thegoodfellas/blogset-br huggingface dataset:
deemed relevant to us. This is fine provided we recognize that we never see the whole show, only my perspective of it - a universe centred on me. The same is true for our everyday thoughts - we think from the perspective of 'me'. We rarely see things simple as they are. Instead the whole world we do see and beleive in is created by our sensory perceptions and our thoughts, which both arise from what I think I am - this 'me'.So who are we? What is this 'me' at the centre of my world? When we ask ourselves and each other this question, the answers are many and varied; usually an amalgam of mind, body or spirit, but with no consensus that could point to a definitive answer.[1] However, there is one commonality amongst all the answers we receive - they are invariable who we think we are, hardly ever a report of direct experience.Let's recap what we've looked at so far: What we 'see' is what we choose to look upon, what we choose to look upon reflects who we think we are, and who we think we are seems to be very confused. Does this reasoning sound a little bit obscure and self referential to you? Maybe you get the inkling of an idea that what we have here is one giant self fulfilling prophesy. What we see supports who we think we are because who we think we are selects what we see. But what if who we think we are is not true? If the self concept that is doing the perceiving is false then wouldnt everything else also be an illusion?We seem to be caught in a matrix of thought that binds us and yet is rarely seen because the core belief that it is built on, 'who we think we are', is never really examined. I'm highlighting these things not to confuse in any way, but only to attempt to loosen the trust we have in our thought system so that perhaps we might be able to recognise that 'who it tells me I am' may not be true, the 'things it tells me I can do' may only be a faint shadow of what's really possible, and the 'advice and direction it gives' may help to maintain my very limited concept of 'me' but does nothing to serve the Real Me. Isnt it strange that we trust our good judgement and yet even a cursory look at what we use for judging shows us that it is self serving and inherently flawed?What I'd like to help us see is that who we think we are is but a small, sickly shadow of who we really Are; and the way to transform our lives, solve our problems and 'change the world' (if that is what we wish) is simply to learn how to see ourselves as we really are and let this, our true Self, nourish us and live our lives. Coincidentally, when we do this we also recognize that, in spite of what
we previously believed, we are not separate from one other. We are all part of one Universal Consciousness, and the intelligence, power and incredible love that are all aspects of this Life Force are available to every one of us.In accessing the flow and genius within ourselves we also give the greatest gift to everyone in our lives and the world at large. In short, we become the change we want to see in the world. Experiencing reality directlyWe don't need thoughts to know who you are we need direct experience, and we experience directly through a mind that is still and unclouded by thought. In fact we could generalize that last sentence and perhaps restate it as 'anything we really know, we know not through thought but through direct experience'. Please take a few moments to consider whether, in your experience, this is true or not. When truth comes you know it - you feel it as an AHA! - an unshakable recognition. Thoughts are just thoughts. Knowing comes through direct recognition unencumbered by thought even though it may have been thoughts that led us to that recognition. As Bob Dylan said, "You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"You may have noticed that sometimes it appears as if there are two different 'me's.There's the me that delights in playing in the world - the one that gets caught in the daily drama of our lives. This is the one that has a ferocious appetite for anything it deems worthy of it's attention: an inflated invoice, a sporting event, another grey hair, tsunamis, sex offenders, AIDS, terrorism, the latest bug in my code, global warming, that last remark he made, corrupt governments, a favourite TV show, the pretty girl that just smiled at me and economic inequities. This is the one that creates expectations and then gets riled when life has a different plan, spraying our innards with toxic bio-chemicals in righteous indignation whilst simultaneously denying any part in creating the circumstances that catch us.Then there's the 'me' that's not fazed by any of this. Maybe it's no more than a distant feeling calling us back when we get too lost in the play of life, or we recognize it again in those still moments when our masks slip and we allow ourselves to connect with someone. Although it's perhaps mostly forgotten, it's always there. This is the Self that's largely unknown because our egos would rather be right than happy. Better to stick to the business of earning a living, raising a family, or serving the community than summon the courage to deal with the unsettling immensity of what reality might really be.Instead of just thinking about this, let's see if we can experience these two me's directly. Here's a little experiment that I'd like you to try. For this exercise I'd like you to become aware of your thoughts and not let the act of reading distract you. It may help if you record this paragraph and play it back to yourself, or get a
