Healing is a kind of reprogramming.
When we have an emotional issue, we can say it’s because of a program telling us that certain painful stories are true. We perceive and live as if they are true, and relate to our experiences as if these painful stories are true.
When we operate from separation consciousness, it’s similarly programming telling us that separation consciousness reflects how our world most fundamentally is, and that we most fundamentally are a separate self.
This means that healing from emotional issues, and healing out of separation consciousness, requires a form of reprogramming.
Thorough healing requires us to reprogram how we relate to our thoughts, how we relate to contractions, and how we relate to life and our experiences in general.
We shift out of one program, one habitual way to relate to life, and find another way and create another pattern for how we relate to life.
REPROGRAMMING HOW WE RELATE TO THOUGHTS
For instance, instead of relating to thoughts as true, we can recognize them as thoughts and examine their content.
When we take a thought as true, we identify with it and perceive and live – at least partly – as if its true. This inevitably brings some stress and discomfort. We assume that the way the thought tells us the world is, is the way the world inherently is. We may not even recognize it as a thought, and we get absorbed into the content of the thought, the stories it tells us.
So instead, we can explore how it is to do the opposite. We can notice the thought as a thought. And we can notice and examine the story it comes with, and find what’s more true for us.
REPROGRAMMING HOW WE RELATE TO CONTRACTIONS
What is a contraction? It has physical, psychological, and energetic components. We have a body contraction. Our mind associates it with beliefs, identifications, hangups, emotional issues, and traumas (all mind contractions). And this also has an energetic component.
When these contractions come up – with their unexamined painful stories and unloved fear – we may fall into our old pattern. We perceive and act as if what they are telling us is true, and we act on it or react to it and try to make it go away.
In general, our old program may tell us to…. defend the painful stories, try to contain the contraction, try to distract ourselves from it, try to make it go away, secretly hate it because it’s uncomfortable, and so on.
So instead, we can explore how it is to create a new program, by…. questioning the stories, allow the contract to be and get as big as it wants, stay with it and meet it, welcome it, find genuine love for it, and so on
REPROGRAMMING INTO NOTICING WHAT WE MOST FUNDAMENTALLY ARE
Most of us are programmed to take ourselves as this human self, and – more essentially – a separate being. There is an I and me here and a wider world out there.
That’s not wrong, and it’s not what we most fundamentally are in our own first-person experience.
When we look, we may find we are…. Capacity for our experiences, and what all our experiences – of this human self and the wider world – happen within and as.
When I explore this, I find that all my experiences happen within my sense fields, and my sense field is a seamless whole. There is no inherent I or other anywhere. That appearance only comes from an overlay of mental images and words, and it only seems real if these are held as true.
What I find is that, to myself and in my first-person experience, I most fundamentally are what we imperfectly may label… oneness, love, stillness & silence, and consciousness.
As I keep noticing this, this noticing becomes a new program. It becomes a new habitual way of perceiving and living.
REPROGRAMMING INTO NOTICING THE NATURE MY EXPERIENCES, AND ESPECIALLY CONTRACTIONS
Even when we notice our own nature, we may still fall into our old programs about what certain experiences are and how to relate to them.
And this especially happens when it comes to contractions and their painful unexamined stories and unloved fear. When these come up, we may fall into our old program of taking what they say as true and either join in with the contraction or battle with it and try to make it go away. We operate as if they are what their form tells us they are.
Instead, we can explore their nature.
I have found what I am and my own nature, I notice in a general way that all my experiences have the same nature, and yet I sometimes go into the old program of perceiving and acting as if some parts of me – the contractions and unexamined fear – is just what the form tells me they are. I overlook the nature of what comes up.
So instead, I can notice what happens, and intentionally notice the nature of these contractions. Do they have the same nature as everything else does in my experience? Are they too the same as I am?
What happens when I notice this? When I relax into this noticing?
When I invite and allow the contractions to find their own nature, and unravel and relax into and as that noticing?
A REPROGRAMMING THROUGH DOING
This is a reprogramming that happens through doing.
I may notice an old program doesn’t work so well, so I seek out and find some potential new programs. I try them out, and if they seem to work, I can continue to explore, refine, and use it.
Through using this new program, I make it into a new habit.
A REPROGRAMMING OF HOW WE RELATE TO LIFE
All of this is a reprogramming in how we relate to life.
Our habitual pattern may be to relate to life according to how certain thoughts tell us life is.
And we can find a more immediate way of relating to these thoughts and life. We notice more than operating from what thoughts tell us.
We’ll still make use of thoughts to orient and navigate in the world, but our center of gravity is more in the noticing – of thoughts as thoughts, of what we in our own first-person experience are, and the nature of all of our experiences including discomfort and contractions.
And all of this is an ongoing process.
Note: I wrote this on my phone in the wilderness so it’s not edited as I would normally like to.
DRAFT FRAGMENTS
When we take a thought as true, we identify with it and perceive and live as if it’s true. We can either make this our conscious identity and who we are and find some comfort with it (although it will also inevitably bring discomfort), or we can react to it, struggle with it, and try to make it go away.
…
For instance, instead of relating to thoughts as true, we can recognize them as thoughts and examine their content. When we take a thought as true, we identify with it and perceive and live as if it’s true. We can either make this our conscious identity and who we are and find some comfort with it (although it will also inevitably bring discomfort), or we can react to it, struggle with it, and try to make it go away.
….
How do we nourish it? By exploring, gaining some insights, perhaps finding others who
….
We find and explore a new program, try it out, and if it seems to work we can continue exploring it, refining it, and making it into a new habit.
What I call reprogramming here is finding a new way of relating to life and different aspects of life, and nourishing it and making it into a new habit.
….
REPROGRAMMING OUR ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT THE NATURE OF OUR EXPERIENCES
Even when we notice our own nature, we may still fall into our old programs about what certain experiences are and how to relate to them.
Especially when contractions come up – with their unexamined painful stories and unloved fear – we may fall into our old pattern. We perceive and act as if what they are telling us is true, and we act on it or react to it and try to make it go away.
In general, our old program may tell us to…. defend the painful stories, try to contain the contraction, try to distract ourselves from it, try to make it go away, secretly hate it because it’s uncomfortable, and so on.
So instead, we can explore how it is to create a new program, by…. questioning the stories, allow the contract to be and get as big as it wants, stay with it and meet it, welcome it, find genuine love for it, and so on.