THE TRUTH ABOUT EVERYTHING, PART TEN: YOU ARE MEANT TO BE HERE!

That's right... HERE! In this place, at this time, on Planet Earth, in a physical body, being who you are, doing what you do, as you, now.

Welcome!

I'm not being trite in relaying this Truth About Everything. Contrary to what might seem obvious, most people don't take their existence for granted. So many human beings spend inordinate amounts of their lives trying to prove their "worthiness" to others, and to themselves, operating under an erroneous conclusion that one's right to exist and one's value as a person has to be earned somehow.

This mistaken idea comes from very early in childhood.

All infants, like all living things, are born with an innate sense of their own "rightness," taking their existence for granted, expecting to be met by life and their environment with all that they need to live. Newborns come in completely helpless and totally dependent on their caregivers, and yet they organically expect to be greeted with a huge welcome sign of unconditional love, acceptance and confident mirroring from the parents who brought them in. That's why babies cry so horrifically when they are not fully met in these ways.

When parents are not developed to a reasonable degree, and so the infant is greeted with the parents' fears, resentments, or neediness mixed in with the love, it is devastating. It literally feels life-threatening, creating unmanageable terror and rage in the baby. Unable to accept that the source of emotional and physical nurturance that they utterly need to survive is flawed and not fully adequate to the task of tending to the child's needs, the little one turns the pain and anger back against itself, assuming it must be the one who is flawed, not adequate or worthy. It's right to exist comes into question. This dilemma is most intensely present in the schizoid character structure, but it is present to some degree in virtually all human beings because none of us were born into self-actualized environments.

This right to exist question transmutes later on into the classic expression of the core conflict in the schizoid character structure: "Life is dangerous to my life."

This is from the Pathwork Guide Lecture: "The Illusory Fear of the Self":

"The fear of the self is the basic fear behind the fear of life and even the fear of death. Neither could the fear of others possibly exist without the fear of oneself.

When the self is no longer feared, neither desire nor fulfillment need to be feared, for the self then knows that desire will be fulfilled and fulfillment will be not an end but a new beginning."

Another common dysfunction that arises from the child's false belief that its own unworthiness must be the cause of its deprivation at the hands of its parents is that of perfectionism. I have written several pieces on the subject on FPL. 

This is from the Pathwork Guide Lecture: "Perfectionism Obstructs Happiness":

"Strange as this may seem, the more you accept imperfection, the more joy you will give and receive. Your capacity for happiness depends on your capacity to accept imperfection -- not in words or theories, but in your emotional experience.

Only in accepting, let us say, an imperfect relationship - and this by no means implies the unhealthy submissiveness that is born out of fear of loss or disapproval - will you derive and give joy in the relationship. Only through accepting your own imperfection can you begin to grow and experience the joy that comes from your own individuality."

Your parents do not, and in fact not even your personality self that you think of as "you" does not, determine the validity of your existence, folks. Your right to exist, and your worthiness of that existence, and of unconditional love, is a hard-wired given, an inherent reality, because... you are an expression of All That Is. And All That Is is not only eternal (Therefore, you can never not exist.), but the essence of that Source energy is what we call "love," and as the FPL Truth About Everything, Part Two reminds us: All Love Is Unconditional.

So, let's go one step further and say that not only are you meant to be here, wherever and whenever you are in the now, but when it comes to your existence itself, well... you sort of have no choice. In the introduction to the very first Truth About Everything post, I reminded readers that the larger laws of our known Universe start with: "You exist."

You exist. You are meant to be here. Yes, you may create suffering, or you may create joy. You can embrace life or embrace fear, or even indulge in the idea of "death." But you cannot not exist, and you cannot be unworthy of unconditional love. Get over it!

Today's Thanksgiving Quote

"Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude."
Denis Waitley

THIS THANKSGIVING, EXPERIENCE GRATITUDE... IN ADVANCE!

Come again, PL? Gratitude in advance?

Yes, that's right. We're conditioned to only experience gratitude for what has already happened, or for what is happening, but as Dr. Joe Dispenza is fond of saying...

"Gratitude is the highest form of receivership."

And that means...?

Dr. Joe, a neuroscientist, biochemist and doctor of chiropractic medicine, is on a very unique and powerful crusade to demonstrate the validity of all the truths and principles of mysticism, metaphysics and spirituality... through science, with evidence that even the guys in laboratories with white coats can see. So, when Dispenza says that gratitude is the highest form of receivership, he is not speaking metaphorically or poetically; he means that experiencing gratitude for what you are creating in the "quantum field of potentials" (in energy or "spirit" form) that hasn't yet manifested in physical form, in matter, is magnetized and drawn to you by the powerful emotion of gratitude.

