free from attachment and aversion alike,
there comes the peace in which all sorrows end,
and you live in the wisdom of the Self.”
- Bhagavad Gita, c 400 BC
Most of us engage in negative thoughts without acknowledging that they are negative. These will often be justified with all our intellect and reason, even at the cost of relationships. Negative thoughts are like an invisible foundation to our lives, a layer of heavy cement we placed there ourselves; one that we hold on to dearly, some people even die or kill to defend their thoughts.
Let’s examine what we mean by negative thoughts. They are not just what we think, for example, when someone cuts in front of us when we are driving and we feel rage, or when we feel hurt by thoughtless words spoken by a friend or family member, or when yet another bill arrives and financial worries mount. It is not just what goes through our minds when we feel the pain of bereavement, or the ending of a relationship, or suffering through illness. Rather, negative thoughts are to be found in all those moments of our lives when we find ourselves experiencing more subtle feelings of boredom, resentment, loneliness, background anxiety, hidden guilt and so on. Such thoughts often include ‘should’, ‘shouldn’t', ‘want’, ‘need’ ‘but’ and ‘because. These are simply justifications and defenses for these thoughts.
Negative thoughts are like a virus that entered our thinking as a habit in childhood and made us sick – physically, mentally or emotionally – and for most of us, has never left.
The reason we become sick due to such thoughts is because we take them as true for us, and this leads us to suffer.
In themselves thoughts are harmless. It is only when we attach to them and believe them that suffering arises. For example, if I have a thought that says ‘my partner watches 3 hours of TV everyday’, this in itself does not make me feel any stress since it’s a statement of fact. But if I have the thought ‘my partner shouldn’t watch so much TV,’ I have attached to this idea and have an expectation that reality should change. The suffering arises from the stress of seeing that reality is not so, and from not being able to accept this. One Zen monk, Bokuju, said, “This is the only meditation I know. While I eat, I eat. While I walk, I walk. And while I feel sleepy, I sleep. Whatsoever happens, happens. I never interfere.”
As this quote suggests, the cure for this virus is really very simple and profound, it is the acceptance of reality as it is in every moment without resistance. It is detachment from the drama of life (judgments and opinions), yet participating fully on the stage of life (what simply is). In order to take this step back, first and foremost, an open mind and willingness to enquire into one’s beliefs is required. A willingness to see that it is the thought about someone that has kept us in bondage and not the person or event itself, since reality itself is neutral. Reality just happens. Reality simply is.
However for most of us, our experience of reality is not neutral or accepting; rather reality is given all sorts of interpretations, value-judgments, labels, images, definitions and is constantly being analyzed, albeit not consciously. It is this constant mind activity of images and beliefs that makes up the veil that lies between people in all relationships, and which is commonly considered to life. As Jiddu Krishnamurti said in Freedom From The Known, ‘All our relationships are really imaginary – that is, based on an image, formed by thought.’ We are rarely present to reality as it is and to people as they are. Our closely-guarded beliefs about people are the very obstacles to achieving the sort of relationships we deep down seek. We are our own worst enemy.
Sri Ramana Maharshi, (1879 -1950), the Indian sage who attained liberation at the age of 16, said: “Creation is neither good nor bad; it is as it is. It is the human mind which puts all sorts of constructions on it, seeing things from its own angle and interpreting them to suit its own interests. A woman is just a woman, but one mind calls her “mother,” another “sister,” and still another “aunt” and so on. Men love women, hate snakes, and are indifferent to the grass and stones by the roadside. These value-judgments are the cause of all the misery in the world. Creation is like a peepul tree: birds come to eat its fruit, or take shelter in its branches, men cool themselves in its shade, but some may hang themselves on it. Yet the tree continues to lead its quiet life, unconcerned with and unaware of all the uses it is put to. It is the human mind that creates its own difficulties and then cries for help.”
The biggest way in which we create our own difficulties is when we believe that our thoughts and concepts reflect reality. But in reality they are our REQUIREMENTS. We NEED our husbands to be more communicative, we WANT our wives to behave in certain ways, we EXPECT our children to do what WE want them to do when they grow up, we become resentful when friends don’t treat us RIGHT. In this process of arrogant expectations, real life passes us by, and along this road we become confused, disappointed, angry and emotionally weary. Life was meant to turn out better than this! I wasn’t meant to feel such struggles! Needless to say, we all know the impact of such emotions and stress on physical health too.
When one is willing to address the cry for help that Sri Ramana Maharshi mentions – whatever the outer trigger is for this to occur, and usually there is one whether due to a life-shaking event, deep loss or simply emotional exhaustion – then we may start to question what we have so far taken for granted. We begin to be kinder to ourselves and allow the deeper questions which we have kept hidden, to surface. Who am I? What is my purpose? What is life? Often counseling is advantageous at this point since such deep and honest questioning can be experienced as a painful process, but courageous perseverance is necessary, for such catharsis is a privilege. Osho, another great Indian sage, said: “In this world the greatest courage is to drop the mind aside. The bravest man is who can see the world without the barrier of the mind, just as it is. It is tremendously different, utterly beautiful. There is nobody who is inferior and there is nobody who is superior — there are no distinctions.”
