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As we see in the news everyday, this is a world divided. What I mean by this is that it is polarized, and not just politically, but this world is dual by its very nature. It is a world of positive and negative. In fact, subatomically, the positive and negative forces within atoms give rise to all form in this world. And form includes not only the physical and the physical body, but the mental and the emotional bodies, as well.
So we have positive thoughts and negative ones; we have positive emotions and negative emotions. And very naturally we reach for the positive states while pushing away the negative. Why would we not?! Aah, but there is a profound spiritual truth that says:
Everything in time shall turn into its opposite.
In our limited ego-mind we teeter-totter between the positive and negative, spending some amount of time in one state before inevitably flipping to the other. With this constant flip-flopping, no wonder we often feel off balance and confused! We have no stable place to ground our awareness.
There is a way through, though. We each have access to a higher viewing platform, so to speak. This point of view rests outside of the dual nature of the mind and emotions. Called the neutral witness or the neutral observer, it is able to view the transitory nature of duality with detachment. Jesus said “If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be filled with Light.” In other words, beyond the two eyes of negative and positive is this third channel of awareness – the single eye – our neutral observer. The positives and negatives of life will still happen, but the neutral observer rests outside of the action and just watches. This observer avoids assigning a value to one experience over the other, remains detached, and instead chooses neutrality. Then something amazing happens. Our inner world of swirling mind and emotions comes into balance and a doorway is opened into an expanded consciousness, one of peace, light and Presence. Instead of flip-flopping between the positive and negative, we begin to ground on that which rests between the opposites of the world – our true, divine nature.
“But how do I get there,” you ask? “How do I find my neutral observer?” The initial step is to make it conscious – to acknowledge its existence and to open to it. We already very naturally observe the personality in action with its judgments, likes and dislikes, but now we add the intention to be neutral in the face of the ups and downs of life, rather than react to them.
When I mentor others and they come me in pain or feel stuck in their lives some way, it is this witnessing presence that I hold for them. We could say that they have lost the neutral observer by identifying with the transitory thoughts or emotions that are passing through them. In our sessions together we process and find our way back to the neutrality of this witnessing presence, anxiety is relieved and new ways of coping and perceiving are instituted.
Over time we build the strength of the neutral observer, reactivity is lessened, and we begin to discover the treasure that is beyond even the positive – an equanimity with all of life and the pure joy of Being.
I received this email from someone the other day:
“At work there is this arrogant person who I find very annoying. Because you have taught me to see that there is no one “outside” of me, she must be a mirror for my own unconscious arrogance. I know I have the power to shift this, but where do I start? What is the core issue?”
Here is my response via email and Skype:
As I contemplate your question, Joni Mitchel’s classic song, Both Sides, Now comes to mind here. Her lyrics describe the futility of attempting to see the truth of life from a dual perspective, concluding, “I really don’t know life at all”!
I’ve looked at life from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It’s life’s illusions I recall
I really don’t know life at all
To know the truth of life beyond the dual nature of the limited mind you will want to look deeply into both sides of any troublesome polarity. I see you are owning the projection of arrogance outside of you. That’s a start. Congratulations. The ancient teachings of the East teach us that the opposites of the world are inextricably tethered, so if you are seeing arrogance outside of you and are being triggered you must also accept that the opposite of arrogance – worthlessness – is inside somewhere as well. When we are in a push/pull dance with the opposites of the world we are unable to see what is true beyond the egoic and illusory; we are unable to see our true nature as a timeless, spiritual beings.
Down near the bottom of our dark void of negative states of mind and lurking in the unconscious, lies worthlessness. Because it is fundamental to our human egoic imprint into separation from Source we each have shades of it that must be cleared on our journey home to Self. Worthlessness becomes a program that can be triggered as we begin to make it real in childhood from negative messaging from our adult caregivers and teachers. Typically, it runs deep with many layers that require unraveling. Because both you and your co-worker have uncleared issues around worthlessness you are drawn together through the process of polarity in which opposites attract each other. When we are unable to see and own our unconscious feelings of worthlessness we will push them into the unconscious and act out the other side, which often manifests as arrogance and/or entitlement. (We see this being played out in our world now by our President “big league!”, as well as by most extreme leaders in the world with a Patriarchal consciousness.)
Conversely, when we are feeling worthless, inadequate, small, less than etc., we are pushing into the unconscious the opposite states of mind and our tendency to be arrogant and entitled. If we are heavily identified with worthlessness, initially, its opposite may be difficult to see and own. But you must proceed with the assumption that it is in there somewhere! What’s essential to accept is that you are both sides. Accepting that you have become identified, consciously and unconsciously, with both sides of any polarity is the first step in opening a portal between the opposites that leads you come to know your true nature, which is beyond duality.
