States of Being

A wonderful thing is happening. I'm actually starting to enjoy writing, which, by the way, was the point of this blog. I just finished an hour of meditation and immediately wanted to write. This is what I want to share today; when I envision a perfect life for me I am earning a living helping people transform their lives, I'm happily married, I see my children often, I'm healthy, and I'm financially independent. I'm sure each of these external realities will lend themselves to my happiness. What occurred to me at the end of my meditation is the importance of having desires for states of being. Internal goals can be relied on better to help us reach our external goals and desires. With this thought in mind I asked myself what I most desire for my internal state of being and this is what came up: may I be open, may I be filled with loving kindness towards myself and all beings, may I be well in both body and mind, may I be peaceful and at ease with things as they are, may I be happy. To those of you who meditate, I'm sure this sounds very familiar.

Yesterday I happened to listen to a pod-cast in which the speaker (I've forgotten his name) referred to a study done at Harvard in which they've shown the moment we set an external goal for ourselves, we put ourself into a state of stress. This stress makes it much harder for us to realize our goal and even if we achieve it, we're not satisfied. Kind of sounds like what the Buddha was talking about when he said the source of our suffering was grasping. Pushing reality away and grasping are the two sides of the coin called suffering. This is good for me to remember as I develop more awareness and skill. What matters most is my internal state of being--then I can let go and see how things turn out.

Unconscious Beliefs

I'm more plagued by unconscious beliefs than I am by disowned parts of my personality. When I sat down to work on lesson three I was looking at what I believe about myself, others, and the world in regards to the three areas I'd like to improve (finances, work, love life). For me, the process involved getting very quiet and letting thoughts bubble up. I couldn't do this with a pen and paper in my hand. I had to lie on the floor and allow plenty of space. What do I believe about my finances? I have to work long hours and make a lot of money to be financially independent. I don't have the energy to work long hours. I'm not creative enough to create multiple businesses. Pretty grim beliefs, wouldn't you say? When things go wrong in this area, I say to myself: I'll never get ahead financially. I'm lucky to keep my head above water. I need money, but I don't like working for it because other things are more important to me than money. Now if you're like me, you're kind of shaking your head thinking, no wonder she never gets ahead financially. Of course I will always prove to myself I'm right about what I believe by attracting people and situations that are tailor-made to help me be right, by interpreting what happens in a way that supports my belief, even if there are other possible explanations, and by behaving in ways that will give me certain results. This last part was mostly a quote from the homework sheet.

Just bringing these beliefs into my conscious awareness didn't make them go away, but at least now they can be examined. It's critical to recognize them as merely beliefs, not the truth. Beliefs can evolve and change and if I clearly see my beliefs as limiting I'm more willing to replace them. We're always going to have beliefs, and the trick is to believe what serves us and promotes happiness. Is it really true I'd have to work long hours to make a lot of money? Do I have to make a lot of money to be financially independent? If I look at these two beliefs closely I can see they're flawed. If I'm paid a lot of money for the hours I work, I wouldn't have to work a lot of hours. If I'm debt free and my needs are simple, I don't have to be wealthy to be financially independent. What else might I believe that would serve me better? Well, how about I am free to choose my beliefs?

Lesson Two

Lesson number two being about disowned parts of our personality, I was asked to engage in a dialogue with the afore mentioned parts. How do you know what you have disowned? You look for clues such as what really bugs you in other people. If we can't stand something in someone else, it's a pretty safe bet we won't want to own those same tendencies in ourself. I found this rather hard to do because I couldn't think of anything that really got my goad. I don't enjoy being around angry people or selfish people, etcetera, etcetera, but I can usually see their behavior for what it is--a way to cope with fear. I wondered if my disowned parts were so thoroughly disowned I couldn't even acknowledge being upset with others. With this question in mind I called in to speak to one of the coaches available to those taking the course. She wanted to help me have the experience of a dialogue with a disowned part so I just picked something--laziness.

I found it kind of awkward to be doing this with someone I didn't even know, but hey, I paid for the course so I wanted to get my money's worth. The point of the exercise is to recognize all aspects of our personality have a purpose. If we own these parts they are allowed to mature so they can serve us in functional ways. Disowned, they come out in not so wonderful ways, sabotaging and blocking us from experiencing the happiness we desire. After going through the exercise with a coach I did it with another  personality trait (anger) on my own. I don't think I have a lot of anger in my life, but I'm sure I don't want to see myself as an angry person so I thought it would be good to talk with anger. I can honestly say I feel differently towards anger and laziness now that I've had a good conversation with them. While writing this it occurred to me I ought to have a talk with "controlling" since controlling people do get on my nerves.

