“Aha’s” or what some refer to as “defining moments” almost always integrate with what was before it appeared. That is, the experience is neatly stored in memory, but the safety of the known is too compelling to alter present-moment living entirely. Oddly, such moments happen free of any known constraints, e.g., religion, beliefs, faith, hopes, philosophy, whatever, and are free and clear of any previous thought or recollection. Even the mind’s constant banter is silent, but, in its incessant way, it fires back up and drags the pristine into the muddy waters of “how it has always been,” and the “moment” gives way to the safety of the known. If your “aha” comes in the context of what you think you know or believe, it’s not an aha. It’s a confirmation to your mind that, while out of control, it thinks it is in control. In other words, don’t let what you know or think integrate with the mystery presented in the still, clean waters of silence. “Defining moments” have no definition. Neither should you.
Bozebits
If life is an illusion (it is), then trying to fix yourself is an illusion too. In other words, that which assesses the need to fix, by whatever means, is also the fixer, and it is the fixer who creates the illusion it seeks to fix. You do see the folly of this, right? It’s like the primary rule of “wing walking. That is, never let go with one hand until you are holding on to something else with the other. However, in so doing, you are still “walking the wing” of the same airplane. To see the real, you must void yourself, altogether, of the unreal, and the unreal is everything your mind holds on to, e.g., literally, everything that passes through it.
Letting go is not a leap of faith, as that would just be affixing yourself to another illusion. It is a leap into the abyss where safety and security give way to mystery and breathless wonder. It is anyone’s guess how you fall or where you land if you land at all, but oh, what a thrill you’ll have. And that is as it should be!
Bozebits
“If your lips are movin’, your ego is groovin’.” Everything you say, regardless of eloquence, beauty, or intent, is ego. What you write, think, or dream is ego. What you do that is kind, unkind, charitable, uncharitable, etc., is ego. Do you see? Human exchange of any kind is ego, and when you get that, once and for all, you will see the miracle of life as opposed to the narrow interpretation of it, e.g., egoic interpretation. There simply is no path to awareness through your mind; it just talks too much (mine too). Still, this is the human experience, so it can never be turned off, but it can be turned down. Focus more of your “seeing” the world on what you hear rather than what comes through your eyes. While it will not rid you of ego, it will undoubtedly have it talking less. That is always a superior, less egoic, “groove.”
Bozebits
“I choose to surround myself with like-minded people who, like me, generally believe as I do, love and accept me as I am, and positively lift me. Comfortable and safe in my world that avoids contrariness, I have few, if any, challenges to my ego or self-esteem. After all, it’s what new age spirituality suggests I do. However, in so choosing, I fully accept that I am missing out on the more significant part of human life and living: a rich and diverse world, full of myriad philosophies, tastes, beliefs, lifestyles, cultures, art, and colors, etc., etc., etc.” Do you see?
Choosing is exclusion, denial, and blindness, while life and living are a package deal. They cannot be what you want them to be because what you want is your own prison cell. “Tear down these walls!” You will be stunned, enriched, and enlivened by what and who is on the other side!
Bozebits
Nothing exposes ego like another ego. “I am right, and you are wrong” is the battleground for ego, and it is always a battle. Even if placation is used to lower tension, e.g., “we’ll just have to agree to disagree.” If you find yourself in that field, you’ve been exposed. Not to worry, however, we’ve all been exposed! There is no right, and there is no wrong except the side that you happen to be on, in which case you are wrong. Ego’s checkpoints are: Are you speaking or gesturing? Are you thinking, imagining, or dreaming? Are you engaged in all other forms of communication, including writing? All of these are fraught with ego.
I know, I know, I’m in trouble, but you don’t have to be. Checking your ego regularly avoids many unnecessary and silly battles.
Bozebits
Those who continuously look outward for safety, comfort, and answers to their minds’ fears, suffering, and travails, never seem to notice the stone they trip over. It is easy to point “out there” while nursing your bruised and stubbed toes, but until you see the stone you trip over as an obstacle, you place in your path, you are going to have sore feet for a long time. Every single thing, person, institution, etc., you denigrate, revile, and curse, is you kicking stones with bare feet with the silly expectation that looking beyond them is, somehow, stepping over them. Your feet tell you otherwise.
Simply, anything, anyone that turns your love into hate, anger, or sadness is not worth your reaction to it. Love, in any circumstance, is non-negotiable.
Bozebits
Consciousness is just another thing co-opted by your ego that it can have more of than someone else and feed its need to be right and everyone else wrong. It comes with a scale you can use to judge yourself and others, which fuels its condescending nature. “Is your consciousness ‘raised’ to the level of someone you look up to in spiritual, social, psychological, or intellectual circles? No? “Well, you’d better work on that,” or “you can get there too.” Do you see? The modern-day love affair with consciousness is coupled to “rules” no different than the varying rules of philosophical, political, and religious institutions that make you better only because you know the rules. There are no rules of consciousness. There are no rules at all. If we are one, then we are all one consciousness, and no part of it is better or worse than any other. There simply are no parts.
Raising consciousness is condescension. That is “raising ego,” and that is not a way to spirituality or awareness. Being married to “what is” with love and reverence makes you aware, but never “better.”
Bozebits
Collective consciousness is “out there,” and if you feed it, you are its “monkey.” That is, not unlike your own “monkey mind,” screeching and howling to a constant beat, whether you consider it good or annoying, plays into the field of what new agers call the collective. And the collective mind is no different than the individual mind, e.g., egoic. Look at the side you’re on in any collective cause, and its only theme is your cause is the right one, and everyone else is wrong. Your added voice-only fuels the already noisy, vitriolic rhetoric spewed at those whom you and your collective consider wrong.
Love loves without condescension, judgment, or moral superiority, and always with transparency. It has no ego and, therefore, cannot be joined to a collective ego. We are witnesses to a lot of ego in the “collective,” but it is not the collective that is sick. It is you and me and anyone (everyone) who takes a side and forsakes love in doing so. Love it all, including “us” and especially “them,” or be another monkey in an endless, unwinnable, clamor for rightness. Isn’t there enough noise without adding yours? Besides, the “quiet” is so lovely.
Bozebits
Your opinion matters least of all in human affairs. What you know, believe, trust in, or hope for is no prize and might even be considered a joke. What you don’t know shows up as humility, kindness, reverence, and compassion. Not words or thoughts; just tenderness. Now there’s a prize! Love expresses most clearly when the ghosts of opinion are not haunting you. Speak less, love more. It’s that simple.
Bozebits
You cannot hate for “no” reason. The very nature of hate is so-called reason brewed in a cauldron of beliefs, conjecture, points of view, and ideology. Some would say love’s opposite is hate or fear, but it is not so because love is an essence indistinguishable from any “other” known source. Like the sun, love shines on and caresses all opinions, divisions, judgments, you or anyone else has. If you hate or fear, you have a reason; if you love, you don’t. You don’t act out of love; you love, and acts form from its nectar. Love is sweetness without the sweetener. Go crazy, sprinkling it!