friend to read it to you.Please take a few moments now to let your mind relax a little. Just as we can be aware of the feelings and movements in our body we can also step back from our thoughts and simple watch them. We are not normally aware of our thoughts - one thought arises which then leads to another and then another, until we become lost in our own world. But right here, right now, step back in your mind and simply be aware of your thoughts as they come and go. Just watch them for a few moments, nothing more. Simply sit still and wait for a thought to arrise and then just be aware of that thought without following it or attaching any meaning to it. This is something we can all do. Simply watch them come and go.Feels good doesn't it?And just watch that thought come and go too.Now, as we are doing this, simply be aware of who is doing the watching, the feeling of your own Presence.Who we think we are, our self concept, is in the realm of thought - those things that we are stepping back from right now and are able to watch. But who we really Are is who it is that's doing the watching. You can see now that they are two distinctly separate entities. Who you really Are is the observer.As you are aware of your Self watching your thoughts, recognize now that who you really Are cannot be known or deducted from thought. Who you really Are can only be known through this awareness, through direct experience. This is a simple yet profound understanding that is easy to forget but will stand us in good stead later on.So what was the point of this little exercise?It may have seemed silly but it has an important purpose, - to help us see that who we think we are cannot be true. Who we think we are is bound up in thought - those things our real Self has just been watching. As we start to step back from our everyday thinking mind and allow ourselves to relax deeper into the experience of who we really Are we come to recognize that this true Self is far more intelligent, alive, creative, loving, resourceful and unlimited than anything our thoughts could even conceive of.As we have just experienced, there is no effort or journey required to access the awareness of our true Self - just a letting go of our attachment to our thoughts and the changing world they picture so we can can step back in our mind and relax - letting our attention rest in the experience of what always Is. This is so simple and easy it is almost universally overlooked.What doesn't changeAs quantum physicists and some neuroscientists are now telling us, we are the choreographers of this dance of life - the world dances to whatever tune we call.[3] The problem is, having long forgotten who we really are, we no longer recognize ourselves as having these
truly creative abilities, and therefore we appear to be limited by, and victims of, laws and circumstances that are not of our own making. This is very stressful; a stress we have become so accustomed to that the prospect of realizing our true nature, which is almost too wonderful to comprehend, can its self seem frightening.With a little practice in stepping back and simply observing our bodies and thoughts in motion we begin to not only recognize that who we thought we were is tied up in these things that we see changing, but also recognize that our own True Self that is doing the watching, is in itself unchanging. Our true Self isn't made up of matter that can be destroyed or thoughts that come and go; it is the pure intelligence that is aware of these things. It has no beginning or end, it never grows old or gets tired, it doesn't need to struggle to achieve anything at all, needs no maintenance whatsoever and isn't constrained by any limited self-concept or belief.As this awareness of our own Presence becomes more and more tangible to us we also start to recognize, incredible as it may seem, that although our genius is expressed in our own unique way, this Presence is the same creative intelligence that we all share. What I am suggesting is that penning Hamlet, discovering relativity or healing the sick takes no effort - just the ability to get out of our own way so our genius, our true nature, can shine through.If it is true that this divine spark and creative intelligence is who we really are, then why is it so illusive? Why are those moments in our lives when we are truly alive, happy and feel capable of anything so rare? Why are the Shakespeares, the Einsteins and the Siddharthas of this world so uncommon? Lets take a look now at why we struggle to shine, so that we might find a solution.Why is the flow state so illusive?The problem we have with trying to get into the flow state lies with the word 'trying'. In the exercise we did in stepping back from our thoughts we could see how easy and simple it is to access the awareness of our own Beingness. Flow is simply an attribute of who we already Are and so any attempt to try, do or attain that state is a subtle denial that we already are - a move away from it. Theres no journey or effort can take us to where we already are.Virtually everyone who has experienced true 'flow' remarks on the complete absence of thought - that we just know what to do and say, with no delay between knowing and our response. We know from our own experiences that we do our best work when we are happiest and we are happiest when we are not thinking as much, more in a state of 'feeling'. We've also just looked at why the more we try to grasp flow the more elusive it becomes, and how
