Tagged: living
Dying is the way of Living
The significance of Death changes according to consciousness.
For most, there is only one death; at the end of Life. Typically, we will perceive death as something “bad”, which we need to delay even though quality of Life may be lacking. These are the individuals “fighting Death.” We hear: “After a long fight, he lost the battle with cancer” (or some other disease.) From that nonsensical perception, we don’t realize that “we will always lose to death.” Always.
Our petty fighting attitude only brings animosity towards the inevitable. A trauma.
Embrace death. After all; it is part of living. The duality of life and death will be experienced. Why reject one side of the same experience?
Death brings fear to the unknown. However, what we truly fear is to lose that which is known. Thus, we may need to learn to die from the known.
It is in that understanding, how a different consciousness could perceive that there is no better way to live Life than dying psychologically while living.
In one lifetime, the one who was born, is not the same as the one who dies. That may require a bit more awareness to understand. The one who experiences death has no part of him identifying with the one who was born: The body is different, the mind is different. Nevertheless, what creates the linear identity of ‘I am the same,’ is the attachment to different things in Life. That could be names, people, objects, positions, ideals, beliefs, etc. That creates the sense of “self.”
Therefore, the greatest attachment is the perception of “self.” We greatly cling to it.
Life will bring many experiences where we feel that we “have lost” something but then, we DO things to gain something back for ourselves. That game, we usually call Life.
“Self” is being built through that game.
When Life brings the experience to “lose” something; we don’t see that this brings the opposite as well, automatically once the old is “lost”, newness is gained. We “win” newness through that duality.
If the above is fully understood, we could observe that dying from something is the way to gain; but the hardest part is the mental clinging of the past, for that which is gone. Then, we live in the past and we are not able to die from the past. We fight. Thus, there is no newness.
Observe. Become aware. Accept. Move on.
Life will “give” but also will “take away” to give something else. Are we willing to play that game?
“Willingness” means our capacity to die from who we were and accept the newness of who we could be. “Losing is winning.”
That game when fully experienced, will change that sense of self; reducing its size until one day, we have died from “self.”
Then, there is nothing to be attached to. We dropped the burden by dying psychologically from a static sense of “self.”
When the psychological “self” is not there, Who is going to die?
Learning to die at every moment, is the way to live.
Surrender to the adventure
Shall we live life with worries and thoughts about an “uncertain future”?
Shall we live life with the thought that at every moment someone is taking advantage of us, trying to get something from us, etc.? Shall we live life thinking that someone is watching us just to make sure that we get “punished” for the “wrong doings” of tasting the different flavors that life brings and offers “free of charge”?
Many individuals “think” Yes, we should.
We should worry about the future. We should “control it,” be “careful” and get life insurance for the afterlife as well.
Don’t get in trouble. Don’t make waves. Don’t ask anything from anyone. Mind your own business…
And yet… those individuals live in constant fear.
Fear is their life.
That is when God as the ultimate source of “insurance” came into the game.
Pray to Him.
Ask Him.
Remember Him.
Do something nice to gain His favor. That is, “love” Him.
To open ourselves to the adventure of living life is to discover our own limitations, which are not allowing us to connect with the Totality, with everything.
Discover your own shortcomings. Observe how the sense of “self” is a limit.
As we discover those limits, an automatic openness in our attitude arrives, and we will no longer see life as “harsh” and to try to ”protect ourselves” from a harsh environment.
Do we want to be only around “nice people” ?
Do we want to create our “safety net” of individuals to belong to so the rest could be “safely” rejected?
When the seeker is a “child” in consciousness; that help is required. It is the starting point. God may be needed to feel protected, secure, loved.
If the child ever decides to grow up and open his consciousness to more than “self-absorption” and to learn to adjust, change and balance his life with the rhythms of the Ocean of life itself….
Then that child needs to get out of the safety of his bathtub someday.
The bathtub of beliefs. The bathtub of traditions. The bathtub of duality. The bathtub of ideologies.
To live in balance means to harmonize the physical with subtle energies, to be able to change, adapt and modify according to the song of the day.
That is not a child’s work.
It is that flexibility which will allow someone to wake up everyday and be grateful to the new adventure of the day, which is right before his own 2 feet.
Break that shell of beliefs and come out from it victorious, just to taste the light of the adventure of living life in joy.
What is the point of living?
Rodney, the “daredevil” has a life path. His reckless driving comes from his nature expressed at a particular point in time.
Any outside force such as a belief system to make Rodney “good,” will only repress that daredevil nature.
Once the belief is over, the repression will go away and with that his daredevil nature will be unleashed.
