Fear was the midwife at the conceptual birth of separation. The attendants were desire, greed, suffering, and anger. Michael Roads
Imagine being much more free than you are now. Once you decide to express yourself as you truly would like to be then you no longer need the system that insists that you act like everyone else. Once you let go of the need to be controlled then you become free. Think about what I just said. If you feel you need people to like you or you need other peoples approval for everything in your life, then you are being controlled by the circumstances linked to the worldview about yourself that society imprinted on you as a child. It is a strange set of ‘expectations’ that our upbringing and acceptance of social norms imposed upon all of us. We have been told that we are separate beings struggling to exist in a dog-eat-dog world of competition, with just a few lucky winners and a whole lot of losers. Those that supposedly win are expected to lord it over those that they supposedly have defeated – it’s all about No 1 apparently. And the saddest part of it all is that most of the people buy into this crap without giving it a second thought. We bitch and moan about the state of the world and how unfair it all is, but shrug our shoulders and put our heads down and just angrily accept the greed, suffering, and unfairness as the result of some unjust God or uncaring universe. We fear almost everything, but especially the judgment of other people of what we do, or don’t do. We fear failing so we don’t try in case we fail, so we try to control our piece of our minuscule world and defend it with great intent. We believe that everything is scarce and so fight to hoard what we have against those who might take it away from us (attachment to things and people). The hierarchy feed us fear to keep us in line and we meekly accept what they feed us as truth without questioning it all for fear of being ridiculed (judgement by others) and in return join the bandwagon by ridiculing others who don’t fit the social norms imposed upon us. We feel alone in the middle of a crowd, but at least the crowd is a mass of other humanity that feels as separate as we do – we have some kinship in our misery. Love when it comes is beautiful but we always fear betrayal, and joy comes in short bursts but our fear of the dark beyond those moments casts our joy into the recessed shadows of our egoic mind. I apologize for that last paragraph, but I would like you to think about your life and whether you feel that free. Think about everything that ‘confines’ you and then why? The why may be elusive.
Now think about who you would truly like to be if you had no constraints. If you say rich and famous you haven’t thought it though – that is still a figment of the world the hierarchy want you to believe in. If it is to lord it over other people then you are sipping the same coolaid the hierarchy use – you’re still thinking power, control and competition. If it is about helping other people and making their lives better even as yours is now better, then you’re thinking collaboration and sharing. And you don’t need to be rich and famous to make other peoples lives, and by association your own, better.
If there is one thing I have found from years of teaching and interacting with people when I talk about a sustainable world if that nearly everyone shares a similar view of what they want from like. Our self-worth has been caught up in public recognition of our contributions – the need for fame and fortune; but as psychotherapist Brene Brown points out, our culture is quick to make the contributions of ‘ordinary’ hardworking people mundane and boring, where the term “ordinary has become synonymous with Meaninglessness.” Everywhere, everyday, there are ‘ordinary’ people doing extraordinary things that enrich and improve peoples’ lives. And they do it with a love, compassion and sense of purpose that others can only admire. The other crazy thing that sets this type of person aside is that they are often happy and full of joy, and when questioned, display an innate sense of worth about themselves – they are authentic people.
Happiness is the passive state, and joy the active state of a positive consciousness. While happiness is an emotion, joy is more. However, both are expressions of an inner state of consciousness. Being happy does not need a cause, it is a state of being. Joy is the more active, dynamic expression of consciousness, yet it is probably less visible to other people than happiness. Happiness easily writes its expression on the face, and is contagious, while joy, though quieter, is more powerful and transforming for it comes from deep within. As happiness is to self . . . joy is to Self. A trigger for joy is found by . . . choosing Love! Michael Roads
I have talked of this previously. When people are surveyed about their lives, only about 10% state that they are happy at what they do for a living. That means 90% of people are working to make money to live, or to fund a lifestyle that will bring then fleeting moments of happiness. Yes, we are again talking about spirituality. (see prior posts Spirituality 1-3). But think about it. A job is something you don’t want to do but it gets you money – its sole purpose is to get you money. If money becomes the goal you begin to confuse the end goal as being the acquisition of money. A vocation on the other hand is doing something you love so much that the money you get paid is incidental. Now, be honest with yourself – if you could do anything you wanted as a job or vocation, what would it be – anything – imagine that the magic genie has just appeared in front of you and will grant that wish.
Obviously, the genie is not going to be there, BUT given that CHOICE, what would you do? Who would you choose to be if you didn’t have yourself, and so many people in your life, telling you what you are supposed to do and be. Now consider how you will actually make such a choice and become that authentic version of yourself. What kinds of creative things would you be doing if you only had less restrictions and responsibilities. Don’t get me wrong, you need to be responsible for what you do and the choices you make and to do so without causing harm to others; yet, how often do we have those responsibilities foisted on our shoulders by well-meaning people who themselves are as embroiled in the system as the rest of us. There is a different path we can choose. I deal more with those challenges that we give ourselves in the next post.
To Definitely be Continued….
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