Past, Present and Future

The new motto or focus of my life is to stay grounded in all areas, spiritually, intellectually, emotionally, etc. When I've thought about the "power of now" or staying in the present moment, it's been more of an attempt to almost "stop planning" or "stop looking at the past." While all of that is well and good... I mean we should just "be present." I completely agree 

with that.

The Weight of the World

"The truth of the matter is that I alone do not determine my fate yet am a part of a cohesive whole, which is the interconnectedness of all people and the fabric of nature."

I have noticed that, in my daily life, my mind is constantly spinning, trying to plan for this or figure that out.  In a literal sense, if I let it, my mind carries the weight of the world.  This constant thinking happens on its own.  If I allow it to happen, it continues.  My point is that I do not have to "try" to map out my life before it happens in my mind, it is a part of past conditioning and is the background noise that clouds my life.

It really all comes down to confusion about the world in which I live.  If my assumption is that my life is what I make it and that I, alone, determine my destiny, then it makes sense that I need to be using my intellect to control my life.  It does imply a sense of lack of faith but more confusion.  This is because I can have faith but can let the fog of confusion in this world seep into my life.  The truth of the matter is that I alone do not determine my fate yet am a part of a cohesive whole, which is the interconnectedness of all people and the fabric of nature.  I am not separate yet inseparably joined with others and this planet.

Another truth is that the universe is a safe, good place that is nurturing me, caring for me and providing for me.  With these truths in hand, I can see that my mind working is just spinning my wheels.  What freedom there is in realizing I do not need to be constantly scheming and analyzing as the Universe has this all taken care of.

I surrender to the Universe and relax my mind as it does not need to control me anymore.  I have faith that things will work out as they should and my role is to accept life as it presents itself to me.  I see how I fit into the grand scheme of things, follow my dreams, and rest in the comfort that I am exactly where I need to be and have everything I need right now.

Observing My Inner Critic

"As I create mental spaciousness, I am allowing my natural state of love and bliss to shine through."

I recently realized that I have an inner critic that is always reviewing, analyzing, commenting, and critiquing my actions.  These are my thoughts.  While I can always control my thoughts, it is not always easy.  In fact, I have found it is more practical to allow the thoughts to continue and just observe them.  I am not a very good 24/7 observer of my thoughts.  When, however, I notice these critical thoughts, I have recently started devoting more energy to observing them.

When they come up, I have the attitude in my observation of "here are those critical thoughts again..."  My attitude is one of a loving father observing a child that is engaged in some sort of ignorant non-beneficial, behavior.

I have only been on the "thought observation" mission for less than a year now.  Once I started it, I noticed immediate benefits (as in within the first 5 minutes). I have noticed that I am best at doing this when I have had enough sleep, earlier in the day, and usually during and shortly after meditation.  After that, I easily become wrapped up in my train of thoughts throughout the day.  I have been making steady improvements, however.

This latest realization of the need to observe my inner critic, which, in affect, silences this "voice", is the other shoe to drop on my spiritual path.  The first shoe being the realization that the spiritual path is the highest goal for me in this life.  Why is that?

My mind leans towards being very critical and over-analytical.  These thoughts go masquerading as "me" but they are far from me.  They are part of my upbringing and remnants of the past.  These thoughts want me to be "not me."  As I have brought my loving awareness to them, they have started to dissipate.  I am noticing more mental spaciousness as I am starting to hear silence more.

For example, I might be late to work.  In the past, I would think through the 5 reasons why I was late, felt bad about it, and shamed myself for this behavior. Now, I will observe these thoughts.  I will consciously expand the love inside my heart for myself and just love me for being me.  I will take the attitude that I am trying my best and that there must have been a good reason at the time for my tardiness.  I will reserve making any observations on how I can improve in this area until just before I go to bed at night.