So, here's how you do it -

You clear yourself of old beliefs and emotional addictions, through self-awareness, freeing up emotions, deep breathing and conscious intention. Then, you let go of your attachments to ideas of identity and to other people, places and things and enter the quantum field, where you are simply and powerfully pure consciousness. After resting in that void, which  so many irrationally fear, you then create in thought what you desire to experience in physical reality. And you stay there until you can actually feel what it would feel like to be in that life, until you feel the deep gratitude in your body for what is to come, before it's manifested in form. And then, of course, you let go and stay open.

It's what James Earl Jones' character meant in "Field of Dreams" when he said:

"Build it and they will come."

Create what you desire from a clear intention, with all sincerity... and it will come.

TODAY'S "NO EXCEPTION" QUOTE!

REPOST: ACCEPTANCE TO ENJOYMENT TO ENTHUSIASM!

I want to say to any of my readers who haven't yet read (or listened to) this book... Eckhart Tolle's, "THE NEW EARTH"... do it now!

To those of you have been doing the deep self-work of self-actualization, and to those who frequently read this blog or have read books like "THE BIG LEAP," by Gay Hendricks, you will find a familiarity in Tolle's words, but his clear, direct and high vibrational way of articulating these truths is special.

Many teachers and writers who speak about consciousness mention three levels of consciousness, or three ways in which consciousness can flow into what you do and thus through you into this world. I have talked about the movement from "false clarity to genuine confusion to genuine clarity," while Hendricks refers to the "zones of competence, excellence and genius" in his paradigm. Tolle breaks it down as "acceptance, enjoyment and enthusiasm."

Here's Tolle:

"The modalities of awakened doing are acceptance, enjoyment, and enthusiasm. If you are not in the state of either acceptance, enjoyment, or enthusiasm, look closely and you will find that you are creating suffering for yourself and others. Whatever you cannot enjoy doing, changing a flat tire in the rain at night, for example, you can, nonetheless accept that this is what you have to do. Performing an action in the state of acceptance means you are at peace while you do it."

Yes, Eckhart. People often ask me questions about how one can apply Full Permission Living to mundane and distasteful tasks like washing a sink full of dirty dishes or a load of dirty diapers. I answer them by proposing a version of acceptance, or "surrender," giving yourself to the task at hand which must be done for certain reasons, such as desiring clean dishes and fresh baby butts. In the process of surrendering, you can find ways to make the tasks at hand less arduous. Play music, listen to a great audio book, indulge a pleasant fantasy... whatever works for you. It makes the task easier and you can speed up time in the process.

Here's Tolle again:

"The peace that comes with surrendered action turns to a sense of aliveness when you actually enjoy what you are doing. Joy is the dynamic aspect of Being. Joy does not come from what you do, it flows into what you do and thus into this world from deep within you. You will enjoy any activity in which you are fully present. The joy of Being is the joy of being conscious."

I love that line so much, Eckhart, I'm going to repeat it: 

"Joy does not come from what you do, it flows into what you do and thus into this world from deep within you."

Get it? True joy and en-joy-ment are what you experience when you are the vehicle, the empty vessel, the hollowed out flute that Sufi Master, Hafiz spoke of when he said:

“I am a hole in a flute that the Christ’s breath moves through.”

That is true egolessness, and anyone who has truly experienced joy has simultaneously experienced deep humility along with it because they know at some level that they are channeling something higher than their ego.

Back to Eckhart:

"Enthusiasm means there is deep enjoyment in what you do, plus the added element of a goal or vision that you work towards. This is why Ralph Waldo Emerson said that, 'Nothing great has ever been achieved without enthusiasm."

Careful, now, all of you rigid character structures! Having a goal/vision is not the same as having expectations, which are a function of the ego. 

Like Hendricks' "Zone of Genius," in which inspiration is the driving force, Tolle's enthusiasm is what I would describe as a "calling," a goal, in other words, that pulls you towards it, not a destination that you direct yourself towards with willfulness for the sake of inflating and supporting the ego and mask. In this place, you are at once surrendered, joyful and living your highest excitement, while expressing fully your generativity and benefitting everyone around you.

So, carve yourself into that flute, folks, and live your highest joy! 

Do that now, too!!

NO RELIGION IN 5D? OF COURSE NOT!

A fascinating study recently reported that children who are brought up steeped in a religion - any religion - are meaner, less compassionate. less tolerant, and less community-minded. and furthermore, according to the new study, published in the journal Current Biology, "children that come from non-religious households behave significantly more altruistically than those from religious households, as measured by greater acts of generosity towards others."

