Awareness

Coromandel, New Zealand


It doesn't matter how anxious, irritated, angry or sad we feel. Everything could be different in the very next moment. 

Peace, love and joy are waiting for the slightest whisper of an invitation to enter our lives. They will not enter uninvited. How do we change the world in a single moment? All we have to do is bring awareness to our thoughts, feelings, beliefs and actions.  Awareness is watching without judgment or labels of any kind. 

In a mere moment, who we are will be completely transformed. More accurately, our identify, i.e, who we think we are, will be different. 

If all of our unhappiness and frustration can disappear in a moment, why do we find it so difficult to change? The reason is that we believe we are who we think we are. We believe that we are our thoughts. The mere separation between ourselves and our thoughts caused by watching them, changes ourselves and everything around us. 

Nothing will be the same. Don't believe me. Try it and see what happens. 

Let's bring awareness to our thoughts and feelings.

Anxiety

Qamea, Fiji

Anxiety is caused by unexamined thought.  If there is no thought, there is no anxiety.   If we do not look at our thoughts, they remain with us even though we are not conscious of them.  They affect us in everything that we do, think and say.

The only way to get rid of our anxiety is to allow our thoughts to come to the surface.  We can look at them without judgment.  Once we acknowledge them, we can allow them to float away like clouds crossing the sky.  No thought can hurt us.  Their only power is our belief that they can.

Acknowledge our thoughts and surrender them.  Acknowledge and surrender.  It is the space between thought where peace resides.  It is hard to be present and peaceful when there is a swirling pool of unexamined thoughts festering just below our consciousness.

Bringing the light of awareness to our thoughts will cause them to dissolve.  We don't have to figure out solutions to our problems.  We don't have to anticipate possible future outcomes or regret the past.  We don't have to do anything.  We just have to look at our thoughts.

Let's have the courage to allow our thoughts to enter our consciousness.  Let's acknowledge and surrender our thoughts.

Surrender

Wyuna Bay, Coromandel, New Zealand

We think we know what is best for us.  We think we know what we want.   We think we know what will make us happy.  We think we know what will make us feel fulfilled.   We firmly believe that our happiness depends on acquiring something outside of ourselves, a material possession, a job, a lover, what have you.  We are certain of it.  We are disappointed and frustrated when things do not go as we hoped.

The opposite is true.  We will never achieve lasting happiness by acquiring things.  The only way to achieve peace, love and joy and live a fulfilling life is to surrender all of our thoughts, beliefs and judgments.

We can call it the Infinite Energy Source.  We can call it the Great Mystery. We can call it Jahweh, Jesus, Allah, Krishna, Vishnu, or Jehovah. We can call it God.  We can call it Love.  No words are adequate to describe it.  It is too grand to be encompassed by words.  Words are related to thought and thought cannot contemplate it.

We do not have enough information to know what we want.  We do not have enough information to know what is good for us, what will make us happy, or what will make us feel fulfilled.  We cannot know what we need. When we surrender our will to Divine Intelligence, we will be led to the highest outcome for all concerned.

Only by surrendering, can we fulfill our life's purpose.  When we peel away the many layers of conditioned beliefs, we are left with our true nature, which is peace, love and joy.

Let's surrender to the Infinite.

Desire

Qamea, Fiji

We may desire, for example, a new home, a new job, a boyfriend or girlfriend, a new car, and so on.  Obtaining the desired object will only bring us fleeting satisfaction.  Soon, we will feel frustrated again and desire something new.  

If we dig a little deeper, we understand that these desires are only reflections of what we truly desire.  When we desire a new home, what we really desire is safety and security.  When we want an expensive car, we really want to be acknowledged and admired.  When we want a boyfriend or girlfriend, we really want to be loved.

Instead of focusing on what we think we want, we can focus on what we actually want, on a deeper level.  The material things we want are but a poor reflection of our true heart's desires.

When we acknowledge what we truly want, we begin to understand that what we really want is what we actually have.  We do not need to add anything to achieve it.  It is our natural state.  We just have to shed the layers of desire, expectation, judgment and belief, which have been programmed into us and which are keeping us from being fulfilled.

If we surrender our material desires, we can have all the peace, love, joy and freedom we crave.  It is simple because we do not have to seek them out or do anything to obtain them.

Let's focus on what is important and true.

Thought

Coromandel, New Zealand

Have we examined our thoughts recently?  If we do, we will find a mixture of regret about the past ("what he did to me was not right!"); dread or hopeful anticipation about the future (If only I get this job, everything will be great."); ill-informed judgments ("that woman looks like a phony."); mundane thoughts ("I need to take the garbage cans out"); and utter gibberish ("What if PLANET OF THE APES was real?").

A very, very small percentage of our thoughts involve helping us achieve our life's goals.

So if the vast majority of our thoughts are at best useless and at worst are causing us to be angry, frustrated and depressed, how do we improve this situation?

We create a separation between ourselves and our thoughts through awareness.  By bringing our attention to our thoughts, without judgment, a separation is created, and we realize that we are not our thoughts.  We are beings who are aware of our thoughts.  This separation causes our thoughts to lose their power over us.  By shifting from unconscious thinking to awareness of our thoughts, we align ourselves with Universal Intelligence.  This alignment brings peace, joy and love into our lives.

Our thoughts bring us nothing, especially compared with the gifts that awareness brings.

Let's be aware.

Stop making decisions!

Waihihi Bay, Bay of Islands, New Zealand

Figuring out the best course of action can be stressful.  We weigh the pros and cons of each decision and have anxiety over whether we are making the best one.

Instead of making decisions, we can allow decisions to be made.  We can stop trying to figure out the best solution through thought, and allow the decision to come through by relaxing into being.  The best course of action for all concerned comes to us naturally and effortlessly.

The information we have available to make decisions is incredibly limited compared to the all encompassing knowledge of the Infinite Energy Source.  If, instead of trying to think a problem through, we surrendered the outcome to Source, we would be guided to the best possible solution.

Our stress levels diminish greatly because it is a relief to realize that we do not have to decide anything.  We can merely allow decisions to happen.

Allowing decisions to be made is not being passive or lazy.  It is instead a recognition of who we are: Divine spirits in physical manifestation.  Allowing Source to guide us causes us to fulfill our life's purpose much more quickly and directly than having our limited minds try to figure things out.

Let's stop making decisions.

Sadness

Whangapoua Beach, Coromandel, New Zealand

When feelings of sadness appear, we seek out memories that are consistent with that emotion.  The thoughts and memories strengthen, magnify and lengthen the duration of the feeling.   Our sadness intensifies and lasts for hours, days, or longer.  In addition to the present feeling of sadness, we are reminded of all the other times in our lives when we felt sad.

If we break the connection between the emotion and our thoughts, the emotion will enter and leave us in minutes, if not moments.  We can feel the emotion with all of our attention, without giving it power by connecting it to our thoughts.  We can break the connection between our emotion and our thoughts by bringing our awareness to our feelings without judgment.  Thoughts and memories keep giving the emotion energy to sustain it.  When we feel the emotion without triggering thoughts and memories, it soon passes.

Shifting our attention away from thought can feel like death.  In a way, it is.  Our ego, which consists of our thoughts, beliefs and judgments falls away and we awaken anew.  We awaken to the realization that we are not who we thought we were.  We are divine beings materialized.

Let's bring awareness to our emotions.