I will take a bit of time right here to play devil's advocate and see if there is any benefit to being critical of myself in real-time. Let's say that it is useful to have this immediate beneficial information of what I could have done differently, that something else comes up that day where I use that knowledge. Or, maybe I will forget the contextual information about what I could have done differently or forget to do the self-review at all that day. I submit that these slight benefits do not outweigh the effect of these critical thoughts in everyday life. I feel worse because of them. It takes me out of the present moment as I dwell on the past. The thoughts are "caught up in the moment" and do not see the big picture of why I made the mistake. In short, these critical thoughts are out-of-alignment with life.

There is little benefit and more ill effects from me endlessly rehashing situations, events, analyzing my every move and why this or that could not have been done better.  Instead of this real-time self-commentary, I have decided to devote a few minutes towards the end of each day where I will review that day's activities to see if there is anything I can learn.  Learning from mistakes and doing self-review is important, however I have chosen to engage in this activity in a set time-frame once per day.  This is a good way to convince my analytical side that the activity will still take place just in a different way.  As I create mental spaciousness, I am allowing my natural state of love and bliss to shine through.

Spirituality and Religion

"The difference between religion and spirituality is religion is a heart led by the mind whereas spirituality is a mind led by the heart."

As we progress on this spiritual path, we see that this is a journey from the mind to the heart.  We can say that we try to operate out of the heart-mind rather than the ego-mind.  Religion is a form that was set up to take you into the Formless.  Religion consists of methods and all methods are traps.

If we get caught up in a method, even a spiritual practice, we miss the point and are trapped.  The point is to go beyond the method and learn to operate directly from your Self.  We learn there is not anything to do, that it is the ceasing of doing that brings us to God.

The paradox is that we need a method to give us a taste of the Divine.  The best thing that can happen is for us to immerse ourselves in that method and then for that method to fail us.  Then, we can abandon the method altogether if we wish and realize that the method itself is not needed.  Religion is a tool to bring us to God.  Yet it is not religion itself that brings us to God; it is God Herself.

That Spark of divinity within you instantly recognizes the Truth.  This realization comes from the heart, not the mind.  Of course, we can then participate in religion, if we wish, realizing it is but a tool we can use if we desire.  This is also not to say that spiritual people do not think.  Rather, our mind is a tool like religion that we may use if we desire.  We operate out of a place of feeling and expansiveness, of pure Love.

Religion attempts to give form to the Formless.  This is a necessary endeavor to attempt.  However, we must realize this.  We must not allow our minds to cling to the forms of religion and arise above it to connect directly to the One that is above all religions. 

Holding on to Future Projections

"Let your mental models go and bask in the light and freedom that comes with experiencing the eternal Presence."

As I progress on this path, I see that one thing that I tend to hold on to is mental models of the way things should be. I think we all do this in one way or another. Mental models are tricky, because they are hybrids of past and future clingings. We are scared of the future, so we construct elaborate models of the way things should be. These models may have been created years ago. They are a bridge between the present and the future. We want to know how to "get there" as if there was anywhere to "get" to.

I tend to miss these models as they seem to exist in the Now or present but do not. They are old mental projections that cloud my mind, keeping me from experiencing the present moment. The models are often times rooted in the ego so are very entrenched in our psyche. A lot of the times, the models are seemingly logical and harmless. It should also be noted that you do not come up with these; these are created on their own. Most of the time, you are unaware you have them.

For example, one model may be that any self-respecting person has a clean house. This is future projection, because another way of wording this is "if my house is ever dirty in the future, I do not respect myself." Cleanliness is great and there is a lot of truth in the model. The tie to the ego is my worth is then dependent on how clean my house is. The irony of this statement is that my earthly house is my mind. My house may be clean but I am cluttering my internal house with models such as these. These projections may give us comfort about the future, such as knowing our house will be clean and getting approval for that, yet they take us away from living our lives in the here and now.

How liberating it is to know we do not need these models anymore! Drop these mental constructs and see how lighter you feel knowing that You are loved unconditionally by the Universe just the way you are. Know that the future is an illusion. There is only Now. We are frightened by the future because we are clinging to this world. We are clinging to our appearances, possessions, relationships, and our body. This creates fear and we develop plans for how to hold on to these things. Let your mental models go and bask in the light and freedom that comes with experiencing the eternal Presence.

