What's on my heart and mind right now?
Heart, and mind, and Now.
We get the idea, I think, early on, that there are all these emotions that stem up in us, rise up from the area within us which we know exists, enough for us to collectively call it the "Heart"- an area that certainly is somehow tied to our physical hearts but couldn't be completely defined in the physical. We get the idea that *all* this emotion just pours out of there in response to circumstances and things and people happening to us in any given moment- and that's what we've been taught, so that makes sense. That we believe that. But not all emotion comes from the Heart.
When people tell you to "follow your Heart" they are tapping into a Truth about emotion that *does* indeed come from that *place* inside us. Your Heart really can lead you to joy, and we know this somewhere deep down, which is why the phrase exists. But the idea that emotions always, or even for the most part, charge out of us automatically from *that* place is a little mixed up. This is why people start to fear following their Heart, and emotions that come from the Heart in general. It's easy to see following your Heart leading to bad feelings instead of Joy if you attribute all emotions to your *Heart.* A --Lot-- of the emotions that rise up within us did not come from the Heart, or that eternal part of us. It is easy to see that they came from the *mind,* even by just understanding how *not in Now* the emotion is. Lemme 'splain.
We don't notice, and fail to notice nearly always, the split-seconds that exist between the time something happens in Life, and when we turn that happening into something else. The split-seconds in which we have moved from experiencing the happening up into our brain, analyzed the happening, JUDGED what happened based on our beliefs, our past, etc, concluded, and then react "appropriately" to the results of that judgment. Our story about about it will be born shortly after (you'll never believe what happened to me today) and many of the details will become skewed instantaneously and minutely (or less minutely, depending) in service of our story. And all of this happens without us even really realizing it, and from the instant of that happening, of that focus shifting, we are no longer dealing in Now.
What we have done is created a cut-out copy of a bit of the Life that happened- one we have usually significantly fucked with- on which we are now focused, and to which we are now reacting. Going forward from the happening, this cut out is what we hold on to. It will *be* the happening, to us. (Since of course the happening is long gone.) We call the cut out- WHAT HAPPENED. But it isn't. We proceed, to varying degrees, to refocus on (and therefore grow the significance of) this cut out- through thinking and retelling and reliving, and keep on reacting and reacting to it, and re-experience all the emotions that go with it- *not go with the happening mind you, but go with the cut out.* Depending how strongly we feel about it, feel good or feel bad about it- this skewed little cut out may remain the focus of our lives for hours, days, months, years, decades. It may alter our future actions, decisions, and reactions. After all, in order to *make* this cut out we quickly analyzed and referred to countless previous cut outs.
All the while, real, honest-to-goodness *Life* continues to happen around us, un-focused upon.
Looking at this cut out copy of Life, to any degree, takes us out of Now. **As soon as we are out of Now, the emotions we are experiencing are not coming from the Heart.** They come from the mind. The mind is our tool for creating. This is of course why these emotions are so powerful, and have so much power in our lives. Our cut outs are powerful in our lives too, and stay with us affecting each moment to the agree that we focus on them. Even ages after the happenings themselves have stopped. But this emotion is *never* coming from the Heart. Our Heart wouldn't tell us a *lot* of things that our mind would and does, for many reasons.
There is a way to tell what it's like to be focused on and living in Now. It actually feels very different. I bet you know the difference already. In a way I think we all do. We all have *moments* in life that draw us into presence, maybe without us even realizing it. Moments where everyone present is peacefully and profoundly and humblingly affected by a great feeling of love. Or a great feeling of connection. With another, with yourself. A feeling of the *profoundness* of Life. Maybe it was a dream achieved. Maybe a baby born. Maybe a feeling shared with someone with whom you have an eternal bond. Maybe a sunset. Maybe even a loving conversation remembering a departed loved one. Times where for whatever reason, the beingness, the greatness of Life was just evident. And you could not focus on anything else. Love was felt fully- for ourselves, for others, for being alive just on its own. Life was felt fully. You were literally nowhere else.
We can learn to live this way. No matter what is happening. It is possible to get out of our heads and come to feel only what comes from that *place* within us. We can cease to subject each happening to judgments and instead see what this Moment presents, what it shows us about the world, what it tells us about Life. If we are noticing constantly what Life is currently telling us about Life we are moving along a specific path. This is Now. You need only look around you to see that Now is constantly changing. So the path of being in Now is one that is growing us always. Living in Now shows us how to move forward, to do things that once seemed hard or impossible. It shows us how we can let go of pain we have held on to, held close, how to let go of the stories that happened ages ago, weeks ago, days ago. To stop suffering over something that *has* happened, might happen, could happen, will happen... Won't happen. If you can find a way to come back to Now, Life will show you new, wonderful ways to feel. Because in Now, there are things and people all around you that are lovable. All the time. Seeing this beauty is the result of living from your Heart. Your Nows would be perfect- but you are not living in them. You have brought all your befores with you into your Now and it's making you think your Now sucks. It's making you miss it.
I promise you that Now is *perfect*-
the second you let go of every other second that has ever been.
All my love, cats and kittens,
right Now,
Amber
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