How I’m dealing with the horror

My dear friends,

I have struggled to find a topic and find words for this month’s blog.  It’s difficult to not spiral into deep sadness over the human cruelty I’m witnessing. It’s not just politics either. It’s about our humanity. And yet, I don’t want to write about that. 

How do I write about beauty, spirit, or creative pursuits? It feels like I’m ignoring the in-your-face events unfolding in such a horrific way.

But I am not. How could anyone not be moved by the horrific human-inflicted suffering we are witnessing.

Kindness, acceptance, curiosity, compassion, caring, understanding, love.

These are traits that I have tried to embrace as a human being and impart as part of my work in the world.

Being in the world but not of it

You know, the only way I can even sit here and write about things that are not subject specific to what’s going on in the world while simultaneously being TOTALLY aware of what’s going on in the world, is to zoom my perspective way, way out and see it all from the bigger point of view of consciousness itself.

 And when I say consciousness I mean the awareness that is always present; the spiritual component of humanity. The truth of who we are beyond our self concepts and beliefs.

Focusing on the truth of who we are rather than on what’s happening “out there”  is not spiritual bypassing the events of the world, which infers a kind of numbing out and disassociation.

The thing that helps me deal with the horrors I witness is to remain present within the essence of who I am, who we are. 

I found myself diving once again into the simplicity of Nisargadatta Maharaj's message.

There is no personal individual separate self.

There is no personal “doer” who is doing anything.

The “I”  drops away.

No ownership.

And when it drops, compassion becomes a deep spontaneous response. Not calculated, nor thought about. 

When action is needed it happens.

This message is  difficult for the mind to grasp and it’s even more difficult to write about.

Trying to maintain a sense of a separate self and identifying with changing thoughts, feelings, sensations is not who you are. 

The unchanging is what is real.  Be there with that which never changes and is always constant.

The rest goes on and on and we witness.

Not with dispassion or dissociation, but with even more compassion that naturally and spontaneously arises when you don’t attach yourself to or identify with who you think you are.

You are vast, 

You are consciousness itself.

keep feeling, 

keep softening

keep loving, 

keep noticing beauty, 

keep creating, 

keep caring

Love & gratitude,

Namaskar,