Firstly, if it is OK with you, I'd like us to stand in some questions to create a space in which you and I can work together. OK?............
What is missing from your life at the moment?
Are you sure you haven't got it? Maybe you just left it lying somewhere.
No? OK, so you haven't got it. If you had a friend with this "Missing" problem, what are your thoughts on maybe-why your friend hasn't got it? [Spend some time with this question, and note down each and every "answer" that pops. Allow time for the surface stuff to get out of the way so that stuff buried deeper can get out into the light, too. Censor nothing. And remember, you're not talking about yourself; you are talking about a friend you know very well who is also missing something in his/her life]
Does your friend really want it? Don't be too quick to answer this one either; there are several layers to be penetrated. Some people want something with a part of their being, and resist it with another. Also, some people, out of habit, get so hooked on "wanting" that the wanting is more important than getting what is wanted.. So sit with this question of "wanting"for a while.
What kind of beliefs do you think your friend might have to have in order to want what he/she wants, and not get it? This is a doozy of a question, designed to unearth both the beliefs behind what is wanted, and the beliefs that lie behind any perception we have that we don't get what we want in life.
OK. Now let's come back to you and your "missing"...... Are you occupying a Position on what you want (ie. an opinion or a belief that you feel you have to be "right" about)? You're not getting what you want; what does that mean to you? What do you think the "not-getting it" tells you about this situation? What do do you think it says to you about you? Which of your principles is being violated? Make a statement of these Positions you are on.
Here's a simple example of what I mean -- What's missing in my life? My wife is not interested in sex any more since the baby was born. What positions am I on? 1) I have a right to sex. 2) Sex is necessary for a good marriage. 3) She should get therapy.
Good. Now, since we live in a realm of Opposites, every position has an oppositon. What is the OPPOSITE position of each of these positions you are on. Put that into words.
To continue with my example, the Op-positions might be something like -- 1) A wife has a right to refuse sex. 2) Sex is only a part of marriage. It's not essential. 3) There's nothing wrong with me. what about you?
Wonderful. Now...... Who in your life has in the past, or is now occupying the Opposite Positions for you?
Only you can answer these. In my example, I might answer -- 1) my mother with my father, my first girlfriend, my wife before we were married, 2) my pastor at Church, my mother 3)my wife, my pastor, my mother-in-law, my mother
Good. Stay with me here, we're getting close.......
If you get what you want, what Positions (ie, opinions or beliefs you want to be right about).... what Positions that you are holding to are going to be proved "right"? What is the Principle involved that is going to be proved Right? What Oppositions are going to be proved "wrong"?
If she gives in and gives me sex, I get to be right that I have a right to it and that it is good for a marriage. She, and everyone else who opposed me on this are therefore Wrong. I might ease up on the belief that she needs therapy -- but only until she says ""No" the next time.
Here's how this game of Position/Opposition works. All this conflict occurs because we forget the Law of Opposites. Everything on this plane has its polar opposites. Everything I take a position on has its opposite in me, but I lie about that -- to myself and to others. When I am in denial about anything, that which I refuse to acknowledge will show up in my face, in events and in other people. Other people wear the costumes and masks that I refuse to take responsibility for, inviting me to own the reflection and open my self up to the disowned halves of myself. It's all done with projections and mirrors. Isn't that miraculous? And isn't that so kind of others to reflect myself back to me? Now that is love!
Good. Now you have a bit of a handle on how this Positions thing works, especially around the Game of "Missing". And "What's Missing in My Life" is a game. The Purpose of the game is: 1) to get you what you want; 2) to perpetuate the game until you do get it; and 3) eventually to discover that the game is not working and just how pointless is all the suffering the game imposes. When you get that ... game over.
OK. Just two more questions, and we're done with this preparation ----
- Am I willing to come from a possibility that "Missing"is just a game, and that the Game is stopping me from getting what I truly want?
- Am I willing to live my life in this possibility?
There are no right or wrong answers to any of these questions. The answers to look for are the ones that come in the form of experiences and realisations -- "Got-Its".
CONTEXT
Around and through everything that is there is a space, a space that holds it all together for each of us. This space can take on all manner of intangible qualities. The miraculous thing is that the quality of the space any one thing is held in depends entirely on the beholder. For example, let's say you and I are having a conversation together in the street when a black cat crosses our path. Now lets say you had a pet black cat that you loved as a child, but I was brought up under a superstition that black cats are very bad luck. You and I are going to perceive the same "black cat" in two very different ways because of the differing contexts we have around "black cats". Context determines HOW we will see and relate to an event, thing or person, and every repetition of that circumstance will invoke the same context, regardless of other circumstances.
This quality of space that I have labelled "Context" has many other names, like Condition, Unconditional Love, Wholeness, Nature, Creation, Good, God, the Life Force, The Word, to name but a few. However we choose to spell it, the space I am talking about is that energy, that directed nothingness, that state of being from which all thoughts, light particles, electrons and gross matter were created, and in which they are now held. Context is the cosmic glue that holds all the contents together. Context has the power to organise creation, and each of us has the power to influence how it works in our world. We have the power to colour that glue to be whatever hues we want it to be. Whether we know it or not, we are doing it all the time. In our waking moments, at least, we are never not-doing it. And we don't know that.. And we wonder why our lives turn out that dunnish grey you get when you mix every colour in the paint box together.
For want of words to describe the indescribable, let us call the stuff of our lives -- our body, mind, feelings, environment, thoughts, beliefs, opinions, longings, expectations, -- let's call all that the Content of our life. The space that permeates and surrounds the Content of our life can be likened to the space that permeates and surrounds a vase giving it a shape and definition we recognise as "vase-ness". We will call this space, Context.
