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Self-Sufficiency

Aug 16th, 2010 by

If your joy is derived from what society thinks of you, you’re always going to be disappointed.

– Madonna

This explains why, being self-sufficient is so important. When we are constantly relying on some outer reality to fulfil us, we are then continuously depending our happiness, or rather our state of being to externality of which is in truth, beyond our control.

Many people don’t believe in self-sufficiency, or rather are misled to think that they are self-sufficient when all is well and good. But when the tables turn around, they are quick to be effected by an outer reality which is entirely none of their business and is swift to point the finger at someone, something or some situation that has resulted in their state of miserableness.

Self-sufficiency is to mean that no outer reality quivers what is inside of us. At any moment in time, the stillness within remains, unshaken. What can be shuddered, is only to be reclaimed. With the attempt of Truth, only Love is what reveals.

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Creation in Every Now

Aug 12th, 2010 by

I shared with my partner the other day, that we are not afraid of how weak or useless we are; instead, we are very, very afraid of how powerful we actually are – which is the very reason why we keep ourselves locked up in a victim prison, not willing to rise up to our own greatness or freedom.

So, it is easy to forget. Sometimes I wonder, if it is an intention to forget. Even when one decides to play the game after already knowing the truth, he will have the tendency to forget that it is all a game – that the world is indeed just a playground.

I was watching the movie ‘Nine’ yesterday (finally!), and there was one excerpt which I particularly liked. It was sung, “Imagination, is God’s garden”. And that is exactly what is required of us – to imagine, and to experience. Our imagination, is how and what we create in our experiences. As the saying goes, ‘What you reap, is what you sow’. Of course, we tend to forget that, and think that it is just our ‘imagination’, some ‘fantasy’ space where we go to and come back, that it’s not ‘real’. But let’s take a step back and recall, have there been no moments, where what we experienced was more or less exactly how we had imagined it to be? And let’s ponder a little here, if we had remembered how we had imagine it to be, then we might not have been so thrilled (due to the expectation or know-it’d-be-coming factor); but if we had forgotten how we had it imagined it (which may actually be an unconscious act of surrendering and letting go), we are usually in for a big surprise! No?

The other day, while I listened to my partner’s story of possible watchdogs and dropouts in the project he anticipates to take over, I was amazed at how he viewed his future experience of having smooth progression in the project being dependent on others, who merely served as his mirrors. There was much light heartedness listening to him. He had forgotten that he was creating all that he was experiencing and all that he was about to experience although during the midst of the conversation, he did mention, “well, I guess I could create…”

The thing is, at every moment in time, we are all already creating our experiences. Each thought believed, each word spoken, each belief generated. At this moment Now, what you think and believe thoroughly is what you have created Now and this programme runs until you will it to change.

So there is generally two types of creation – one that is conscious, where we are mindfully aware of the programmes that are running in the mind; or one that is unconscious, what the mind picks up with or without our conscious permission, because we are unaware. Thus the importance of taking care of our mind, to guard the mind so per se. To think I can create something in the future in future is to be in a delusion, missing what is in the Now. To stay present in the Now, and be mindful of what has arisen, I am already set in creating my future. We are indeed, the creators of our own experiences whether in a conscious or unconscious state.

The past is gone. I can’t even say that it existed. But when I am still affected by something of the past, Now; the past has not left me and hence become my Now. The future is also not here, and I can’t say that it will ever come at all because by the time it arrives, it is then my Now. So all I have is Now. By being in the Now, I have created my future. Now is here, at this point – what is it that you want, Now?

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Mirror, mirror on the wall…

Aug 11th, 2010 by

Looking at my partner’s drive to soar in his career, I have great appreciation and admiration for him. Although there are times, I wished that he was present to me, but when I become fully present to him instead, I find him a very interest subject to converse with, and also, I’d find myself there too – the one side of me so immersed in my function to perform, to work that no one or nothing else mattered, except my job. For that, I am grateful that he has shown me that part of me which I did not realize then but now recognize and accept with love.

If I have come to recognize and accept that part of me, there is no way I would not understand my partner as he served to be my mirror. Whatever thoughts, judgments or perceptions that may arise such as “he doesn’t love me”, “he should look at me”, “he has worked so vigorously for the past few days, why can’t he spend time with me?” all poof into thin air as I recall those moments where I was exactly there, now mirrored in his shoes. If I choose to condemn him, then I would have condemned myself for behaving that way; but if I am choose to love and appreciate him, then what I give out, i.e. the love and appreciation that I have for him, is what I have given onto myself in return.