To most self-aware people, this is not news. Religious dogma that holds the threat of eternal damnation over the heads of its followers for not adhering to its particular doctrines, or one that offers the eternal sexual favors of virgins for committing murder and suicide, couldn't possibly lead to an attitude of compassion for others.

What is news, however, is that this is being studied and reported on, and that participation in religion overall, as we head into 5D, is in serious decline. According to a piece in the Washington Post: "Christianity is on the decline in America, not just among younger generations or in certain regions of the country but across race, gender, education and geographic barriers. The percentage of adults who describe themselves as Christians dropped by nearly eight percentage points in just seven years to about 71 percent, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center."

So, folks, in addition to less murders, bankers, bad food, cigarettes and kids, you can put religion on the "What ever happened to..?" list.

WANT A BETTER RELATIONSHIP? ENJOY SOME SOLITUDE!

A few months ago, I posted an excerpt from an article about a book, "DAILY RITUALS: HOW ARTISTS WORK", that extolled the virtues for creativity of frequent walking.

Another section of the book talks about the equally important need for solitude in the creative life:

"If you want to do prolonged creative work, you're going to need to figure out a way to avoid the demands of society, at least some of the time. Most artistic endeavor requires stretches of solitude. That's why so many artists get up super early or stay up super late—only then, when the rest of the world is asleep, are they guaranteed not to be interrupted by family, friends, visitors, or telephone calls."

"Anne Rice, when she’s writing a book, says she needs four hours of unbroken time each day, and that to get this, she must be ruthless about turning down appointments and social obligations. 'Because you won’t get those four hours if you’re spending most of the day worried about getting to an appointment and back,' she said. 'A lot of people don’t understand it. They think, ‘Well, I only want to see you for three hours. Why can’t you write the rest of the day?’ But it doesn’t work like that. What you have to do is clear all distraction. That’s the bottom line."

I've written from Fire Island about the importance of solitude and separation, and not only for the purposes of creative work, but also for the purposes of self-work and for the health of our relationships. Here's Mark Epstein, my favorite Buddhist psychotherapist, on the subject:

"Clinging is as much of a problem in lovemaking as in the rest of life. In order for sexual relations to be deeply satisfying, there must be a yielding of this clinging in a manner that actually affirms the unknowability and separateness of the loved partner. It is the peculiar convergence of awe and appreciation with pleasure and release that characterizes the best sexual experiences. Separate and together cease to be mutually exclusive and instead become reciprocally enhancing and mutually informative. There is wisdom in this state, not just raw instinct."

So, folks, to foster the health of your creative life and your interpersonal life... spend some quality time alone!

REPOST: THE PRIME MORAL PRIVILEGE!

This is a repost about a piece that was on the Huffington Post by Pilar Jennings, Ph.D., entitled: Ushering Wellness: The Convergence of Buddhism and Psychoanalysis, which talks about the "recent" merging of the principles of psychoanalysis and Buddhism in healing practices.

Here's Dr. Jennings:

"What has changed in recent years, and captured the attention of both Buddhist teachers and psychoanalysts, is the fascinating relationship between these divergent traditions. Today, there are growing numbers of people looking for therapists who respect their need for meditation and spiritual support."

Don't get me wrong. This is great to see being written about, but there are those of us who've been using the techniques and understandings of the sciences of the mind, body and spirit for many decades now. To her credit, Jennings does mention two of my favorite psychoanalytic theorists who embraced metaphysical principles in their writings in the last century:

"The interest in how Buddha Shakyamuni's approach to wellness might converge with Freud's began more than 60 years ago. In the 1950s, psychoanalysts including Karen Horney and Eric Fromm wrote about their growing interest in Zen Buddhism, and its more hopeful vision for how people might come to genuinely enjoy their lives, despite the pain of loss and the power of desire. In the intervening years, many more therapists and Buddhist teachers joined in this conversation, exploring the tools of each path, and seeking creative ways to bring them together."

Here's a quote by Karen Horney from a blog post of mine, a quote in which she is espousing the same understanding as Full Permission Living:

"Inherent in man are evolutionary constructive forces, which urge him to realize his given potentialities, that man by his very nature and of his own accord, strives toward self-realization, and that his values evolve from such striving. With such a belief in an autonomous striving toward self-realization, we do not need an inner straight jacket with which to shackle our spontaneity, nor the whip of inner dictates to drive us to perfection. There is no doubt that such disciplinary methods can succeed in suppressing undesirable factors, but there is also no doubt that they are injurious to our growth. We do not need them because we see a better possibility of dealing with destructive forces in ourselves: that of actually outgrowing them. The way toward this goal is an ever increasing awareness and understanding of ourselves."

