Spiritual leaders will tell you that 'more' is our challenge. If we are poor, we want more. If we are rich, we want more. We work towards something, achieve it, feel a sense of pride that very soon flickers out. Shouldn't we be moving onto something else, we ask?
I am profoundly guilty of this state of mind. My mind is such that is always in search for the next thing to do, or achieve. I can feel the restlessness, the confused mind; the trying to put things in their rightful place. Don't I have an appointment card at the bottom of a handbag? Now, which handbag was that? Maybe, I have double booked myself. How can I know when I haven't written all the dates in my diary, I ask myself, berating myself as I go. I don't really need anyone else to come down hard on me, since I do an excellent job of flogging myself. If only I was perfect. If only I was more motivated, more organised, more...
Sometimes, I ask, 'What have you actually achieved today? Anything??' That's delusional thinking of course since I can't sit still much at all, nor really ever feel satisfied with my output. I'm usually confident that, if more efficient, I could have achieved so much more.
There is no question, from anybodies perspective, that I could, indeed, achieve more. Time is spent on tumblr. Time is spent reading articles on Buddhism, or talking to friends, or trying to settle my mind as to what on earth it is that I really should be doing before the day comes to an end. I am a disorganized, organized sort of person. I get there in the end, but I have to push myself to get there. Seriously, quite honestly, I'd rather not think, and that's nothing new. I have been aware of this fact always. I'm dreamy. It is what it is.
Doing my writing course worked from the point of view that there were outside forces insisting that I do my work. Of course, nobody insists that you get Distinctions and High Distinctions. This is self enforced and comes from egoic thought, but there it is. If I was putting my name to it, it had be of high quality.
In the process of assisting my son make a film I chatted with a wonderful psychologist who, whilst waiting for the lighting to be 'perfect' (Oh gosh yes, I passed on these genes...) told me many stories about past patients (all anonymous, of course). He told me he had one woman submit a paper for her post graduate degree that barely passed with a push. Under no circumstances was she to submit a paper that earned more than a P. She had got it into her head, he explained, that she was a failure in spite of all that she had achieved. She was a failure if she didn't get a HD, and if her baby cried in the night, well, more evidence that she was a failure at parenthood too. So, he nipped it in the bud by taking her as close to failure as he dared and showing her that she would survive the 'ordeal'.
The story was terribly, painfully close to home, although I never let on. Of course. But, it did occur to me that if I were ever to put my trust in psychology again (highly unlikely), this was my man. It helped that he had a brilliant sense of humor and that the irony was that he was as uptight about his own son's VCE year (final year of school) as any of his clients. He said to me that "we have so much to do over the holidays", and then we shared a knowing look. Yep. He was a perfectionist, anal retentive too. Over-achievers are painstakingly boring and predictable, and there are so many of them around! (It takes one to know one.)
I've mentioned before that I meditate in a group, though Tuesday was my first group meditation in two months, far too long between cushion time for me. My meditation leader is a fabulous woman who has become a good friend. I'm suffering jealousy right now because she is in New Zealand at a retreat that I dearly wish I was at, but I chose Japan with my husband instead, and that was the right decision. Still. It's hard right now. I wish I was there.
Anyway, as spiritually evolved as she is, she gets tense. She worries. So, I asked her what to do in those situations. What does she do in those situations?
'You must go to your cushion,' she says. 'It is the best place for you. The feelings will pass. Clarity will come once you sit and let go.'
I have had many fleeting thoughts, not always 'caught', about BDSM, about dominance, being similar to a spiritual life. The Top, as I have experienced it, insists, absolutely insists on control, and with that categorical control, provides the sort of space where thoughts can be let go. Whether that it is through pain, or pleasure, or some of both, he empties the head of obsessive thoughts and worries and provides a space where the submissive can surrender to life; find the true essence of oneself, free of concerns about what to achieve in the material world.
Eckhart Tolle, whom I recommend to you as an easily understood spiritual leader, said in a short UTube clip that "every moment offers you the choice between conditioned reactions or conscious Presence". The goal is to bring some space into the stream of thought, and that is what happens when beaten, when bound, when contained, when reduced.
Once, in the very early days of my investigations into domination I read of a man who had a big chair in the corner of a room and when his girl was fraught, over anxious or overwhelmed, he told her to sit there and not to dare to move unless he gave her permission. She would sit there, angry, smoke rising through her nostrils and up into the air, but as time went by the negative energy began to dissipate and she began to think clearly. Then, they could talk it through, calmly and with clarity.