His recent work trip had allowed me to work with my feelings of insecurity. What I thought had been a long gone idea, was visiting me like an old friend as if I had not yet learned enough. As I stepped back to watch the insecurity that arose, I saw that the mind was finding many ways to justify why insecurity should not surface – and that itself, was a judgment to insecurity – allowing me to come a step closer to realize that I had viewed insecurity as bad.

Since I already knew for a fact that the feelings of insecurity was my own to claim, and here I mean to say that it has nothing to do with my partner, I decided to learn from what has arisen, rather than condemning it or trying to sweep it under the carpet. It was within a matter of hours where I realized my feelings of insecurity, which was born from the fear of being betrayed was reflected back to my own ideas of being away from the family. To be authentically honest, I have a fear of betraying my own family. As I imagined myself being the one away from the family for a long period of time, I could see myself living my own life, leaving my family out of the equation – i.e., not needing any one of them (but it doesn’t mean that they are forgotten or any less loved, mind you!). You know how the world works at times – out of sight, out of mind. That was exactly the idea that was reflected back to me. No wonder I was afraid that my partner will betray me! Because I was the one who would betray myself if I had left my family! Although it was my partner who was the one who went on a work trip, my mind went on one too! What a humorous joke!

When we are unwilling or rather unable (at some point in time) to look within us, this is what happens. Our own ideas of fear that we detest projects itself onto other people, more so on the people that we love. For all we know, they are not doing what they seem to be doing. It is our perception that discolors each word that we hear, each action that we see. My perceptions cannot be trusted, because they do not represent the truth, especially at times when there is another to be blamed for my suffering.

The truth is, there is no other and there are only mirrors.

There is, only me. Phew… what a relief!

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Inability to Judge

Aug 10th, 2010 by

I remember a fengshui master whom I regard as one of my earlier teachers told me in a light hearted manner, “If you did all the judging, then what is God to do?” At that moment, it dawned upon me that the stress I was going through in most of my relationships then was indeed caused by my judgments. My judgment all came with probable solutions too! ‘He talks too loud, he should speak softer’, ‘She doesn’t care about him, she should treat him better’, ‘This dish is not delicious, you must learn how to cook.’ Sounds bossy, doesn’t it? Of course, having known better now, judgments are merely arising thoughts through one of the mind’s functions to perceive which I had taken as real, and as mine.

A few days ago as I read A Course in Miracles, it clearly stood out again, our inability to judge. It shared,

How can you judge? Your judgment rests upon the witness that your senses offer you. Yet witness never falser was than this. But how else do you judge the world you see? You place pathetic faith in what your eyes and ears report. You think your fingers touch reality and close upon the truth. This is awareness which you understand and think more real than what is witnessed to by the eternal Voice of God himself.

Can this be judgment? You have often been urged to refrain from judging, not because it is a right to be withheld from you. You cannot judge. You merely can believe the ego’s judgment, all of which are false. It guides your senses carefully, to prove how weak you are, how helpless and afraid, how apprehensive of just punishment, how black with sin, how wretched in your guilt

– Lesson 151, A Course in Miracles

If my senses, which do not know one another only to have meanings or perceptions conjured in the mind because of its functions of interpreting and perceiving, how will I know if what I perceive is to be of truth? And if it is not of truth, then what would I be perceiving or judging except to allow my mind to throw in their own idea-ready-recipe into a pot of soup for dinner so to allow disaster in my experience to unfold?

The truth is that, judgment only arises because I have believed in a certain chain of thoughts that occurred in the mind. If I was just watching the thoughts coming and going, that is all that they are – impersonal thoughts that come and go; but instead, when I start buying into the thoughts which are constantly being churned out by the mind, making them all so personal to my experience, I create my own hell so per se.

Funnily, a thought just crossed my mind, why is it that we tend to believe judgments or thoughts that ruin us, but doubt those of the thoughts that say, ‘I am loved’ or ‘I can do this!’ or ‘I can be a multi-zillionaire’? We are indeed, a strange species.

