Befriending The Moment

You have probably heard it said, that you can pick your friends but you cannot pick your family. The present moment is like family. It shows up and you decide what kind of relationship you will have with it.

To our ego's way of thinking, circumstances determine the quality of our relationship with the present moment and the forms that come with it. Choice is a high teaching when it comes to how we react to life. Left to our ordinary perceptions, our joy meter goes up when things are going well and we can embrace the moment quite agreeably. Conversely, we dislike and resist the moments that look like trouble. The path of mastery, as taught by Tolle, and embodied by Jesus, Buddha and others, suggests an approach to life that is an open, welcoming embrace of each and every moment. Unconditional hospitality to all that shows up can profoundly change our lives.

An image of such extraordinary welcome is the opening scene in Les Misérables when Jean Valjean, who is seeking food and shelter, knocks on the door of a monastery after being rejected by countless households. A fearful nun and a kindly priest meet him at the door. Valjean tells them he just was released from prison for stealing, and shows them his parole papers declaring his dangerous nature. The nun cringes. The priest, without blinking an eye, invites him to enter, and tells him he is welcome to join them at their table.

You and I face this choice each moment. We do not know what the next moment will bring, what fate will knock at the door. The continuum of misfortune and fortune is vast and imminently unpredictable in this life. If we allow the conditions of life to determine our level of welcome or resistance, what hope is there for our peace? Can well being ever be achieved if the winds of change must always favor our preference? The answer of course is no. Yet, the ego dies hard and thrives on a continuous stream of dissatisfaction, ignorance or resistance of the present moment. Even when things are going extremely well, there is only a fleeting embrace of the pleasurable moment, before a past or future thought edges out a hospitable embrace of the present moment.

The importance of this message is knowing that we have a choice when life shows up. Here is the clear advice of Eckhart from A New Earth:
Once you have decided you want the present moment to be your friend, it is up to you to make the first move: Become friendly toward it, welcome it no matter in what disguise it comes, and soon you will see the results. One decision changes your entire reality. But that decision you have to make again and again and again - until it becomes natural to live in such a way. - Eckhart Tolle
The way we will bring forth the new earth is one choice at a time. How we cast our vote in any given moment will determine the world we live in. We may not be able to control what shows up at our door, but we can greet whatever it is with equanimity, maybe even befriend it. Such an approach to life can transform our hearts and that is the surest way to change our world. As Jesus said, there will be trials and tribulations in the world, but I have overcome the world. There is an overcoming power in you and me, and one powerful demonstration of that power is making the choice to befriend the present moment.

From Breakdown to Breakthrough

Like every hero's journey, our journey to spiritual enlightenment is fraught with daunting obstacles that would threaten our success and deter our resolve to continue. Those of us who have been on this path for any length of time have become all too acquainted with the "dragons" on the path.

These seeming enemies of our spiritual progress can take many forms but share an apparent motivation to deny and refute the emerging awareness of our true self.

Our journey of awakening through A New Earth teachings of Eckhart Tolle have consistently reminded us that our true identity has nothing to do with external definitions of human life. Neither gender, family history, social standing, occupation, material possession or dispossession, nor even internal definitions formed by our beliefs, experiences or personal perceptions of life define our true selves. To truly awaken we are consistently asked to drop our identification with all forms, including thought forms, and become conscious of our pure Being-ness; the pure consciousness that stands under and behind all that arises in form.

The greatest dragons we confront in our life are the inner demons of our wounds. Tolle calls these elements of the human experience, the "pain body." He defines the pain body as the "energy field of old but still-very-much-alive emotion that lives in almost every human being---the remnants of pain left behind by every strong negative emotion that is not fully faced, accepted and let go."

Naturally, we would rather take this hero's journey without dealing with these dragons. Yet the truth, discovered by every spiritual master that has gone the distance to self-realization, is that these apparent obstacles take us to the edge of an abyss, to the edge of our false self, where we must surrender to reach the greater awareness that lies beyond.

The pain body is the rant of the false self that screams over the top of our emerging realizations to claim we are not what our Spirit selves would have us know and realize. Yet, this rant must not have the last word if we are to prevail. Despite our very human tendency to shrink and do an end run to avoid the pain body confrontations, wisdom emboldens us to remain present. Just as turning around and facing the monster that pursues us in a dream can neutralize the threat, our willingness to face the pain body that gets in our face, can free us from its menacing hold on us.

This becomes the path to freedom, because our pain body, that collection of highly charged emotions, which would seem able to overtake us, will not withstand the light of consciousness. What is not real, will not survive the Light of Truth. Fight or flight will only make these imposters stronger in our mind and distance us from our true self. This is where heroics comes into play, at this pivot point that leads to greater progress on our spiritual journey or to greater suffering. It is the critical juncture where courage can return us to the path of wholeness. It is the place where a breakdown can become a breakthrough, where we can awaken through pain, and find transformation through suffering.

In community we find the collective resolve to support the growth and beauty that can emerge when we deal with dragons in a life affirming way. Remember as Rev. Michael Beckwith says, "a bad day for the ego is a good day for the soul."

War & Peace

The real and lasting victories are those of peace, and not of war. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Every war, every conflict with another person, every asserted opinion, every need to be right, is, at its core, nothing more or less than the defense of an illusion. Whether it is our religion, our nationality, our role, our culture, our family history, or our story, we can become identified with these aspects of our human experience and lose our true identity in them. We refer to these aspects by saying my religion, my race, my opinion, my story and distinguish them from everybody else with their religion, opinion and so on.

We become so easily lost in automatic identification that we really do need to stop and realize that all these aspects are nothing more than collections of thoughts and emotions. Admittedly, we may be deeply rooted in these ideas and identifications, but the truth is, they are not even close to representing the reality of our Being. Jesus said, "Before Abraham was, I Am." He was not talking about his body, but his essence. Before you had a body, or a family, or a religion, you were the offspring of Infinite Life. .. bearing the light that enlightens up every man/woman who comes into the world.

Conflicts that lead to resentments, at the least, or war, at the most extreme, stem from our perceived need to protect, and keep alive, a sense of self that is unmistakably false. As you know by now, if you've been following along with A New Earth teachings, this false self is the ego. The ego is bent on a relentless struggle for survival. Survival requires the "I" thought which requires the opposing notion of an "other." The ego survives and thrives on the notion of separation - separation from God, separation from all of life. The more we see ourselves as special and different, in competing relationship with everyone and everything else, the more we will keep alive the sense of self that is false. Survival of this false self is fed by being right and making others wrong. Is it any wonder conflicts, small and grand, are endemic on this earth?

Yet, we know a greater truth, deep down anyway. There is another reality, and another way of being together on this earth. The truth, revealed by mystical insight and quantum understanding, is there is a hidden wholeness, a unified field of life, in which we all live, move, and have our being. At our most elemental, essential nature, we are spiritual, existing in a field of energy where we are connected to every other living thing. In this field of unity, there is no need to struggle to survive, no separate interests competing for well being. Jesus called it the Kingdom of Heaven. Martin Buber called it I-thou awareness. In the I-Thou relationship, human beings are aware of each other as having a unity of being, subject to subject, rather than the I-It relationship in which others are separate and apart from one another.

To remain at war requires a sustained awareness of separation. To remain at peace requires a sustained awareness of our oneness. The only hope for lasting peace on earth (individually or collectively) is the fact that we have a choice in every moment. One choice leads to the battleground, and one leads to the peace table. Either we judge by appearances, which bear witness to a world of separation that leads to judgments and justifiable attacks, or we rise above ordinary thought to see through the eyes of the Christ and recognize our essential unity with everybody and everything. It is a true or false question.