Special Lessons

All of us know what it's like to be dogged by parts of us that want to drag us down. Call it what you will: some compulsion or obsession seems to follow us into all our relationships, only to wreck them in one way or another. We struggle as best we can to free ourselves from these dark states but invariably find ourselves short of the mark.

Do you find yourself going through your day, running around like some mad human being, trying to juggle the pieces of your life to make them fit into some picture you've imagined? Have you had enough of suffering uselessly over your best attempts to change those daily experiences? Then here's what you need to consider...

In the still uncharted realms of mind and heart, there exist parts within every person that are drawn to seek out relationships with thoughts that are self-wrecking. For instance, we can often become transfixed by our own troubles, turning the image of some fear-producing picture over and over in our mind. And who hasn't found himself drawn into an argument where the antagonistic voice in his head is nothing...

Looking at life through the eyes of resistance is not unlike looking at our own reflection in a pool of troubled waters; everything gets distorted. In fact, when seeing our lives through the narrow bars of some unwanted state, nothing is the way we see it.

How would you like to live from a nature where no matter what happens, no matter what comes at you, as soon as whatever it is lands on you, it's changed into something good? "Oh gosh, wow! You mean I could live from a part of myself where it wouldn't matter what it was that came to it -- no matter how dark, fearsome, hateful, worried, angry, no matter what it was -- as soon as it touched me...

Depending on how the day breaks for us, we often find ourselves feeling discontent about our life, experiencing any or all of the following conditions whenever we: Find ourselves unable to change or control someone near to us. Take a close look at our physical appearance and find we are somehow lacking. Run headlong into self-compromising behaviors beyond our seeming strength or ability to change...

What is it, then, that balances? What is that which allows this nature -- this divided nature, this nature that works in opposites -- what is it that would permit it the peace it seeks? What is it that creates balance in a human being?

Useless suffering can't be separated from useless resistance. The more you resist something, the more you suffer, believing that somehow or other your resistance to what you don't want to do (or be) is going to separate you or liberate you from the thing you don't want. Resistance is an unconscious form of attention, and the more attention you give to something you don't want, the more of it you get.

When it comes to our wish to make real changes in ourselves, good intentions cost (us) nothing... and that's why the road to hell is paved with useless coins. On the other hand, making a conscious effort to change -- in the moment that calls for it -- comes with the cost of seeing ourselves as we really are. This awareness shows us not only the possibility of being released from our worry and fear...

The reason that we do what we do is because we are looking for the truth of ourselves. It doesn't matter - wanting to learn how to cook, wanting to start a new business, looking for a new relationship, wanting to learn how to write a book, surf, sumo wrestling - whatever it may be. And as many people as there are hearing or reading this... wherever you are, all over the world and in this room...

As a race of beings, we have become completely complicit in the pain that visits us. A thought from the past pops up and punishes us. Someone says something we don't like, and we try to punish them and feel the pain of the blame that we place on them. There is an endless series of relationships with a part of our own nature that has convinced us that the pain is produced by a condition outside of us...

We can't really know love's power to free us, to fulfill us through our relationships, until we gain some totally new ideas about how to see, and then interact with others. Not just a rehash of our past failed viewpoint; we know that path is powerless to heal the aching heart. An altogether higher view is called for. We need to be able to see others through the "eyes" of a completely fresh understanding...