attempting to get rid of our limited and fearful thoughts and beliefs is very difficult. Mystics and spiritual types have spent years trying to do this with only moderate success.We don't need to do anything to let our own genius shine, it always has and always will shine; and it shines through in the space between our thoughts when we relax and give it welcome. 'Doing' is what hides it from our awareness. To be aware of our true Self requires the opposite of doing - it's a letting go, a relaxing into, welcoming the recognition of what already Is. This requires no effort whatsoever.Those who 'seek' enlightenment are merely covering their own eyes. We are so conditioned to seeking, figuring things out, finding 'a way' to do things that we have great difficulty in accepting that we cannot 'go to', 'try to be' or 'attain' the recognition of our Self or the wonderful state of flow that accompanies it. We resist and dismiss what is closer and more obvious than our own breath as trivial and unimportant.There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says "Morning, boys. How's the water?" The two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and asks, "What the hell is water?"Think back to a time, perhaps an hour or a day when you were really happy, relaxed and everything seemed to effortlessly flow, when everyone and everything seemed to magically conspire to support you. In looking back you'll probably recognize that you were actually in a state of non-thinking - a state of feeling. Thinking has become the process which is mistakenly believed to be synonymous with knowing but in truth, knowing exists only through a state of feeling. We know something is true when it moves from the head to the heart and we feel it as an awareness and recognition. It's the thinking that generates the doubts and fears.For most of us, those moments of flow have been when we're doing something we enjoy and so we have associated flow with doing these things, but this is backward thinking. It is in doing that which we love and being with the people that we feel safe, that we have let go of the need to think, which then created the stillness and the mind space for our true feelings and nature to shine through. Genius, true happiness, love, perfect intuition and the flow state are simply attributes of who we Are and so they flow naturally from a still mind. Our true Self dances on in own volition in the white space between our thoughts, and so we need do nothing but give it welcome and get out of our own way. The good news is we are more powerful, creative and naturally happy than we can even imagine. We are all creative geniuses - and there is absolutely nothing we can do to change this.
What we do 'do' is hide this from our recognition. This is the great trick of the ego - continuous seeking keeps the presence of the seeker out of our awareness. The few we look upon throughout history as geniuses and miracle workers are simply those who knew how to get out of their own way, to become defenceless in the face of everything that seemed to be happening around them so that their own true nature could have a seat at the table.Free Will Most of us assume and insist we exercise free will but in reality we rarely do. In practice our thoughts seem to choose us, as though they had a will of their own. Try not thinking of anything for just one minute. Most people find this very difficult - our thoughts resisting all attempts to be controlled. When we make choices within our lives we call this free will, but how can we be exercising free will when we are making choices from a mind set that seems to tell us what to think?The mind makes an excellent servant but a terrible master. Free will comes from knowing who we are, what makes us happy and following this will, unencumbered by self concepts, beliefs in limitation or fearful thoughts. Instead of exercising free will what we really do is choose between different aspects of the world that these illusory, wayward thoughts picture. This is not choice but entrapment.The problem is, whilst ever we do insist that we are exercising free will then there is no escape because we don't recognize ourselves as being trapped. If you are familiar with the allegory of Plato's Cave[2]; - whilst ever we believe the flickering shadows on the cave walls are real and the cave is home, there will simply be no reason to turn around, face the sunlight and take those few easy steps to freedom.The only real choice we have is to decide to no longer be bound but our existing thought system - the illusion of relative powerlessness and limitation that seems to tell us what to give our attention to and what to think. Instead, we can allow our True Self, our inner knowing and innate wisdom, our Free Will if you like, to guide us, live our life and do whatever truly makes us happy.Our usual, everyday thought system (thinking, organizing, efforting, judging) is one of limitation - an illusion of free will. But we do have this other choice - to express our unlimited nature. We'll look now at how we can do this.Footnotes:[1] I recently read a fascinating book entitled, 'the real meaning of life' by David Seaman. It sampled some of the many thousands of responses to an Internet forum post of the same title. The answers vary from the trite to the deep and meaningful and from the funny to the tragic. What is interesting is the huge variety of opinions on who we are and what life is. [2] An overview of the Plato's Cave can be found on Wickipedia Plato's
