The amazing result of being hard on yourself.....

Writing this blog last night I was in a mini-depression which I conveyed by my inability to write anything of quality with regard to spiritual transformation. Depression has been defined as aggression which is turned inwards towards oneself. Last night I was in the grip of self-hatred. I went to bed and luckily fell asleep immediately.

This morning I woke up before my mobile alarm. I was in that great state between sleeping and waking and I felt incredibly relaxed. Lying in bed looking out of my window at the early morning dawn I felt my consciousness expand, growing bigger. It seemed like either my consciousness was going out to meet the trees or the trees were coming into meet my consciousness. Either way for those few moments there was no separation between my consciousness and the trees. I have had this type of experience before but never as profound as this. What is it that makes possible this experience? For starters, I had a mind which had no thoughts, when I looked at the trees there were no thoughts in my mind. Without thoughts there is nothing for the consciousness to get hold of. Consciousness gets bound up with thoughts to prevent an experience of spiritual/mystical one-ness. Perceiving without thinking is the key to entering this state of consciousness.

The process I went through last night where I blamed myself for not handling a certain situation in a different way bore fruit by giving me more freedom of consciousness. This freedom of consciousness enabled the experience this morning. Being hard on yourself diminishes the ego so the consciousness can be freed. I hope this makes sense. It feels so clumsy which is always what happens when you use form (which words are) to describe and explain the formless. This distinction between form and formless I have taken from the talks of Eckhart Tolle. When I heard this I suddenly thought that Eckhart is saying the same thing as Alice Bailey when she speaks about the ego and the soul. The ego is the form wrapped up in the personality and the soul is the formless. Consciousness is also a form because it can be grasped but beyond consciousness is awareness which is what the consciousness becomes when it escapes from form. When consciousness is freed from thoughts and emotions it becomes awareness. Awareness is the end of duality. The end of the subject/object split.

I felt so renewed and refreshed after this experience and I feel strongly that it was influenced by the process I went through of being hard on myself the night before. I know that this is subjective and is only my surmising but given what I remember from the 1st cycle this seems to be the way it operates. I am loathe to be definite because experience has taught me that when I am definite I get shown quite clearly how changing and impermanent everything to do with form which thoughts and emotions are, is.

I went for my usual cycling session at the gym. I realised from the few people that were there that the chances for me to lose myself in meditation like I usually did were likely to be slim. This was on the back of the last week where everytime I closed my eyes to meditate the instructor interrupted it with some comment about my form!(no pun intended!meant here in the sense of my physical body on the bike). I decided not to even try and when I chose to do this I found that I enjoyed the class immensely. The irritation came last time when I was interrupted. This morning I just accepted that this was the way it was going to be. I think I was also so nourished by the experience in the early morning that it was enough.

Came home from the gym and I was mooching around my flat when my intuition said 'go to the centre'. That's the vocabulary of my intuition. Instruction, short and sweet. I couldn't think why because I had everything sorted for the workshop I was running on Saturday. I had seen and paid for the room. I couldn't think of why I would need to go there again before Saturday. I hadn't received any phone calls of interest for the workshop which I thought was strange because I had gone there with a poster which they had put up in a visible position in the reception area. I had also sent an email flyer which they said they would circulate to their mailing list. I was confused at why my intuition was so strong to 'go to the centre'.

I always trust my intuition no matter how much it goes against my mind and intellect. It is our inner teacher and I have rarely found it to be wrong. There is a difference though between higher and lower intuitions. Lower intuitions are those which have some kind of personality involvement, the involvement of 'me'. Higher intuitions are not concerned with the personal, only the universal. This distinction is important. When an intuition which will always start as a higher intuition becomes tainted with a quality of the personality say for instance desire then it becomes a lower intuition and cannot be relied upon.

I set off for the centre. When I got there I realised that all kinds of building works were being done. It looked like a building site. Suddenly I knew why there had been no phone-calls of interest for the workshop. The centre had been closed for the last week and a half. The staff hadn't told me that any of this was planned when I booked the use of the room. I walked up the stairs but nobody was there only the builders. I spoke to one of the builders and explained that I had booked the use of the meditation room for a workshop on Saturday. He gave me a look which said 'you'll be lucky' and then said 'we're aiming to have the work finished for Saturday' but then gave a shrug and said 'who knows, that's the aim'. Watching the feelings of anger that rose in me I thanked him and wished him luck and walked out.

I was so grateful to my intuition which brought me to see this before Saturday. Had it been Saturday when I realised how awful the place was I would have been a lot less calm. As it was I came home and immediately sent an email to the manager explaining quite calmly that the centre was not fit for the workshop on Saturday and that I had cancelled it and asking for a full refund for the money I paid to hire the room. I was careful when I wrote the email to come from soul and not personality. When you complain and it comes from the personality there will always be ego involved and the ego of the person to whom the complaint is directed to will feel it and come out to defend itself. When you complain from soul there is no threat to the ego and the response of the other person will be markedly different. But don't take my word for it, try it for yourself. This probably begs the question 'how do you complain from soul' my answer is to be polite and courteous. Ego and politeness never go together!

When I returned home I watched some the DVD of the talks given by Eckhart Tolle. He reminds me so much of the Dalai Lama. He has a childlikeness and a simple humour which is similar to the Dalai Lama. So much of what he said resonated. I would like to speak about the what he says about the form and the formless. He was speaking about the formless being the essence of who we are. He talked about the old consciousness which is a consciousness that is wrapped up in form and has been dominant losing its grip. As we move to the new consciousness there is going to be more of a balance between the form and the formless. There is going to be more experience of the formless as the consciousness releases itself from the form. I find this to be so exciting and is exactly in keeping with what I am experiencing. The fifth kingdom which we are all transitioning to is going to be the kingdom of the soul - the formless kingdom. More and more people will directly realize THAT which the form has hidden.

Isn't that an exciting way to end this blog entry for this evening......I am so grateful and happy to be alive...it is truly a wondrous gift, the gift of life and consciousness.