I had the most intimate relationship with my thoughts. Yes, my thoughts. Not my mother, not my father, not my partner, not my friends, not even my daughter or my pets; but with my thoughts. They had such power over me that I would believe everything they say – I am pretty, I am ugly, I am rich, I am poor, I am good, I am bad, it’s his fault, it’s my fault, I deserve this, I don’t deserve that… even at times when they questioned me things like – Does he love me? Why doesn’t he love me? Can I do this? Why can’t I do this? Can I afford this? Why can’t I afford this? I find myself having a very, very dear conversation with them internally. It’s as if they were the ones I’d make love with; over and over again; without ever having to fear that I would not experience an orgasm. Without them, I would not be blessed with the myriad of emotions; without them, I would not survive; without them, I would not exist. Also, they were truly great lovers; although they could each come from different directions with entirely unrelated topics all at the same time, but ooohh… they were so, so skillful you see, they just knew how to interlink themselves all together, bonding unrelated topics altogether into one, to let me see how they were all connected, so that I could enjoy an orgy. What immense relationship we shared…
And soon I pondered, if they were really my best friend? Or were they my enemy? If they were my best friend, why did they make me suffer? If they were my enemy, then why did they make me laugh? Is it true that they could never meet at the middle? Is it true that they could never be quiet?
Oh no.. please don’t be quiet, I’d tell them. You’d need to keep on going – because once you are quiet, I wouldn’t know what to do! I wouldn’t know who I am!
And thus the dilemma – to exist with thoughts, I experience the extremes of both ends; to exist without thoughts, I am nothing.
Trusting them, I am a battery-free robot, actually believing that I am living; Observing and inquiring them, I realize that they were a hoax and that I was free! I believed their existence was real and oh, how I had been fooled!
And so as I watched how they were actually dead and did not have a life; that I was the one who gave them each a soul; I observed how each thought births and dies on its own without my interference. I soon discovered that I no longer fancied having multiple ‘sexual’ partners; so I could no longer make out with any of them. How could I, when they are so impermanent? And so our intimacy ceased. But though the intimacy was absent, there arose a revolution. They could not disappear by themselves!
I soon learned they were neither there to make happy or to make me suffer from the start. They merely wanted me to hold their hands to lead me the way to show me where they come from; an abode which I had unconsciously built. And so it was me. I was the one who had conceived them. How ignorant! How innocent! And miraculously as I recognized their origins one by one, a little bit of their foundation each, is being chipped off progressively. And soon they’d all disappear; as if they never existed. With that space, an emptiness. But that emptiness has not loneliness. In that openness, ascends freedom; and in that freedom, peace and joy is spirit.
Each moment of respond is an interaction with consciousness. When there is upset, I am interacting with upset. Even if it seems someone out there is the cause of my upset, it is my thought I am interacting with.
Similarly with making love. Sad to say it is my feelings I am interacting with though I may be touching my partner and experiencing the softness of her skin.
The consciousness is who “I” am and the experiences is also “who” I am – the consciousness itself. Nothing came to me, and nothing left me and yet consciousness perishes each moment to be reborn again – as such it came and also left.
Your article reveals what was hidden and brought to light what was in the dark. A writing skill that is truly admirable.