I woke up and I heard a voice saying: Live, and Let Live

It was a voice inside me.

It wasn’t that puzzling because I had spent the previous day questioning why there is ever any need to focus on others in a way that involves some kind of judgment, or an opinion, or comparison.

Isn’t it enough of a  job just focusing on oneself, knowing who you are, and living responsibly and in integrity?

LIVE

Looking at the first part of that phrase: LIVE

I ask, 

• Am I living aligned, and what does that mean? 

• Am I living in wonder and awe of the incredible life force flowing through me? 

• Do I let this energy guide me, or am I bogged down by the mind’s incessant ramblings of past and future and it’s fears, oblivious to the wonder of what is right here?

• Am I aware of all the other living creatures (creations) in this incredible universe and see the mystery in them as in myself?

Having reached the number 70, as in cycles around the sun, I marvel at how I feel today. ALIVE and Living as if for the very first time.

I investigate why that is. 

And what comes, as by way of explanation, is that apparently after spending years drawn to focus on what it means to awaken to the truth of who I am, I find that I don’t hook into the mind's thoughts as reality as much as I used to.  Moving from the choppy chattering waves of the mind into the deeper vast silence and connection to the mystery. To know I am part of this magical movie AND that it is a movie after all. 

This understanding of the nature of reality and how we are neither mind nor body alone but also something that is inexplicable has shifted attention away from the mind movie. This shift has given me tremendous relaxation, clarity, and energy (energy that is no longer depleted focusing on mind chatter and internal dialogues).

If you have a deep desire and intention to know yourself, this is possible. For everyone.  At any age. It doesn’t require anything but a seed you plant consciously. A seed of desire to know yourself. Your true self. And then nurture it without attachment.

Nurture it by taking care of your body. That may look different for each individual. How you eat that takes care of your body so it functions optimally may be different to how others eat. Where you live, the environment. Some may thrive in mountains, others near water. This is all part of knowing yourself on a human level and how to navigate in this 3D plane of existence whilst also knowing you are part of a loving mysterious energy.

Nurture it by taking care of your mind.  Find ways to relax the mind, through meditation, or being in nature, physical exercise, making things with your hands. Find ways to pause from overthinking.

“Leave your front and back door open.

Allow your thoughts to come and go.

Just don’t serve them tea.”

~ Shunryo Suzuki

Living isn’t only about striving for an end result from a-b, nor arriving at some kind of a conclusion.

It’s about surrender. 

Surrender to being in the ‘soup’  -  fluid, changing flowing energy that centers around the freedom of not being anything, and therefore being everything.

You are this soup. Not being anything and therefore being everything. It's only the mind that veils this reality and insists that you are an important separate thing that must strive, dominate, force, and be on top.

LET LIVE

When you live awake to the mystery of who you are and the role you play in this vast play of life, it’s not an issue to let others live and play their roles.

You don’t need to be disturbed by what’s happening for others.

“Do not give your attention to what others do or fail to do; give it to what you do or fail to do.” ~ Buddha

Like a holograph 

Everyone is a part of the holograph

Each part contains the whole

Everyone is the whole universe 

There is no hierarchy.

There is only one, and millions of ones within the one.

And even in saying that, it’s like trying to nail something down that can’t be nailed down or explained.

When you find yourself being disturbed by something in the outer, look within and explore where the belief in separation exists in YOU. Because that is the illusion.

“We but mirror the world. All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body. If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change.”

~Mahatma Gandhi

Everyone is playing their part and there is no need to do anything but focus on your part, and play it well. As best you can. And with love.