DEEPLY AWAKE – NOW, THEN.
To say I feel different is such an understatement. It's like saying a tiger is different than a kiwi. Yes. They are different. There is a before and after at play here, something big moving, shifting, evolving, coming up for review and appreciation.
I remember that dream which inspired “Sandstorms.” It's been coming back to me in waves. Working very hard, concentrating utterly on something, then a sandstorm kicks up, and then, through the dust, all the old structures that I just took for granted as the ones I'd see after the storm, they had all been replaced, very mystically and magically and against reason.
Nice.
I can feel the dust settling.
I've been pandering Seth. I bought The Nature of Personal Reality a month ago, and dove into it a week ago. I remember mainlining that book in the '80's, and I'd be able to read about a paragraph, sometimes just a couple sentences. Then I'd feel full, complete. Then I'd go to sleep, and have a dream explaining the concept I'd just read about. That happened so predictably with Seth, that I have always recognized him as a great teacher of mine. And here he is again, reminding me in words I can now better understand and concepts I can now finally feel in my heart when I read, and then easily and readily APPLY in my physical life.
It has been a relief to read Seth, because, even though disembodied, he does not convey the underlying message so many of today's channelers have going on these days. Seth honors creaturehood. He does not deny that physicality has a set of rules in which cool things can happen. He is a friend of the human. Maybe if he was channeling these days he'd be talking about light bodies and ascension and such, but it is so refreshing to have such a pure channel so completely devoid of VALUE JUDGEMENTS. It's been a breath of fresh air in my reality, I can tell you.
The truly involuntary obsessing I had been doing, about the meaning of life, my worth, my path, all that stuff, it feels weirdly resolved.
And it is not because I have somehow reconciled the outer with the inner world I know. This peace comes from ownership of the outer as a clever and loving expression of my inner self, and my deepest wishes, desires, what is the very best thing for me in the here and now.
Imagine the idea that in dreams I work out tons of probabilities, and have access to every solution, even to the maddening, core koans of my existence. And then I come into awareness within this body each day. How can I imagine that what is then happening in my life, my bills, my ambivalence, my joys and my conflicts, how can I imagine that these things are against me, or are a threat to me, or might end me, kill me, or break me? They may inconvenience me, make me confront things, but they are from my bigger self, the part which knows the way. It's not just meditations and prayers that are expressions of my highest good. My highest good, and my ability to attain even more experience and self understanding, these are contained in each moment of each day, eyes open, engaged.
The conflicts and seeming impediments which I focused on all my life, I feel resolution. And I have this resolution without steady job and without book contract inked. Nothing has changed outer-wise, not in a big way, but in small ways, all the while knowing, just knowing, that everything has changed within.
I think it has been good to be reminded that challenges, dissonances, conflicts, even, are not an indictment of inner worth. This last relationship solidified this lesson for me. I was in relationship, really, deeply in love, with someone who, in the space of a phone call, could not tolerate that I had a polar opposite take on something, on an event going on in her life. I said what I thought. There was a skirmish, an attempt to convince me that my thoughts were incorrect, my beliefs wrong. I really couldn't have cared less about the subject, but voiced my opinion anyway. She needed me to change my opinion and agree with her. I did not comply, and this caused a row.
I got dumped, told I wasn't committed enough to my own spiritual growth. Whatever. Sure, yeah, whatever.
But I bring this up because I have gone through this insane patch where spiritual growth just HAS TO MEAN peace and love and abundance and flowers and joy and wheeeee and no worries and yada yada.
And I think that is silly, frankly. Conflicts, challenges, dissonance, that's just part of life. To expect that you will agree and see eye to eye with every single person you are in communion with just means that somebody's going to be doing some lying. It's the residue from the disagreement, ah! That's where it all gets good.
You see, it's the feeling I get from the thought that is a biggie. And these feelings, they are by-products of my beliefs.
If I believe that, as a lightworker, I have come from a distant space of divine love, that I am an angel incarnate, and my job, my only reason for being here, is to spread peace and love and light, well then, that is a nice notion. But I see something going south with this thinking. A fault in the wiring of this belief system.
In the beginning, I believed that enlightenment was not assured, and meanness was a clue that the end was near, we've failed, the BS will get worse and we've lost the war, there will be no ascension. I felt panic and fear and anger and threatened when I encountered obvious low-level thinking, worrying that somehow the race was doomed, the universe threatened, because some guy is being an asshole.
Further, I equated calm, quiet, peace, happy relations, with spiritual goodness. Discord, then, had to be seen as a symptom of spiritual failure.
What fucking nonsense.
So, this thinking could lead to legions of co-dependent lightworkers “spreading light” when all they might be doing is shutting down discord so that they can think people are in agreement, happy, peaceful. So they can feel intact. This is the fault with the wiring.