Through such letting go of the false aspects of ourselves, our fears begin to gradually released and life starts to flow more smoothly. Our stance becomes less negative and more positive. Our worldview is allowed to change and our relationships become more meaningful and fulfilling. Let’s look at some examples of how such transformation may impact a person’s life.
A man who feels angry that his father died when he was two-years old and has the belief that his father couldn’t have cared about him since he left him or that he himself wasn’t worth it, may see that it is these very painful thoughts that are the source of his anger and suffering, not his father dying, and that it has moreover brought anger into his relationship with his own son. He may also see – and feel – that actually his father is very much with him in his memories, for where do people exist if not in our thoughts?
A woman who is in pain due to her partner ending their relationship may see that it is the thought that she cannot cope with now being alone, is what is keeping her in bondage, not her partner leaving, which fact she may actually be able to accept as the right thing for both of them.
A daughter who doesn’t get on with her mother because her mother doesn’t listen to her may see that this very thought is what is preventing her from being interested in and listening to her mother in the first place.
So as we inquire into our beliefs about ourselves and others and see that this is where our pain stems from, a burden begins to lift, dead-weight starting its departure. This is not to say that we can live without beliefs. But it is what we believe that causes the unsatisfactory effects in our lives. Adyashanti, a spiritual teacher based in the US, says that when we drop the ego, we see that “the only thing that could really be called the self is simply the thoughts we have about it”. Another spiritual teacher, Dadahagwan, said ” Once you get rid of the wrong beliefs, and keep the right belief for a while, you will arrive at your original place, after which there will no longer be a need to keep any beliefs. Then your work is done… It is because a person does not have the knowledge of how to get rid of a wrong belief that he has been wandering aimlessly in the world life after life. Even if he comes to know this belief is wrong, he does not know how to get rid of it. Infinite lives have passed without getting rid of even a single wrong belief.”
Beliefs are a burden. And without this burden, we stop arguing with reality, and instead of trying to get the world to fit our explanations and expectations of it, we get to see the world as it really is. The jigsaw piece has found its rightful place. Things become one, merging into harmony. The imagined world is finally given up in favour of the real one.
In the act of favouring the real world, we take responsibility for our shadow; and discover perhaps the integral and fulfilling sense of integrity in doing so. Seeing how we project beliefs and opinions onto others, this immediately starts a chain reaction of energy which propels us further and further into non-attachment. Yet, ironically, such non-attachment comes hand-in-hand with true feeling; the two are not separate. Feelings become permissible. We start to see that we have lived most of our lives like icebergs, only allowing the tip to show, and that it is ok now to risk being emotional, to feel our fears and go beyond them, into a life where we can truly give and receive love.
It is through the journey we take in and through our mind, that we become the master of it. Until we do this, we remain victims. Gradually, our mind is reprogrammed to turn down the volume of constant value judgments and assessments. This feels good and is much needed relief. We are arriving at our original, unhurt state that is the birthright of all human beings.
Thus, as we become masters of transforming breakdowns into breakthroughs we enter into a place where we find peace, joy and a sense of coming home. Suffering is felt in a new way, a purposeful way, and it gradually becomes of a shorter duration, until it has no more a resting place here, nothing to latch onto anymore, no hook. We begin to experience what freedom really means. We move beyond a life based on separation and duality – good/bad, right/wrong, male/female, me/you, pleasure/pain – to living a life that is more in unity with others, more authentic and more true to ourselves. As we learn to be present to what simply is, we begin to know intuitively what action is to be taken in any given situation, and confusion and inner conflict subside.
And so we learn to empty ourselves of what filled our dissatisfied vessels and to simply be. We enter onto a conscious path of self-realization where we yield and surrender to what is.
In the Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle says:
“In the state of surrender you see very clearly what needs to be done, and you take action, doing one thing at a time, and focusing on one thing at a time. Learn from nature. See how everything gets accomplished and how the miracle of life unfolds without dissatisfaction or unhappiness. That’s why Jesus said, ‘Look at the lilies, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin.”
Are you willing to be like a lily?
Reena Gagneja is an Internet Marketer and ‘Spiritual’ Entrepreneur’. She works with her team to help them achieve success, both inner and financial. She also offers Spiritual Counselling and Soul Contract Reading sessions to private clients.
To receive Reena’s Spiritual Entrepreneur Empower Now tips enter your details on Reena’s Blog.
To receive information about an Internet Marketing system and very lucrative opportunity to create abundance click here.
You must log in to post a comment.