That belief gave him “safety” by delaying the expression of his nature, which could get him into “trouble.”
However, as we know, every experience is beneficial, trouble or not, it is a game in the nature of immortality.
If that repression took place for 10 years, obviously his daredevil nature will be tamed out of age, (getting old) which will give Rodney a different consciousness.
Note how the particular path that will be experienced in Rodney’s life is completely “out of his hands.”
Rodney may go to jail for life. He may experience many accidents or he may not experience nothing at all but a few traffic tickets here and there.
It is all in his destiny… When we see this, we start trusting life and with that, a smile in the face appears. 🙂
Any “Life teaching” is just theory until someone has experienced that teaching in his life. Then he can understand the teaching and verbalize it. That is how there are different levels of “Life students” according to their consciousness, the beginning stage is duality. “This is good, that is bad. This is wrong, that is right.”
At the same time, do we see that nothing experienced is “good or bad” in itself, but just another tool that life has to change our consciousness? There are consequences, of course which are material for further lessons. Do we see that because we are inter-related, a change in a person will affect others as well, who are closely related with that person?
It is the domino effect.
Consciousness is eternal. The “soul” is eternal. Matter is eternal (cannot be destroyed neither created) then we may realize this:
Why some individuals put so much emphasis in destruction? The Armageddon is near…
Obviously because their consciousness does not allow them to see how everything is eternal. Everything changes but it is eternal.
To put emphasis in destruction is like living life with fear to die at any moment.
“Don’t enjoy now because you are going to die anyway and you should worry about your future, about what happens after you live this life.” “You will be in a better place than this world, Paradise… but you can lose it if you don’t do enough to deserve it.”
The fear of death is used as a powerful motivator for an ego to “do something” about it.
You need to get salvation and to save others as well… so you get a “golden star” in your chart of your ego-good-deeds…
However, that individual does not realize about his own immortality. That individual is unwilling to trust life and the experiences in it when is trapped in duality and the belief that “this is good and that is bad.” His ego wants a better ” heavenly job” in the “future.” A place near the CEO, God… That ego must survive for the future through repression now!
That is the irony.
Destruction in Nature, is another way to re-create again. Suffering is another way to learn about the “I” and the extension of it in our lives. Suffering is how we realize about that “I.”
Everything is as it should be. That is the perfection of this experience, which we call life.
Someone may ask: “What is the point of life if we are going to die?”
A: To discover that there is no death when the “I” dies. Living life is the path to that discovery.
Q: If there is no death, what do we do, what is the “right thing to do “ in life?
To enjoy every moment of it as it “is.” That requires a different consciousness.
The “law” of attraction in life
Life has many students coming from a diversity of consciousness.
To learn to “knock at the door” in life is what typically has been called the “law of attraction.”
Think about something that you want and it will appear. Many books have been written to share this wonderful “Secret,” only known by the selected ones and now being shared for mainstream.
If the door opens then we could tell the “Secret” to others 🙂 However; if the door does not open, that only means that destiny wasn’t meant to be in that particular door.
Keep knocking at different doors.
There is a “Secret” in attraction, which is experienced by all, nevertheless we may fail to realize.
When 2 magnets attract each other, they have to be from opposite polarity. There is a collision through that attraction.
Similarly, when we reject something in life we attract it, for the polarities are opposed. Isn’t that paradoxical?
Ananda couldn’t stand to be in the presence of smokers. When he moved into a new apartment complex, his main request was not to be around smokers. As months went by smokers started to appear, then 2 heavy smokers arrived nearby.
Ananda wanted to get out of that apartment complex but he couldn’t. His lease wasn’t over.
Mathias the wise tree, suggested to Ananda not to feel rejection towards those who smoke.
Ananda said: “ But the smoke gets into your clothes and it is unhealthy for you. “
Mathias replied: ” Even more harmful for your health, are the sentiments of rejection that you are emitting in that moment.”
Ananda changed his ways and accepted the smokers around him. Every time he was close to one of them, he thought that it was a “test” and that he had to “pass the test” by not feeling rejection and by having a friendly conversation with those smoking.
The “test” game is interesting. The game is to pretend to be “good” by tolerating. In that toleration, there is separation between the “I” and them, the source of my tolerance.
Mathias the wise tree, informed Ananda that he was still living in that place despite his wishes to move out, because of his rejection to smokers.
Obviously, Ananda had attracted that which he was rejecting.
One day, one of the smokers had a small conversation with Ananda, while smoking his cigarette.
Ananda did not think anything at all related with smoking in that conversation. He saw how the smoker got rid of his cigarette after a little while. Ananda did not feel or think about this episode to be a “test.”