Do you see the difference? There is a place, a land, where no one is shamed, no one knows blame or guilt or fear. These quivery realities are blasted through. But even there, would anger be off the table? Isn't anger, when used as the tool it is, within creaturehood, just a form of physical impetus, maybe a clue that you feel your boundaries have been bumped. But anger is, in and of itself, just one feeling, out of a whole palate. Even dogs and cats have anger, they growl or bunch up their face or bodies, expressing that they would prefer not to be tread on. Are our dogs and cats “bad,” because they are feeling and expressing one of the tools of expression they have on hand? Are we?
I am beginning to feel great disinterest with some of this new age movement stuff, the ascension stuff, that I see on the web, the stuff that tells me how to think, or with information which states that I am unable to figure something out without their help, oooh, I disengage immediately from that.
The changes are intense and obvious now. I feel no distress, and a great deal of humor. I feel no hopelessness.
But mostly, the critic has been silenced.
The one who was always critiquing my situation, choices, feelings, desires. Gone. Or at least very very still. I'll get a stick and poke at it a little later.
I worked both Friday and Saturday nights. Each night, when I got the confirmation, I wept. To say I feel ambivalence for my chosen profession would be, of course, an understatement. But on Saturday morning, after a shift which was unpleasant ONLY in my head, I realized, just clear as day, the truth behind the words we all parrot to each other in encouragement or superiority, “It's the perception of the thing, not the thing itself, which is at the heart of the matter.” It's not the work, it's me.
It's not the patients, the staff, the facilities, it's me. It's just not a great fit anymore. But I am here. I have chosen this. This is no accident. And I love it too. And so I will just let it be. I will accept it as true that maybe, if I can not have these over-reactions, these violent reactions to the behavior and choices I see at work which distress me so, if I can change how I approach my reaction to these states, then I can change my whole reality.
And so, Saturday night I did just that.
I decided to just not collapse into the experience, but to instead ride it, observe it, enjoy it.
Yes, there were many many inconveniences. But at the start of the shift, when I met with impediment after impediment, I understood that I was testing myself, to see if I'd implode, blame myself, or hate life because I ran into a few snags. I did not succumb. And then the weird glitches and inconveniences (computer stuff, machine malfunctions) ceased, and things went smoothly.
I'm getting more bullet proof. And I am beginning to realize it's possible to now be open to environments, realities, where the bullets don't fly quite so freely, but, to be honest, I have needed the bullets up until now.
I am now able to feel authentic when I say I have spent this last year, ever since January 25, 2012, getting right with myself. It was time. I couldn't really have gone on. Everything had just become so tight and repetitive and unhappy.
I am unwilling to be one of those lightworkers who sacrifice my creaturehood, and my full range of awarenesses, laying on an alter of fear of those experiences which are gritty, complex, or appear to be counter-intuitive or self-harming. No one knows where they are going except them selves. Judgment of someone's situation, their reactions, their needs, what is the point to that? It's an exercise in arrogance, and that is all.
I think it makes a lot of sense to be someone who can accept everybody. If you show me that you have attained a certain level of comprehension, then I can share more of what I know. But this is a process few master. I think the chasm which I always envisaged looming between people, I understand it is ultimately illusion. But it's funny just who is still maintaining it's there.
Here's a question: A person asks a random opinion of me, well within my realm of experience, on a subject on which I could be helpful, but not something I might give a big whoop about. I speak my piece in a non offensive, take-it-or-leave-it way, and come to discover that the questioner holds absolutely opposite beliefs about the matter. And my opinion is evidently so threatening that I am rejected, on the spot, and within the week I am ex-communicated!
What might that be about?
Now, the truth is, that had this not occurred, I would not be aware of what I am aware of, and these awarenesses have a lot to do with self-validity and being OK with being OK with lots of different expressions of being human. I really don't know what caused the malfunction. It could be that I completely missed what it was that was evidently offensive. That is possible. All I know is the intent was pure, the delivery as playful and clear as any other talks I'd ever had with this person, and BOOM, then end came.
And it didn't weird me out, and that sort of weirded me out.
The rejection and that sense of execution you get whenever someone cans you or dumps you on the spot, it didn't also contain a feeling of self-hate, just lots of curiosity this time. It led me to ponder bigger issues. Can two people love each other and disagree? In what context? What is acceptable, what is not, when it comes to reactions?
There are certain people whose commitment to misery is so intense, and their need to punish and break so great, that I choose not to be in their company. That is true. And I have a couple people in my life who walk around, always, carrying a loaded gun, ready to shoot, trigger happy. But I have gotten good at dodging their bullets, and mending injury from jumpy reactions to things that go bump in the night. The gifts remain too big to cut these folks off, but I am aware always, before dealing with them, that what I may find inoffensive might be enough to make them react unskillfully. So be it. I don my bullet-proof vest, smile, and proceed. It's sort of interesting.
