August 12, 2011

 

In Evolution - being more of you:   

 

Lose your mind, please...

 

Thinking. Mind. Information.

We've come to believe that our lives are about thinking: mind,
intellect, knowledge, information.

Our lives are about energy.

I don't mean airy-fairy, "woo-woo" energy. I mean that the
quality of our lives is derived from the tangible energy
we possess and how we choose to use it.

We are composed of energy. That energy consists of four main
components; physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual.

We create our identity from all four of these components. And
our mind - thinking - is only one aspect of our identity.

We seem to have forgotten this.

Increasingly, we have allowed our mind to become how we
define ourselves; we've also allowed mental activity to create
the structure of our day-to-day lives.

This creates...imbalance.

A little history...

Prior to the 20th century we were more balanced with ourselves
because our four main components - physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual - were more balanced within us.

Back then, our lives consisted of activities, tasks, habits, and patterns of living that required each aspect of us to be an
integral part of each and every day.

We physically walked places, we often engaged in more physical
activity than mental, we expressed ourselves more genuinely, and
we engaged in forms of self-expression that fulfilled us; hobbies,
activities, clubs, community groups, time with extended family,
neighborhood functions, etc.

And, we connected emotionally - on a daily basis - to
neighbors, family, friends, fellow church goers, acquaintances, merchants, etc.

Intellectually, we exchanged ideas with our families, co-workers, and/or friends face-to-face each day. Therefore, our ideas and emotions were grounded in our actual experiences with one
another. Plus, most people's lives included "contemplative" time;
in nature, in silence, in prayer - or just plain rest and relaxation - without technology of any kind.

And, we had a spiritual life. Whether that was an organized
religion, charitable or community involvement, or simply a strong, regular connection to nature...spirituality was a part of our
every day existence.

But industrialization, the information age, world-wide communication, international economies - and now the age
of super-technology - has changed all that.

Everything from the simple patterns and pace of our daily lives,
to our institutions - education, government, financial, communication, business, religion, family - has changed.

Now, at the center of our lives...is mind.

We have made mind - thinking, information, intellect, empirical
science, our brain, the pursuit of knowledge, mental activity - the
center of our universe.

(No doubt some truly great minds - Einstein, Fromm, Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Reich, Freund, Jung, and many others - are rolling over in their graves at this exploitation
of the mind!)

We've come to worship the mind. We've made mind our
master.

As technology has advanced, more and more of our daily life involves mental activities: radio, television, email, the internet, social networking, texting, tweeting...even our telephones. The mind has become the dominant force in our day-to-day life.

Since the start of the 20th century (and of course on through
the 21st), transportation has also changed; so less is required
of us physically. Most everyone owns a car. Cities and suburbs distanced us from nature and from one another. The multiple in-person connections we once experienced - on a daily
basis - with neighbors, merchants, community leaders,
extended family, friends, etc. has diminished significantly.

Opportunities to experience and express ourselves
emotionally via hobbies, clubs, community activities, church,
etc. have all but disappeared; replaced by television, gaming,
the internet, texting, tweeting, sexting, and social networking. (None of which creates tangible emotional connections.)

And spirituality - whether that is formal worship of God or simply
a vital connection within your self - is not the centerpiece of most
people's lives.

Does all this mean "we've done it all wrong?" Am I saying we need to dump technology and go back to "the good old days?" Am I proposing some kind of crazy conservative agenda? Should we all pretend like we live in Mayberry R.F.D with Andy Taylor, Opie, and Barney Fife? (Though, I do love Barney...)

Absolutely not.

What I am seeking to convey is the simple fact that we
have too much "mind" in our lives.

And as a result, we are imbalanced. That imbalance is what
you see happening in our world.

That imbalance is what you feel inside of you.

Mind likes to dominate. As everyone from Freud and Fromm to
Jung and the Buddha will attest, the mind's job is to keep busy
and it will always, always, always seek to dominate if given the opportunity.

How do you allow mental activity to dominate your life? It is as
simple as not creating the balance of physical, emotional, mental,
and spiritual in your life each day. It is as complex as allowing
the unconscious mind to dominate - control your life - such that
you begin to sacrifice your own well-being; you sacrifice the
quality of your own life.

What do I mean?

I mean this is what our attachments to everything from money
and substances, to relationships and technology is all about. This
is why children are being treated for depression, why our obesity and addiction rates are so high, why almost ¼ of all Americans
are on prescription antidepressants, why women in their 40's
and 50's are starving themselves or injecting their faces with
botox, why men need Viagra or want steroids.

