up, is then repeated as a pattern throughout one’s life. And to those on the spiritual path, this ebb and flow of finding your way and then becoming lost again will probably sound very familiar. Taking two steps forward and one step back, we all know what that is like.
When we become lost in the world, it is because too much of our attention is given to the surface, and not enough to the essence. We become fascinated with noise, and forget about the silence that lies beneath and beyond it. This then takes the form of increased mental noise and compulsive thinking, which gains momentum and keeps us floating on the surface.
At some point, because you have already known what it is like not being lost, there will come a time where you feel a desire to return back home. Being more or less lost like this is normal to the majority of mankind, and many people can be away from home like this all their lives while remaining relatively peaceful and happy. But when you have had a glimpse of freedom, it will be impossible for you to be lost without suffering. The desire to return home can be felt as anything from vague unease to a painful sense of pressure, and however it manifests there is absolutely no way of ignoring it.
Nor would you want to ignore it. Because you know that being lost in things is not what you want, however easy and comfortable it may seem in movies and magazines. Travel down that road and you will always find yourself disappointed, frustrated and uneasy. Which is most likely why you are reading this right now.
This pattern I mentioned earlier, the ebb and flow, is the strangest thing. It’s amazing how easy it is to get distracted, to get lost, over and over again, even if you know that it is not what you want. The world has a very strong pull, and the momentum of thinking we’ve inherited in our conditioning means that it doesn’t take much to send us wandering off the path.
Ultimately, the suffering we encounter when walking in the wrong direction is what keeps us coming back, and the more lost we get the more we suffer. At first, we tend to get completely lost, suffer greatly and then find our way back in a flash of insight, perhaps. All very dramatic. But further along the path, there comes a point where the movement is relatively gentle. As I’m experiencing it now, I don’t get lost enough in the world so that I hit a point of suffering that then bounces me back. The movement is slower. There is peace, and presence, but a persistent tendency to get carried away with form.
A word that keeps coming to me in relation to this is vigilance. And what I recognize I must do, and what you may want to do also, is to increase the level of dedication. Cultivate discipline; not in the sense of forcing it using willpower — that is the ego at work — but rather as a sense of sobriety and deliberate intent.
It feels good to return home.
Filed under Notes on 13. February 2007 »
I’m sure many of you recognize the symptoms of being mentally over-stimulated; email, RSS, instant messaging, forums, blogs, podcasts, social networking services, etc., together working to create a constant stream of information that demands your attention all day every day. And we become really good at keeping up with all of it, expanding our capacity for dealing with rapidfire input of information all day long and taking pride in the ability to do everything at once.
Speaking from my own experience, all of this — let’s just lump it as information technology — has proven to be a great challenge in my spiritual practice. I spend most of my waking hours in front of a computer, and so my mind has become very good at processing information. This is a valuable skill to have these days, but also a great liability; not in and of itself, really, but rather because it amplifies the preexisting dysfunction of the mind. It speeds up our thinking, and when the mind stream gathers momentum the easier it is for the ego to play out its destructive thought patterns. The mind is only a tool, of course, but continuously feeding it more and more noise can cause it to spin out of control.
I’m going to write a more in-depth article on this, but for now I’ve made a list of potential remedies for this self-inflicted attention deficit disorder so many people are finding themselves having to deal with now. Small exercises that only require you to set aside a couple of minutes per hour, but need to be practiced diligently in order to work over the long term. The difficulty is in establishing them as habits, but once that has been done the overall effect will be much greater than the time commitment would suggest.
In order of difficulty, easiest one first:
1. Observe your breath
Consciously observing your breath, even if only for a couple of minutes, is much more effective than it sounds.
2. Listen to silence
If you are surrounded by noise all day long, and rest assured you are not the only one, try sensing the underlying silence beneath the noise. The silence out of which the noise arises, the emptiness, the stillness that is always there no matter how noisy it may appear on the surface. One method of getting closer to this is to try and notice a sound that is really far away, something barely audible (or only in your imagination, as it were).
3. Feel the aliveness within
This is about feeling your body from within, to sense the incredible aliveness in your entire body (and it is amazing once you are able to notice it). To start off with, hold out your arms and, eyes closed, ask yourself “how do I know my hands are there?”
Another way of looking at this is to move your point of ‘beingness’ from your head and into the rest of your body. Sensing yourself as being centered in the abdomen, for example, and focusing your attention on that area.
4. Stop thinking
Which is really the wrong way of saying it because you can’t really stop it, or at least not with force. It is more a conscious decision to allow thought to subside, which can with practice start to work in a way that you are able to simply stop thinking, so to speak. You step back and observe the thought stream until it fades away by itself.
The main difficulty with all of these is to simply remember to practice them. It’s so easy to get dragged into a stream of thinking, especially with these modern and information addled little minds of ours, so as long as we keep using information technology we need to be vigilant in keeping it at a certain distance.
Filed under Articles on 18. January 2007 » [3]
Most people will be familiar with the ebb and flow of interest and motivation, and how frustrating it can be to swing from one thing to the other without ever really committing to anything. This can apply to casual interests and hobbies, consumer goods, career options, places, situations, and even friendships
Filed under Articles on 7. January 2007 » [5]
Although it may sound like the title of an article from Cosmo Girl magazine, except for the last part perhaps, issues having to do with our parents are not limited to the lives of children and adolescents only. Even if you are in your 50s, 60s, or even 90 years old, the fundamental beliefs you have about yourself and the world can probably be traced back to what you were taught to believe as a child. Growing up, our whole picture of the world is limited to our immediate environment, and so the way in which a child perceives the world is heavily dependent on the outlook of its parents, siblings, and relatives
Filed under Articles on 2. January 2007 » [10]
A common issue on the path to spiritual awakening is balancing outwardly focused activity with inner stillness and introspection. The world has an enormous pull, and especially early on in the transformation process it is very easy to get lost in ‘doing.’ The conditioned thought patterns that are the main characteristic of the unconscious state tend to have great momentum, and remaining active in the world while maintaining balance can prove challenging
Filed under Articles on 28. December 2006 » [9]
In this world, some things that happen can appear to have no meaning or purpose. Mostly these are the things we judge to be bad, like being laid off from one’s job or having an accident of some kind. People are at a loss to understand how war, hunger, natural disasters and human suffering can possibly have any meaning, and why these things happen
Everyday Wonderland is a weblog on the subject of spiritual awakening, creativity, enthusiasm, inspiration, and generally everything having to do with the higher levels of human consciousness. The author is Helgi Páll Einarsson, 24 years old and currently living in Iceland. He likes books in the morning, making things, and taking long walks.