Allegory of the cave[3] They also tell us that when we look very closely at the world 'out there' all we find is energy, constantly flowing but itself unchanging. Form is how the mind, through the senses, 'sees' this. The concept of separate things that act independently from us is an illusion we have come to believe, and (such is the the power of our mind) what we believe we seem to see.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------Chapter 3Real choice - the power of our Free WillIt's because we are so trapped in our culture, in the being of being human on this planet with the brains we have, and the same two arms and legs that everybody else has. We're so trapped that any way we could imagine to escape would be just another part of the trap. Anything we want, we're trained to want."......Chuck PalahnniukSo how do we still our mind to let our true nature and the flow state show up?Well the good news is we don't have to do anything. With a little understanding of how our attention and intention work, we'll see that this is all we ever need. These two great allies are our ticket to freedom, ready access to our genius, effortless problem solving and right action.Lets look at attention first.Our attention is the one thing we have complete dominion over. Although we're probably not consciously aware of it, we are moment to moment choosing what we give our attention to and what we ignore. This is the principle: whatever we focus on expands in our life and it does so to the exclusion of everything else.Attention cannot multitask. It can quickly flit back and forth from one thing to another to give the illusion of mutitasking but in reality it can never be in two places at the same time. Try it and see. This is why we don't need to try to still the mind or rid ourselves of limited self-concepts. When we feed our true Self with our attention we are withdrawing attention from our little, limited self. Without the support and nourishment of our attention our limited thought system simply withers away on its own. I think Buckminster Fuller nailed it quite succinctly when he said, "You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." and perhaps Mother Theresa knew it intuitively too, - when asked to march against the war in Vietnam, she replied, "No, I won't but when you have a march for peace, I'll be there."This is the same reason why we find we find it so hard to break habits and resolve many of the big problems in our lives. When we focus on solving a problem our attention is on the problem and then that attention just perpetuates the problem. This is what happens when we try to stop smoking, get out of debt or lose weight - we focus on the weight problem and then just get frustrated as hell at how difficult it seems to be
to keep the weight off. Have you ever wondered why as soon as you want to break a habit the temptations seem to suddenly multiply? We tell ourselves we need to find a better diet or need to try harder or have more discipline, all the while oblivious to the fact that we are feeding the problem by focusing on it. The ones that find it easy are those that see themselves as they want to be and feed that vision with their attention instead. Then, any diet would work. It seems to me that once we start to apply and teach these principles we could quite easily prevent all the lifestyle diseases that seem to be so prevalent and flourishing at this time.So, instead of 'trying' to get into flow, and instead of battling with our doubts and habitual thinking patterns, when we simply choose to give our attention to our true Self, this is what grows in our awareness. The rest just falls away.Now we'll turn our attention to our other ally, intention.Our intent is the great power that each and every one of us has and yet we are mostly unaware of it. Our limited self thought system would have us believe that to achieve anything we need to expend energy, to try, to work at it; - over many millennia, we have so over-learnt this that we have virtually forgotten this power of our intent. The difficulty most of us have with this is that it is so simple it is tempting to overlook it or dismiss it as trivial. Our ego's insists there must be something else. Perhaps fearing its own extinction it always seems to wants to get in on the act and complicate things but by attempting more we withhold the little that is asked. It is the power of our intention and not our own effort that we need to trust. There isn't anything mystical or 'other worldy' about this and it's not something or someone outside ourselves that brings this awareness to us. It is simply our own ability to always know who we really Are.Think back to the little exercise we did earlier where we stood back from the activity of our body and our thoughts and just watched them. By watching ourselves operating and perhaps floundering in the world we can become aware of our errant thoughts (grounded in beliefs in effort and limitation) and also what it is that's doing the watching. We can simply give our attention to this Observer, with the sole intent of reclaiming our Essence and our Free Will; and trust this, our true Self, to nourish us, lead the way and shine upon our lives.Here is the principle: We can call upon the power of our intent to bring our True Self into our awareness. We can choose this and trust that in choosing it is done, nothing more; and to experience the result of our choice we need only relax and feel the peace that envelopes us as we recognise our Self in this