GF Live 1-22-22 The Power To Drop Painful Self-Doubt

We cannot fulfill who we are – all that we are created to be – in an imagined time to come, any more than a rose waits for the “right kind” of sunlight to reveal ­– and to realize – its natural beauty and grace.

Transcript

I hope somehow you have put on your dancing shoes this morning, Your smart cap, Because we're going to look at something pretty extraordinary. Some ideas. Real ideas. And just to be clear, The purpose of any real idea is not to give you just something to think about, To momentarily stimulate the mind. Real ideas, The kind of which we're going to look at together, Are like the connecting fiber in a muscle. They are something that weave their way through what we would call reality. Because reality is, In one meaning of the word, The expression of these living principles, These ideals. Something that, From out of which comes our experience of life and our possibilities as well. And I want to start with an idea, Again, That I'm going to ask you to listen to and not so much think about while we're working together, But if you make a little note or something like that, Or find a little place in your heart where that certain feeling can be stored, We can use these ideas as a kind of window. We must learn to look through new ideas, New self-knowledge. Our life now, The way it is, Is the way it is because we look out at the world and our relationships with others through what we call our understanding. It is what we meet life with, Our understanding. Our understanding is built upon our experience of the ideas we were given as we matured. But we should also be able to use an understanding that transcends these ideas that says, Well, Look, Somehow or other, The ideas that I have, That I'm living from, They are not bringing about the fulfillment, The sense of completion that I'm looking for. I need new ideas. Christ spoke of this, Talked about a new mind, The Buddhas, A metanoia, A new way of looking at life. That's what we're going to do. So let's get started. First, It's very important that you and I have a basis, A context for our work together. And it begins with this, Whatever word you use, Enlightenment, Nirvana, Awakening, Rebirth, These words, These ideas are not some fixed state. We tend to think along the lines of me, What I want, And the thing that I want so that I am always somewhat apart from what I think about, And hope to close the difference between myself and that idea one day and become that ideal. Enlightenment is a moment to moment conscious relationship with the divine, By whatever name you want to call it. Nirvana liberation is not something that we, In quotes, Achieve. It is a realization of another order of relationship that you and I are created as human beings to enter into and live with and from at all times. That is our real purpose. Because that kind of real enlightenment, That real nirvana, Speaks to a transaction between the moment that unfolds, What it stirs within us, And what is revealed subsequently, So that there is this ongoing upwelling of wisdom, This ongoing realization of another order of ourselves because it's always being given to us at once to leave who we have been and it wants to enter into this new sense of ourselves, This new relationship with life that is always renewing itself. So that's first. And I don't think you would be joining me here if you didn't have that sense. So we have to ask this question. If that's what we are actually interested in, What's keeping us from being all that we sense that we are meant to be, From realizing in a very intimate fashion a kind of indwelling greatness? Not the greatness that this world calls great. This world doesn't know anything at all about greatness. This world worships what it imagines greatness to be. This cannot be and is not something imagined again. It is a relationship with what is the penultimate greatness, The true greatness. What's keeping me from experiencing this? Why does it elude my grasp? If you're a serious aspirant, You've had to have asked this question. If you're a serious aspirant, Then from time to time the teaching comes along and helps you grasp a little bit more of what it is that is between you and that which you know you are meant to fulfill the purpose of your life. So here's the answer. What is it that is between us and this greatness? And please just listen. It is a kind of an illusion. In truth, It is a misdirection and a subsequent misunderstanding born of that misdirection that you and I are not already whole. That you and I are not already and have not already been given all that we need to fulfill the true purpose of our life. Now this is not a new idea. It's spoken of across the board, Literally in every true religious context, Not mechanical religion, But the true religion, The true teachings that are here to help us reconnect ourselves to this other order of our own being in which we can begin to experience directly a relationship with an unfolding ceaseless greatness. What's the nature of this illusion? What is this veil? Use the words that you want. And it is this. It is the illusion of becoming versus the power to be. The illusion of becoming versus the power to be. What's the difference? I will cite just