Sharing a wound

We humans share a wound.  

We share the trauma of believing we are separate, feeling disconnected and alone. We share an agonizing and often stifled cry, as Rumi writes when he gives voice to the reed complaining about its separateness from its source.

“Listen to the story told by the reed
of being separated:
‘Since I was cut from the reed bed,
I have made this crying sound.
Anyone apart from someone he loves
understands what I say.
Anyone pulled from a source
longs to go back."

We are all born into a world of change.  A world where nothing lasts forever and nothing stays the same.  We come into a world of unpredictability and uncertainty.

We come into this manifest world whole and at one with everything.  

As young children we turn to the vibrant color of a leaf or flower, we cry when we are hungry or uncomfortable, we stop in our tracks at something that catches our attention, no matter how small or fleeting, we wrinkle our noses at a nasty smell, we are alive to the whole wide, ever changing, world, attuned to the very moment that is happening right now.  

And as we grow we develop into unique personalities.  I, me, mine personalities.  We develop personal narratives – seeing ourselves as standing apart and separate, becoming aware of ourselves as a body and able to think for and about ourselves. I am a girl.  I am tall, I am a brother. I like dogs. 

Over a lifetime we can and do develop marvelous abilities: we can remember our history, we can imagine how things might be tomorrow, we test ourselves and reality with adventures, we think about ourselves and can know how we feel and to varying degrees we can feel confident and “make things happen” in our lives. 

And typically, we lose ourselves into our personalities – we invest in our way of life, we identify as those personalities, and we attach ourselves to the superficiality of who we think we are.  We live as if our personalities are all there is to us. The separate personality, carving out a life, attempting to find some semblance of control and predictability in a world of change . . .and, of course, the ultimate change -  the inevitability of our death.  

We often forget what we came in knowing. We forget the eternal NOW that we were in touch with when we were very young. We forget the innocence of open-to-everything. 

And if and when we go looking – and if and when some hardship cracks open our façade – if and when something breaks our heart – we can finally hear our plaintiff cry for what we have been cut off from.   

And, in our very bones, we will remember:

We are human and we are divine.  We are, in actuality, one, undivided and whole.

We live in a divided world and we can love and be empathic.  We live as unique personalities and we can reach across the divide in our families, in our neighborhoods and in the world, in a real way.  We are tribal and we can be inclusive.  We are human beings and we can know oneness in the marrow of our bones.

This divided world is a “playground”, overflowing with opportunity for growing and for remembering, in a visceral way, that we are, in essence, unconditional love and wholeness.  We can actively embody oneness in every day life.  

From our innate wholeness, we can start with ourselves – loving every part of our sweet, confused and messy humanness.  We can truly accept our foibles and our trespasses as we relate to each other. It is possible.  We can deeply inquire and know our selves as humans; we can have compassion for our self-centeredness.  

And we can extend this kindness and love and acceptance out into the world, especially knowing that the great divides we see – male and female, white and black, powerful and powerless, arrogance and humility towards nature and life – are illusionary, deeply false and truly heart-breaking.  

We can hold, know and embody the whole picture, the transcendence of duality.  We can because we are the whole picture.  We are essentially, undivided. 

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Living from wholeness

What does it suggest to live from wholeness?  Or as Muktananda wrote: “There is boundless love within. Go within and find it.”

It is more to the point to talk about what keeps us from our innate liberation.  What keeps us from going within, from seeking the boundless love we hear is within us?  What keeps us looking “out there” instead of within?  So often it is fear – including, and maybe especially our fear of pain and distress.  

How often are we afraid of feeling fear?  Weakness?  Or anger?  How often do we avoid feeling hurt, disappointment, shame, confusion, humiliation and so on and so on - avoiding ourselves so intently that before we know it we are closed off from our emotions, from how we feel, from the small, quiet voice of our hearts. 

