Are you aware that you’re a vehicle of energy? Wherever your attention goes your energy follows—along with your creative power. But in the modern age of information, which is quickly turning into the age of confusion, your clarity is even more precious: the ability to discern what’s true, or not, allows you to make conscious, spiritually responsible choices rather than reacting or getting triggered by what others say or do; by what they judge in you or you think they expect. Clarity gives you the power to find your authentic, joyful place in the Universe and create a better future for yourself and the world.
You may not realize it, but all the noise and fast-paced busyness that appears so normal is continuously strengthening your ego’s ‘sense of otherness,’ the inner bully that colors your perception and disconnects you from yourself. Because your sense of otherness is a reflection of the world and the world is a reflection of your sense of otherness. Yep, in reality they’re one and the same projection of the mind, and the realization that you are not your mind frees you from its grip.
Clearly, this is easier said than done, for you’ve completely identified with the mind, and you may even be wondering what I’m talking about here, thinking, “If I am not my mental processes, my memories, my story, then who am I?” Well, would you say you weren’t you as a child, before you acquired conscious memories of yourself, the awareness of being separate or different from your environment, or a more wounded and conditioned sense of self?
In truth, back then you were more authentically, more audaciously, and more lovingly YOU. But this is a play of Consciousness and we’re each playing our roles while exploring things and having individualized experiences. Now, if you’re often distracted and giving away your attention, your emotional energy, and your clarity to others, the ego-mind will pull you further and further away from your true nature and you’ll miss the true purpose of your life-movie: to discover yourself and realize your own divinity. If this purpose is blocked or distorted, life becomes dull, stressful, boring, gray, painful, fuzzy, or filled with obstacles and opposition.
Now, don’t get me wrong, life is challenging no matter what, since you navigate it with an ego-mind and your ego gets attached to things and people while life itself is fluidity and change. But there’s a huge difference between living life mainly from sensory perception (the density of 3rd dimension) and embracing it from a higher, deeper awareness within you. Things may look the same on the outside, but your experience can be one of distress and fear or one of joy and peace.
There are two ways to learn the way back to Consciousness, that is, to your true nature: one is through awareness and the other through suffering; and the greater your awareness, the less suffering is needed, because awareness is love and love heals your disconnection. By the same token, the more aligned to Consciousness, the more joy you’ll experience. And I don’t mean you have to be super happy, jumping up and down about something; I’m referring to a quiet, intimate reunion with the clarity and peace within you. It comes from emotional dispassion, which is love without attachment—in other words, love without ego. True joy is inner silence.
Freedom Begins By Perceiving Things Anew
I read somewhere that, as a young child, acclaimed writer Annie Dillard often hid a penny on the street for someone else to find. She’d place it in a crack of the pavement or next to a tree and used a piece of chalk to draw long arrows pointing to it from various directions. Once she learned to write, she’d even add something like, “Surprise ahead!” But she didn’t lurk about to find who the recipient of this little miracle would be; the excitement of knowing some lucky passer-by would find the penny was enough for her.
She had no attachment to the outcome of her actions and expected nothing in return: no recognition, not gratitude, no flattery, not even a smile from a lucky stranger or her family, had they known. She didn’t share what she was doing with anyone either, and kept this random act of love to herself. The joy it brought her was the only reward she needed. Why? Because she did it for its own sake, with the excitement, generosity, and freedom of her child-like perception.
There was no self-proclaimed godliness about this micro-miracle she orchestrated. But how many people do you think would notice or care about finding a penny today, when everyone is glued to their cell phones and neglect to make the time to look at the sky or breathe in the beauty and love that surrounds them? In spite of the noise, the imperfections, and the density and darkness of these times, you too have the choice to find delight in the mundane.
When you were little, before your ego was shaped and congealed, you were much closer to Consciousness than you are now, with all your knowledge and experiences and training and accomplishments, because your ego wasn’t fully in control yet, directing your life-movie as much as it does now. So your path toward emotional and spiritual freedom—the joy and happiness you seek outside of you—is really a return to yourself, to the wonder and curiosity and endless capacity for love you had before your ego was formed. You reclaim them by nurturing those qualities that were more natural back then:
- Be humble. Only your ego has anything to prove, out of fear and insecurity.
- Be curious. Without curiosity you can’t grow or be fully awake.
- Be fluid. When you think of yourself as fixed, with positive or negative labels, you box yourself in ego.
- Be grateful. Approach every day as a new opportunity to discover new things or new ways of doing things.
- Be playful. Stop taking yourself too seriously and let go of your self-images.
- Value your time. How you spend each day is how you’re using up and paving your life.
- Value your energy. Where and how you invest it determines how you’re shaping your future.
- Be free and detached. Express yourself fully, even if nobody is listening or watching.
- Do things for their own sake. No ulterior motives, no expectations, no agendas; just the sheer joy of exploring life.
- Cultivate solitude and silence. Counteract the busyness of ego (the world) with introspection and stillness.
Consciousness is inner peace, joy, true love, and happiness. But as long as you remain identified with the ego-mind you’ll think of it as something external, something outside of yourself you may only find through others. So contact me today to diminish your egoic ‘sense of otherness’ and begin the wondrous journey of an autonomous yet empowering soul-guided life!
© 2018 Yol Swan. All rights reserved.