This is why the world is such a rapidly changing, increasingly
challenging place; there's too much mental energy and not
enough balance.

We. Are. Out. Of. Balance.

A while back, mind - mental activity - began to dominate our
lives and we simply accepted this as our reality. It was "just
the  way things are." We have become more and more mind-oriented since then.

Mind isn't master. Mind isn't the boss of you. Mind isn't more
important or more powerful than any other aspect of you -
physical, emotional or spiritual - we've simply come to believe
that it is.

And once you believe something is true, it becomes the
lens through which you see, feel - and experience - everything.

Believing, belief...is a product of the mind. No coincidence.

We believe in the supremacy of the mind; that how smart you
are is the most important aspect of your identity. We believe that thinking and mind can solve all our problems. We believe that mental acuity equals supremacy, that mental control equals maturity or power. We believe that more and more information
is key to improving the quality of our lives.

These are all illusions.

Illusions that have our world becoming more and more dysfunctional. From Casey Anthony and the killings in Oslo,
to our debt debacle and the riots in London, we are becoming
more dysfunctional by the day.

Because what we have believed is true - that mind is
master - is an illusion. And, when illusion collides with reality...
suffering, struggle, and sacrifice is the result.

Once a lot of people believe something is true, a flow of energy
is created. Then, because a lot of people believe "X" is true, some more people will then believe that "X" is true.

Eventually, we all become swept up in the illusion...believing it
is true. Believing it is reality. The mind does this.

Belief runs your life. Belief runs the world. Seriously.

At different times in my life I have "belonged" to groups of people
- family, friends, colleagues, organizations, etc. - who strongly
believed "X" was true. And eventually, we came to believe that "X"
was true because we all believed it was true.

Not so. Just because some people - or a whole lot of people - believe that something is true...doesn't mean it is true. It
simply means they are sharing a reality that they have created.
And that can lead to some scary stuff...especially in our world
right now.

(Personally, I find so-called leaders like Rick Perry of Texas -
and the people who support him - pretty darn scary. And the
fact that they claim God is in their pocket...is downright frightening!)

It isn't that mind is bad or evil; it is simply that it is truly only
one of four essential aspects to our identity.

You have trained your mind to protect you from uncomfortable
realities and truths. In balance, that's a good thing. However,
you need the balance of all four aspects of you to truly experience and engage with the world from clear and accurate awareness. From that balanced place you can then see, feel, and experience...what is true.

These four aspects of you are your built-in system of checks and
balances. But you must keep them in good working order - and
in balance - in order for them to guide you well.

So, if we are not balancing the mind with our other aspects -
using all of who we are to experience, discern, choose, etc. - we too, can be swept up in beliefs that are false, realities that are illusions, leaders who manipulate, and a way of living - and
loving - that does not serve us well.

Bottom line?

We operate optimally if all of us - physical, emotional,
mental, and spiritual - is engaged, experiencing, expressing, learning, and growing.

So, what can we do to change this?

As always, the answer is ridiculously simple. Spiritual truth
always is.

All we need to do is step out from beneath the false reality we've
been living under - that mind is the boss of you - recognize the truth of our situation, and reorganize the pieces of our lives in order to create balance.

Balance. Balance. Balance.

The "secret" to changing our lives - and the world - is balance.

No sh*t.

I know it's not sophisticated or sexy or "spiritual" enough - this
balance thing - but it's true. It is truth itself. The secret to
changing your life and the world is balance.

We don't want to believe it is this simple. The mind doesn't
want to believe it is this simple because then it will be out of
a job; the job of being the boss of you.

Mind is not the boss of you!

When we begin to make our own lives a balance of all four
aspects of us, the quality of our lives will change. In turn,
this will impact the people around us. This in turn, impacts
our world.

I have some very mind-oriented friends who think I am full
of sh*t because this is too simple. Of course they think that!
Their mind doesn't want to accept the simplicity of it...because
that would invalidate the supremacy and importance of...
their mind!

Balance. Balance. Balance.

It is this simple. I promise you. It's physics. It's spirit.

It's the meeting ground of science and spirituality; of
belief and reality.

More next time...


    

 

(For more about the concepts in this message, go to "Energy: the science & spirit of you," "dear kgs... I'm a thinking person, but I tend to get caught up in analysis..."The Certainty of Intimacy: being more of you," "Addiction Nation:
were all addicts" & "Words: words have power" at www.kellygracesmith.com.)  

 

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