We are emotional/feeling beings and when we turn away from ourselves in this way we are losing much of our juicy-ness.  Like keeping our car in first gear . . . only . . . and missing out on the higher gears.   Chug, chug, lurching along.  Maybe we are staying in first gear for some apparent safety and perceived control sake, but we lose out on the freedom that comes from living life in the fullest way possible, feeling and sensing the wide-open road, feeling and sensing our full selves, being in direct contact with life.  

Fear of:  When we are afraid of feeling, when we turn away from our first, and often our most natural response to some sensation or circumstance we have added another layer that is blocking our direct contact with reality.  Now we are not only distanced from pain or hurt or fear; now we have added debilitating resistance.  Fear of and resistance to is how we do it – it is how we are taught.  It is how humans from the beginning of time have been taught. 

Resistance – the granddaddy of all suffering!  If you want to get a feel for the power of resistance pay attention to how it feels in your body when you say no to something that is already happening – a feeling, a sensation, a circumstance.  Notice the contraction, the tension and the discomfort.  Then pay attention to your body when you lean into and allow what is actually happening, what has already happened.  Your body softens and eases, like a crying child welcomed into a warm and supported embrace.  And this ease, this softening is the opening into more creative and more open ended responses.

Living from wholeness is surrendering and trusting in something higher than our small selves, our limited minds. It is letting go . . . surrendering the ego – the voice in the head that is saying don’t go there, don’t feel, don’t be vulnerable or open. 

It can feel counterintuitive to your way of thinking but when you are devoted to remembering your deepest nature you will allow yourself to break, to crumble and be held. When you surrender into whatever you are feeling in this moment, in its’ rawness, when you stay open to the sensation in your body, including the fear of feeling, including whatever resistance might be showing up, it is likely you will slide deeper and deeper into yourself and into the real heart of the matter.   And you will soften into a different reality, into a more expansive state of being.  Science tells us there is an emergent order as things disintegrate – an entropy that reveals a bigger picture.

We experience an opening in our interior when we allow what is being revealed.  In fact, the mere movement of noticing what you are feeling, what is showing up is powerful in itself.  Bringing presence to a feeling can be transformative.  In the wash of presence, the feeling can, and often does, dissipate, like clouds in the sky.

And yet . . . what about the feelings that do not dissipate?  What about what persists, even though bathed in presence?  

All that is unhealed, unseen, undigested and, especially all that is unloved, is heeding our undivided attention and might be sticking around for a deeper look – for acceptance.  All the repressed, hidden away, tucked into corners of our bodies and minds – the hushed and silenced shame and rage and grief lives within us, consciously or unconsciously.   So, why not listen; truly listen and engage.

Feelings come and go.

Presence is everlasting

Bringing presence to deeper . . . getting honest with oneself deeper . . . encounters are transformative.  Looking with a genuine curiosity – being sincerely open to what is revealed (scary feelings that stick around or come back again and again- deeply embedded habits and patterns) - will open things up and bring in sorely needed spaciousness. 

Having repressed anger most of my life it is deliciously liberating to feel a sense of outrage that might arise in the face of some egregious behavior.  Now that I am not afraid of anger, it is exhilarating to be one with the pure animal energy instinct of oxen’s hooves pawing the ground or horns banging into trees.  I am not only more in touch and more alive, vibrantly alive, but the energy it took to suppress anger is freed up and available.  There is more space. 

Something . . . call it consciousness, awareness, the ground of being, presence, or creative intelligence . . . whatever name you give it . . . is silently holding and infusing every cell of your being, every cell of all matter.  Learn to trust it, giving over time and time again to its’ call and its’ wisdom.  Feel what you are feeling.  Sense what you are sensing and let something deeper and wider speak ITS’ mind. Follow its teachings.  Trust the creative intelligence of expression. 

The conditioned mind tells us something is wrong with us when we feel frightening and vulnerable emotions.  Instead, by turning towards and by turning inward, we are given the opportunity to bring what has been left out or behind into consciousness.  Wholeness is calling us home, inviting us to be as we naturally are . . integrated, undivided, one.  

Die into oneness.

“In all chaos there is cosmos, in all disorder, a secret order.”

