Ignorance is NOT bliss!

I remember growing up and using reading to cut out what was going on around me: noise, rowing, fighting, fear of not having enough food or money. It was easy to do this and it felt safe. I could and did ignore the truth of what my life was about. It was too painful to accept and I didn’t want it to be like this… to believe that life was painful and that it hurt… a lot!

So I ignored it. I chose to put my sights on somewhere and something else and concentrate on that. Making a picture that wasn’t whole somehow fit into a dream of mine.

That is how it was for many years until I SAW what I had been doing! Many of us today are doing the same thing. We can see what is going on around us, but we are not truly SEEing. We do not want to admit what we have helped to create in this world of ours. For whatever reason that is specific to us as individuals, we do not want to accept violence, hate, resentment or any other of these feelings, fear or beliefs we carry inside of us. We feel that it is not right to get angry or be afraid. Yet we watch those close to us doing this very thing. Not only this; we ‘feel’ the energy of their emotions but are unable to articulate them. We hold them inside of every cell in our being. Before we can make the changes needed in this world of ours today, we have to ACCEPT that things aren’t right. How can we make any real and lasting changes if we cannot accept that which needs to change? Surely we will create more ignorance, not love and light?

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Gratitude

I used to work with the notion of gratitude… feeling that if I focused on this, things would somehow be better. What I then realised was that being grateful for both good and bad experiences wasn’t necessary. It’s a bit like being positive when all around is falling apart!

I have taught Positive Thinking for about ten years now and I still see its worth today. But like gratitude, sometimes we just have to put up our hands and acknowledge that we feel c**p… because we do. And most times, even if we try to be positive or grateful we end up suppressing the truth of our feelings.

When we are being grateful, we are making a judgement that something is either good or bad. If we could let go of the judgement and see it as just ‘experience’, then we will know freedom from suffering.

Shifting

I sit in a place of in between. No longer attached to the past; not yet ready for the new. Patiently waiting for what, I do not know. All the old structures have crumbled, no longer able to sustain themselves. Everything I thought I was, revealed as illusion. Where do I go to next?  I feel like I am in a state of life between lives. That place after death: the waiting room; waiting to take on the next role.

A strange situation it is, too. I am here, but at the same time not here. Part of this place, but also strangely removed from it. Family and friends gone, disappeared as though they never existed. It’s as though I have been picked up and placed in another setting, another play. A play not yet revealed. It’s not a scary place, but a strange place; like I’m in a foreign world observing the natives, trying to grasp their language, their rules for life, even. I feel like an intruder, as if I don’t belong; which I no longer do.

I’m not who I was, but as yet not who I am.

Let go to enjoy the ride!

For many years I have been following my ‘spiritual’ path, always looking for the meaning in everything inside and outside of myself. It has kept me very busy and I have learnt much about myself and the world in general. It has kept me company when I have been alone, like a companion who has so much in common with you and who cares about you. It has become a comfort!

However, that ‘comfort’ had also become a drag. So much time spent ‘looking’ that at times I missed such beautiful experiences that were with me right there and then. It had become another form of attachment, almost like a dark cloud hanging over me. Such a heaviness I carried, believing it to be part of the journey, part of the learnng experience. I became heavy, my conversations became heavy… I thought that this was how it should be on this spiritual path.

But today, lying in my glorious garden in the morning sun and listening to the birds and a family member singing in the bathroom, I realised that I need to let go of all the looking and the lessons. I need to let go of the heaviness and meanings.

After all, Life is just… life. It is meant to be lived, not sought. And so today, I have let go so that I can indeed enjoy the ride — the ride that this life actually is — fun, exhilerating and full of wonderful moments. Perfect!

Master of Your Destiny

No one else can live your life. You are the Captain of your ship, the Master of your destiny. Before you set sail, be sure you know where you are heading. Plot your course accordingly, even if you can’t see it, it is there just on the horizon. Even when you have no energy for things, you have energy… you cannot not have it, you would be dead otherwise. Perhaps you are already dead… dead to the old way of being, and if this is so, say “goodbye” and dream a new dream, a new life. For after all, no one else can dream your dream, or live your life. It is in your hands… so go now, go grab it with a blind faith in yourself that all will be well!!!

A Different Language

I’ve spent sixteen years plus trying to manifest my desires and have just realised that in all the 30-odd years prior to this, I never once used the word ‘manifest’.

The books I read, written by authors from other countries, all use this word. Because I was interested in self-development, I also used this word. But the truth is, unconsciously, it never did sit well with me and I would usually end up disappointed if what I wanted didn’t materialise.