Just as it is the the "not-vase" space that creates and defines the vase -- just as it is the "not-black" space on this screen that creates and defines the black letters and words -- so the Context of our lives creates and defines the Content...... I'll say that again --
The Context in which we choose to live our life creates and defines the Content of our life.
At this point it starts to become clear, I hope, that efforts to change the Content of our lives are ultimately futile if we pay no regard to, or are completely ignorant of the Context. Without a consciously created Context, life feels like we are spitting in the wind. Contexts of every kind attract events, people and experiences that support and reinforce the context. All contexts are self-proving.
Without a consciously created Context, we get to live in a quasi-Context -- a default Condition. Victim-ness, for example, is Condition (a default context) -- and a very, very popular one. God knows why, because it attracts unto itself events and experiences that allow the Victim to experience all the powerlessness and frustrations that are the consequences of giving up responsibility for one's own well-being. Any Context that is not deliberately chosen is a Condition. But every Condition still acts like a Context, creating and defining experiences that align with it's (negative) characteristics.
The raw thought-energy from which our tangible, perceptible universe was created permeates everything that is. It holds all the atoms and molecules, neutrons and electrons, planets, suns, constellations and galaxies, moving them majestically in a cosmic dance, suspended in an infinite firmament. Without Context, nothing could exist.
Whether we live in Context or Condition, that space not only defines and creates what we experience, but is actually also its life-force. Neither Context nor Condition are separate from the Content; they are its essence -- it's life-giving energy. And the emotional quality of the Context or Condition governs the quality of the energy. A Context of, say, Delightedness carries a very different energy from a Condition of Anxiousness.
Context (Condition) is a state, not of doing, not of having, but of Be-ing.
Context (Condition) is not something you get (like a reward or punishment) nor is it something you catch (like the flu) -- it is something that you choose to Be. You come from it. When you decide to transform your life, you have to change the state of Be-ing that you emanate from.
So, who are you?
- You are the state of being (Context or Condition) that you create for yourself.
- You are not your physical and psychological makeup. You are the spiritual space that defines how your physical and psychological being is evolving..
- You are not what you think and feel. You are your relationship to what you are experiencing, thinking and feeling right now
- You are the effect of the Contexts and Conditions that you have created for yourself.
If you're getting a bit depressed about this, remember that anything you have created, you can also dis-create, and re-create as something more appropriate to the kind of life you want to have. Conditions can be dis-created by simply creating a conscious Context in its stead and jumping into that. It can be that simple. It may take some time for the circumstances to change, but if you have made the leap from Content to Context, transformation will happen.
Every good communicator knows instinctively that, when people come to hear or read him, each one comes in his/her own self-generated cocoon of thoughts, feelings and preoccupations, probably none of which have anything to do with what he wants to communicate. So, to be effective, he will FIRST create an appropriate Context, and then invite his audience to step into it. At the end of the communication, if he is truly wise, he will gently take each audient back to his/her individual condition, so that that may be transformed by what has just transpired between them. At the outset of this article I created a Context by asking you to engage actively with a series of questions that invited you to step into my space for a while. There are many other ways to create Contexts and, if you want to know more about it, may I humbly recommend my books "Communicating For a World That Works", and "Another Way"?
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
The simplest and most effective way I know to create a Context is to put it it the form of a Question -- a Question that invites experiences, rather than pat answers. For example, if you want to live in a Context of Enoughness, create a question like -- "What does it feel like, and what do I need to learn, to experience Enoughness?". There are no "yes"or "no"answers to such a question. There are no worthwhile rational answers to it. It invites challenges and experiences. That, after all is what life is all about.
All questions provoke answers that are limited by the size and quality of the space from which the question arises. Questions from the Mind (Content) get answers from the same Mind. There is no growth: in fact, there is a contraction that accompanies definition, separation and limitation. On the other hand, questions that arise from Context, provoke and inspire answers in total experience that come from the Universal Context of all absolutes, the same context that is the life-force of all creation. We can access that because it is what we are a part of.
Questions that come from Context are unlimited and expansive, and so are the "answers". Questions of Context open up new possibilities. The experiences they engender may be fraught with paradoxes and contradictions with which your mind will want to wrestle and demand rational answers. Pay no attention to your mind. Treat all paradoxes, contradictions and mysteries as invitations to let go of your hidebound assumptions of what is real and unreal, possible and impossible. We do not know what is possible!! Inside our tiny minds we have no idea of what is possible!! Possibility is the child of non-sense. The non-sensicalities of paradox and contradiction invite us to expand in ways that Mind simply cannot do. That's why minds cannot wrap themselves around Mystery, so they kill it by trying to "explain" it.
When a question arises in your awareness, look at where it is coming from. Does it come from Mind-Content, or Context?
How do you tell the difference? Questions from the mind demand an immediate and definitive answer, and tend to baulk at any delay for introspection and real experience. Minds want to "get it sorted" -- a.s.a.p. Minds hate unanswered questions. Minds are terrified of "not-knowing". Minds LOVE something more to be right about.
Questions from Context are happy to stand in a space of "not-knowing", and to wait for life to deliver the lessons which will give rise to the Wisdom you are really looking for anyway. Questions from Context feel expansive, and they enrich your experience. Notions of "right " and "wrong" just don't enter into it.
Questions from Mind have one Right Answer -- The Answer -- and an infinite number of Wrong ones.. Questions from Context have no Right or Wrong answers. they expand your perception of life in every dimension at once.
Look, it is more than just possible that the most you are ever going to get from life is what you put out for. If you come from Mind's stuff or Content, then what you ask for is going to be limited. If you come from Context, then both what you put out for and what you get will be unlimited by any expectations.
You will get in experience the Power of Possibility.
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