Lessons

When I purchased the Holosync CD it came with an on-line course called, "Master Your Emotions, Master Your Life". I had immediate access to the course while I had to wait awhile for the CD to arrive. Since I like this type of information I started right in, mostly out of curiosity. I really didn't expect to learn anything new since I have a Masters in Counseling Psychology and I've been meditating for a long time. Well, I was surprised to learn quite a lot. There are four lessons in the course and so far I've completed three. The first lesson is about internal representations (the story we tell ourselves when an event occurs), the second, aspects of ourself we disown (our shadow side), and the third lesson is about unconscious beliefs. It's not that any of this is new information to me, but I learned something about what I was doing in those three areas. In short, I gained more awareness, giving me more choice.

Here's an example: I already know I give meaning to everything in my life and that often it has nothing to do with reality. I also know if I'm feeling bad about something, I'm thinking unhappy thoughts. What lesson one pointed out was that anytime I feel anything distressing, I'm focusing on what I don't want and that the distress is my resistance to the situation as it is. By shifting my focus to what I do want, unpleasant emotions dissipate. Even this wasn't an entirely new piece of information, but I started paying attention to what I was feeling and what I was focusing on, and sure enough, I was focusing on what I didn't want. That, of course, brings up the question, what do I want? It turns out I always want to be peaceful and at ease with things just as they are, even as I work toward something else I might want. This is quite an insight for me and I realized it's not that hard to choose peace and ease. Why not? It feels better.

Meditation

The only way to reach a higher state of awareness, that I know of, is through some form of meditation. My understanding of how meditation creates expanded awareness is by integrating the right and left hemispheres of our brain. They have separate functions; the left side is linear, verbal, and all about us as a separate person functioning in the world, whereas the right side is streaming consciousness--collecting all the sensory information. The left side holds us as separate, the right, connected to everything. Most of us in  western countries are completely dominated by the left side of our brain. This gets us to an appointment on time, but not necessarily happy. Being present to whatever is happening in the moment (through the right side of our brain) allows happiness to bubble up--unconcerned about schedules and deadlines. When the left and right side of our brain are fully integrated we can function in the world without stress or strain, even when we're in challenging situations, because we know how to respond skillfully to each new circumstance as it arises.

I've been meditating for about twenty five years, and I know my awareness is much greater than it was when I began. Still, I have my stuck places. I consider the three areas I want to improve stuck places. I'm not entirely happy with the status quo, but I don't take any new action. I'm being passive. This is what I want to shine a light on and I have a new tool. It's called Holosync, which is a CD that creates integration through the use of tones. You have to listen to the CD with a stereo headset or else it won't work. I've been using this CD for about 2 months and I'm noticing some change--a dropping away of behavior patterns that don't serve me. This is kind of exciting even though I'm aware of inner resistance.

Make Haste Slowly

Having written my intentions where others can see, I feel compelled to make it clear I expect this whole process to take time. I haven't lived all these many years without noticing conditions have to be right before things occur. What I want to do is develop enough awareness so I can see how to help bring the right conditions into play. I want to make haste, slowly. Patience is an aspect of persistence and without patience, we rarely persist.

I first really understood this about ten years ago. My husband had died and I was left with all his belongings. There were obvious things to let go of and as I went through the process of sorting and purging, I noticed a strong desire to organize the whole house. This wasn't a brand new desire. I'd feel it every time I looked at a Pottery Barn catalog or read a Better Homes and Gardens magazine. I love beauty and I wanted the drawers and closets to be as orderly and attractive as the living space. Even though I felt this way, the project just seemed way beyond my capacity until this particular time. This time, it was clear to me I could do it, if I'd take it in small chunks and keep at it. What amazes me is how obvious something is once you really see it.

I have a strong sense I can do whatever I really want to do, if I can just see it clearly. I suppose this requires some degree of elevation. The question is, how do I get to a higher state?

A brave foot forward

My life has been about change. This isn’t really saying much since change is the one sure thing in the Universe, but perhaps I have embraced it more readily than others. I don’t know why this is true about me, but it seems to be so. I started out as a child of record in the Mormon Church and I have moved very far off that path. Some change I signed up for and some was forced upon me. Even when I’ve raised my hand and volunteered, I haven’t always enjoyed the process. I’m brave. I also whine. What I can honestly say, however, is that my ability, even willingness to change is a core part of my self-esteem.

In this blog I want to document, discuss, share, my next phase of change. My life works well, for the most part, but I have chosen three areas that do not work as well as I’d like. First, I’d like to be financially independent, second, I want more passion in my work, and finally, I’d like to have a life partner to travel down the road with. In these three areas I have unrealized dreams and I believe they can come into reality through increased awareness. I am setting out on a path of increased awareness and surely change will result. Stay tuned.