The other day, I received a sms from a neighbor citing that the security guards at our garden did not conduct a stringent check on a foreign vehicle that he was in. Being the chairman of the resident association committee, I got edgy and irritated with the guards for not performing their duties up to mark and was ready to give them a good blasting. Clearly, there was already a sure case of judgment. The minute I got down from the car and consciously made an intention to listen to the whole situation instead as the security supervisor explained to me what happened, I realized that I had no reason to feel edgy, irritated or angry. Whatever that he did, was perfectly fine in his perception (and mine too!). But it was because I did not listen to the full story, merely buying into my neighbor’s story, which could have been misinterpreted or misperceived by my senses anyway; I judged the guards wrongly and got myself angry.

This incident allowed me to see how I am so incapable of judging anything or anybody based on limited information. As A Course in Miracle also states in the same text,

No one can judge on partial evidence. That is not judgment. It is merely an opinion based on ignorance and doubt. Its seeming certainty is but a cloak for the uncertainty it would conceal. It needs irrational defense because it is irrational. And its defense seems strong, convincing, and without a doubt because of all the doubting underneath.

How true that this is revealed. If I am to refrain from judging, I am lessen a burden of a task I thought was mine to carry out; and this applies too to self-judgment. As long as someone or something becomes the target of blame, judgment has set in and thereby disallowing truth to unfold itself. In truth, whatever happens out there is none of my business. In fact, my business is also none of my business because it is already fully taken care of. But for the sake of having something to ‘do’, then my business is, just to be with Truth, and to be Truth – to forgive my perceptions which cannot represent truth, and to be Love. And oh my, Love judges not. Now, that’s Truth.

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Give evil nothing to oppose and it will disappear by itself

Aug 6th, 2010 by

Life is simple. Everything happens for you, not to you. Everything happens at exactly the right moment, neither too soon nor too late. You don’t have to like it – it’s just easier if you do. If you have a problem, it can only be because of your unquestioned thinking. How do you react when you believe that the past should have been different? You scare yourself stuck, because what you resist persists. You get to keep your stressful world, a world that doesn’t exist except in your imagination; you get to stay in the nightmare. It hurts to oppose reality, because in opposing reality, you are opposing your very self.

When you know how to question your thoughts, there’s no resistance. You look forward to your worst nightmare, because it turns out to be nothing but an illusion, and the four questions of The Work provide you with the technology to go inside and realise that. You don’t have to grope in the dark to find your way to freedom. You can just sit down and give it to yourself, anything you want.

Nineteen years ago a doctor removed a large tumor from my face. I had found inquiry – inquiry had found me – so I didn’t have a problem with the tumor. On the contrary: I was happy to see it come, and I was happy to see it go. It was actually quite a sight, and before it was removed I loved being out there in public. People would look at it and pretend not to be looking, and that tickled me. Maybe a little girl would stare at it, then her parents would whisper to her and yank her away. Did they think they would hurt my feelings, or that I was some sort of freak? I didn’t feel like one. That tumor on my face was normal for me; it was reality. Sometimes I would catch someone looking at it, then he would look away, then after a while he would look again, then look away, look again, look away. And finally our eyes would meet, and we would both laugh. Because I saw the tumor without a story, eventually he could see it that way, too, and it was just funny.

Everything turns out to be a gift – that’s the point. Everything you saw as a handicap turns out to be the extreme opposite. But you can only know this by staying in your integrity, by going inside and finding out what your own truth is – not the world’s truth. And then it is all revealed to you. There isn’t anything you have to do. The only thing you’re responsible for is your own truth in the moment, and inquiry brings you to that.

~ Excerpts from A Thousand Names for Joy by Byron Katie ~

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Reflecting…

Aug 4th, 2010 by

In an example where you desired to find someone to love you, your desire undoubtedly reflects that you do not feel loved now and believe that no one cares much about you. Discover the heart-closing thoughts by which you create this sense of not being loved or cared for, such as “No one will ever love me,” “No one wants me so there must be something wrong with me, ” and “I must have bad judgment because everyone I get involved with turns out to be insensitive and uncaring.” Such thoughts are, of course, a reflection of you and how you treat yourself as being unworthy of love and how you are insensitive and uncaring of yourself. As long as you entertain fantasies of find the special someone who will finally love and care for you, you will be caught in a never-ending quest since whomever you find will reflect your present unloving thinking about yourself and will seem to treat you the same way you treat yourself – unlovingly. To undo the cause of this desire, therefore, it is imperative to discover the specific thoughts by which you close your heart to yourself and recognise that you believe them and act on them, thereby reinforcing the unloving reality that they create and of which you complain. Since the true source of your unhappiness is your own heart-closing thoughts, only by becoming disidentified and nonattached to them will you discover the Love you already are. When your heart opens to yourself, your experience of others will transform and they will be more loving as well. Until then, you will continue to experience your unlovingness reflected back to you in others.