I have a copy of  ‘The Secret’. I have read many books on “the law of attraction”. I have even taught positive thinking and using visualisation to create your dream. But, not until yesterday did I realise that the reason I could not ‘manifest’ was not because I didn’t believe, in the normal sense, or not even because I could not see it or feel it but because – purely and simply – I never had an innate sense of the word ‘manifest’!

Now, when I supplement it with a word that I do know (a word I have used throughout my life), I can see how I have achieved the things I set out to, and from that can achieve the thing I next aim to. Simple! All I have to do is use the word I know, the word I expereince the world with. That word is ‘create’.

I create all that I have. I create all that I am. I create all that I want. This is my word. This is my language. From this, I make sense of my world.

Sixteen years seems a long time to be studying something before I got to this understanding. I wonder what other things I have spent so much time on in life before I could see?

Before you take one more step, check in with yourself. Check in to your real language, you real thoughts and your real beliefs. After all, if we have not truly experienced something for ourselves, can we actually say that we ‘know’ it? Can we really resonate with it?
What are you following that somewhere inside of you does not feel real, does not feel authentic and does not feel YOU?

Point of Reference

In life, most people are guided by something… perhaps a God, an idea, a belief, or a relationship. In all of these, there are rules to learn and to abide by and there are languages to help us understand the game of life. These things are our safety net, they are what we define ourselves by. Should we act outside of these rules, we may fear being alienated, cast out and alone!

We get to know ourselves firstly through our parents/carers, then our siblings, larger family and to the general population. We join groups, sports teams,  organisations, protests and marches. We fight causes that call to us even if we do not know why and we align ourselves to political parties. We live with material success and the need for approval of others. For the most part, we feel a sense of connectedness, of belonging and unity. We get a sense that this is ‘us’, this is what life is all about. All is good.

But what happens when you find yourself without these groups of people, successes, material gain or causes to align with? What do you do when the world has been pulled from right under your feet? Where is that sense of connectedness you felt to those you believed in? Where is that connection if your God is not what you thought it to be, if the ideology you followed turns out to be an illusion? You realise that no matter what you believed, felt, knew or connected to is no longer there. You are adrift without oars or a compass, being carried along without a north star to guide you. What do you do, who do you turn to if there is no one, no thing to turn? 

Can you trust yourself to be your guide? Do you really believe what you know, feel, see or hear as your own truth? Do you trust in your own innate being enough to guide you on? And if you did, what would you be heading towards if all you knew had gone? No goals to follow, no dreams to dream, no place to run or hide. Where would you see yourself ending up?

This is where we need a new reference point, that reference point US (I). A reference point we set ourselves, one that can NEVER be lost. When our frame of reference is set at US – which is and has always been then  never again can we be cast adrift in a sea of lonliness or false living.

It is said that we come back to the very same place we began. We come back to US!!!

I therefore, must be our frame of reference, our starting point, our guide in life and in death. I, is always with us, even when in disguise. If we use this as our guide, then we can know that we will never be separate, can never be alone even when outside of us the world may be falling apart!

Love

How can you love, when you don’t know what love is.
How can you trust, when you don’t know what trust is.
Love does not go to war, or gossip, hate or envy.
Love does not fear being left or fear living alone.

Love does not worry about where the next meal is coming from, or even if there will be a next meal.
Love does not say “I love you” and then destroy you with hateful words
It does not judge or criticise.

If you are feeling pain, that is not love. If you are left wanting, that is not love.
If you can’t forgive your mistakes, that is not love.
And until you can know compassion, you will not know love.

For you see, love only knows love. It can only ‘be’ love.
When you can rise above the fears, the sorrows, blame and regret only then you will meet with true love!

Death is All Around Me

Death is all around me

Death is all around me I sense its timely entrance.
Be away with the old, the rotten and the stale
Be away with the stench of all so fowl.
I am that death, it resides in me
I am that death and the I
That I was, has ceased to be.
I have evolved like the caterpillar
Into the butterfly,
I spread my wings with joy and fly.
I fly to another place
Where i become we
And we are but one face.
I fly to another world
So different from this
No longer trapped
I feel the winds kiss.
I am free to dance and to sing,
I make up my life
On the prayer of a wing.

(Author: Jacqueline Cullen)

The Mirror of Your Life

Have you looked in the mirror lately to see yourself in all your glory? Did you notice the man in the mirror who showed you your true worth? Did you see the woman who so loved you that it hurt?

Did you see the wonder of  All That Is?

Or, when you looked in the mirror of all those faces you know so well, did you see fear, did you see anger, jealousy, hate, poverty or violence?

What is it you see today in that mirror called ‘this world’ (your life)? What do you see?

In the wonderful richness of this tapestry we call life, we get to choose what we want, what part we will play and in what surroundings that will be.

Be careful what you focus on… that becomes your choice, your way, your life, your story. Choose wisely, dear friend… choose wisely!