Flexibility
“We need not stride resolutely towards catastrophe, merely because those are our marching orders.”
~ Noam Chomsky
We are living in a time when great care and patience are called for. Our understanding of our individual and collective circumstances are so wholly impoverished that we often hasten to act from fear and caprice when relaxation and graciousness would better serve. The strident earnestness of New Age spirituality and its pop-psychologies are inadequate for the task at hand. So too, are our cultural, ancestral, familial and personal ideologies, mythologies and stories.
As much as we want to believe otherwise, we are living a mystery that is unknown and unknowable to the human mind and personality. Our strong desire to understand is itself a function of our thought-based enculturation: We therefore need regard this normal, but unnatural bent, with suspicion. Gravely, we have not. Rather, we have persisted in believing our thinking, fears, beliefs, “facts,” dogmas, proofs, and other sundry theories which masquerade as definitive “truths.”
As we begin suspending our entrained habits of thought and move into accord with our natural proclivities, we first perceive and directly experience the energetic realms about us. Many people use the word “intuition” in referring to their perceptions which arise from these fields of energy. You know these yourself as you have many such experiences. The key is to sort energetic perceptions from the confounding imagined “perceptions” created by the mind of your personality’s ego: It has a particular bent for projecting unconscious thinking onto oneself, others, things or circumstances. In its doing so, many of us confuse the things our minds “make up” as genuine when they are not!
Real and genuine perception of energetic phenomena occurs constantly however we have been trained to distract ourselves from experiencing the Wisdom of these worlds. Generally we do so before we are consciously aware of them. Thus we remain isolated from a great deal of the Mystery’s generous Grace. To remember to remember the energetic information impinging on you in each moment, I offer the following pointers. These pointers, in the form of questions, will prompt shifts to your mental and emotional states, in your states of consciousness and states of being. In doing so, your ease of energetic perception and experience is enhanced. The counsel you will garner in the fields of Wisdom will further your movement into the creative expression of your promise.
1) “How might I feel even more gratitude for my sentient life? For the beauty in my life? For the plentitude I have? For the reality that I am reading these words? That I am breathing? That I am ambulatory?”
2) “How might I slow down my daily movements and relax more fully and consistently, giving myself into life’s buoyancy?”
3) “How might I develop a kinder and lighthearted responses to all that life presents to me?”
4) “How might I see my own innocence, beauty and dignity more completely? See these in others too?”
5) “How might I see the Grace in all circumstance?”
6) “How might I claim my life fully? Fully engage, embrace and embody the vitality life offers to me?”
7) “How might I fully bring myself to bear in bringing my brilliance to those who have and will come to the planet after me?”
Brilliant! So well stated. Each of your questions seem as though they might be a chapter in a book. I have read them and have begun opening to the answers from the Mystery and not my head or local self.
The blog world has just improved in quality, integrity and relevance by an immeasurable amount! And this particular blog has impacted me profoundly. Not only is the content a mirror of my own personal journey at this time – the timeliness is, well, magical. Becoming less and less ‘attached’ to prior worldly and ego perspectives, I have been feeling, at times, a bit lonely and unaccompanied on my path. The content in this blog post speaks my heart and the questions are, each one in itself, an entire subject matter – focus – asking of me exactly what I am embracing in my life…a bit more everyday. This article has helped me clarify my experiences at this time and has encouraged me on my way..validating my efforts to live the life I long to live – of service, gratitude and grace. Brilliantly written and presented, this gift is a much needed contribution – I am grateful.
I have always appreciated the self-inquiry questions you have presented across the years. They are generous and generative. Thank you.
Stephen,
These reminders that bring us back to presence and connection…well I can never ask them too often because it’s so easy to ease away from them. I especially like remembering to have a lighthearted response to whatever life offers up.
Stephen,
Profound! You indeed have a gift of soulful writing, allowing you to express without duality, or to go beyond the duality of ego. Each word you write resonates so deeply, so purely that it awakens that which has so long been hidden within. Those of us who have embarked upon the journey of self discovery, soul discovery are at times travelling alone; it is an incredible but hard path at times. Thank you for your gift. I look forward to continuing the revelation with you.
“…continuing the revelation…” Wow! beautifully stated. I am heartened you resonate with my words..too with your kindness in writing me. Take good care…
Yes ! I am agree ! Peace on Mind Peace on Earth ! Stay in Your Center ! Stay in Your Loving and Brave Heart ! Blessings To All.
Leah.
Well Done Stephen, i very much enjoyed reading this. I love how you stated the questions to ask ourselves as it is the only way to move forward in our evolutions within the evolution.
Wow
We live in a push button mechanized society that gives instant relief and expectations that something happens when “I do it”. the microwave meal on your table, took all of 3 minutes from freezer to you. The water I turn on from the tap, simple simon, I need it it comes on, it goes off. If I need light I flip a switch. If I’m cold, turn up the heat-quickly everything is appeased. I can’t help but think that this perpetuates the greed of the moment when time is always on our side. At the turn of the century everyday was busy with just the challenge of existing. Plucking your own chickens to making everything by hand. At dusk you had a candle for awhile and then you better go to bed-it came around too soon again-Yes we should hesitate and maybe give up light for an evening, or push one less button to conserve water for the day-we can do a little at a time and take time for each other-even if its just to play a game of cards-do we need constant radios and TV’s-no we don’t its a good start to eradicate unnecessary expenditures -the budget cuts of excesses-