So, excommunication. When is this a valid reaction to a disagreement? Really, anytime, I guess. My excommunication helped me immeasurably.
So much of this last couple months has been about me getting right with judgment. Shedding my need to judge has meant, for me, shedding my need to condemn myself. Once I stopped enjoying hating myself, once the scales tipped and it started to feel, actually, uplifted and not dishonest to think kindly about myself, well then, it became less necessary to judge anything or anyone.
Had I not gotten cut out of a loved one's life, seemingly for holding a deviant belief structure, it probably would have taken a little bit longer to get that beliefs can be altered in a heartbeat, and therefore, reality can be altered. In a heartbeat. And because belief structures can be altered, it now seems silly to hate someone for a belief structure they hold, for their own reasons.
Let me extrapolate to politics. I am as leftist as they come, I think we would do well living communally, eating locally, hugging trees and encouraging meditation and personal fulfillment. So, there you go. I think everyone should get two hundred dollars anytime that pass go, that basic necessities should be readily available, that poverty is a moral crime, that we are all in this together, the ever sturdy and innervating nature of the soul, that things are not as they seem. As a result, I don't adhere to the death penalty, I'm fine with abortion, think pot should be legal, and think alternate societies and alternate economies and governments are in order. I'm a real live-and-let-live girl.
So, you can imagine, talking with someone who only watches Fox and never has read a history book, comes from a fearful, reactionary, primal place in some respects, well, there's trouble brewing. But, really, is it? I can allow the rightists their expression. I want to know what they are thinking and feeling. It's important.
But, here comes the tricky part. I really don't care to change the mind of a right wing person. It's not my job. They've come to these conclusions, and while these are at times nonsensical to me, they are beliefs they'd die for, or more accurately, kill for. Meeting their fear with resistance only worsens the situation. If I can shrug, and see their point of view as valid for them but not applicable for me, then I am ok.
The trouble comes when someone becomes fearful, convinced that their beliefs are the only valid ones, especially if they believe that I am at risk of some horrible thing if I do not believe as they do. Logically, I must alter my belief structure, to avoid their imagined disaster.
In terms of the friend who wrote me out of her life, the truth is that I could have given in and not risked excommunication. I could have agreed with my friend and said yes, yes, indeed, yes, the sky really is falling, but gosh, I didn't think it was. I couldn't get on the bandwagon, couldn't agree with the assertions being made. And that was a high crime, I think.
And I don't want to be like that. Throwing baby out with bathwater.
I don't want to shut you out because I cannot stomach what it is you like, believe, wish, imagine. And I really think that's what unconditionality is all about. Live and let live.
I know it and do not like it when I am in communion with someone who is so toxic that a little of their poison is going to get on me it I hang out with them, so I don't hang out with them. Water seeks its own level, and I no longer find that brand of pain that appealing anymore. I don't hit, and I don't hang out with people who hit. I sort of like that analogy, chess players don't hang out with hockey players.
But neither will I continue to invalidate another's experience, just because I do not agree with it, or, really, understand it. The fight to do so has just gone out of me, to be frank.
So, I am the problem and I am the solution. What I think, what I believe about things, structures the things themselves.
A couple thoughts that have really been giving me a lot of peace lately:
1 – The idea that I have a bigger self, and I am having multitudinous simultaneous lives in the now. But in THIS life, in THIS personality, the only real thing is this moment. From this moment I can touch all else. But as a 3D creature, there are some limitations to my awarenesses. These limitations are changing, loosening, and are weakened by two things: focused awareness and physical engagement
2 – It is no longer necessary to wall off a large part of my experience to the physical. I have been in training, in a way, and have cloistered myself from the outside world. Although it is nice to imagine I did this primarily to honor the holy man energy in my bigger personality, it could also be true that I was just really wounded and in hiding. What matters now is engagement. Being unafraid of that which I have agreed to co-create and experience.
3 – My life is no longer about moral lessons, right and wrong, correct and incorrect, clever and stupid, spiritual and base. I am done with that. My life is about experience. I am no longer willing to see it all as some sort of moral play, some sort of archangelic passion play, ascension laid out in terms of holiness and sacredness.
No.
I believe in angels, and I love God. But my understanding of gods and angels has undergone drastic revision. What I have considered the Host of Hosts, therein lies deep and profound sacred energy, but without risk of injury, without risk of rejection. You see, we are made of this stuff. We are made of the stars and the most fervent prayers of our generation. There is more sanctity in the plastic of this laptop keyboard than I could have imagined a month ago. But whether the laptop is good or bad, and by extension, whether I am bad or good for owning it, ah! That is what has altered, because I see the need to make such a judgment as unnecessary, uninteresting.
