I was compelled to create this diagram
Not sure what else to say really, I have been spending a lot of time lately observing my mind and it's tendency to make problems out of things, and declare how insufficient certain situations or people are.
In my experience, in the past when I have become involved in these stories, it means a drop in energy and a feeling of dicomfort or fricton.
It means a forgetting of my state of bliss ,generosity, and spontenaiety
This is my attempt at explaining how we as beings have a lot of say in what affects us, and whether or not a situation or a person can become a problem. If we refuse to take on the identity which has a problem with things, then theres no problem.
It does require vigilance
And lately I have been reflecting that it's not longer acceptable to me, to allow these tiny habits any room in my life any more. So I am paying attention, noticing them, accepting them, not acting on them, and letting them flow through. And they go away just like everything else - because it's our attention which empowers things. Or sometimes it's our resistance. So you might say sometimes I just ignore mind when it wants attention, and sometimes I pay it full attention yet without any identity around the situation. I think both approaches work.
✩✩✩ Let's take responsibility for our attention and intention. ✩✩✩
When I started out on my spiritual path, I was very excited for so much new information and exploration. I began cultivating a brand new spiritual persona, and I made a lot of new friends with this persona. Now I don't have a problem with Identities, but I would like to point out the irony of being identified with being spiritual - in the sense that it is just another restriction and polarization against life. Just like I describe in the diagram. As the journey has progressed, I realize that more important than being involved in some exciting happening - is the deep internal work towards equanimity, and relating to all aspects of life appropriately. You could call this cultivation.
It's hard to see sometimes but life doesn't have the categories and seperations that we have come up with, it's actually just a big beautiful coherent energy field - with so many diverse expressions.
Yet the human habit is to get stuck in the mind, and through the mind identifying with who we are who we are not. And it is through this fundamental division that all the other chaos gets sown.
My reflection is that the mind is not necessarily a trustworthy friend, and we should understand that a lot of thoughts are repetitive and unhelpful. For this reason I strongly endorse meditation, self inquiry, or any spiritual practice that puts you into a calm or balanced state. This way you will be less likely to act out the madness that mind proposes to you, you can simply observe it, ignore it, and get on with living truly and freely.
Thankyou for tuning in friends
Namaste
PhillyC