This morning, while doing a qigong breathing exercise during my morning practice, I suddenly visualized a blinding beacon of light penetrating me deeply through my closed eyes. It lit up my mind – my whole self felt on fire with light.
My first immediate thought was, “No wonder I've been so judgmental of myself lately! With all this supernatural light my every flaw is revealed! With nothing to hide them, my personality defects, my selfish agendas, and my constant demands for attention, stand exposed. It's a wonder I can tolerate my self at all!”
This is the downside of receiving Light – it reveals our less than pleasing attributes and tendencies.
Our challenge is to see these inferior aspects and accept them without judgment and self-scorn. But, how ?
The answer lies in being able to forget about ourselves; we must forget about our own incessant needs & wants, our demanding fears & anguish, our search for success & protection from failure – we forget about the self made “me” altogether for moments at a time, and then forget ourselves more and more until all that remains is the burning flames of desire to serve Source.
Believe it or not, this is the key to true contentment, this forgetting of self for service.
“Stop trying to be perfect,” says the Light, “and give up your whole self to Me.”
6 Responses
Thank you Tracy for taking these concepts into your relationship with yourself and the world. Thank you for being willing to apply and verify the ideas presented here (like how the world reflects our beliefs) and sharing your findings here for others to see. It is wonderful when others like you also experience the truths I have been fortunate enough to find. Blessings, Lynne
That’s exactly it.Self extermination(Thanks for pointing it out):-)
My mind has worked tirely at trying to eliminate parts of my life that felt wrong or not good enough.I don’t blame it because i see now how my beliefs about how life should be has prevented me from accepting life and reality as it is.I finally understand what loving what is really means.
My beliefs and thoughts are limited to what i have learnt so far and some of these beliefs are infact not true and only lead to suffering.I see now that life was infact reflecting my victim ego and allowing me to see a reflection of who i thought i was.Its amazing to realize this.
Thanks Lynne.
Yes, self examination is a tough cookie.Its so much easier talking about everyone and everything else and running from one expectation to another.
I realize now that the more i learn about who i really i am the less i allow my limiting beliefs to take over.It does feel like a really slow process though and with no tangible benefits sometimes i wonder if i am making any headways at all.I feel less in control of what happens around me or rather that i am letting go of trying to control how things are.I still feel scared and unsure about that and a part of me still wants to cling to the belief that i have to control the outcome otherwise i will not get what i want.There is a split between me who needs to control the outcome in order to get what i want and reality presenting itself sometimes in my favor and sometimes not.
Tracy, Altho self-examination is challenging, the word I used in my previous comment was self-exTERmination (meaning the attempt to get rid of parts of self we find unacceptable) 🙂
There are tangible results that come from intervening on our limiting thoughts – in the form of peace and enhanced self-acceptance.
I’ve found that the part of us that needs to control life is founded in distrust of life. It thinks life is against us – such belief generates fear and lack of safety. When we stop personalizing everything that happens, it frees us to begin to look for how reality is in our favor (regardless of how it appears in that moment). Even “bad” things hold a gift for us – focus on finding that gift, rather than giving in to the victim within who sees only hardship and unfairness. And don’t forget that Reality is always, and only, a mirror that reflects our own (or the worlds) thoughts/expectaions/beliefs.
Blessings, Lynne
Oh Tracy, I so relate! And have you noticed how difficult, if not impossible, it is – this process of attempted self-extermination? I have.
I’ve noticed that one of two things happen in my efforts to rid myself of some unwanted part of myself: 1. I soon replace it or compensate for it with some character trait that is as worrisome, or 2. I simply push it out of consciousness; in other words, I deny it. Denial is dangerous because it leads to unconscious acting out. I cannot take responsibility (the ability to respond) for something I ignore or don’t see.
I have come to see that openly embracing these parts (not necessarily liking them) allows me to explore them and find the underlying beliefs that prompt them. (Remember we do what we do because we believe what we believe.) Stepping back into Observer Consciousness allows me to compassionately examine those beliefs and reframe them (See Katie Byron’s The Work). I’ve noticed when I step back from these previously unacceptable parts, cultivate an attitude of self-acceptance, and question the beliefs that cause them, they often “die on the vine” from lack of resistance (which is the food that fuels them).
We cannot stop the behavior as long as we believe the thoughts that drive it, but we can question and place doubt towards the driving beliefs and free ourselves of the feelings and behaviors associated with them.
There is a Bigger Story we can choose to identify ourselves with. For me it is the story of my Self as being an emanation from Source, like rays of sunshine emanate from the sun.
Everyday I do two things: I question the beliefs that cause me to act in painful ways and keep me identified with the limited self, and I practice remembering this Bigger Story of who I essentially, eternally am.
Blessings,
I think for me the constant struggle has been to remove the parts of me i was ashamed of and look for ways i could change my life to suit a mental image of how i think things should be.Yet reality continus to be as it and changes in its own time.
I feel that i am at the point where i am tired of struggling/analysing and debating.It does reach a point where it feels pointless.
I see how i derive a sense of indentity from the constant worries and fears of things to come and the biggest struggle for me now is the question that if i let go of all these then what will i identify myself with?