Experiencing our discomfort simply as it is and not being carried off imagining that it is the end of the world, has some hidden benefits; benefits that we may never have either considered or imagined without slowing things down enough just to notice.
The experience of having our feelings simply as they are presents unexpected outcomes, but only if you take the time to notice. For instance simply having the experience rather then attempting to shun it or push it away, or mood alter can in and of itself have the ability to open us up to dynamics and to places within us that are so vast and rich, so full of the presence of spirit and creativity that it would be hard to describe them, let alone imagine them to be there without having the opportunity to experience them.
People who have experienced these awakening to the deeper side of life have do so as the result of experiencing life from a prospective that was life threatening and or terrorizing, and they report that in the midst of all the clamber and hullabaloo they came in contact with aspects of themselves that they never would have imagine were there to be contacted in the first place. Now the oddity of it all is that they might never have consider of looking inside the pain, the confusion the clamber and hubbub to see what was there and they only reason that they did was because they had no choice, it happened to them.
• So how can one become skillful at taking benefit from that observation and intimacies with that which scares me nearly to death?
• How can one go about touching base with the deeper side of things that seem only to be accessible via methods that are both scary and uncomfortable?
• Then if you wanted to stretch it just a little further how could one use the wisdom gleaned from the experience of crossing over into that place as a temp plate for resolving life’s difficulties.
• Is it possible to source the deeper aspects of yourself and not be scared to death as you do it?
Simply have the feeling. Not being lost in it or having to run away from it or re arranging it to appear to be something that it is not but rather to simply sit on it and noticing, just watchingto what is happening both on the inside and the outside.
Just notice.
That is all that is required.
Simply Notice
All most to a person, we have a strong desire to shun the sensation of what is initially perceived as unpleasant or uncomfortable and all most to a person we will hesitate to even admit that this opportunity of deep introspection is there just waiting for us, should we choose to try it.
• Scary thought not to run away from the fear or the hurt and the pain.
• Scary thought just to have it and notice all its qualities.
I have done this many times and noticed one consistent thing; the feelings are never what I thought they were. Scary is not scary after I get passed the initial moment or onset and not reacted. I have found that there were stages to move through as I sat with the feelings, and the first and most intimidating of all is the overwhelming sense of vulnerability.
Vulnerability is like a vestibule or waiting area that leads to the deeper workings of the soul. The front hall if you like. Be there in vulnerability can be something akin to sitting in the dentist’s office waiting for your turn. Being there in vulnerability often seems to be an empty, creepy and lonely thing to doplace, yet when your consciousness simply stands there in it, waiting, it is then that you notice that there is a very particular discomfort that sets up deep within you. This discomfort has many noticeable features that can change from situation to situation and they can come together and seem to gather momentum to be come the working definition of creepy or lonely or empty and the list goes on and on.
We notice this strangeness and we will, quite naturally, want to make every effort to avoid it.
But … and this but is a major but … if you can just stay centered in the moment and allow yourself to delve deeper into the introspection of the natural and painful processes, know this, growth is hidden within the process of examination.
There is really only one major requirement and that is; that we stay with the sensation of vulnerable, or metaphorically, stand in the vestibule, and then simply notice what comes along in our consciousness.
Then simply notice.
Don’t grasp, don’t push, don’t run just notice. Allow it to be what it is and how it is.
Free from your influence that is being driven by your underlying fears.
Simply notice.
This is often said to be done in a fashion that we have never would have imagined possible and often as not, to heighten the affect, we do it with people or in circumstances we would have thought impossible to either be with or be in.
Imagine that ...doing something that I would never have thought possible.
Question To The Universe
So does vulnerable equal defense¬less?
1) And if it does, then when these two places in our consciousness come together do they conspire to bring about the pain, the pain we are afraid to have in the first place.
2) Am I complicit in my own suffering either covertly or overtly?
3) Are there times where life conspires with the circumstances to present situations that simply have no appetizing solutions, it seems that it is just more despair and depression?
So there you are in the midst of experiencing turmoil on many levels, intense sensations that most would want to call painful at levels in your being that you would never have imagined.
Now if you stay steady with it for just a few brief moments in time you may begin to notice something unusual, the sensation, in and of itself, begins to change. The business of standing in the vestibule of your soul becomes an interesting place to be.
The feelings evolves and as it does some of it evolves into that motivating force that will begin to move you towards sharing things you never would have dreamt of sharing with people you never would have thought of sharing with, ever, but … and here is the magical big but again … you do this because in all honesty, you need to for your own well being.
It is like an awakening or birth where the soul breaking out of its shell, the ego, much as a butterfly has to break out of the chrysalis to complete the transformation process, of becoming … what you might ask … of becoming intimate, actually become an intimate, someone who has had the experience and gleaned the wisdom to be able share from the heart.