ever so briefly because I have a lot of other important ideas to share with you, That there are these very well-known teaching stories surrounding Christ's life, Surrounding the life of Siddhartha, The Buddha, That point directly to this difference between the illusion of becoming and the power to be. In the New Testament, For instance, Christ goes into, After baptism, Goes into the desert and after 40 days is met there by what is called in the written anyway, The devil, The deceiver, By the way, The real meaning of that word. And that unconscious nature says basically to Christ, Look, You're no doubt something pretty high and mighty, But I can make the world bend its knee to you. I can give you all the power in the world. There's three of them in this particular story, But I'm cutting short. Now I don't know if it's ever occurred to you why in the world if this deceiver, If this unconsciousness, If this dark force, If it had power of its own, Why would it have to tempt? Why wouldn't it just smite everyone and everything in its way? You know, Just bury it. Because you see, It doesn't have any power. Evil, Hatred, Fear has no power other than what? Than what we give to it when we instrument that principle. So here's Christ and he says, You bow to me and I'll do all of this. So Christ is tempted to do what? He is tempted to become what he has promised if he will obey the edict of that evil. And evil, The real definition of it, Including in all scripture, Is that which comes between a man and a woman and the indwelling good that they are intended to instrument. Something that separates us from what is holy. That's what evil is. So here is this evil and it is tempting Christ to become something if Christ will just do what he's told to do, Which is to kneel, Bow to the evil. Buddha under the tree, Mara appears, Tempting him. Tempting him how? By showing him all these things that he could have and do and eventually make his own, Get rid of all his suffering. He's over. You could become all of this, Tempted to become. But Buddha like Christ did not answer that temptation to become. They answered it with the power of being. The power to be. And in both instances, The idea is completed by this idea that not by these powers, Not by these illusions am I completed, But by the bread of life, By the word of God, The word of, By the living truth. The living truth, Not something outside of me that I have to think about how to become so that then I can be whole, But something that I am already a part of. And because I'm already a part of it, I'm already endowed with everything that I need in this instance to dismiss the deceiver, To dismiss Mara and all of the temptation, Her daughters, The fear of that, Of being injured, The promise of being made whole beyond belief, But a belief that is endowed in an idea of becoming what? The image that one is given in that moment. I hope you're able to follow me with this. Because it is our life. The only way that there is any power over us to be afraid, To worry, To be and sense ourselves as inadequate, Is that prior to that moment we are tempted into unconsciously identifying with the promise of some panacea, Of some power, Some prescription to whatever may be that immediate sense of inadequacy that we feel in the moment when along comes the trial. And generally this works on us because it's a kind of a slight in hand. Suddenly my mind says, Oh no, Look at that. What's going to happen? What does this mean? Surely you know this. Now why would I have a reaction, OMG, Oh no, What that means? Why would I have any reaction like that unless in that moment somehow or other I was brought into a relationship with what I think is the world, What I see as the potential of a problem or a pain or a punishment coming my way, And in that moment to do what? To feel inadequate. I suddenly feel inadequate to the moment. Maybe I think about, I want a new job, I want to move someplace new, I want to change some relationship I have. You and I both know in that same moment that we have that something in us brings up the abbot. Well what about this and what about that? And then the mind starts bouncing back and forth with all the negative possibilities that are the projection of what? What is every negative possibility our mind presents to us? What is its nature? If not built into it, Is this deception that somehow or other I am, You are going to be inadequate to meet that moment. When the moment that we are being fed this idea of being inadequate to meet doesn't exist without some negative imagination that has drawn us into identification with it. I hope you're following. You want to write something down, Four words, Inadequate by unconscious comparison, Inadequate by unconscious comparison. In that moment where we feel inadequate, How can I feel inadequate unless something in me already in quote knows not only what I should be or need to have in order to get through that moment, But in that image that I have that is a construct of this unconscious nature, An image perpetrated through time, Passed down from generation to generation about what it means to be a whole strong successful human being, A man of my own, A woman on her own. And every last one of those images, Every last one of those ideas