~ Excerpts from Purifying the Heart by John Goldthwait, Ph.D ~

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It lies within Me

Aug 2nd, 2010 by

I realise lately in myself and others that seldom are we afraid to make the wrong decisions, or to be treadding along the wrong path. We don’t really regret anything that we had experienced in the past too. If we were to take a step back to think back on how far we had come along, most of us will agree that our life journey, despite the ups and downs were indeed colourful and full of flavours, and believe it or not, it can be accompanied by some subtle sense of satisfaction, appreciation and gratification.

Yet, most of us are still afraid to make our own decisions especially when asked to embark on a journey which the heart yearns. For that, we constantly seek approval from others because we have a fear of making the wrong decision when the truth is, we have a fear of how people would perceive us if we were to make a mistake, or in a worst case, fail. That, my friend, is the fear of being judged.

Just because I am afraid of what others will think of me if I was to do this or that, be this or that; I’d better think twice or thrice before doing anything authentic; just because I’m afraid of being cast out or labeled differently, I close myself against my own heart – as if my needs and wants are not important. You see, how and what other people think of me is MOST important, not what I feel about myself. As long as others think I am alright, then I am alright!

Is that true?

Since I can only relate my own experiences in life, I will come clean that I’ve never felt entirely as joyful, free or happy during my younger days as compared to now. If I was given a choice to turn back time with the permission to surpass those times, I am very sure that I wouldn’t want it any other way although to repeat the experiences will not be necessary. First of all, everything happened exactly the way it did; and secondly, those times are parts and puzzles of what sums up my life, which had in one way or another brought me where I am today – sufferings included. Why would I want it any other way unless I am not appreciating myself of where I am today?

This means to say, whether I have made the right or wrong decision, stepped onto the right and wrong path, had my hearts broken many times over; I am not sorry for what I’ve gone through in the journey. Yes, there were times while I wished I could have handled things or situations differently but since I did not know any better then, how could I have done any better? The fact is, what is right and wrong except in perceptions? No one, not even ourselves can say that it is right or wrong for it is exactly as it is, and did not happen any other way.

How long more can we continue to bury our inner calling or inner vocation which is crying out for our attention? For how long more do we succumb to an illusionary criteria that we have created others to have of us? The thing is, is it true that others really do have a set of conditions on how we ought to live or be? Or is it just our imagination turned into a reality through the coloured lens of our perception? And so what if they really do have a whole list of rules? What has that got to do with us?

We are swayed away from our center in our unconscious state – when programmes are running in an autopilot mode, unquestioned – hence, the importance of self-awareness as it brings us back to our conscious state. Nobody is being asked to disobey, go against or oppose any beliefs, laws, anybody or anything. Only this – to listen deeply to ourselves what is it that will promote and encourage our beingness of joy, peace and inner freedom.

We are all playing our own game living out our own stories conjured in the mind. Let others have their own game and stories about us, it is ok; but let us always rise up to ourselves and to constantly bring ourselves back to our center. For my joy, happiness, peace and freedom lies within me, not in anyone else.

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See it as Unreal…

Jul 30th, 2010 by

See it as a bubble,
See it as a mirage:
one who regards the world this way
the King of Death doesn’t see.

~ 170, Dhammapada: the Buddha ~

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Addressing an Inner Conflict

Jul 29th, 2010 by

This article was written some time ago. Posting this in remembrance of a journey of an inner conflict whether to address self or the someone out there.

***

Am I not seeing things clearly? Am I hanging on to an idea which is now conflicting to what is happening around me? Which is more true? What is happening outside me? Or the voice within that is calling out to me to honor myself? Has ignorance finally caught up once again, attempting to wash away whatever that I’ve arrived at? Or am I asked, again and again, just to be independent, to answer only to myself? Am I subjected to others’ calling or their good intention to smoothen out my path of liberation? Or am I to trust myself, that whatever decision I may make, that allows me to stand in my own true space, is what I ought to live for? How am I to know if I am treading along the right path if I am on my own?

