Awake at 3:38 am
3:38 Am, Honlulu Time. I am awake. From my home, I can see the lights at the airport, stretching out beyond H-1. I usually get up like this when something is bothering me. It is a vague feeling that usually writing and reflection can only cure.
My mind is on various projects and the personalities involved. And to settle myself, I take Eckhart Tolle's book, A New Earth off the shelf. His words quickly-name it-my discontent, for me:
" A collective ego manifests the same characteristics as the personal ego, such as the need for conflict and enemies, the need for more, the need to be right against others who are wrong, and so on. Sooner or later, the collective will come into conflict with other collectives, because it unconcsiously seeks conflict and it needs opposition to define boundry and thus its identity. Its members will then experience the suffering that inevitably comes in the wake of any ego-motivated action. At that point, they may wake up and realize that their collective has a strong element of insanity. It can be painful at first to suddenly wake up and realize that the collective you had identified with and worked for is actually insane." (p. 126)
The words jump off the page. And my personal awareness of this reminds me to come back to center. The overvaluation of the multiple causes I have worked for over the years has at times made me insane. I remember when I was younger, when I was completely vested in an oppositional identity-vested in women's rights, vested in third world/indigenous people's rights, vested in the "violence against women's"/peace movement. There was a certainty that came from a posture of righting the wrongs of the world and speaking "truth" to power. And there was a great deal of attachment to my "role" and a great deal of "struggle" and "efforting".
This is not to say that I do not to continue to do this social justice work. I still do. And this not to say that where I was in my development was, "wrong."
I think it was the proper response for that time and place in my consciousness.
However, in the present moment, I can remind myself that it is my intention that the underlying energy-frequency that flows into my work is the creative power of joy. Just writing that feels so liberating because I become immediately aware that I choose my thoughts. And I become, again, aware that I am not my projects and I am not the thoughts that at times so quickly rush to position, justify, attack, or blame.
Thank goodness for the gift of present awareness! Again, Tolle's words help here:
"What remains is the light of consciousness in which perceptions, experiences, thoughts, and feelings come and go. That is Being, that is the deeper, true I. When I know myself as that, whatever happens in my life is no longer of absolute but only of relative importance. I honor it, but it looses its absolute seriousness, its heaviness. The only thing that ultimately matters is this: Can I sense my essential identity as consciousness itself? Or am I losing myself in what happens, losing myself in the mind, in the world?" (p. 79)
Perfect thoughts to sleep on in the dream world.
My mind is on various projects and the personalities involved. And to settle myself, I take Eckhart Tolle's book, A New Earth off the shelf. His words quickly-name it-my discontent, for me:
" A collective ego manifests the same characteristics as the personal ego, such as the need for conflict and enemies, the need for more, the need to be right against others who are wrong, and so on. Sooner or later, the collective will come into conflict with other collectives, because it unconcsiously seeks conflict and it needs opposition to define boundry and thus its identity. Its members will then experience the suffering that inevitably comes in the wake of any ego-motivated action. At that point, they may wake up and realize that their collective has a strong element of insanity. It can be painful at first to suddenly wake up and realize that the collective you had identified with and worked for is actually insane." (p. 126)
The words jump off the page. And my personal awareness of this reminds me to come back to center. The overvaluation of the multiple causes I have worked for over the years has at times made me insane. I remember when I was younger, when I was completely vested in an oppositional identity-vested in women's rights, vested in third world/indigenous people's rights, vested in the "violence against women's"/peace movement. There was a certainty that came from a posture of righting the wrongs of the world and speaking "truth" to power. And there was a great deal of attachment to my "role" and a great deal of "struggle" and "efforting".
This is not to say that I do not to continue to do this social justice work. I still do. And this not to say that where I was in my development was, "wrong."
I think it was the proper response for that time and place in my consciousness.
However, in the present moment, I can remind myself that it is my intention that the underlying energy-frequency that flows into my work is the creative power of joy. Just writing that feels so liberating because I become immediately aware that I choose my thoughts. And I become, again, aware that I am not my projects and I am not the thoughts that at times so quickly rush to position, justify, attack, or blame.
Thank goodness for the gift of present awareness! Again, Tolle's words help here:
"What remains is the light of consciousness in which perceptions, experiences, thoughts, and feelings come and go. That is Being, that is the deeper, true I. When I know myself as that, whatever happens in my life is no longer of absolute but only of relative importance. I honor it, but it looses its absolute seriousness, its heaviness. The only thing that ultimately matters is this: Can I sense my essential identity as consciousness itself? Or am I losing myself in what happens, losing myself in the mind, in the world?" (p. 79)
Perfect thoughts to sleep on in the dream world.
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