My Concept of God

"On this journey, all it takes is traveling 1% of the distance by faith and the Universe will travel the remaining 99% to meet you."

This post is deeply personal as it reflects my current beliefs about the unseeable in this world.  At the same time, it may help you if you have some of the same questions that I do.  The spiritual path cannot be understood by the intellect.  This is why it is so difficult to write about it.  I am, in a sense, trying to write from my spirit or soul and connect with yours.  Yet, we are having to do that through our mind that is incapable of understanding these truths.  The secret is letting go of your rational mind and being with the truths.  This is a scary thing to do so it is understandable if it takes some time to be able to work yourself up to this point.  Once, you do, I think you will see that things start to fall into place.

To be honest, it is very frightening sometimes to believe in that in which we cannot see.  Since it goes against the intellect, we are constantly having to relax our minds to continue on this path.  You might think or even have others call you "crazy", however, in order for there to be a crazy, there has to be a normal.  What is normal in this world?  I heard someone say you have to be a little "out of your mind" to progress on this path.  This is because spiritual truths are outside your mind and reside in a place of being.  They are already a part of you.

The penultimate illustration of this is my concept of God.  First and foremost, you can already see the paradox. A "concept" which is in the mind and God who is beyond comprehension.  Yet, we can try.  My concept of God is constantly changing and this is perfectly acceptable.  God is inside and outside.  She is personal and impersonal.  Some days I want to throw the whole "God" model out and see God as the interconnectedness we have with others or as the laws of nature.  This is fine too.  I see when I want to do this it is because I am clinging to my rational mind.  I really do not even like to use the word God or many spiritual words because I think they have a lot of baggage associated with them.

My point is that this is why we all need faith.  Faith is what sustains me on my spiritual path when I find myself clinging to thoughts.  I also am reminded that, when I feel inner resistance to the spiritual path, this is to be expected as it does come down to belief.  This is also why we need to progress forward in our journey, where even a seemingly "backslide" is still forward.  We are always learning and evolving spiritually.  As we experience the supernatural in a concrete way in our lives, we see that Spirit meets us where we are at if we just move an inch forward.  In other words, all you need to do is have 1% of faith and the Universe will make up the remaining 99%.  As you experience the Supernatural in your life, your faith increases.  This is when a perspective shift starts to occur.  Yet, without this 1% of belief, we are stuck in rational thought.

The Heart of Spirituality

"Loving yourself and loving others is only possible by living in the present moment."

Spirituality is very interesting, because the words that we use when talking about it seem very religious.  The funny thing is that this is the opposite of the truth.  It can sound very "churchy" and new age-y and all of that.  However, these are the most down-to-earth and practical teachings in the world.  This is because they are truth and true wisdom.  It is so difficult to communicate intangible truths to others at the risk of seeming "out there" and the simple fact that teachings are trying to make these truths concrete.  This is, of course, impossible.  No one can fully express spiritual truths in words that we can fully understand; the words are meant to be guideposts so that you can come to the realization yourself.  Any "out there" teaching can be communicated in "material" terms just as well as it can be communicated in "spiritual" terms.  In other words, the truth can take on any form so that anyone can see the guideposts.

A belief in "God" is not even necessary as spirituality can be communicated in language of this world, using only tangible things and concepts that you are already familiar with.  Buddhists, for the most part, do not believe in a god as many define that term.  We get so tripped up on these terms, because they have been over-defined, defined poorly or even incorrectly defined in some cases.  I think we all need to learn how to not get hung up on words.  We need to look to the meaning behind the words.  Even Atheists believe in a god.  Their god may be the rational mind, nature or science.  It's very silly, really, that there is this war of words when it comes to spiritual things.

I firmly believe that someone who does not even believe in a spiritual world can master concepts that arise from the spiritual world on the physical plane.  There are countless examples of this.  Just look to any popular, successful person that does not believe in anything beyond the 5 senses.  Famous actors, philanthropists, and artists are but few examples.  The reason for this is that any plane of existence, such as spiritual or physical can be explained in its own terms without overlap.  They are mutually exclusive.

