Dear Marieta,
“Strangers are friends we haven’t met yet.”
Thank you for this opportunity to find simple words, basic wisdoms:
Where to start?
1) Are you aware of the difference between “believing” and “knowing”?
“Believing” seems to be easier/faster than “knowing/examining”!
2) There is a big difference between “I” and “my”; overlooking this subtle difference causes all the lovelessness and cruelty in this world of ideas.
I am aware of:
my body,
my finances,
my situation.
I am lonely,
I am sick,
I am in trouble.
“I” is not a thing, is not a perceivable object.
“My” is a mind-construct, a story we painfully grew into and learned to believe to be real.
//
Please don’t believe anything I share here, but see it as an invitation into your own peace and happiness; to dis-cover for yourself, examine, explore, understand what is behind the words.
We easily rush and miss the real gift of being alive and risking friendship.
3) “my” and “me” requires thinking, mental activity; words, interpretations, assumptions.
“I” is who we really are;
“I” is not a thing in time and space.
It is higher than making-sense:
you cannot deny that you are!
Time is produced by thinking.
Space is produced by our five senses.
Mind is a master in shamelessly filling in the gaps, in telling stories.
//
I try to use very simple words.
Please give them a chance, be sincere, let’s look together, ask questions; we have no time to waste in the me-kindergarten.
We are here to celebrate life, to be practical, to share.
4) Words are pointers, for our attention to follow.
The word apple is not an apple!
The word apple is a concept, a mental image, an idol.
Concepts are powerful, concepts enable all our so called advancements as a human species; but without love and wisdom we are doomed to suffer and to destroy this amazingly beautiful world.
//
5) “Identity” is an important word/concept/aspect to explore, to experiment with.
In ignorance, I believe I am “me”, this body-mind.
We believe to be the thinker of thoughts.
We believe to be the feeler of feelings.
We believe to be only the body-mind instrument.
We are busy with objects/impressions that come and go and we totally disregard/overlook “I am”.
//
“I am”… not as a complicated fancy spiritual struggle or achievement, but the most simple and effortless sense of being:
I am, I exist; without the mind coming in with its insatiable hunger to tell stories, to make sense, its shameless attitude of pretending to be in charge.
//
6) Life is more than meets the eye!
Marieta, did you grow your hands, did you invent breathing, are you controlling digestion, blood flow, hormone levels, and all the uncounted miraculous functions that are happening right now in ‘your’ body?
Nada 👎
Life is doing all of that, but “me” claims ownership/control.
Life is not a problem to be solved but a mystery to dis-cover.
//
God/Life/Awareness/Consciousness/Mother Nature – whatever name you enjoy – is LOVE, is Beauty, is Intelligence.
Your being here and now is not an accident, you are neither a random vegetable, nor a special “me”.
7) Our suffering as a “me” – our sense of being a seemingly separate-self, alone in a dangerous world of eight billion “others” – is caused by a subtle misunderstanding of who/what we are in Essence.
We are unaware of the difference between “I” and “me”.
We are easily intimidated by so called “facts”.
We are intimidated by “our own” thoughts and feelings.
//
8) Relaxing (without being lazy) is super important; it is more like a brave listening attitude:
Life, tell me, guide me, show me…
from the unpretentious place of “I don’t know”.
Child-like, not childish 😇.
And to playfully/lovingly become aware of our habitual mind patterns; not to fix what isn’t broken, but to dis-cover the peace, gift and abundance of this moment, here and now.
Not to put our head in the sand, but shamelessly debunk our faulty thinking, fear, pride, shame, expectations and attachments… the whole shebang of the believe in “me” as a separate-self.
//
The portal to our natural peace, guidance and wisdom is the effortless sense “I am, I exist”.
“Truth is simple, but the seeker is complex.”
Our spiritual ego has a hard time to surrender, to give UP, because we invested so many tears/hopes in this assumed “me” that lives as a parasite as our thinking mind.
(I like to discern the erroneous psychological ‘thinking mind’ from the practical/necessary ‘working mind’.)
//
Sorry for so many words.
The words themselves are only pointers, for our attention to follow, to dis-cover the gift and mystery of simply THIS:
I know that I am,
but I cannot put into words what I am ❤️.
//
Many books could be written about all the nuances, and we could spend lifetimes talking and discussing words.
//
Please give my words a chance; don’t just run back into your beloved misery/thinking, but risk to be open and free in clarity and peace.
//
A last thought: In martial arts there is a saying:
“A tight muscle is a slow muscle” 💪.
A tight muscle requires an extra step, because it first needs to be relaxed before it can move.
Relaxing is super important, and it can feel very scary, because of the paper tigers of “me” – our misguided thinking and muscle-memory.
//
Peace and gratitude 🙏
your impersonal friend,
Holger
PS: My words are more like a draft, not fixed as “something” to be fanatic about, but more like a sincere and playful invitation to debunk unhappiness.