Clearing the egoic dance between arrogance and worthlessness in your patterning requires that you make what is unconscious conscious. To do this make four lists: 1. My desire for worthlessness 2. My fear of worthlessness 3. My desire for arrogance 4. My fear of arrogance. Feel deeply into the energy around each state of mind. If you are having a hard time coming up with reasons for one of the lists it is because it is particularly unconscious to you. Meditate on it and ask inwardly to be shown what is not being seen. Remember to accept that all four states of mind are in you or you would be creating a different relationship with this person.
Making the unconscious conscious is a powerful and eye opening process. But to reconcile the opposites underlying your programming you must call on that part of you that is beyond the limited egoic self by surrendering all that has been seen and named back to Source. When you feel complete with your lists make a prayer offering your lists up asking for all of your conscious and unconscious patterning to be cleared and reconciled. Make an inner commitment to heal the layers of your childhood wounding around worthlessness. Remember, there is nothing outside of you, and when you have reconciled the schism of worthlessness and arrogance inside of you your world will reflect that integration. The arrogant person will cease to trigger you and your relationship with that person will eventually shift into one more aligned in heart and Truth.
I hope you find this helpful.
(For more on mirroring and projection please see the post “It’s all You!” from October, 2016), and for more on the the Worthlessness Program read “Seeing through Worthlessness” from April, 2010 on this blog.)
In this world a message we get all the time is be positive, stay positive, or focus on the positive etc. Well of course! Makes sense. Foolish would it be to focus on the negative, although the ego will fall into this trap from time to time and, unfortunately, even get lost in it. We have two choices then, or so it seems. We can go negative or we can go positive. But what happens, eventually? Experience shows us that life is transitory and we won’t remain on the positive side of life forever; at some point negativity will creep in and even take over! And then the tide will once again turn and fate will hand us a positive experience, which, if the negative experience was particularly painful, we will cling to for dear life! So we will inevitably flip from one side to the other in an endless cycle of positive and negative, happiness and unhappiness, pleasure and pain. Is this what life is about – always grasping for the positive and pushing away the negative, the wheel of karma endlessly turning? What can we do? Is there another way?
The Middle Way, or the path between the opposites of the world is what the Buddha teaches. It reconciles the tension inherent in polarity and becomes the path of no resistance. It’s the one that gets my vote! This choice transcends positive and negative and the dual nature of the limited mind, and new more stable states of being become our default in the world – acceptance, compassion, equality, faith, forgiveness, generosity, gratitude, humility, joy, selflessness, tolerance, and trust, among others, for example. Feel into them for a moment. Do you notice how your attention comes to rest at the level of the chest at the heart chakra? These states of being are heart states and have the unique qualities of transcendence and eternality: our capacity for compassion, generosity, or joy, for instance, is unlimited! It is these heart states that unify the opposites of the world, bringing about inner peace and, yes, on-going happiness. It is through making the choice to choose the heart, rather than simply the positive, that puts the brakes on the wheel of karma and our identity with the endless ups and downs of life.
When we choose the heart we identify with our true, essential nature as timeless beings. Negative and positive experiences will always occur in a world of form that is dualistic by nature, but we will no longer find our identity in them. Instead, life’s experiences will pass through us, through the still center of awareness that we know ourselves to be. Without the extreme teeter-tottering of emotions creating instability and fear in our lives, life smooths out greatly. We embody more and more transcendental light and shine that light out into the world. Our lives change. We begin to draw to us all that we need for our well-being and happiness.
Too good to be true? What I’m describing here is our birthright to live happy and content lives beyond the limitations of egoic consciousness. When we choose the path between the opposites of the world we surrender the denser aspects of ego that are driven by individual will. We come to know and to trust in Divine Will to guide our lives, which, in truth, is all there ever is… if we could only get out of the way! Through processing and practice we learn to surrender our limited egoic consciousness for what may yet be unknown, but for what is always absolute truth.
Do you feel ready to take on this inner work? If so, allow me to be your guide. I promise you a gentle ride through the roller coaster of egoic life. And I promise, at its end, the ride will even out and you will feel not only relief, but more and more moments of absolute joy! Please click the Spiritual Guidance page at the top of this blog, schedule a session, and let’s go!
Photo credit: Penelope Dullaghan
Beyond our desires and fears, our anger and our pain a place of peace, equanimity and love awaits us at the level of the heart and beyond. In this full day seminar you will learn about the beauty and power of living from the heart chakra, or the spiritual heart, and how it serves as the doorway into expanded awareness and higher consciousness.
Our minds are polarized in nature creating the familiar teeter-totter of emotions that we experience daily. We may feel good one moment or on one day, then bad the next in an endless cycle of pleasure and pain. Over the course of our day together we will learn how to walk the “razors edge” between the ups and downs of life and begin to live from the still center of our being and from the love that naturally resides there. Our time together will include guided meditations to ground our new awarenesses.