do not bring the strength they pretend to produce. They bring exactly the opposite because in that moment when suddenly I have this fearful reaction based on incidentally a perception produced by my own mind interpreting some event then it is met with at once this feeling of, God I'm not going to cut it. I'm not going to be what I know I should be or could be, How come? Because in the past I've never lived up to it and we're thrown into this cauldron, This crucible, Trying to figure out in that moment now given my inadequacy, Given the fear that I feel. Fear is the lie of inadequacy but it is the inadequacy born of an illusion that somehow or other I'm not going to be able to be what I need to be and therefore what happens I have to go look to become something. And in that moment we're shunted off, We're thrown into a world of imagination and the time that we need to get ready, The time that we must have to prepare ourselves for the onslaught or the possibility of this problem that's coming. I know this runs deep but you and I are created not only to comprehend this consciousness in which all of this darkness works its way with us but in the very awareness of this illusion and all of the ways in which it pulls the wool over our eyes to be able to stand there and recognize, Ah I'm starting to get this. I am tempted to pursue what I must, Whatever power, Whatever pleasure, Whatever it is, That I must pursue it because of why. Because if I don't have what I need to become then I will be relegated back into some position of being powerless, Afraid, And alone again, Thrown back, Rug pulled out from underneath me. I hope you're following because it's an important insight. It means there can't be any kind of temptation. Temptation to do what? Did you know that when you try to figure out what you should say to somebody that the reason that you're trying to work out in advance what you need to say is because another part of you is terrified that if you don't have it down pat, If you don't have some plan to follow that when the other person responds the way they do, Which you also fear that they may become negative or throw something in that you can't expect, Then you're going to be thrown for a loss and you don't want to be thrown for a loss. Why? Because you have the image of yourself as someone who's strong. But strength isn't in preparation. Strength is in the perception that who and what you are is given everything you need in that moment, The wisdom required to outgrow and transcend this fearful consciousness, This sense of inadequacy. Try and see it. There can't be temptation without the sense of inadequacy. There can't be temptation without the idea of being limited. I can't be tempted to try to become something unless I feel in the moment of trial that who and what I am of myself is not enough to succeed. Do you see it? Because what is the temptation? It's to go look for an idea, An image, Some past knowledge, Something. The temptation is to look for a life raft, Isn't it? The temptation is to look for another captain, Something to come in and save me from this situation. That's the temptation. See, Look, You can see it if you're willing to. And in that temptation, What? The very nature that tempts us then shows up and says, Here's what you need. Aren't you glad that now you know what you need to do? Now you know what you must become by identifying with what I am suggesting to you to identify with. Here's what you do. You must simply act like you're not afraid. That's the solution. Demand respect. That's the solution. Don't put up with that. That's the solution. Go make some more money. That's the solution. Get a bigger house. Drive a better car. Get a six-pack set of abs. Get your face, Your body fixed up so that you remain beautiful. All of these are solutions offered in the face of a temptation, A temptation predicated on the idea that who and what we are in that moment is insufficient, Inadequate to meet that challenge successfully and to exit that moment as we are intended to exit another order of human being. Why? Because we entered into that moment understanding the power to be, The power to be in relationship with another order of consciousness that as the moment is unfolding, So is that unconscious nature in us being revealed, So that we don't just think to ourselves, I should be this or I should be that, But I'm actually a witness to the appearance of that psychological fear. See, We don't, We're not aware of our fear itself. We're not aware of the consciousness of fear. We're not aware of the consciousness of inadequacy. What we are in quotes aware of, And we're not aware of it at all, Is what that consciousness, That's the root of the fear and inadequacy, We're only aware of what that consciousness is pointing to out there. It's saying there's the source of the fear. There's the reason you're inadequate. And what it's pointing to is something that essentially it's saying that if this doesn't go the way you need it to go so that you can remain propped up by the image you have, If this doesn't go the way you want it to, You're going to lose everything. So basically we are handed a threat. Please see it with me. I'm supposed to go give a presentation in front of my peer group at work. I want