Carl Jung

What makes me tick?

What do you know of yourself?  What do you know of your deeper self? Asking the questions, what makes me tick, who am I really, what do I know about being alive can be portals into your very essence.  

In our heart of hearts we humans want . . . hunger for - living free from suffering, free from the ache of depression, the struggle of anxiety, the relentless choke of addictions and the underlying fear and aversion to pain and our inevitable death.  We, consciously or unconsciously seek the truth of what we are beyond our “every-day” selves, knowing our inexpressible suffering from being disconnected from direct contact with life.

And, oh, the irony of ironies about this.  It is in the very facing of this suffering, the very felt sense of this confusion and disconnect that we can find the very peace we desire.   In fact, further irony; it is in running away from our suffering that we sadly create more suffering. 

We come alive, blood flowing through the veins alive when we are free to feel the real heartbreak of loss, the real pain of missing out on your life, and the agony we feel when we crush innocence.  We become acquainted with something essential when we open into direct contact with life, with messy, ever-changing and creative life.

What if hunger, yearning, restlessness, fear, loneliness . . . suffering itself is calling you home to direct contact with yourself – calling you back to your waiting-for-you- wide-open heart?  What if desire and aversion themselves are wake up calls to what you deeply know in your innermost heart and mind?

This freedom from suffering comes from the deeply silent place, from a wide-open heart. We get so lost in our thoughts, our made-up world, lost in the forest of bewilderment and suffering, convinced of our beliefs, we miss the truth beating in our hearts, showing and opening the path to what we truly are.  The primitive/limited human mind cannot see clearly into reality.  It is not possible. It distorts, it is self-serving, by its very nature. Reality is perceived through the quiet small voice of the innermost heart and mind. 

Be brave; be willing to go under your defenses and to admit to yourself when you are hiding, when you do not know.  Listen to what has stayed underground and stay open to spiritual insights . . . be still enough to hear the music calling you. 

Follow the path of suffering, of pain and discomfort – adhere, stay, commit until you find and can dwell in ease.  Feeling lonely, being lonely can be a siren song.  You have looked for something or someone to fill the vast abyss of loneliness.  You have looked for the thing that will make you feel better.  You have looked for the song that will keep you company at night.  Take hold of the notes and delve deeply into yourself, following the sound and the resonance of what you most deeply desire.  When you touch, when you taste the wide-open space of your heart’s desire you will realize how familiar it is.  You will remember wholeness with fondness. 

Stop talking . . . figuring out, attempting to understand or control . . . and listen.  Open your ears to the conch – listen deeply and always.  Listen to the strings and beat of your heart. Listen – there is a drum beat in your being, calling you to yourself.  Turn towards yourself.  Turn towards the unspoken, the unknown. 

Do not be swayed by the noise and chatter of what you have been taught, to the limits of your conditioned beliefs.   Do not be persuaded by what is “out there”.  Turning towards your inner world can be one of the most important movements you ever make.  Something inside might just say “I’ve been waiting.” 

Stop moving and be still. 

“ . . .  and one’s body is filled with desire and one suffers. One does not know and one knows.  Yes, vaguely, one realizes that it would be good, that the world would be beautiful, that it would be a paradise, happiness for everyone and joy.  To be guided by one’s blood, let one’s self be beaten, explored, let one’s self be carried away by the galloping of one’s own blood to the infinite prairie of the heavens smooth as sand.  And one would hear galloping, galloping, beating, beating, exploring, exploring, and the thundering drum beneath the great black palm of the pulsating blood.

     But it would be the dance, the true dance, one would obey, with true obedience.  One would do what the body desires.   All these calls of the blood would be calls of joy. Whereas here, one does not know, one is not sure if one ought.  One knows that one ought, but one dies not stir, one is bound.  And from the hollow of the breast one is also bound, that dance music, and the calling blood, it as though one were torn in two.  Because the poor body no longer knows.  Because the young blood that is just made knows. “

The Joy of man’s Desiring 

Jean Giono