This is one in a series of posts with brief notes on healing, awakening, and personal things. These are more spontaneous and less comprehensive than the regular articles. Some may be made into a regular article in time.
IS AWAKENING “PERMANENT”?
Some talk as if awakening is somehow “permanent”.
I understand why.
When the noticing is here and stable, it seems obvious and unmissable. It seems it will never go away.
Time happens within and as what we are, so how could this go away?
Also, some may go into the thought that it’s permanent to find comfort. They want it to stay, so they tell themselves it will.
And yet, is it true?
Permanence is the story of a future.
I cannot know.
So for me, it’s more peaceful to hold it lightly and keep it open.
Also, I know that there is often an awakening shift, then it goes away (which can be experienced as one kind of dark night), and then it’s refound in a different and more thorough way.
[Made into a regular article]
JUNE 24, 2023
HEALTH CRISIS SYNCHRONICITY
Yesterday was the midsummer celebration in Norway, annually on June 23.
Last year, I came to Norway on that day, broke a tooth, and got sepsis and septic shock and almost died.
This year, I also ended up in an ambulance and my wife and I thought I was about to die. (It turned out that it was a different cause, and although it looked serious, my system was able to recover on its own. We had found a heavy-duty massage tool among my parents’ things, my wife used in on my shoulders, and it had messed up the nerves in the neck. That led to dizziness, strong disorientation, difficulty to talk, uncontrolled movements, and eventually an inability to speak.)
It’s interesting that these two similar-looking situations happened on midsummer and in Norway.
JULY 3, 2023
WHAT DO WE WORSHIP?
This is true when it comes to religion. If we use our religion to put others down, we are worshipping ourselves and not God or the divine. We use our ideas about religion to feel better about ourselves, and perhaps justify treating others as less than ourselves.
In a more general sense, this is true any time we hold a thought as true, whether the thought is about religion or worldviews in general, our neighbor, partner, child, parent, or ourselves, or anything else.
If we tell ourselves we know, we worship our thoughts and our ability to tell what’s true or not. In reality, I find I cannot know anything for certain. If I am honest, I have to hold all my thoughts lightly and as questions about the world.
They are here to help me communicate with myself and others, and help me navigate and function in the world. They cannot hold any full, final, or absolute truth.
DREAMWORK
What’s the “purpose” of dreamwork?
For me, it’s mainly to see what comes out of it. I explore a dream and leave any bigger-picture purpose up to life.
Also, I can say that it’s about getting to know more sides of myself. Anything in a dream represents different sides of me, and I get to know them through dreams, and I get to know them as parts of who and what I am through exploring dreams. I get to embrace more of me and find more parts of me to live from and more ways to be in life.
And I can say it is to notice that any and all experiences – whether in a dream or waking life – happen within and as the consciousness I am. It all happens within and as what I more fundamentally am.
JULY 11, 2023
SMALL-MINDED ABOUT BEING SMALL-MINDED
One of my pet peeves is people being small-minded. When they seem stuck within a small perspective, and are judgmental about others living a different life.
Of course, when that thought comes up in me and I join in with it, I am small-minded. I am just like them. I take a small-minded view on them.
So what’s the remedy?
One is to look at small-mindedness itself.
If someone appears small-minded, it’s from my own perspective. It’s my opinion. It’s a judgment in my mind.
As mentioned, I become small-minded about them. In that moment, I do exactly what I see in them. We are the same. We are in the same boat.
Also, they likely hold onto an apparently small-minded view to stay safe, just like all of us sometimes attach to a thought or identity to feel a bit safer. It’s very understandable.
They may be broad-minded in other areas of life and about other things. Perhaps even more than me. Likely more than me.
They may have other very admirable qualities, many or all of which I am unaware of.
It may come from trauma and be a trauma reaction. I also have trauma reactions.
There may be upsides to small-mindedness. In some communities, it’s easier for you to be accepted and included if you take a small-minded view. As mentioned, it helps us feel safe. (Although it doesn’t make us safe, of course.)
There are costs to being small-minded, and reminding myself of that helps me find empathy and a sense of connection. It’s about us, not me and them.
Their views may appear small-minded to me, but I don’t know much or anything about their background. Perhaps they come from an even more small-minded subculture and have worked a lot to get to where they are. And independent of the specifics of their background, I would likely hold onto similar views if it was me. We are all the product of our history and the history of our species and even the universe.
They are doing their best with what they have – their background, pain, trauma, cognitive and empathic abilities, and so on. Just like me.
They likely don’t enjoy being judged for being small-minded, so I can do them – and me – a favor and inquire into this which helps me shift out of judgment and into empathy.