From Fear to Love. The Beginnings of an Awakening

There is a life waiting for all of us.  A new life.  A life not dictated by our fears and anxieties, but instead a life created by our love for life and all of its creations.  

The only thing that is stopping us from creating harmony is fear.  Fear is a global cultural norm.  It is systemic throughout humanity.  For example, we fear that if we cannot pay our bills that we will be cast onto the streets.  We also fear nature and so we fortify our environments and destroy mass ecosystems in the name of profit.  It is scientific fact that we are in the midst of the greatest mass extinction in 65 million years [Source].  We are over consuming the earths resources to keep "business as usual" and to "pay our bills."  So "normal" is this fear that we do not care to question its dominance over our lives and how it dictates economic and social activity.

And what about our social fears?  Sometimes we are so afraid to speak what we feel to our friends, our partners, and our families, that we suppress what we feel in order to keep the status quo.  We often keep ourselves quiet when there is such a vast array of emotional intelligence within us that should be shared.  We fear we will hurt or loose the relationships which we cherish so we stay silent.  We are afraid to be alone, but what we fail to see is that isolation and aloneness are only creations of the mind.  Our disconnection from life, from nature, and from spirit, is directly tied to the dominant cultural paradigm of fear based actions [or inaction].

Adherence to cultural norms based in fear diminishes our sensitivity to life.  We see that it is only adaptable to suppress our sensitivity.  It is only normal we say.  We must secure our livelihood, we must protect ourselves, and keep the economy "growing."  But can we not see that our fear driven culture is consuming not only the physical world at a rate that is not sustainable, but it is consuming our minds and diminishing our ability to be love, to be light, and to be connected to spirit.

This is as far as I will take it.  This entry is not intended to be a negative one.  It was written to shed awareness.  And only when we are aware can we make changes.  Despite the statements above everyone whom I meet and spend time with I have an inherent love for.  The reason why is because I see love within them.  We are all family in this life.  And it is this life of dualistic proportions that gives us the opportunity to even know what a "more harmonious life" would be.  It is this current society that allows us to see how we can grow.

Awareness of how fear influences our lives both at the individual level and the social level [for they are both one] brings us closer to the awakening that this world is crying out for [as well as our hearts... again, they are both one of the same].  It take courage to see the truth, but in your courage to see things as they are your reward is compassion and a sensitivity to life that will open your heart to the love that is all around you.  Be not focused then in the mind that dwells in fear, but instead take shelter in the faith that the connection to the spirit is real.  

On Isolation, Humility, and Connection

Every now and then feelings of loneliness can take over.  At times we may feel isolated and alone in a world that feels so separate from us.  We may feel loneliness when we part from a significant relationship, or when we move to a new town and don't know anyone, or when someone close to us dies, or we may simply feel it and not know why.  At the core of the feeling of loneliness is isolation.  We should not try to change this feeling because it is a natural part of the human experience.  Without it we would not know isolations opposite.

When we let any aspect of the human experience to be as it is, without trying to change it, we give our selves the opportunity for life to teach us humility.

Distracting ourselves from any type of unpleasant emotion may push it out of conscious awareness, but this unpleasant emotion will remain in the sub-conscious gnawing at us in some unseen way.  We may then start to feel these emotions creep up at some later date and not know why we feel depressed.  It is best to deal with things as they arise.

When we run away from our feelings we run away from ourselves and when we run away from ourselves we lower our capacity to be the fully present beacon of consciousness that we inherently are.

There is no doubt that at times in my life I have felt a seemingly unrelenting loneliness.  When I was 18 my life long best friend died peacefully in his sleep.  For almost a years time I would distract myself in unhealthy ways to placate the feelings I had brewing inside of me.  I questioned the purpose of life and was filled with an intense anger.  "Why God did my best friend have to leave this world so early?!"  Yet in this experience I gained a deep sense of humility for myself and for life.  The passing of Matthew's life is something I will go into greater detail at some later date.

What I learned brought me to a humbling and paradoxical realization.  I found out that only in the awareness of my isolation was I able to start to feel a profound connection to the world around me.  When I let go of the need to be connected to others to placate my loneliness I started to feel a natural connection.  It was something that was at first so subtle it was like the whisper of spirit, but when I tuned into it I felt it coming out of all living things.

We can tune into it by being humbly aware of the gift of life and the precious opportunity we have being here for just a short few moments in the landscape of eternity.

So even despite the loneliness I feel at times...I know that life is with me, that spirit is all around me, and that even the stranger is family.  Nature too, has its own way of communication.  And only when I allow myself to feel can I connect to the emotional matrix of life that is all around me.  Yes, we should be selective to what energy we want to pick up, but a compassionate and humble heart will always attract you to just the "right" people and places.

Looking Within to See the Light

Despite what you may believe you are perfect just as you are.

What is it that influences the way we relate to ourselves?  Understanding this is vital to creating harmony and peace.  I am not saying we need to be questioning ourselves constantly, but it is important to periodically check in with ourselves and draw our awareness inward.  Without bringing awareness to the seemingly automatic sub-conscious mind we may never realize the perfection of who and what we are.

Are we conscious of what is affecting our mood and our worldview?

Could it be that the accumulation of all past experience strongly influences the way we experience life?  I am not saying that we are not unique and in some way untainted by the past, we are, but how strongly does the past presently exist within you?

Understanding the past and how it affects our perception is key to understanding how we feel and experience life.  When we witness how our relation to the past influences our reality we become aware of our selves in a profound way.  This is the art of self-meditation.

When we give ourselves time to be inwardly aware we start the process of transcending old patterns and belief structures that no longer serve us.

How do we come to understand what it is that holds us ignorant to our perfection?  What is that we should look into?  

We need to look inside and question?

Does our way of thinking enable us to be inwardly aware and sensitive to ourselves?

Does our way of thinking allow us to see each other as we are or do our thought structures create a reality before us that is based in some pre-conceived notion?  If so, does this limit our ability to see things as they are and be grounded in this moment?

If a life goal of yours is to be at peace with yourself it is important that you start to assess these questions.  I myself must do this on a regular basis.  If I do not the past with all of the ingrained modes of discrimination begin to shape my perception of not only the world around me, but also, and more importantly, of myself.  If I do not allow myself to be aware of how I think or behave I default to a way of relating to people or things that is comes up from my past.  In these instances I act on thought forms that are not really my own [because I learned them from others, mainly those who raised me] and I mentally laminate them on to others and other things to witness.  Yet I realize that I do not want to live through the filter of thought forms that are rooted in the past.  Ultimately, I will not find my peace this way.

When we perceive things as they are in their purest form we witness things without definition.  Words and concepts may help us navigate life, but they only do so in the relative sense and not in the ultimate sense.  The ultimate acknowledgment is that life is boundless and cannot be deified.  You yourself cannot be defined and you are amazing beyond any belief or thought you have about yourself.

This realization occurs in the moment when we inwardly witness that we are perfect even with our "self-perceived faults".  We are often hard on ourselves for not being what we think we should be.  But witness...that this is just a thought and not the actual reality as it is.

The thing is, only when we do accept ourselves for who we are, faults and all, do we begin to transcend that which holds us back in self-judgment.  Your "faults" are as perfect as you are.  Without them you would not know which way to grow.  Therefore, be humbly aware of how you relate to the present moment and forgive whatever it may be that holds you in a pattern of being ignorant to your perfection.