You want to be strong. You want to be capable. You want to choose a path and you want to walk it with determination. You want to get somewhere, accomplish something, become someone. You’re thinking about what you’ve been taught is good and right and successful; and you have been taught about the pitfalls you should worry about: being bad, being wrong, or failure itself. And you are trying to make your way though this maze of words and ideas to your destination. Your doorway. You are passing the test of goodness that will gain you some reward. Right?
Ah, no.
Sri Ramana Maharshi said it nicely: You carry heaven and hell within you. Look, even if you’re looking from deep within a religion, the Kingdom of Heaven is an eternal place. It has existed for all time, and it will last for all time. I’m good with that idea. But we have to see this “place” as a state of mind within ourselves. Because if heaven and hell are eternal, that means they are happening right now. They don’t start when you die—that’s a bit arrogant. None of us are so important that our personal death suddenly incites the existence of Nirvana.
Heaven always exists and it lives inside of you, but you can’t see it because you are trying to negotiate your way through the words, and the ideas that the words construct. You are stumbling through words like good and healthy etc. etc. etc. With the best of intentions you are surrendering every Holy Moment in the pursuit of Holy Moments. You turn your back on God to try to find God.
The basis of everything, the energy of life—the source of your Being—is the Oneness that is God. You don’t need to be religious to experience that. You just need to lower your barriers. You have all of these ideas and identities built within yourself that prevent you from meeting the universe holistically.
If God-energy comes to you in the form of a friend, you accept it. If it comes to you in the form of a powerful sunset you will stop to simply witness the God-energy being itself. If it comes to you in the form of a book or piece of music you love, you will call it inspired, and in that you mean inspired from the great beyond—from the formless awesomeness of that which is the basis of everything. To these things you are receptive, and open, and clear.
But if God-energy comes to you in the form of an enemy, or an obstacle, or a challenge, you suddenly turn your back on God; you stop your worship of all that Is and you instead shift to rejecting what the God-universe has wrought. You get picky. You get personal. Only certain forms of God will do. And yet your salvation lies not in embracing what you already love, it lies in embracing what you cannot recognize as an aspect of yourself.
Can you imagine that some people see you as difficult? Can you imagine that some see you as an enemy? That some people find you troublesome, or incomplete, or ineffective? And yet, have you ever tried to be any of those things? Of course not. You were just doing what you were doing, and occasionally another boat got swamped by your wake, or even impacted by the conflict between their course and yours. But everything is God, and so the accident is too.
Without accidents and problems there would be no heroes. Without wars no war brides and no baby boom. Whether you have the war or don’t, all sorts of lives will be lost. There are no one-sided coins. Stop trying to find your way out of life through words and symbols. Stop trying to negotiate with concepts and ideas about reality. Stop trying to become something you’re not, and start enacting what you are.
You are a divining rod. Your feelings are a guidance system. They will take you where they will take you. There is no wrong place to go. There are only words that make aspects of the God-energy appear to be wrong, or unattractive, or unappealing, but even the negative words are made of the God-energy, so you can see how futile it is to battle against them.
The only reason you want to figure out the words and the path is because you want to avoid the pain. You want to find a way through the maze of life without all the pain. This is why you must be lost before you can be found. It makes sense that you would want to avoid the pain.
As you spiritually mature you come to know that what you seek is impossible—it is a denial of many forms of the God-energy. This is the acceptance that The Buddha came to. He did not dispel suffering. He accepted it. He accepted it as a constant companion and, in doing so, it lost its power to control him. Because he was not trying to avoid it, he was able to go whichever directions he felt he should go.
Maybe you think a relationship is crazy. Maybe you think having a baby now is nuts. Maybe you’re worried you can’t afford to quit your job, or go on that trip. Maybe you wish you had a different past, or were set up for a different future. All of these things are ideas that control you because their existence tells you which way to go—which is away.
If most people look closely at their lives, they will see that much of what they enjoy today came from sources that appeared unlikely to provide joy. So it is with God-energy. There’s no point in second-guessing it. It’s too huge for that. Better to just relax and go along for the ride. Because letting go is what allows you to relax into what can only be called the good life.
peace. s
Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.
I help people achieve better mental health by teaching them about reality.