3 days later, a new management took over the apartment complex and with that unforeseen change the opportunity for Ananda to move out appeared.
Ananda’s feeling of rejection finished and with that, the need for him to be in that place.
Have you seen a person having fear (rejection) towards roaches?
But… they are ugly despicable vermin, dirty, repulsive etc…. rationalizing our motives will not do anything to hide the rejection. It is not the “fact” of what they could represent but how we FEEL about that “fact.”
Usually that person rejecting roaches is the one who has most encounters with roaches.
What about the one who rejects a religious group or a philosophy or a group of people?
Their life will be full of that which is rejected.
That is the law of attraction in life.
Another example?
Ananda believed that garlic was “bad for the mind.” That belief became so extreme as to reject any food touched by garlic in the grocery store.
One day Ananda became very sick due to mold growing in the bathroom of his apartment. He was feeling tired and his lungs were not breathing to the full capacity.
Mathias the wise tree, recommended to Ananda to drink apple cyder vinegar in the mornings and to eat raw garlic before lunch and after eating lunch, for 3 days…
Mathias mentioned to Ananda: “Let your food be your medicine.”
But… garlic is “bad”… Any alternative? 🙂
To be tormented for a long while by doctors’ tests, insurance companies and secondary effects of medicines.
Ananda changed his view about garlic and his belief as well. His awareness changed once he became well again.
Everything that happens in life has benefit. We choose to call those episodes as “good” or “bad” according to what we perceive as convenient, without realizing that there is a journey made up of life experiences that every individual needs to go through.
Wisdom comes through those experiences in life, which will be converted into insight from lifetime to lifetime. When we are AWARE we could observe and obtain a valuable teaching from those experiences in life.
If everything is beneficial in the journey of the “life walker,” how is it possible for something to be “bad”?
When we reject any aspect of life, we cannot flow with life. A belief becomes the protector to preserve a particular type of consciousness, but at the same time, that same belief does not allow for consciousness to flow, to change… for life is change.
What is there beyond duality?….Non-existence? what EXISTS then?
A question from a reader.
What exists is your perception.
Duality is a perception which rejects by conveniently separating experiences in life. Let me give the classical example:
There is a glass of water. The water fills up the middle of the glass.
Is the glass half full or half empty?
The example above in the traditional consciousness, is full of duality. You are made to choose between two apparently opposite states (fullness and emptiness.)
In life “at the office” this is the type of indoctrination that we go through and we apply the same to everything in our perception of life.
If you perceive the glass “half full,” you get the label of being a “positive thinker.” Otherwise, you are “negative.”
Do you see how duality is still there? (Positive vs. negative.)
Moreover, a workshop in “positive thinking” will be created so our rejection to the other half (negative thinking) is granted. When there is rejection of one side of duality, paradoxically, we will experience that rejected side as well, for our perception of duality is just a perception and life itself is… oneness.
Be aware of your thoughts. Don’t label them or judge them. Be in tune with your feelings and be part of the Totality.
That is why, when someone talks about the law of karma under the perception of duality, by labeling actions as “good” and “bad” that is a very infantile way of looking at things. Actions are neither “good or bad” by themselves. That is why, in the oneness of life our intentions are important, our feelings… for that drives the action. We cannot pretend to “act good” when our feelings are not like that. That is why, to act in accordance with the need of the time, to be in tune with the Universe and Nature is in itself what may need to be done without further labeling.
The common good.
A Human being will not be able to experience that while trapped in the duality of individuality vs. the collective.
That is why, it was mentioned that we need to go beyond that perception of duality.
Basically, there is no need to take sides, to be in favor of something or against. That is duality. Our society may pursue this duality, but a “life walker” should be able to be there without being there…out of duality. 🙂
In the example of the half empty and half full glass of water, someone’s perception could be to observe a glass with water and air. It is neither empty nor full.
That mind will not take sides by labeling empty as “bad” and full as “good.” That is the origin of rejection.
It simply, “is what it is” without any further labeling or judgment.
When we truly understand that we are dealing with perceptions in life and what matters is not what our senses are able to perceive but rather how do we feel about our perception, then our consciousness may start changing.
Do I reject? Do I separate? Do I take sides?
I am caught in duality, if so.
To perceive something and enjoy that perception while it lasts, is to maintain that joy like a little child; who is joyfully riding in a train in Disneyland’s “Magic kingdom:” The scenes will change continuously and the child will just smile throughout the ride… enjoying the experience while it lasts. 🙂
Art and Life
What is the meaning of a painting, music or poetry?
