"When I let go of who I am, I can become who I might be"- Lao Tzu
Since I can remember, kids and adults have adopted phrases such as " I'm living life to it's fullest, I'll enjoy my life and do what I want, eat what I want, life is short etc." But because you operate based on understanding your life is temporary, does not mean you live a life of quality; where the quality of thinking, acting, speaking, feeling, eating and being are in check- more important and fulfilling than putting effort into your home, car, or possessions. But what's really behind those words? Are they simply mimicked, no different than a parrot without understanding and experience behind them? Are these words simply a reaction to the responsiveness of a disinformed public? As people are doing what they feel with little understanding of their health and reality of their choices, people are aging less, living longer and becoming stronger and healthier as they age- as every culture does and has since the beginning of time.. besides our own country.
Often, the people who use these terms are compromising their own integrity, hiding behind empty words to mask the lack of attempts at actually living life to its fullest by being well informed people of action and discipline. No , living life to its fullest doesn't mean doing whatever you want, it is about being conscious in your choices, being able to see the result of your thinking and the impact it produces. But this would mean self response-ability, strength and faith. It comes down to self mastery, and the realization that our thoughts produce the outcomes we see in this world. True strength is consciously impacting the world with the intention to aid others.
"Death itself is not sad, the sad thing is that most people never live at all." - Serge Ivanoff
So how can attaching to limited one way of acting and thinking mean living a broad and expansive life? Blindly walking through life unaware of what lies before you does not constitute fearless, wholesome living. It is like choosing to pull in the oars and drift along the rivers of life, when oar are made purposely to steer us. Knowing only about the world through the advertisements, commercials and stories we pick up does not constitute wisdom or experience.
I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand- Confucius
This quote is a universal truth for us all, but unfortunately the little bit of the world most people encounter has been created for them by the media, family, beliefs and more.
The Mind: When we think life is going our way, we enjoy things; our music, movies, friends, social life etc. But we don't really enjoy them, we are addicted to them. They are distractions to avoid the chaos of our inner world, the parade of regrets, anxieties, and fantasies we call the mind. In our habitual quest for achievement and entertainment, we avoid the fundamental source of our suffering. Nearly all of humanity shares this predicament. If you don't get what you want, you suffer, but then when you get exactly what you wanted you still suffer because you can't hold on to it forever. Your mind is a predicament and the task is to live outside of the mind. The mind wants to be free of change,free of pain, free of obligations of life and death. But change is law, and no amount of pretending will alter that reality. Life is not suffering, it's just that you will suffer it, rather than enjoy it until you let go of your minds attachments and just for the ride freely, no matter what happens. The mind has no positive uses. The mind is an illusory reflection of cerebral fidgeting. It comprises all the random, uncontrolled thoughts that bubble into awareness from the subconscious. Consciousness is not mind, awareness is not mind, attention is not mind. Mind is an obstruction, an aggravation.It is a kind of evolutionary mistake in the human being, a primal weakness in the human experiment. I have no use for the mind. My strength comes from letting go, going with the flow and connecting with the void. When we understand our own impermanence, all of life is perfectly where it should be. And accepting this and always being thankful for it is developing a true faith. The brain on the other hand can be a tool, it can recall phone numbers, function the body, create beautiful art and poetry. In this way it works for the rest of the body like a tractor. But when you can't stop thinking of that math problem or phone number, or when troubling thoughts and memories arise without your intent or control its not your brain working, its your mind wandering. Then the mind controls you, and then the tractor runs wild. To really get all of this you must observe yourself to see what I mean. You have an angry thought bubble up and you become angry. You have a sad thought bubble up and you become sad. Its the same with all the emotions. They're your auto pilot response to thoughts you can't control.
"Iron is full of impurities that weaken it, through forging it becomes steel and is transformed into a razor- sharp sword. Human beings develop in the same fashion."- Morihei Ueshiba
The mind is conditioned so well that we will go back to the same things even if they harm us for the sake of comfort. Living to our fullest, living boldly and with virtue is not following the programming that has overwhelmed and abused the senses. All of our morals, our understanding is manipulated and distorted by controlling sources. We all manufacture our own dust and static which serve to interfere with seeing, hearing and experiencing life. This self imposed interference keeps us stuck in an old belief system that we use repeatedly, even though it doesn't get us where we want to be. We become slaves to our tendencies and walk a narrow road. We may feel ourselves moving forward each day but motion does not always mean progress, change does not always mean evolution, and if you do not accept yourself in your current state you will never live up to the possibilities of your unfolding.
We know more about fictional t.v. characters, cars, sports teams than we do about our own minds, hearts and bodies. So when it comes time to perform in life, to face adversity, the tools we have to persevere are lacking- and we feel the emptiness within. We feel the same way about the world, our place in it and life as we have before, all things seem to be growing and transient except our mindset and choices. We do the same things and think the same way and expect somehow to receive more out of life. Time moves forward so we can too.
