Right?
Because the alternative is just staying lost in our fears and our worries.
And it's not just we do it once,
Right?
We always think,
Oh well I'm just going to worry about this one little thing and then I'll get back to the present moment.
No,
It's how you do anything is how you do everything.
And anytime you give in to these thoughts of fears and worry,
Not to say that there's not a time and a place that maybe there is something you need to give your attention to,
That you do need to think about,
Right?
We're not saying that thinking is the enemy.
It's this constant repetitious thought stream of fear and worrying and trying to control,
As you said,
See,
Trying to control that which we don't control.
We don't control anything.
We think we do.
We think,
You know,
That we're still even just controlling this one.
There's no,
There's nothing independent and solid about us that is in control.
It's just an arising of all of these just billions of different causes and conditions moving in one direction versus another and trusting that how that has been working for you so far has actually been pretty good.
Of course,
You've been there the whole time trying to imagine you're controlling it.
Up there in our little thoughts,
Oh I could just control this,
All the fears,
All the worries,
All the what-if scenarios,
Not controlling anything,
Not controlling anything.
Just creating more fear,
More pain,
More suffering,
More illusion that I am this little me up here that's so frightened,
That this little me up here needs something over there in order to feel safe,
In order to feel whole.
There is absolutely nothing on the other side of this moment and there is absolutely nothing outside of me that could make me feel complete and whole.
Whatever it is that you get in the external world is a temporary feeling.
Is a temporary feeling.
Enjoy it,
Enjoy the good conditions,
Don't turn them away.
But do not think that these things outside of you are going to complete you,
They cannot,
There's nothing.
You are already complete and yet we are just living in this fear and worry and anxiety and greed and lust and desire for something outside to add on to me or something to push away some unpleasant thing as though that is somehow going to make us complete.
We are already complete.
We have all tried.
You've had the success,
You've had the the high moments of life,
The new partner,
The new job,
The pay raise,
The new car,
The new holiday,
The new outfit,
Right?
I mean how excited we get over the new iPhone,
Right?
We get so excited,
Oh it's such a fleeting feeling and there's nothing wrong with it.
Enjoy the fleeting feeling,
Enjoy it,
Yay,
Feels nice,
Right?
Something pleasant,
Enjoy it but understand it's just a pleasant temporary feeling because on the other side of that you know it just kind of comes and goes and if you were putting all your hopes on feeling complete by that,
When it goes,
You're left with that empty feeling again.
What next?
Oh maybe I needed the bigger,
The iPhone with the bigger memory.
Maybe I need,
You know,
What else?
Let me get on Amazon,
Let me get on,
Let me go shopping,
Let me you know,
Figure out what it is that I can get outside of me to feel good.
Let me get some validation,
Let me get some praise from someone so I can feel good about myself again.
Again,
Even that,
Nothing wrong with the praise but just fleeting,
It comes and it goes,
Right?
And it keeps us lost in the illusion that there is something here,
I'm pointing here,
Kind of the little thought created me,
The separate me,
The ego,
That somehow I could complete it and feel good.
The feeling of completeness is the absence of the thinking that there's a little me that needs something.
That's what we're waking up to,
The illusion of separateness,
The illusion that somehow we are not connected,
That I am not arising dependent upon you right now.
That's an illusion because I am arising dependent upon you right now.
See,
Because of the question,
The comment you made back there,
You know,
Kind of spurring this on in a different direction.
I get we say like it does sound simple but the alternative is suffering,
Continued suffering.
And every time,
Every time,
We just feed into it a little bit,
Just this little thought over here,
I'm just going to fantasize for a few minutes about this,
About a new partner,
About how good it would feel if I got that new car or something.
Any time you're buying into that thought created me,
You are perpetuating the illusion there is something here that is somehow incomplete and there is something outside of me that can complete me.
And then we just continue on the little,
You know,
Like the little,
You know,
In the mouse cage where they've got the little wheel that spins around,
Just spinning and spinning and spinning,
Right?
And it's just hop off,
Hop off,
Be here,
Start to trust the stillness and the silence openness and the spaciousness that is there in the stillness and the silence,
The wisdom that is here,
There in the silence.
But we just,
You know,
We're there for a few minutes and it feels good.
And then we're like,
Oh,
But back to my thinking,
Back to my worrying,
Back to the illusion.
It requires effort and it just,
It requires a continuous begin again,
Begin again,
Begin again,
No judgment,
No beating ourselves up.
That just pulls us right back up into the illusion,
Just begin again,
A fresh start,
Breathe,
Know where you are here,
Look around and start trusting the sense of being okay.
We just so don't trust that sense of being okay.
We so do not trust it.
And so the more that we practice,
The more that we keep coming back to it and spending more time there,
Giving more evidence to see,
Okay,
I'm safe,
I'm okay,
Right?
The more that we do that,
Right?
The more time we spend there.
And then again,
We are setting the conditions for that accident of enlightenment to happen,
The grace of enlightenment,
Of awakening.