to talk to my mom or my dad about a problem, A long-standing one. I want to sort something out with my friends. Maybe I have an addiction. And the minute that something in me properly prompts me to want to meet a condition that I have never really dealt with because it's always put on the back burner. Why is it always put on the back burner? Because the moment I think about it, Past, Present or future, Something in me says there's a threat here. I may lose something. What am I going to lose? I'm going to lose this falsely esteemed image of myself, Which is the source of my fear, Not the source of my strength. And when that threat appears, It could even be just getting into traffic. You ever try to go someplace and you didn't leave on time and you're suddenly in traffic? You and I both know there's anxiety there. The anxiety is what? It's the threat that if I don't get there on time, Don't rush, Somehow something bad is going to happen. I'm going to lose something. I won't have as much pleasure as I want, Or I'll somehow be, There'll be some penalty for being late. And when the threat appears, What appears in the moment of that threat? The temptation to do what will disarm what is threatening me. Please see it. Speed. Be defensive. Think through what you need to say so that you look like you know what you're talking about. See it with me. Because in that moment, What am I being given, If not an answer to the threat, By the very nature that produced the threat? The rescuing agent appears on the spot. And the rescuing agent that appears on the spot is the minion of that unconscious nature that produced the illusion that my ship is sinking, That something bad is going to happen to me. Not one of those thoughts, Not one of those ideas, Not one of those temptations to become, To imagine myself as adequate, To imagine myself as strong, To imagine all of this nonsense in this world called affirming myself. You don't need, Doesn't it ever occur to us that the only thing that needs to affirm strength is weakness? So that anything that comes from a lemon seed grows a lemon tree, Which is why we go in and then when we can't live up to what we've imagined we should be, What happens to us? Then we start beating ourselves up and judging ourselves for what it is that we were unable to do as imagined we should be. We have to get rid of all of that. Underneath the threat, Underneath the temptation that comes to answer that threat is one underlying lie. The purpose of this talk. One underlying lie. Take a nice deep breath. I need to be someone, I need to be something other than I am right now. Why else would I suddenly be looking around with all these, My thoughts looking high and low? Why else? He said something that hurt me. Why else does my mind start running around trying to figure out what's the right response? How do I handle this? Because in that moment the reaction that we are responding to is a, How shall I say, It is part of the illusion that who and what I am in that moment must now prove that it is not what it fears itself to be. Think about this with me for a moment. If I don't come up with a clever response, If I don't put you back in your place, If I don't get that situation straightened out so that everything's sitting pretty again and everything's at peace again, Can you not see in that moment something is telling me, Hey guy, You must begin right now to figure out how to escape this condition. The condition by the way that doesn't exist without a consciousness that has interpreted that moment and told me on the spot you're not enough to deal with this, Go find something, Get past this. You see, In that moment we're thrown into a world, An unconscious world of trying to figure out who we need to become so that we can get through what it is that we're being told is happening to us. My own mind tells me that unless I put you in your place, My own mind tells me that unless I am so incredibly prepared for this confrontation that's about to take place, I'm going to somehow or other come out on the short end of the stick when the moment hasn't occurred. So the confrontation that I fear is the projection of a negative imagination that as it projects what might take place projects with it the idea that if that happens you won't be enough therefore you need to become what you imagine you must be. And in that moment I am handed off. I'm handed off into the idea that as I am I'm not enough and nothing can be further from the truth and this is not motivation, This is not pump me up, This is not get you all you know, Spurred up and yeah spirituality beautiful I really I am and all the rest there's nothing to do with that. Shame on the teachers the phony baloney gurus who want to motivate you into feeling good about yourself because they know that that's how they get you to take part in the plot they have to take from you what they want. No when I say the understanding is a misdirection that I'm not enough as I am what I'm saying is in that moment I can meet with complete open eyes with a willingness to recognize that within me yes lives this darkness and that my task is not to try to overpower the darkness it isn't to become something else it isn't to handle the fear it is to hand the fear over to the part of