"If you make a string on an instrument too loose it will not play, and if you make it too tight it will snap, the music is found in a balance between both extremes as is all harmony."- Buddha
The Body:
" Think with your whole body" -Taisen Deshimaru
Why, with the unlimited potential we possess do we create our days the same way each waking morning? Why do some people get upset about one thing and others won't be phased by the same event? Why do we attach to repetitive experiences? Repetitive experiences being processed into the subconscious cause neurons (nerve cells) and synapses ( junction between neurons) to form what is called a neuronet. The more an experience is practiced the stronger the neuronet becomes and is hardwired to the point where our responses are no longer consciously taking place; we are on auto pilot so to speak. The brain does not know the difference between what is sees and what it remembers so reality is constantly taking place in the brain, stressing and taxing the body. Nerve cells that fire together wire together. We bring to ourselves situations that fill the biochemical craving of the cells in the body by creating situations that meet our chemical needs. This is why an angry person will find and create circumstances that bring them their bio-chemical need, same with sad and happy people. What floods our body is called a peptide, and we create peptides for every emotion; this makes you think about the term addiction defined by the inability to stop. Our inability to change, is the inability to stop doing exactly what we are doing- further hard wiring ourselves to the conditioning of the world to solidify the things that make us happy, sad and so on, never experiencing more in life.
We aren't actually living through choice, we are responding to life in accordance with how we have been trained to be. But we can't escape responsibility. Our choices will catch up with us; poor diet will cause bad health and premature death, our intolerance for others in the world will waste the body from miserable thoughts making us unhappy with ourselves. The only things we feel about the world are based on thoughts and feelings inside of us, we have to identify with them first before we project them unto others and events.
We all respond daily to life. Life is a series of responses. We respond to the alarm clock, and then the hunger to eat breakfast. The rest of the day is spent responding to others, to sounds, written word, odors, feelings and all the activities that go into making up our world. Harry Truman had a sign on his desk that read " The buck stops here"; he didn't coin the phrase it had been around for years. The point of it is, it is far easier and less damaging to our ego to find a scapegoat for our failures, big and small. There is no success no height of living without self accountability, without the hardships of learning through error. The hard fact is that each of us are where we are socially, financially, emotionally, mentally, physically because of our own thinking processes up to this point. Most which are influenced and aligned with unlimited wealth behind lobbying and advertising. What we will be in the future will be determined by our own mental activity now. If our thinking process doesn't change significantly, neither will our life and life style.
We all have an inner knowing, an instinctual programming deep within that is overwhelmed with distractions. Our cup is constantly overflowing and we can't keep any information in or retrieve what we know deep within. Our attachment to the world that has been programmed for us shows when we are hostile and uncomfortable in new situations or trying new things. If our way of life was absolute for us nothing could disturb our peace, but the exact opposite occurs.
When we take things exactly as they are, face all circumstances without attachment to the past, responding in fear- when we can treat all people as we wish to be treated, be thankful for every encounter, make conscious choices and give without expectation we will be living life to its fullest as all the masters throughout history have lived.
Our ignorance and lack of awareness is not an excuse for our self induced negativity, unhappiness and mistreatment of others and minds/bodies. People say the world is pointless, sad, or miserable; that our point is to work and die but these are not truths they are distortions of reality. Don't confuse your feelings with what actually is. We suffer when the world we experience externally does not resonate with what we experience in our minds; we suffer the non existential. We need to role with things and accept what comes at us. Control, clinging on to what we think we know about ourselves and the world when it has caused us to turn up empty in many circumstances is fear of change; it is our greatest strength and our greatest weakness.
Know more about yourself, come to your center because experience is not out in the world for you, it is waiting inside to come out. With the 80% of people sick and dying from eating the same crap and indulging in the same things, the multitude of people who are on medications for mood and emotions, early deterioration, high levels of stress, stress hormones eating away at the immune system, bad digestion which cuts your bodies ability to heal and regenerate and so on; it is obvious when you actually learn what is worth looking at what should be done for oneself. Why put more care and be more occupied with taking care of your car, or your belongings and putting more structure and routine into eating, smoking and drinking crap while making people rich as you struggle to maintain? Can it be seen that they profit from your programmed behavior, your patterns?
Instead of knowing oneself, thinking freely and not consuming crap we simply obey what we don't know any better than. Well you know about sports, and music, and cars but what about lets say, your digestion? What do mean you don't know the state of your digestion, don't you want to be healthy? What do you mean you don't know if you are really healthy, don't you want to live? What do you mean you don't know about life, don't you love yourself or this experience? What do you mean you don't love yourself, don't you love others? What do you mean you don't know, and you expect life to give you more than right now, you think you should have something more than this when you don't even know what you have right now? In approximately 3 years, 154,884 people will die from obesity, 228,000 from second hand smoke; 2,652,000 from smoking related; 3,119,142 from heart disease from improper diet yet so many people are actually afraid of a terror attack that killed 3,000 people. More people die in a year from peanuts than all the terror attacks in our history. But this illogical play between choice and fear come from misinformation, being irresponsible with knowing what is going on in this life. If you are not investing within to find your own answers and know yourself in all aspects you are not living, you are sitting on the sidelines; and this experience is not for spectators. Get up, find what moves you and give yourself to it. Learn the difference between living and slowing killing yourself. Experience the difference between being awake and being asleep in waking life.
Life is growth. If we stop growing technically and spiritually, we are as good as dead." - Morihei Ueshiba