Topics we will explore include:
the chakra energy system and the shushumna (the core light within)
the Human Imprint and the upward and downward spirals
the Neutral Witness and the path of the Middle Way
practical techniques for clearing the blocks that keep us from our hearts
The seminar will be held in San Francisco at a quiet Outer Richmond district location. Suggested donation: $75. Please bring a lunch. For questions or to reserve your space you may e-mail Gary at: garysnote@bluebottle.com
In this full day workshop we will learn three powerful, but easy-to-do techniques for clearing the spin of the emotions developed by Leslie Temple-Thurston and introduced in her book The Marriage of Spirit. Based in the ancient teachings of the reconciliation of opposites, the Polarities, Squares, and Triangles techniques help us to clear our confusing mental and emotional states, gently moving us into a place of balance, trust and equanimity.
Sunday, February 2, 2014 10am – 4:30pm
quiet Sutro Heights, San Francisco location
This workshop is offered in the spirit of service by donation. Suggested donation: $75.
Please email Gary at garysnote@bluebottle.com, for questions and to register. Space is limited to eight participants. Please bring a lunch and notebook and pencil
“If you want to shift your life, shift your consciousness”. Leslie Temple -Thurston
Paul, a student (not his real name), asked “why is it I get in so many car accidents?” After a bit of self-inquiry he was able to name how he has a habit of identifying himself as a victim as he goes through life. We could say he holds the energy of victimhood in his consciousness, and that this energy lives as an energetic field or aura that inhabits and surrounds his physical body. Through the spiritual law of attraction this field acts like a magnet drawing to him people and situations (car accidents!) that victimize him.
I explained that if he were to clear his aura of this victimization energy his life would smooth out greatly. As we dug a little deeper he also noticed that, although he spends most of his time being a victim in life, he can also act out its opposite sometimes. He saw how, when push comes to shove, he can also be a dominator or a perpetrator (the energy of the Tyrant)!
Duality is the operating system that runs consciousness for most of us in the world right now. It is a consciousness divided, and it plays out in our minds and emotions and, in extreme cases, in our physical world as dance of opposites, or polarity. Although Paul identifies primarily with the victim, he was beginning to see how he flip-flops from being a victim to being a tyrant, depending on the situation on any given day. Victim and tyrant, in fact, all polarities, are inextricably bound to one another!
Spiritual law says that any polarized state of mind will in time turn into its opposite; we cannot have one without the other… When Paul is in victim mode this energy dominates his reality, and that’s all he can see. He feels small, inconsequential, needy and deprived. But his tyrant didn’t go anywhere! This character is just not conscious to him, and what is not in the conscious mind lives in the unconscious. Similarly, when Paul is acting out his tyrant energy, his victimhood lies unseen in his unconscious, nevertheless always present and eager to resume its starring role in his life’s movie!
The underlying energy that upholds and sustains the tyrant/victim construct in our minds is the energy of power vs. powerlessness, and like all polarities held in the mind, it is inherently unstable. So, as good as it feels to Paul’s ego to feel powerful, in control, and able to assert its will, it won’t last. Inevitably, tyrants become victims! On the world stage, they’re all too familiar: Look no further than Hitler or, more recently, Saddam Hussein; then there is Mubarak in Egypt, a tyrant to his people for thirty years. Now he sits in a jail with a sentence of life imprisonment; and we all know the fate of Osama bin Laden!
Because Paul is committed to growing his consciousness and living his life from a place of balance, equanimity and inner peace, he must be willing to give up both his inner tyrant and his inner victim. Through a process of self-inquiry Paul’s work is to begin to name and own all of the ways he plays the tyrant and the victim, and to free himself of the exhausting and perpetual dance between them. He needs to make what is unconscious to him conscious, and then be willing to hang up his dancing shoes! He must make a bid for true power by surrendering both aspects of ego. Here is where grace will take over if he asks. In fact, it is the essential piece that will create an integration.
Paul’s consciousness with this polarity is boxed in by the seen and unseen attractions and repulsions he holds around it. I asked Paul to create four lists: 1. Why I desire to be a victim 2. Why I fear becoming a victim 3. Why I desire to be tyrant 4. Why I fear becoming a tyrant. What Paul will discover is that he spends some indefinite amount of time with the consciousness of each of his four lists before he inevitably flips to the state of mind of the next list, and the next, and so on in a never-ending loop of desires and fears.
His flip-flopping consciousness between victim and tyrant is keeping him in a spin of opposites, manifesting adversity in his life and from the peace of mind that he seeks. By feeling deeply into and naming all of his desires and fears around being a victim and being a tyrant, and then surrendering them all back to Source, he will move into greater balance and equanimity with this polarity. And if he continues to scrupulously examine and release even the most subtle ways that he engages these self-defeating personas, he can be free of them. No more victims or tyrants need ruin his day!
How about you? Are you ready to give up the struggle between your victim and your tyrant? Your inner peace and true power await you there beyond all polarity…
I’ll meet you there!
embracingOneness Blog 