I understand I am good.
I understand that you are good.
You might believe that murderers need to fry and that all fetal tissue must always be treated as a beloved victim requiring protection.
I might believe that murdering a murderer is just so barbaric as to be comical, and fetal tissue to be a door through which a soul may or may not choose to enter.
Maybe we could agree to disagree, rather than feeling threatened and frightened at the dissonance the opposing belief could engender. I like my beliefs, they work for me. You like yours, and they've worked for you. Change yours if you'd like, but not on my account. I'll change mine as I see fit, and will be displeased if you make this a requirement of friendship.
This is a blessed neutrality, an all encompassing and compassionate outlook.
The friend who wrote me off, I would welcome her back in a moment, because I know we'd talk about the malfunction and grow in self and other love as a result of the exploration.
That neighbor who crapped all over me, no, I think she will just be getting a polite nod, and little else, when in company. She has proven herself too wounded, too unpredictable, too irrational for my tastes. Friends don't attack. Friends have your back. BUT THEY MAY NOT ALWAYS AGREE WITH YOU. Interesting.
So I think it is all holy and sainted and mysterious. I am at peace, here spinning ever so gently, listening to Neil Young on KBCO, thinking about how cold it is outside and how blessed I am to have made the decision to write my heart's words today, knowing that I am in relationship with my ever deepening, widening, clarifying reality in a brand new way, as a friend, not a victim.
I feel sort of bad about all the kvetching I have done in this blog. It's embarrassing to look back at such heart felt scribblings and see where I was missing the point so profoundly. But that is instructive in and of itself. I am a smart girl, and if I could have gotten hung up on these dumb things for all my life, maybe getting extricated on paper, live and in person, will help someone else get unstuck. Who knows. The act of writing has proven to be the key, the doorway from which, and into which, my life now glides.
I see this as a Christed year, 2012, and my clarion call on the 25th marks a special passage. I look back on this great commitment fulfilled, a sacred vow maintained, this “Drop-everything-and-DO-this thing” thing that picked me up and swept me away a year ago, it has changed in character and even in purpose, I think.
From here on out, it's a ride. A gift. I am no longer afraid. I embrace the challenges, the difficulties, the inconveniences, the conflicts, the dissonance. I am no longer willing to shut any of it down, but to see it all as blessed. And this thought, that the more peace I have the “better” or more spiritual I am, well, although that is strictly true, it is a limiting thought, a limiting belief.
I approach my life as my own art, my statement of my current understanding. I see your life as just that. I cannot hate your creation unless I see some shame in my construction. I see what I am doing as sometimes unskilled, and my life is somewhat unpredictable, but that is ok, and something I am playing with. My erratic and big life is mine. If it bothers you, you can tell me that, but hey, it's not up to you to impose your needs onto me. You can try, you can try. If it's not too costly, I will comply. I will dance. We will step on each others' feet. We'll manage, and we'll do it best if I can hold you in high regard, and you do the same for me. This is what I have hoped for. Liking everybody without needing anything from them, especially their approval.
This is my now, then. How can I be afraid of you now? How can you, really, ruin my day? How can you hurt me?
How can I hurt myself? And why would I want to?
And that is why I feel as if I am approaching my daily life differently, more effectively. What is the point in beating myself up for my poverty? Why not, finally, welcome it into my awareness and love it, rather than continue to resist it? Within its ambiance is its origin, its message, and the keys to its release. Only by accepting it as something I have indeed created for my benefit can I discharge the beliefs I've come to use to perpetuate it.
Is hating myself going to make that process any more pleasurable or effective?
Self hate, obsession, thinking always, all that metal activity, it has settled down deep, in my trunk, in my belly. I am settled, clear, pure in a way that I didn't know I could know. Quiet. Calm.
And hopeful. It's less of a hope and more of a knowing. Even the surprises, and any chaos that comes into my life, well, ok, here it is again, how do I approach it? And do I collapse into defeat yet again, believing myself unable to manage this thing, or do I see it as a thought bubble, a symbol of all I believe myself to be in this moment, neither good nor bad, because these concepts are not applicable? How can something which is intrinsically magnificent, the container and contents of All, be thought of as simply good or bad? And how can one thought, one belief, be so abhorrent that all that magnificence could be turned from, negated, ignored?
I think these are salient questions for all of us, but I really can only, honestly and fervently, speak for myself.
This is my life at this moment, subject to change, as always. My now. It's a grandmother lovingly surveying the progress of the baby, the last to leave the nest, the grandmother who has seen all her little ones interpret themselves in surprising and interesting ways. How will this one interpret this? And this? And that?
This, then, is my now.
