After a few days of writing my journey-to-life blog I feel great confusion in my mind. It becomes apparent to me that I carry a lot of ideas in my mind, sometimes very conflicting ideas, and that the mind does not even stop collecting more ideas. It is like a sponge, that sucks up all ideas it can find. And then it gets very confused about those ideas, what to do with them, how to react to them, how to apply them, which ones to select to focus on, which ones to abandon. There is a very interesting article in the Desteni material about Death that made the same point (http://desteni.org/desteni-material/blog/death-master-life)
I was at this point in my process earlier, actually a few times, and it always happened when I began to write my journey-to-life blog. So far, I tried three times to write my blog but after a few days I stopped because I got so confused about what was going on in my mind that I simply could not continue. I did not understand why these thoughts in my head changed all the time and why I was unable to find those that really were worthy to focus on. They all seemed to be relevant, but what seemed to be relevant and important changed almost by the day. Why was/is it, that I cannot determine and group of thoughts that remains constant in their value for me? Why was/am I unable to determine a direction for my life based on the many thoughts I had/have going around in my mind?
It seems that I really only collected thoughts, sucked them up like a sponge, without having the capability to select among them those that were helpful, meaningful, purposeful, while disregarding those that were not. It changed all the time.
Sometimes I was sure that I needed to help this world to become a better place, to support life and what is best for all, to save the earth and protect and clean the environment, to live sustainably, etc. And then, when I tried to purchase a piece of land to live on and off the land in a sustainable way, I could not do it. I was unable to purchase land on which I could live and do all those things (protecting the earth, living sustainably, …) because other thoughts would interfere. I was not sure if I was able to sustain myself in this way or even if I could find a suitable piece of land matching my available budget. I was suddenly also afraid that investing in such an endeavor would require a huge amount of work and commitment that I could not possibly muster all by myself. But who was there to work together with me? Nobody. I would have to do it by myself. And this seemed to be too daunting, too demanding, surely beyond my capabilities (as so many other endeavors in my life had been), and thus I probably – again – overestimated my capabilities and my strength. So after a short time, I abandoned this idea.
The next idea was to contribute to an existing project that was already in place and where people would do all those things (living sustainably etc.). I looked out for them and checked out a few places. But I always felt dependent on them, as this was their property and they would thus make all the decisions. This was bringing me into a state of dependency of them and I could not live under this condition. In particular because it did not give me any security (they could kick me out any day and all my investments would be lost). I also found that most people who were running those projects were not really free from egotism and would only seek cheap help and money, because they too had overestimated themselves, not taking into account what a project of this magnitude would entail, while underestimating their financial resources and strength to follow through with such a project. So this did not work either.
And on top of all this I found that when I got involved with sustainability projects (either trying to purchase my own land or contributing in someone elses project) this would take away most of my time for inner reflection. Under those conditions life was mainly directed by the need of the land and the people living there, which gave me little (too little) time to pursue my inner work, my writing, my reflection, etc.
So then I abandoned this idea too and tried to live simply and alone somewhere, where I had the time to pursue my inner work. This worked for some time but retracting into solitude disconnected me from life and others and I was missing the feedback from people, found my life alone pretty egoistic and meaningless, at least in view of the pressing problems humanity was/is facing. And I was not helping it by thinking about it, reflecting about it, and reflecting about myself and life in general. So suddenly even the previously felt need to pursue my inner work became meaningless. And this was/is usually the point when I gave up. None of the great ideas I carried around in my head (becoming self-sustainable, joining a self-sustainable community, retracting into solitude to focus on my inner work) worked for me. So why was this so? Why did I not have the capability to determine one of these ideas (or any other for that matter) that really was the most important one and follow through with it?
The most obvious reasons were that (1) I had no means of deciding what was REALLY important, because my mind kept changing the importance of those ideas as soon as the first obstacles would arise, and (2) I was obviously not strong enough to pursue any idea and face the obstacles involved. So far, during my previously abandoned attempts to write my journey-to-life blog, I stopped at this point and simply gave up. I felt the writing was all going in the wrong directing, just keeping me focused in my mind, confusing me more than it would bring about clarity, and thus it would make no sense to continue my writing.