Karen Horney finishes the passage with this great statement, which I leave you with as we delve into the final week of the decade, a reminder of what it really means to be "working" on yourself:

"Self-knowledge, then, is not an aim in itself, but a means of liberating the forces of spontaneous growth. In this sense, to work at ourselves becomes not only the prime moral obligation, but at the same time, in a very real sense, the prime moral privilege."

TODAY'S "THINGS CAN'T FIND YOU IF YOU'RE NOT HOME" QUOTE!

"It's only when you invalidate whatever your process has been that you actually add more time. Many of you are impatient to be somewhere other than where you are and that's exactly what makes you take so long. You really don't need to be impatient- the only reason you are impatient is because you think you need to be patient.  It's because you're not enjoying where you are right now- so the sooner you allow yourself to let where you are right now to be exactly what it needs to be, the sooner you validate the present- then you enjoy the present- because if you're enjoying the present you don't desire to be anywhere else. Because no where else is any better, it's just different. And as soon as you stop needing to be somewhere other than the now you will find your life accelerating, because something else will than be able to come through you, through the present. Things can't find you if you're not home! The only place you exist is in the present- so the more you focus on 'where I'd like to be in the future…where I was in the past…' the less you are in the NOW the less likely it is that things that need to find you will find you and the slower things will take."

       Bashar

THE TRUTH ABOUT EVERYTHING, PART TWO: ALL LOVE IS UNCONDITIONAL!

That's right, contrary to one of humanity's most common misconceptions, all love is unconditional. In fact, there is no other kind of love.  

If it's conditional, it's not love.

Human beings spend lifetimes trying to figure out ways to "get" love, or more of it, from lovers, friends, parents, children, etc., even from ourselves. We contort ourselves by suppressing what we believe to be unacceptable aspects of ourselves, including some of our feelings and thoughts, in order to get more love. We force stereotyped behaviors upon ourselves in a futile effort to be more worthy of love. We try in desperation to accept substitutes for love, substitutes like attention, admiration, praise, sex, food, money, etc., and end up still feeling empty, even when we are showered with those things. 

Why? 

Because... there are no substitutes for love.

One of the essential features of love, besides being unconditional, is that it is freely given in direct proportion to the giver's capacity to love. To whatever degree the channel for expressing love is open or closed in any individual, that's how much love you can receive from them, depending then on how open you are to receiving love. 

Period. End of story. You can't earn more, no matter what you do. 

And likewise, you can't be less deserving of love due to negative behaviors, thoughts or feelings. That's right. You may be less appealing to spend time with if you are acting out negative impulses or remaining unconscious to yourself, which is why someone can leave  a relationship with you, even though they may still love you, but you will never be less worthy of love based on your actions.

Take a breath on that one, folks. The deal is that if your actions, whatever they are, are judged by you to be proof of your unworthiness, you will close off to receiving love as a result, love that might actually help you heal what was ailing you that made you act out negatively in the first place. Another way of saying this is that our belief in our own "badness" is what leads to our behaving badly and our belief in our own unworthiness is what leads to our experience of lacking love in our lives. 

In childhood, which is where we initially develop these illusions about ourselves and love, we start out in a state of natural "purity," so to speak. We expect to receive love in the same confident way that plants sprouting up from the ground expect to receive sunlight. When a child, organically dependent on adults totally for several years, does not receive the love that it needs to become fully self-actualized, it cannot conceive that the source of their suffering and lack is that their parents are flawed. A human child would be devastated if faced with the reality that its parents are not self-actualized enough to channel the amount of love said child needs to flourish. So, the next most tolerable thought had by that deprived child (all of us on Earth, by the way, in the time period we've been in) is: "It must be my fault. If only I can figure out how to be more worthy, I will get what I need."

And of course, it never works.

It never happens, because the issue was the inability of the unactualized love-givers in early life to give more. Nonetheless, well into adulthood, human beings continue the fruitless efforts to become more deserving of love, or more satisfied with its substitutes, until or if one finally does the self-work necessary to become self-actualized and able to access the unconditional love of our true Higher Self for our physical/emotional self. This unconditional self-love then becomes the basis for actualized love between adults, which is shared, not "earned," not co-dependent, not conditional.

Here's a quote from the Guide:

"Blocks and prohibitions of true fulfillment exist because within the adult personality, the infant still claims fulfillment according to its mode.” (It's "mode" being to try and make itself more worthy through illusory efforts at self-perfection.)

On the website of the Pathwork Guide Lectures do a search for the word "love." HERE and you will find a wealth of material on this subject.

HERE'S a link to a piece written by me called, "LOVE JUNKIES? MAYBE IT'S NOT LOVE!"

Give yourself access to what is inherently yours, folks, the unconditional love that already exists within you for you, by doing whatever it takes to open the channel.

You deserve it... just because you do!