The heart of what I see as the most beneficial message that I can communicate is the root of all problems in this world.  I have written about it in the past but need to address this directly.  The Western world's main problem is addiction to the mind.  You see 12 step groups for every addiction but, it is my belief, that any religion has been created to address this problem.  We are so stuck in our head most or all of the time, that we are not living our lives.  We are living our lives in our head, which is no way to live.

Addiction to the mind means that we are slaves to our mind.  We do not have direct control of the mind.  We do not know how to turn it off.  All spiritual teachings come from this one problem.  If you solve this one problem in your life, you have solved the problem that that has given rise to all religions.  If addiction to the mind is the problem, what is the solution?  The solution is self-control.  We must learn how to control the mind so that our mind is slave to us.  At the same time, we must love our mind.  Once we are able to be more present, love is then possible.  Learn how to love yourself and love others.  True love is only possible if you can quiet your mind enough to let the love through.  Loving yourself and loving others is only possible by living in the present moment.  If we are stuck in the past or future, dwelling on these endlessly in our mind, we are incapable of living a life of love for ourselves and other people.  A life of love is only possible through learning self-control.

Be Kind to Yourself, Part 1

"Radiate love from the depth of your being and allow that love to transform your mind, eventually spilling out and radiating love to others through your actions."

If you do not have control of your mind, then you are like a ship at sea, tossed by waves and storms.  Life is a seeming chaotic place to live, as you are at the whim of what happens to you.  This is because our minds are reactive to our environment; they blow things out of proportion and focus on the minutia rather than the important things.  The fact that your mind, body and emotions are not You is an important teaching.  Once you learn to love and observe your mind, then the knot begins to unravel.  The power of the mind is when we consider the mind as us.  That is the illusion and is the lie we have bought.

The worst poison in this life, which may even be the hell that we have heard about, is when we are a slave to our mind.  Worse still is when our minds play back tapes of failures in our life, how worthless we are, or how we cannot do this or that.  If we are to believe in sins, this is one of the worst sins of all.  This can truly destroy us.  The danger about being a slave to your mind and that your mind is replaying negative thoughts is that this causes your emotions to spiral downward, with no way of escape.  Even the thought "why am I being so hard on myself" results in a negative emotional spike.

We should have compassion for people who are cold or indifferent to others.  These people may have the worst attitudes, are critical or judgmental of others and are simply unpleasant to be around.  These same people are even harder on themselves.  This is part of the karma of acting on negative emotions or thoughts.  As humans, we are unable to treat others differently from the way we treat ourselves.

Where is the way out?  The way out of this state is to realize that you are not your mind, your body or your emotions.  This is the first step.  This creates a buffer around your life, so you are not instantly reacting to things.  You begin to think "this is interesting; I ran out of money" instead of instantly trying to come up with a hundred plans to manipulate life to give you more money.  You give space to life and allow things to happen to you.  The second step is learning to be an observer of your thoughts.  You do not interject commentaries into your thought stream but just observe it, thinking "this is interesting."

What begins to happen is you will begin to have lapses of thought where you almost get the feeling of radiant light breaking through, a light filled with peace and love.  This is when there is a break in the mind stream.  The third step is learning to love your mind.  You are to love your mind as a child, as a friend, as a very necessary part of you that is your ally.  If you treat your mind as something foreign or "bad", it will react in this way to you.  The fourth and final step to break free of this bondage is to begin to fill your mind with positive, uplifting things.  Meditate on the many blessings in your life, express gratitude for everything that has been given to you, be joyful.

These steps do not have to be taken in order.  Each one is in fact not independent of each other.  They all can be summed up in the following statements.  Love yourself with as much love as you love others.  Give as much grace to yourself as you give to others.  Give yourself the benefit of the doubt.  Maybe you are doing the best that you can considering the circumstances.  Learn what you can, at the time, when you could have done something better, then let it go.  In short, radiate love from the depth of your being and allow that love to transform your mind, eventually spilling out and radiating love to others through your actions.

In the next part, I will write about ways that you can be kinder to yourself, in general.