The funny thing is, as I am writing this now, even if I had the intention to make a different point and basically excuse myself for abandoning my writing again after only 4 days, during my writing the whole issue became a little clearer. What became clear now, basically in the last two paragraphs, is that I am really not having the strength to face the big problems earth and humanity is facing. Just like all those people which I usually blame for not seeing it, not acting on it, turning a blind eye to all of it, I too do exactly this. Because I dont have the strength to follow through. Because it would require hard work and commitment to do so. Because the outcomes would be more than uncertain. Because I could lose it all.
But as Death explained in the post I mentioned in the beginning, I will lose it all anyway. With death, the mind and body will stop. So why am I afraid to stop it already now or lose it now? I guess it is because the mind and body want to survive. The mind wants to keep and pet its ideas and the body wants to be secure, well fed, protected. And this is what we care for. We care for our ideas and our bodies. But we do not care for life. We dont even know what life is. We believe our bodies live and our minds live and we dont realize that WE are neither the body not the mind. There is something else here, a deeper current, an inner essence, our true being, life, a sense of Selv, whatever you want to call it, that sees all this. It “sees” the mind holding on to its ideas and belief systems. It “sees” the body with its demands for security and protection. And this is all good because without the body and without the mind we cannot direct ourselves in this physical environment of earth. But neither the body nor the mind should be the DIRECTORS of our lives here. They can only be the servants that carry out our directives. And these directives must come not from the mind and not from the body. They must come from a deeper place within us that is free from our cultural conditioning and free from the addictions of the body. It is a deeper place within us, our core essence, the Self, life itself. And this needs to become the directive instance of our behavior. This instance uses the mind and body to carry out our deeper intentions.
And again as I write this, another thought comes into my awareness. What if the mind has been hijacked by some other-dimensional entity to mislead me, to redirect me away from the intentions of my Self and Life?
I have had this thought a few times before and therefore I am not sure if I can trust my mind at all. I have heard and read so much about other-dimensional beings that can and probably do manipulate our minds, that I am afraid to believe my mind at all. Where do all these ideas that I tap into with my mind come from anyway? I do not know. They are there in my awareness and I am not sure that they are even my ideas. They could as well be somebody elses. Because I cannot determine my next thought or what will show up in my awareness in the next moment. It is totally beyond my control. Thoughts just pop up out of nowhere. Are they really mine or are they there for ME (my essence) to evaluate them, judge them for their validity and meaning, just like baits the we can accept or reject?
If this is so, if the thoughts we become aware of, are not our own, how then do we select the “good” ones from the “bad” ones, the right from the false, the meaningful from the meaningless, the supportive from the unsupportive, pro-life from pro-death thoughts? I think this is the more easy part. We carry in us the ability to judge this correctly in most cases. But we dont do it, because of our conditioning, which more often that not wants to secure our own survival at the expense of other things. This is what then became our ego. The strong need to fight for life, secure as much as we can for ourselves, and disregard all and everything that does not support us directly. And the result of such behavior is what we see very clearly manifested here in our lives here on earth. It results in irresponsible behavior, in the destruction of the world, in the destruction of life itself. It is not life-supportive. We support death. We destroy, we grab, we fill ourselves and our lives with ideas and stuff until we can carry no more and break down under its weight. This is obvious. But I have no strength to change it.
- I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to let my mind and body talk me out of acting on the ideas that are coming forth from a deeper place within me, which is not the mind but the Self, and which support life.
- I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself over and over again to listen to the mind and the body and their demands, making them my master and not my servant, and thus following a path of destruction and death instead of a path of life and living.
- I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to use my mental and physical weakness as an excuse to keep pursuing the demands of the mind and body, even though this leads to deep suffering in my soul/self.
- I commit myself to stop following the mind and body, now here, once and for all, and put my soul/self/me in charge for the direction of my life.
- I commit myself to stop thoughts of inability and weakness, as I can see them coming from the mind (inability) and body (weakness), which I will not allow any longer to direct me in this world.
- I commit myself to stop whenever thoughts of inability and/or weakness arise, to examine their origin (mind, body).
- I commit myself to follow through with those ideas that were here before thoughts of inability and weakness arose, as those are the ones that are coming from the deeper place within me, from the soul/self, which shall be the new director of me here.
- I commit myself to listen more closely to my deeper needs (not my mind and body) and carry those out in support of life, not death.
- I commit myself to re-evaluate my relationships with others, release all bonds to people and things that are connected to death, and establish new connections to life and the living.