Again, a post from March. I'll be dumping old thoughts and new addendums in the days to come.
Fun
Sometimes the most fun you can have is right in the middle of something. It’s not the end goal that is the good time, it’s the steps along the way. I just finished a crazy workout and here is the lesson: what you do isn’t fun. How you perceive what you do allows fun into your life. Fun is a natural state. There seems to be a big false perception that action X, Y, or Z is where fun shows up (clubbing, drinking, general pursuits of debauchery). Trying to have fun is never very rewarding. It makes it seem as if fun is a possession, as evidenced in the phrase “have” fun just like I “have” a car. Fun, joy, and feelings of lightheartedness are just that- feelings. They come from within.
Similarly, the pursuit of happiness is strange and ironic thing. One tries to find the illusive thing, the final piece of the puzzle that, once it clicks, allows one to be happy and life to be fulfilled, and so one devotes their time to the pursuit of some external factor to make one feel complete, whole, or finally fulfilled. But the truth is that sort of happiness is illusive, fleeting, non-existent. Happiness comes from within, not from without. So stop your mad search to finally find the thing that fulfils you, makes you feel whole and complete, whether you’re looking for a lover, shopping for the latest shoes to dull the ache, or any other behavior that could otherwise be healthy but might have turned into a destructive habit in you. You know which your personal vice is. Let yourself be happy where you are, here and now.
Sit for a moment in stillness. Simply become aware of being aware. Think to yourself “I am here and, right now, I am good enough.” Find a physical sensation to focus on to take your mind of the compulsive feeling of lack which characterizes anyone who feels the need to look outside rather than within for their feelings of joy.
Use the mind to fill yourself up as you need. Focus it on a list of five things you’re grateful for. Look for the rays of light within your own present day life. Don’t hang your hopes for salvation on an illusory future which doesn’t exist anywhere outside your mind. Even if you sweat and strain and work as hard as you can to make that dream come true, what happened to the time you spent sweating and straining? Did you enjoy it? Did you love it? Did you live it? Those are moments of time you will never, ever get back or be able to replace, buy, or cover up with all of the fancy material possessions in the world. I’m not telling you not to strive for goals. I’m telling you that your primary focus is on right now. If you aren’t enjoying what you’re doing, why are you doing it? But remember, your state of mind determines whether you enjoy it, not the event itself.
Need a quick trick to get into the present moment? Breathe. You probably remembered to breathe again after you read that, right? Most human breath is shallow, sometimes non-existent, as we are constantly distracted from other things, taken out of our bodies by our minds and left in a very odd, anaerobic and not very healthy state.
Focus on your breathing. Don’t force it to be deep or shallow, but just let it go. Put your attention in your hands or feet or chest or belly or hips or butt or knees or the whole body. Anywhere that your attention naturally falls within the body, however briefly. The body, while impermanent, is part of your present reality. Though it will leave you eventually, it is what you have now, so use it to become aligned with the now, and so forget your false futures and restricting pasts.
Allow that wave of attentiveness to flow over the whole body. Feel how things relax and release when you give them just a moment of attention, of the TLC that we are all craving every moment. Give it to yourself. Give yourself the love that you deserve. Don’t let your radiant existence become a means to an end. Stop thinking of beginnings and endings. Things neither begin, nor do they end, except from the limited perception of the mind. Be here now and accept reality and love it as if it were the salvation of all people. Don’t love it conditionally. Don’t focus on how much you love your six pack or your smooth, slender fingers or anything like that. Don’t love the artifice. Love what holds it together, the energy field within that you feel when you give some part of your body focus, the energy that rushes in an allows a certain part of you to relax and unwind. Allow it to enter and your physical body to become less tight, constricted, and dense. This energy you feel, this subtle release, is what binds all things in the universe together.
We are much more energy than we are physical matter. The distances between protons, electrons, neutrons, and atoms is infinitely greater than any of those material things. As such, all form are actually essentially empty space, held together by forces which cause them to appear solid. We are all riding on this energy, these forces, and bound together so infinitely that separateness is nothing but an illusion. Recognizing this infinite similarity, the macro-unity we all are, is love. It is to see that there is nowhere someone ends and another begins. All things are, simultaneously.
Recognize your own presence, and you will begin to see it everywhere you look. If you start with love within, you will have no choice but to love without.