It is expression. It is a form of communication. If that expression is capable of touching someone, even the author itself, then that piece becomes “extraordinary.”
Expression has no boundaries, unless the artist has boundaries within.
When there is an “I” creating art. a boundary is already made and the ability to be in the “zone of creation” will be limited.
When there is no “I” creation is limitless. Expression is boundless and communication is all there is.
Painting is capable of taking someone away from self-absorption. The story of the “I” with all its drama and baggage will be gone in that moment and the object, the canvas, is “what is.”
In fact, painting is just like meditation. It allows our consciousness to move away from the self-absorbed “I.”
“Creation” occurs when self-absorption is not.
If we “frame” ourselves by trying to copy a photograph or something else without allowing our emotions and “inner-touch” to express; then we are bound by something and that something becomes our “jail.”
Creativity is gone.
Life is movement, continuous change.
Some individuals would like to see a picture of Nature in their living room or a photograph or a movie of Nature to feel that “they have it,” rather than the “real thing.”
Our minds believe that something static is the thing. It is that belief which creates a dissonance with life.
This phrase will be explored later on.
All human attempts to possess or trap something which is changing, will fail. That attempt will “kill” the sacredness of the experience.
Nature is not just about “seeing” it, but using all senses to experience the uniqueness of the moment.
Enjoyment comes at that point. We are fully alive, fully attuned, in the moment; but at the same time there is no “I” there as a point of reference. No thought about “me” and my wonderful story. 🙂
Roy rented a wave runner. It was the first time for him to try this experience. He was looking forward to it.
The exhilaration of going at 70 miles per hour in the water with no restrictions, the craziness of that moment and the adrenaline pumping the heart with extra zest.
That enjoyment of the inner child could be brutally stopped when the “I” appears and takes over as a “punisher” of the inner child.
“You’ve got to be nuts. Slow down, you can cause an accident…”
The boundary arrives and with that the fun goes away.
The boundary is a mental jail.
Creativity is without boundaries.
Nature does not have boundaries, because there is no “I” behind it, orchestrating what should be “good or bad.”
Any religion, any philosophy, any teaching is a boundary. Those boundaries are there to be experienced, respected… until the time comes to let them go.
Moving to different consciousness is like moving into different boundaries, every time those boundaries are smaller and smaller because the “I” with its beliefs and preconceptions becomes smaller, it is not there to impede newness.
Art has a greater meaning as the mental boundaries are let go.
The art of recognizing our own mental jails, is the most rewarding art of all. 🙂
The many players in the game of life
“Life is like a monopoly game. There are players playing on the board of life, but also there are other players who are influencing the players in the game.”
Mathias, the wise tree; said that to his friend Ananda.
Many “spiritual,” metaphysical paths bring the awareness of the players who are influencing the “real” players on the board of life.
They call them “beings of light,” “ghosts,” “spirits,” “archangels,” “angels,” etc.
These beings are the ones influencing the game.
We don’t see them. We may not be able to communicate with them, but they can do that with us if needed.
Some may know the darker side of this experience for there are many types of consciousness in the “spirit” realm reflecting the human world.
But some may know the beneficial side of this experience when a being of light contacts someone. A being of light contacts a human being, chooses a human being. It cannot be the other way around.
Yet for some, all of the above is nothing but rubbish.
It is all according to what we need to experience at the time. Everything changes and as our awareness increases, we could be able to experience other things in life.
A being of light may be playing “Santa Claus” for some individuals. Worshiping them has been the typical behavior from many. As our consciousness develops, then we could see that the motive for such a connection is to increase our consciousness, our awareness for our next level of experience.
The path is different for everyone, although it is the same path. This is paradoxical.
If we are able to perceive our own immortality then because of that our acceptance of what life offers becomes complete and unconditional. The seed for a new state of consciousness is born at that time. When the student is ready, the teacher may appear…
However, just like when we change grades in school, we also change teachers.
Self-realization may be the apparent destination, but that journey has so many different paths according to the state of consciousness of the student.
Self-realization is a “one-to-one” individualized training. It cannot be put as a “mass teaching” in a book or in a religion. Of course, “Mass teachings” and religions are not “bad” but part of the experience of life. Those experiences are the “agents” for change in consciousness.
That is why, anything and everything that occurs throughout our paths in life is necessary, useful and perfect. When we learn to accept that without thinking about it and move on, life can flow through us and change the chapter onto the next one.
When we complete the different chapters of the book of life, the book is no longer needed and then we may discover that reading the chapters of the book until the last page, was meant so we could start forgetting about it…
What is the purpose of living then?
To enjoy the experience. 🙂
Exploring the Depth of Living 