For many years I kicked and screamed, whined and moaned, rebelled by acting out without restraint, and pointed my finger at every conceivable "other" (people, places, and things of all sorts) that I held responsible for my woes. I realize today that I had become what I was taught to become and that I was willing to live with the lie (belief) that I had no control over the path I was walking. I know now that my "teachers" were not good people or bad people, smart people or stupid people, morally corrupted people or righteous people, they were as I believe I had become, sleepwalkers, simply doing what sleepwalkers do, maintaining status quo. There is nothing easy about being a sleepwalker in the early stages of waking up. Anger, confusion, unbridled blame, self-loathing, and many other disruptive concepts and behaviors can become the default for all traversing the early stage of awakening. This can be a very rocky road where travelers break down, or crash and burn, or simply abandon the quest because there are "better" things to do.
For those who stick it out, one of the significant rewards of this journey, identifying specific achievements along the timeline of awakening, can be discovered in summary. To my knowledge there are no rules a reviewer must follow to summarize awakening, no format, no right, no wrong, no nothing. I do not even know of any requirement to summarize, I do however see the effort as a worthwhile one. That absence of structure takes a lot of pressure off, it also removes the obstacle known as excuses, a barrier to progress the vast majority of humans default to IMO. And then there is the concept of Karmic Debt but that circumstance will be a future subject. For the now I want to share a write from my earlier stage of awakening with the caveat that I did not understand at the time what was happening for me. For the record I want to say I am still in the process of waking up and I like it, but to this point, wherever this point is along my journey, there is nothing easy about the process. Best.
Failed Memory
When was the time
Was it in this life or one of the others
I do not know
That memory has slipped away
A time of freedom
From the bondage of your expectations
that memory has slipped away
When I was held up and declared
Your choice became my decision
How to live this life
Was innocence
Was ignorance
Misunderstanding
That brings me here today
I forgive the path you chose
I took
Now I see another way
To reclaim that precious memory
The one that slipped away