I've had better meditations than last Tuesday but none more still and pain free. I sit with my knees folded under me and, maybe it was all the walking we did in Japan, but it was perfectly comfortable to do this for the entire hour. My meditation leader once said to us that sometimes it pays to go to the pain, not hide from it. She counsels people with cancer and it is a strategy they use, not to fear the pain but to consciously experience it and come to the resolution that it is a do-able pain. I did this and discovered that I was more or less pain-free. I maintained my focus in my body very well indeed, stayed with my breath, returned to my body when thoughts came; refused to give in to the thinking mind; banished it. It takes practice. The words 'coming home to the body' resonate with me now.
This is part of the whole understanding that in meditation we 'come home to the body'. Focus is put on the breath, or perhaps the feet. Focus is taken away from the thoughts, or at least we acknowledge the awareness that thought has happened, again, and now we return to the body, to the open spaced Consciousness where we just exist; that space between thoughts. One way to achieve this is to focus on the process of breathing, not to engage in it but to watch it. The body will inhale when it is ready; will exhale when it is ready. And, in between the inhalation and the exhalation there is a space. It's thrillingly quiet and calm in that space.
In some ways, the smarter you are, the more challenging life can be. Why sit in the car and chill when you could put on a CD and learn another language? Don't think for half an hour? Are you mad? Some super brainy surgeons feel this way. But, I need to submit for more reasons than one. I need a strong dominant because I need to feel that authority to achieve what I can't achieve on my own. If you read some of the forums on Fetlife about 'Mental BDSM' you'll see that I am not at all alone. Streams of people want very much to engage in non-thought activities because instinctively they know that this is what is good for them; that endless worry and thought isn't getting them where they want to go in life; in their lives inside their heads where we all reside.
Of course, in the 'Real' material world we all engage in activities and pursuits. We all have a purpose of some kind. At the same time, Tolle reminds us that as well as this we share a life purpose - to find that which is our essence, that which has no form. Nothing really is more important than that, especially given that there is really only one Consciousness of which we are all a part. The more people at peace, the better, for our material world is a mirror image of what our inside world looks like. It is much too noisy. I think we can agree on that.
I am profoundly guilty of this state of mind. My mind is such that is always in search for the next thing to do, or achieve. I can feel the restlessness, the confused mind; the trying to put things in their rightful place. Don't I have an appointment card at the bottom of a handbag? Now, which handbag was that? Maybe, I have double booked myself. How can I know when I haven't written all the dates in my diary, I ask myself, berating myself as I go. I don't really need anyone else to come down hard on me, since I do an excellent job of flogging myself. If only I was perfect. If only I was more motivated, more organised, more...
Sometimes, I ask, 'What have you actually achieved today? Anything??' That's delusional thinking of course since I can't sit still much at all, nor really ever feel satisfied with my output. I'm usually confident that, if more efficient, I could have achieved so much more.
There is no question, from anybodies perspective, that I could, indeed, achieve more. Time is spent on tumblr. Time is spent reading articles on Buddhism, or talking to friends, or trying to settle my mind as to what on earth it is that I really should be doing before the day comes to an end. I am a disorganized, organized sort of person. I get there in the end, but I have to push myself to get there. Seriously, quite honestly, I'd rather not think, and that's nothing new. I have been aware of this fact always. I'm dreamy. It is what it is.
Doing my writing course worked from the point of view that there were outside forces insisting that I do my work. Of course, nobody insists that you get Distinctions and High Distinctions. This is self enforced and comes from egoic thought, but there it is. If I was putting my name to it, it had be of high quality.
In the process of assisting my son make a film I chatted with a wonderful psychologist who, whilst waiting for the lighting to be 'perfect' (Oh gosh yes, I passed on these genes...) told me many stories about past patients (all anonymous, of course). He told me he had one woman submit a paper for her post graduate degree that barely passed with a push. Under no circumstances was she to submit a paper that earned more than a P. She had got it into her head, he explained, that she was a failure in spite of all that she had achieved. She was a failure if she didn't get a HD, and if her baby cried in the night, well, more evidence that she was a failure at parenthood too. So, he nipped it in the bud by taking her as close to failure as he dared and showing her that she would survive the 'ordeal'.
