The Inner Critic (Judge) is never satisfied, always chanting the mantra: `I will be happy, when…..´ and that `when´ never comes, of course. The Controller never gives up on trying to dictate the winds rather than allowing us to develop the capacity to surf, and trust, the waves. The Victim keeps telling us that..
The third possibility is to try to find some subset of the domain into which you have come that can receive even a little portion of what you have to give. This is the pedagogical attitude of helping them to realize the need; what you needed, received, and have now got to give. Those are the only possibilities…
Even though we made our first connection a mere month ago, the not-so-suprising fact, considering the parallels in our life experience, was that we got on so well, as if we had been friends all our lives. This is reflected in our wonderful conversation about The Great Spirit, the Universe, Life’s Challenges, Adversity, Courage, Recovery, PQ Mental Fitness, Transformation, and Paying Forward to the next generation..
My life then took a dark turn. Many years were to follow in limbo, spent in the no-man’s-land of clubs and pubs; numbing and self-medication, whereby my feeling got stuffed ever deeper, until the anaesthesia was almost complete. “Lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely; a story with a middle only,” wrote the contemporary Irish poet, Paul Durcan at around that time…
We know that our ability to feel pain is essential. If you touch a hot stove, it’s good to feel pain so you’re alerted to the danger to your body and rapidly remove your hand before lasting damage is caused. Similarly negative emotions like stress, fear, anger, disappointment, guilt, and shame are extremely helpful to alert you that something needs your attention. These are signposts pointing inward, despite our initial conviction that the solutions are to be found `out there´…
Sitting in the kitchen of a friend’s house, holding in my hands one of the few remaining prized possessions, – my hardback copy of John O Donohue’s `Anam Cara´, – I opened it at a random page to read: `Many of the things that hold us back from inhabiting our destiny are false. They are only images in our minds. They are not real barriers at all. We should never allow our fears or the expectation of others to set the frontiers of our destiny.´…
On a beautiful sunny May afternoon, Cologne Cathedral, one of Europe’s finest architectural and cultural gems, is thronged with awestruck visitors. The bright sunlight is streaming through the many spectacular stained-glass windows, creating an almost psychedelic kaleidoscopic experience. At the base of each window, a religious teacher is singing the praises of his particular window. The Rabbi, the Imam, the Bishop, the Zen Master, the Hindu Guru, and so on; each explaining to the curious on-lookers why their window is the best one, the one worthy of all our attention, even devotion. They have lost sight of the light, the light that is streaming through all the windows…
My sense is that the TV has superseded the open fire in the homes and psyches of our people. I much prefer the fire, a preference based on countless hours of `fire-watching´ in my childhood. You will find no TV in my abode…
John Lennon was right when he said that: `When we love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance.´ It is worth pointing out that we also experience less stress, more success, better relationships, restored physical health, and peace of mind. Being mentally fit helps in moving us ever closer to the goal of living the lives we love…
As this has been the major theme of my own experience, it appeared that the time had now arrived to `pass forward´ the guidance and support which has so generously been given me during my life. One of my main qualifications could be described as `having made almost every mistake that can be made´ along the way and `turning the respective experiences into gifts´…
As long as we are constantly hijacked by our Saboteurs, fear rules our lives and the lives of those around us. This takes place sometimes very obviously, sometimes more subtly. Fear’s toolbox contains a very powerful device that, if not addressed and relinquished, will ensure that the old order will forever rule the day. This device is denial. For many years I stewed in the juice of denial. Sara Bareilles describes the dynamic eloquently in her sublime song “Orpheus“:
Missing the world
The one you knew
The one where everything made sense because you
didn’t know the truth…..
Indeed, many of us didn’t know the truth for long stretches of our lives. Denial has an important role to play in our survival…
My general observations lead me to conclude that we are either in autopilot and react in line with the coping mechanisms and survival strategies we developed before our fourth birthday (approximately) or, having developed sufficient awareness, mindfulness, and mental fitness, we learn to pause before responding to whatever stimuli cross our paths in a conscious, loving manner – beneficial to the healing, growth, and joy of all concerned. The term “autopilot” may be considered charitable. Some would call it “sleepwalking through life” (Dr Allen Berger) or even refer to a “Zombie” existence. And of course, this is not an all-or-nothing phenomenon…
So, it was really telling when, in a recent yoga lesson, we went though balance exercises which included the Vrikshasana (The Tree Pose, where standing on one foot we bring the other to the inside of our upper thigh), that the terror of childhood – as a felt state – returned. My heart began to race; I began to sweat and couldn’t maintain my balance for longer that twenty seconds. Of even more interest was the fact that my breathing froze. Despite all the insights and, indeed, practice in so many other modalities and situations, here we had the default patterns re-asserting themselves immediately, and with a vengeance…
© 2022 SoberOasis | Patrick Little