Fun
Sometimes the most fun you can have is right in the middle of something. It’s not the end goal that is the good time, it’s the steps along the way. I just finished a crazy workout and here is the lesson: what you do isn’t fun. How you perceive what you do allows fun into your life. Fun is a natural state. There seems to be a big false perception that action X, Y, or Z is where fun shows up (clubbing, drinking, general pursuits of debauchery). Trying to have fun is never very rewarding. It makes it seem as if fun is a possession, as evidenced in the phrase “have” fun just like I “have” a car. Fun, joy, and feelings of lightheartedness are just that- feelings. They come from within.
Similarly, the pursuit of happiness is strange and ironic thing. One tries to find the illusive thing, the final piece of the puzzle that, once it clicks, allows one to be happy and life to be fulfilled, and so one devotes their time to the pursuit of some external factor to make one feel complete, whole, or finally fulfilled. But the truth is that sort of happiness is illusive, fleeting, non-existent. Happiness comes from within, not from without. So stop your mad search to finally find the thing that fulfils you, makes you feel whole and complete, whether you’re looking for a lover, shopping for the latest shoes to dull the ache, or any other behavior that could otherwise be healthy but might have turned into a destructive habit in you. You know which your personal vice is. Let yourself be happy where you are, here and now.
Sit for a moment in stillness. Simply become aware of being aware. Think to yourself “I am here and, right now, I am good enough.” Find a physical sensation to focus on to take your mind of the compulsive feeling of lack which characterizes anyone who feels the need to look outside rather than within for their feelings of joy.
Use the mind to fill yourself up as you need. Focus it on a list of five things you’re grateful for. Look for the rays of light within your own present day life. Don’t hang your hopes for salvation on an illusory future which doesn’t exist anywhere outside your mind. Even if you sweat and strain and work as hard as you can to make that dream come true, what happened to the time you spent sweating and straining? Did you enjoy it? Did you love it? Did you live it? Those are moments of time you will never, ever get back or be able to replace, buy, or cover up with all of the fancy material possessions in the world. I’m not telling you not to strive for goals. I’m telling you that your primary focus is on right now. If you aren’t enjoying what you’re doing, why are you doing it? But remember, your state of mind determines whether you enjoy it, not the event itself.
Need a quick trick to get into the present moment? Breathe. You probably remembered to breathe again after you read that, right? Most human breath is shallow, sometimes non-existent, as we are constantly distracted from other things, taken out of our bodies by our minds and left in a very odd, anaerobic and not very healthy state.
Focus on your breathing. Don’t force it to be deep or shallow, but just let it go. Put your attention in your hands or feet or chest or belly or hips or butt or knees or the whole body. Anywhere that your attention naturally falls within the body, however briefly. The body, while impermanent, is part of your present reality. Though it will leave you eventually, it is what you have now, so use it to become aligned with the now, and so forget your false futures and restricting pasts.
Allow that wave of attentiveness to flow over the whole body. Feel how things relax and release when you give them just a moment of attention, of the TLC that we are all craving every moment. Give it to yourself. Give yourself the love that you deserve. Don’t let your radiant existence become a means to an end. Stop thinking of beginnings and endings. Things neither begin, nor do they end, except from the limited perception of the mind. Be here now and accept reality and love it as if it were the salvation of all people. Don’t love it conditionally. Don’t focus on how much you love your six pack or your smooth, slender fingers or anything like that. Don’t love the artifice. Love what holds it together, the energy field within that you feel when you give some part of your body focus, the energy that rushes in an allows a certain part of you to relax and unwind. Allow it to enter and your physical body to become less tight, constricted, and dense. This energy you feel, this subtle release, is what binds all things in the universe together.
We are much more energy than we are physical matter. The distances between protons, electrons, neutrons, and atoms is infinitely greater than any of those material things. As such, all form are actually essentially empty space, held together by forces which cause them to appear solid. We are all riding on this energy, these forces, and bound together so infinitely that separateness is nothing but an illusion. Recognizing this infinite similarity, the macro-unity we all are, is love. It is to see that there is nowhere someone ends and another begins. All things are, simultaneously.
Recognize your own presence, and you will begin to see it everywhere you look. If you start with love within, you will have no choice but to love without.
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