Having the facility to share and listen and not be dominated with or by fear.
To be able to translate and transfer that experience to and with people in a fashion you never would have thought possible.
Imagine that ... doing the impossible.
What everyone notices who venture into this process is this:
(a) Those barriers that stood between you and you sharing with the world outside of you slowly began to fall away as an indirect aside from taking the time to appreciate the sensation for what it is.
(b) The appreciation process becomes the tool or the instrument of release from the cocoon of the ego, it is the process that is melting those barriers mentioned above.
(c) By stopping and doing this marks the beginning of the undoing of the self imposed isolation of self and the beginning of the undoing of that tiny little painful knot that is hidden deep down in your heart, something like the single pebble in the heal of your shoe. It becomes very wearisome after awhile.
(d) It also marks the beginning of the process that will allow you to touch the existence of the reality that lay at and just beyond the very surface of your skin. Something akin to a fish in a pond that discovers the surface and senses that there is something more out there, no idea what, but a sense that something is there and it is important to have. So he pokes his head up to the surface and begins to hang out there simply for the experience.
(e) By simply being willing to explore the deeper aspects of your own sensory output, this will eventually cause you to become aware that for you, more is possible.
Here is the interesting fact of life; for me to touch them they had to touch me, for my life to be focused and centered in reality I had to be real.
You can come in connect with them
and they with you
and not be destroyed by the contact.
My conundrum was that I was afraid and I was hiding deep in side my skin, far below the surface of my metaphorical pond but if I wanted to have the life I said I always wanted I had to at least come to the surface and be present and accountable.
Being Real Can Only Happen Where The Skin Meet The Air.
My pain brought me to the surface. I never said out of my body, just to the surface of my being.
It is at the surface of our existence, the skin line so to speak, where we find things like compassion, and understanding, love and caring, things that if we allowed them to sink in, to be absorbed, then we could begin to give over the hard driving perfectionist tread mill that we keep our selves on.
• We also might even notice others just like us at the surface too trying figure out what the hell to do too.
• We may just very well awaken into a place where we can begin to appreciate that we are not alone on the face of this planet and God has not made a mistake.
• That we really are here for a reason, and that reason might not have a darned thing to do with our logic and reason.
• We might notice that if we are actually paying close attention to all that is we might notice that there just might be a message in the fact that we are here in the midst of 6 or so billion other lost souls here too and maybe we should try experimenting with what we might be able to do with at least some of those others who seem to be aware of the predicament we are all in.
All our natural defenses of resistance are just devices we use to keep our focus off the job at hand, of exploring the universe we were born into.
So here is the conundrum:
We are left right in the middle of a life that has brought us to our knees by the sharp fragments and shards of it’s circumstances and there seems not to be an appetizing solution at hand, but there is a door, and that door seems to go places that could be both scary and painful, but as we stand where we stand in our life’s circumstance the very pain of standing there is slowly becoming overpowering so we either have to mood alter, pretend or get on with it and go through.
It is simply a decision.
It is the ramifications of that decision that are mind boggling when you stop and think about it.
As we begin to examine the pain of it all, we might just notice that there is a choice hidden away in there and I could have if I wanted it and that choice seems to be for me to step through the thought/passageway/door and enter a deep world of appreciation that has nothing to do with outer world values, that is now opening to me if only I choose; a place that is called by many different names and a place that for a time initially will appear to be filled with unknowingness, unfamiliarity and sometimes raw fear, but I now know that this will all pass, if only I give it a chance.
Finally as we are brought into touch with a place very deep inside our souls we find that this unknowingness slowly gives way to a place that has a quiet sense of immense strength and spaciousness.
It is place where courage and strength is sown and harvested, where our ability to imagine and accept and go on in the face of adversity comes to maturity and if drawn upon this place it allows us to preserver and get on with life as it is laid out for us.
It is a place where we can be stretched beyond what we think we could do, and then do whatever it is that comes next and needs to be done. This can all come to fruition in the face of the unfamiliar and the uncertain and done is such a fashion that your next action will be full of both a sense of self and a sense of creative genius intertwined into one new sensation.
It is a mystical place where you and your physical reality can meet up with your eternal essence. This meeting up is more a blending and it does not happen because of the pain or aversion, but rather out of a respect for life gained as you examine the pain and aversions of your life. It comes about because of the willingness you display to play on the edge of, and explore into the depths of, which allows you a greater access to that deeper part of you.
The re¬sistance to exploration of the pain is us holding that opportunity at bay purely out of fear of fear, because we believe we don’t know, and we don’t want to go round the corner and see. We are simply too scared. But if you just take the time to enter into the feeling of being scared you will notice it has deeper qualities too and it is only the device our mind is using to keep us from seeing our own true nature.
When we open to our suffering we open to our humanity … to all that is.
