Oh so sweet all the lovely inquirers who came to participate in the teleconference yesterday morning.
For those who missed it but wanted to do your own work and follow along, click here. Please keep this confidential and hold it as the personal and sacred work that it is.
There were so many who listened in (so touching!)….your presence was wonderful, and thank you for coming and questioning your thoughts and being with us as silent participants.
So many people love questioning their beliefs….and it isn’t always easy to understand how to do it.
Recently I worked with someone who was deeply disturbed by the unknown that presented itself when considering question four.
Who would you be without that thought?
Yikes. No idea.
Like on the phone call yesterday….as we looked at the belief“that person should STOP doing what they’re doing.”
Maybe without the thought, if someone were threatening us, we wouldn’t KNOW it….and we’d get badly hurt, we’d be crushed, we’d walk right into dangerous situations, we’d die.
It was late at night several years ago and I was having trouble sleeping.
I had not heard from someone I loved dearly for a long time, despite occasional emails and two long heart-felt phone messages left on her voicemail.
I had asked “Is something wrong? Have I hurt you? I love you, you know….”
Nothing.
I was entirely confused. We were close, we shared intimately. This was one of my best friends. I would scan my mind trying to think about what could have happened.
Time for the work. A perfect thing to do when you can’t sleep.
Is it true that she should stop offering silence, non-communication, emptiness?
Yes. I can feel it. Something changed, something off. I don’t know if it’s me, true….could be something else….but how strange.
I would feel better if there were contact.
Can I absolutely know that to be true? Am I sure? Would I really feel better with contact? Am I sure it’s true that I would be better of if she STOPPED being silent?
No. In fact, I love silence.
I used to be uncomfortable with silence, but now it is so incredible, I almost can’t wait for the next quiet time, the next meditation retreat…I am even thrilled about being in silence without going on retreat.
But with her…would things be better, if only….
No. Can’t know that’s true.
How do I react?
I think, think, wonder, imagine, reach out, ponder.
People have this feeling with someone they are newly interested in sometimes: he should call, she should email, I wish I would run into him right now, she should be here with me….this aloneness should stop.
It doesn’t feel exactly relaxed, you know? It’s slightly edgy, nervous, sad, worried….or aggravating, feeling extremely hurt, knife in the heart.
So who would you be without the thought that he or she should stop that? Stop being silent? Stop interrupting? Stop coming too close? Stop moving too far away? Stop leaving?
“Truth never explains why it’s moving that way at that moment. And if you ask, it won’t give any information. It would be like a leaf asking the wind, “Why are you moving that way right now?” The question doesn’t make any sense to the wind.” ~ Adyashanti
Without the thought I wait, I move towards, then away, then I rest, I let the wind out of my sail, I stop trying, effort-ing, pushing.
Then one day several weeks later, after that late night doing The Work, I made a discovery and find out something about my good friend, completely by accident, that is absolutely shocking (or seems so) and then I even chuckle because I thought I might know what couldn’t have been known.
And I realize all that is possible is to hold that dear person with the greatest compassion, with all their frightened reactions and mixed up responses and mistaken dramas….
….and I remember this is also me.
I have imagined the worst, made up dramas, reacted with fear, had mixed up responses going on inside MY mind. Imagining “bad” things because of….silence.
The mental process is the same.
“We’re all children when we believe unquestioned nursery-school thoughts. – He’s a bad person, it’s not fair, I need to be punished, I’ll cry to get what I want, I’m a victim, you are my problem.- Have you graduated yet?” ~ Byron Katie
I turn the thought around: I should stop what I’m doing.
Especially when it comes to that friend, to my relationship to the unknown, when it comes to silence and uncertainty and lack of approval or contact from someone….I should stop.
Because it hurts to imagine what THEY are thinking.
“That’s the part very few people come to know: it can stop. The noise, the fear, the confusion, the constant changing of these inner energies–it can all stop….You thought you had to protect yourself, so you grabbed the things that were coming at you and used them to hide……But you can let go of what you’re clinging to and not play this game….It will stop. No more struggling–just peace.” ~ Michael Singer
Stop what I’m doing? Stop this war with that person, and what they’re doing? Let go, and stop clinging to my ideas, my demands, my war with what is?
Yes.
Much love, Grace