Sages and meditators for the last bazillion years have spoken about the internal deep dive – the search for the self. It’s a marvel that everyone I know that has taken this trip with earnest has the same results – they can’t find themselves. This identity that seems to run the show 24/7, with personality traits and dreams and attachments and dislikes, et al – it doesn’t exist. Not in the truest sense. We get to experience the notion of a self so that we know we are alive – so that we can, one by one, wake up to the knowledge that we never existed. And in that, that there is no separation. That. Is. Fucking delightful.
That’s been stewing today as the notion of emotions has been swirling through me. Where do these fascinating little good and bad flare-ups come from? As I talked to Orion about this via Skype (he’s in Australia, flying a trip to Sydney), we landed on a key premise – that emotions and feelings are different animals. I like this division very much. Emotion, therefore, becomes elements of our thoughts. I ran through the list of ‘em, and this resonated. Jealousy is conjured up when my mind thinks someone I love is giving affections to someone else. Anger appears when mind thinks she’s been wronged. Sadness says hi when something I was attached to does not play out as I wish. The list goes on. Emotions, in this manner, are stories the mind creates, which the body reacts to. They are anchored in the past (I can’t believe that happened. I’m so angry at him for doing that) or the future (I’m so afraid he’ll leave me. What if I fail at this again?). Everything not occurring in the present moment is a creation of the mind. Have you ever noticed how you’re mind is never actually present? It’s a wild realization.
Feelings though – what the heck are they? I consider feelings those spontaneous responses within the body and the spirit that happen moment to moment. Love is the obvious go-to – it’s always there if I’m not writing a story of resistance around it. Think about how it feels when you totally surrender to any given moment. Sensations abound – and while fear may be lingering (I’m so afraid of this vulnerability omg what am I doing. . . .) when you let go, it’s just insanely liberating. There’s an intense feeling of trust, of freedom, of bliss. Even if it feels risky. Feelings, therefore, are whatever is genuinely flowing through each moment you take a breath. They are the sensations in the body, which are expressing What Is inside those bones and tissues. They are communications that simply tell you what is really transpiring in your duality.
So what of this self then, this being that appears to experience all of this? It’s the part I love the most – the fact that the one thing many of us (especially Americans) cling to the most is not in the least bit real. We live in a world where individuality is coveted and prized, where people wear their identities like badges. ”I am this and I am that and I always do this and I never do that!” We talk about finding ourselves as if we really know what that means. If we did, we would realize it’s a laughable, win-less quest. Unless it means to find that we aren’t real. That the notion of this person who has all these experiences. . .it’s the cosmic joke. We get to *feel* as though we’re real, as consciousness without apparent separation is totally unconscious. So the divine split into billions and billions of pieces so that it could experience all the infinite experiences and feelings repeatedly, all at once, over and over. And then pieces of itself awaken to their glorious nothingness. What a fucking fantastic unfolding.
My mind today created many things to react to, and I felt the internal response. Sometimes attachment. Sometimes fear. Sometimes melancholy nostalgia. But then I would ask “Whose emotion is that?” It wasn’t mine. I can’t find the source of me. I can only find a single source – and it *feels* like a vast, infinite, identity-less chasm of love, bliss, and liberation. That space I feel when I drop the need to be me is an incredible nothingness where everything dwells. I realize that isn’t in the least bit sensible. Nothing about these no-mind spaces makes sense. . .to the mind. They’re not supposed to. They can’t, really. But the heart this body embraces – she swells and expands and it feels like. . .well, home.
And so that is my current focus / task. To take all that is happening, all that “I” am feeling – in every moment – and to remember that it’s NOT personal. It can’t be, because “I” don’t exist. It’s not personal if someone is raped. It’s not personal if someone wins the lottery. It’s not personal if someone falls in love. It’s just the all experiencing the all. All the beautiful damn time.
Yeah, I wish sometimes I could get out of the mode of Me, Me, Me once in a while!