myself that is always present and always powerful and always perceiving in that moment that if I will simply recognize that that moment has come not to bring fear but to release me from the identification with a fearful consciousness by revealing it to me that's what enlightenment is. The capacity that we're given by what is celestial in nature to bring into this consciousness that is asleep and in the dark of itself a light that by its very dawning reveals at once everything that that whisperer everything that that dark voice everything that that victimizing nature wants to create in us by telling us you know you're not going to get through this you don't have what it takes you you've failed a thousand times you need to be afraid of this because it's much more than you can handle that that's the lie but it's not the lie because you and I are great it's the lie because within us lives another order of being that recognizes that very moment is one that's intended to be transcended and how is it transcended it's transcended by realization it's transformation through illumination not transformation by becoming something that will then enable me to get past that power by struggling to become what I'm given to imagine I need to be what happens to me see it why am I in the moment I'm in suddenly facing again that feeling of anxiety or fear if not for the fact that the last time I was in that situation I was given an image an idea something to become a time when I would no longer be subject to the whims and vagaries of this world and then identifying with that image and then giving my life to it literally incarnating an illusion come to the point where it's clear it's an illusion and rather than meeting that moment with the understanding that I have been brought once again face to face with an illusory order of self rather than I do what I've always done which is to simply thank whatever that darkness is which you don't think it's darkness because everything that rescues you is made in your own image isn't it of course it is in that moment I have a new relationship with that moment and I can't be tempted why can't I be tempted because I see through it because I understand how that works now the key lesson that I wrote for this time together says we cannot fulfill who we are all that we are created to be in an imagined time to come any more than a rose can realize its beauty by waiting for the right moment of sunlight by which it will be revealed there is no time to come when you're going to be free there is no time to come when I will achieve moksha when I will understand the nature of nirvana there's no time to come it is now and it's now because you and I are already the instrument of a relationship with something that is so far removed from anything that can be imagined that the process of entering into it requires setting down this imagined self the imagined threats it faces and the imagined nature it will become if it only listens to what is threatening us you cannot be more than you are because what you are is the endless potential and possibility of transcending every limitation inherent in this nature I just have to say it one more time and then I'll say good morning and goodbye you can't be more than you are I cannot be more than I am in this moment what am I in this moment let's do this together in this moment I am aware of my surroundings I am aware of this beehive going on behind the mind imagine how many drops of water fall into the Niagara River from the Niagara Falls it is unimaginable now imagine that every last drop of water from the from the falls into the river is an influence an impression a movement and that every last one of those impressions are pouring into this river called myself this flow of life this dow how in the name of heaven can a human being believe that he or she can be threatened by any one of those drops any one of those influences how in the world can a man or a woman fall prey to this idea that that can be threatened it cannot be why because it is continually pouring into itself and it is continually perfecting itself that is what we are and you can't be more than that and you don't need to be more than that and one day by the grace of God by the grace of the divine you will understand that you don't need to be one thing more than aware not judging not choosing not struggling present to everything that is unfolding in you present and then present again and present again why because that's enlightenment because that presence is brought about by the drops of water coming into the river and the river responding to the circulation and that circulation is this consciousness that you and I are meant to be a part of in the truest celestial sense of that word catch the temptation catch the thief remember it isn't about becoming you'll always see that when you're afraid or worried or anxious something is whispering to you in that moment what you need to do to not feel that way do not listen let alone identify with what's telling you you don't what you need to become in order to change or escape that moment this isn't about control this is about a new order of consciousness and it's already there 41 minutes be safe do your work this is work and I'll see you next Saturday right.