The story was terribly, painfully close to home, although I never let on. Of course. But, it did occur to me that if I were ever to put my trust in psychology again (highly unlikely), this was my man. It helped that he had a brilliant sense of humor and that the irony was that he was as uptight about his own son's VCE year (final year of school) as any of his clients. He said to me that "we have so much to do over the holidays", and then we shared a knowing look. Yep. He was a perfectionist, anal retentive too. Over-achievers are painstakingly boring and predictable, and there are so many of them around! (It takes one to know one.)
I've mentioned before that I meditate in a group, though Tuesday was my first group meditation in two months, far too long between cushion time for me. My meditation leader is a fabulous woman who has become a good friend. I'm suffering jealousy right now because she is in New Zealand at a retreat that I dearly wish I was at, but I chose Japan with my husband instead, and that was the right decision. Still. It's hard right now. I wish I was there.
Anyway, as spiritually evolved as she is, she gets tense. She worries. So, I asked her what to do in those situations. What does she do in those situations?
'You must go to your cushion,' she says. 'It is the best place for you. The feelings will pass. Clarity will come once you sit and let go.'
I have had many fleeting thoughts, not always 'caught', about BDSM, about dominance, being similar to a spiritual life. The Top, as I have experienced it, insists, absolutely insists on control, and with that categorical control, provides the sort of space where thoughts can be let go. Whether that it is through pain, or pleasure, or some of both, he empties the head of obsessive thoughts and worries and provides a space where the submissive can surrender to life; find the true essence of oneself, free of concerns about what to achieve in the material world.
Eckhart Tolle, whom I recommend to you as an easily understood spiritual leader, said in a short UTube clip that "every moment offers you the choice between conditioned reactions or conscious Presence". The goal is to bring some space into the stream of thought, and that is what happens when beaten, when bound, when contained, when reduced.
Once, in the very early days of my investigations into domination I read of a man who had a big chair in the corner of a room and when his girl was fraught, over anxious or overwhelmed, he told her to sit there and not to dare to move unless he gave her permission. She would sit there, angry, smoke rising through her nostrils and up into the air, but as time went by the negative energy began to dissipate and she began to think clearly. Then, they could talk it through, calmly and with clarity.
I've had better meditations than last Tuesday but none more still and pain free. I sit with my knees folded under me and, maybe it was all the walking we did in Japan, but it was perfectly comfortable to do this for the entire hour. My meditation leader once said to us that sometimes it pays to go to the pain, not hide from it. She counsels people with cancer and it is a strategy they use, not to fear the pain but to consciously experience it and come to the resolution that it is a do-able pain. I did this and discovered that I was more or less pain-free. I maintained my focus in my body very well indeed, stayed with my breath, returned to my body when thoughts came; refused to give in to the thinking mind; banished it. It takes practice. The words 'coming home to the body' resonate with me now.
This is part of the whole understanding that in meditation we 'come home to the body'. Focus is put on the breath, or perhaps the feet. Focus is taken away from the thoughts, or at least we acknowledge the awareness that thought has happened, again, and now we return to the body, to the open spaced Consciousness where we just exist; that space between thoughts. One way to achieve this is to focus on the process of breathing, not to engage in it but to watch it. The body will inhale when it is ready; will exhale when it is ready. And, in between the inhalation and the exhalation there is a space. It's thrillingly quiet and calm in that space.
In some ways, the smarter you are, the more challenging life can be. Why sit in the car and chill when you could put on a CD and learn another language? Don't think for half an hour? Are you mad? Some super brainy surgeons feel this way. But, I need to submit for more reasons than one. I need a strong dominant because I need to feel that authority to achieve what I can't achieve on my own. If you read some of the forums on Fetlife about 'Mental BDSM' you'll see that I am not at all alone. Streams of people want very much to engage in non-thought activities because instinctively they know that this is what is good for them; that endless worry and thought isn't getting them where they want to go in life; in their lives inside their heads where we all reside.
Of course, in the 'Real' material world we all engage in activities and pursuits. We all have a purpose of some kind. At the same time, Tolle reminds us that as well as this we share a life purpose - to find that which is our essence, that which has no form. Nothing really is more important than that, especially given that there is really only one Consciousness of which we are all a part. The more people at peace, the better, for our material world is a mirror image of what our inside world looks like. It is much too noisy. I think we can agree on that.
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