Have I de-toured?

Again, am I seeing clearly on my own? Or are that of what my closest friends are showing me is exactly what I am resisting?

I’ve come to the stage recognizing everything including the happening of my vehicle or any other external manifestation is merely symbols. Is it then possible that something material could give me anything unless I believed in it?

If I am truly an extension of the Infinite, thus making me too, God, then am I not to respect the divinity within me? How can others be sure if I am listening to my heart or the thoughts in my head? How would they know if where I will go is truly not the path that will lead to where they’d be or going anyway? How can they be sure if it is my ego I am succumbing to, and not the voice within?

Is it important at all that they know? Or more important that I know and understand?

That’s right, it is more important that I know – the truth of the truth, within me. A friend can turn into an enemy in the mind in the context of a false need, yet an enemy can turn into a friend when the right understanding surfaces. Sometimes, I feel that since there’s no one out there, why would I still need to address others? Recognizing them as my mirrors, it brings me closer to home; and yet when the mind starts to hang on to experiences reminiscing the memories that I once had, I allow myself to be swayed once more, away from home; giving away what has rightfully always been my own.

Still, Love always calls me home, because I am Love. I am whatever that I long for in others, for I’ve never left me – except when I’ve forgotten.

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Do I have a Choice?

Jul 28th, 2010 by

Do I have a Choice? Yes and No. I like to think that I have choices – choice of colors, choice of the types of TV I’d like to buy, choice of careers, choice of mental states. But the truth is also this – I don’t have a choice.

I only have a choice when I don’t know what I want. When I know what I want, I will be left with no choice, except with what I want.

Take for example – if I am in an unforgiving state, and I pick out an angel card that tells me, “Choose Peace”, I can be sure that if that is not what I want at that moment, I will have no choice but to continue to be in an unforgiving, resentful state; until I decide that I want to be peaceful, then will I choose peace and start embarking on what is necessary.

When one of my teachers finally told me “surrender the choice”, I looked at him blankly and asked, “what do you mean?” He laughed and explained, “when you surrender the choice, who are you left with?” and I said, “myself”, and he said, “when you are left with only yourself, and you know what you want, is there any choice in it?” It was indeed very profound and I was dumbfounded by this truth. When I later experimented this truth, it was indeed so true to the core of my being – that it was when I didn’t know or wasn’t sure what it was that I wanted, I am in a delusion to even think that I have a choice; but the moment I knew what I wanted, I would be left with no choice but what I wanted.

On another level, why we don’t have choices is because of the ingrained ideas that we already sow in the mind. When I have an idea that I prefer a cat as a pet, there is no way that I would choose a dog as a preference unless I made a conscious choice to make a different choice from a previous decision that I would have made. So it seems again, that I might have a choice here – to fully adapt or be a puppet to an ingrained idea, or to opt for a different experience outside an ingrained idea – but the truth is this, a choice to choose a dog over a cat is also an idea – and do you know what would have us make that choice? It is because we want to – so that leaves us with no choice too!

Choices are available to allow us to ponder deeply what is it that we truly want, or rather, what resonates intensely in our hearts. No qualms about that. When my partner asked me quite some time ago what is my dream car, I gave him a whole list of possible vehicles in the market from a Perodua Viva, to an Alfa Romeo GTV (old type) to an Audi TT. He scratched and shook his head often not being able to grasp the criteria of an ideal car for me. Apparently, everyone has some idea of what type of dream car they would want, except me! I told him that the vehicle would be something which makes me tick on the first sight of it, that I would know it belongs to me and vice versa, and no other way. Soon enough, I saw her (as in my current car) and fell in love with her almost instantly. See, I had no choice!

I rejoice in the truth of this. When I know I have a choice, I am only faced with a situation where I am then unsure again of what I want. Do I welcome it? Why not? But the choices do not define me or what I am. If I choose to be an accountant, it will not be because I love numbers, or that I am a meticulous person – but simply, because I want to; and my number one criteria is that it must resonate with my being, it must give me joy. See, no choice again! Now, this is freedom!

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