| WHAT IS THIS WE CALL FREEDOM? The way I lived most of my life was not awake, not spacious, not free. I lived from ideas of what might be. These ideas became hardened and solidified through my unconscious effort to gain control of a future me that might be the equivalent of those ideas. I lived from an assumption that I was what I looked like. That is, I was my body, my personality, my name, my gender, my job. I was a “me” that was separate from “you.” And the way I stayed separate was to maintain this so-called self by giving all my attention to it. Living as “me” invited an existence anchored in apprehension, and impoverished by a perception that claimed me as a misfortune. Believing this betrayal, I exhausted myself trying to learn more, earn more, give more, all the while believing a parental message that I was stupid, repeated just enough for me to live it as truth. I polished my shoes and tapped danced my way into a role of pleasing others. I could smile at the drop of a hat, no matter how displeased I was with myself. Everything I did was provoked, stolen, from the archives of a demented, well-established chronicle in my head entitled YOU’RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH, STUPID! Then one day I met a man named Ramana, one of many I met during my 20 year journey searching for enlightenment. He had no investment in me. He had no investment in any “me.” His invitation was to be the reality of now, to be freedom. I accepted his invitation and lost myself forever. I didn’t really lose anything, nor did I gain anything. What actually happened was that the ideas from which I had previously lived, and the personality made up of those ideas, dropped away. Everything that formed Georgette dissolved into the spaciousness, the nothing-ness, that is always here. So, now as freedom lives Itself through me, IT shines my shoes. It dances. It lives this human experience with all it’s feelings, emotions and thoughts. What’s different is that IT takes on no role. IT, in seeing everything as Itself, sees nothing as wrong or right. IT only knows freedom. IT only knows love. IT watches things as they come and go in its space, never judging, wanting more or trying to change any of it. Imagine living life free of judgment, free of problems. No me, no problem! Imagine living life with all the perks we have now: feelings, emotions, thoughts, body sensations, relationships, work, families, friends, Starbucks, The Chocolate Lounge, Greenlife, Organic Tailgate Markets, and anything else you just love!!! Imagine living with all these things and never having a problem associated with any of them, never resisting anything that happens! The freedom that lives us right now is the empty formless field where everything, thoughts, feelings, objects, people, animals, etc., appear. The formless field of freedom does compete with any thing. How could it? IT is the empty field in which things appear. If this formless field wasn’t here first, there would be no space for things to appear. The formless field is the essential, open-ended and undefined container in which all things appear, or, better yet, are allowed into! FREEDOM IS… *Here, always, without struggle and hard effort; *Allowing all feelings and emotions to be experienced without reference to thought; *SEEING without perceiving or interpreting; *Peace that remains undisturbed regardless of what’s happening; *No resistance to what is happening; *Surrendered being and action; *Accepting everything, (including when you cannot accept that you are in resistance); *Receiving everyone and everything as the One that you are; *Living from stillness; *The recognition of cherished opinions, stories, and strategies. I used to think that a life of freedom was a life of extraordinary experiences, a slim body, great financial wealth, blissful joy, etc. It is none of these and all of these. Most importantly, it is life without a separate self, without a person in a chronicle called YOU’RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH, STUPID. |
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WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO LIVE AS LOVE? LIVING AS LOVE IS A PHRASE THAT DESCRIBES LIVING EVERY MOMENT BRAND NEW, FRESH AND UNKNOWN. LOVE, AS I REFER TO IT, IS THE OPEN AND UNCONDITIONED PRESENCE THAT IS ALWAYS HERE AS THE SILENT, UNRECOGNIZED BACKGROUND OF EVERYTHING. THIS PRESENCE MEETS EVERY PERSON, EVERY CIRCUMSTANCE FOR THE FIRST TIME. IT IS THE STILL, QUIET AWARENESS THAT LIVES AS AN EXPRESSION OF EACH OF US. IMAGINE BEING LIVED BY LOVE. IMAGINE YOUR LIFE BEING DIRECTED BY LOVE, RATHER THAN BEING DIRECTED BY THE VOICE IN YOUR HEAD. IMAGINE BEING GENTLE, CALM AND COMPASSIONATE WITH YOURSELF AND OTHERS, EVEN WHEN YOU GET SCARED, HURT, ANGRY, DISAPPOINTED, OR DEPRESSED. IMAGINE LIVING LIFE NATURALLY, WITHOUT STRUGGLE AND SUFFERING. IMAGINE NOT KNOWING WHAT’S GOING TO HAPPEN, HAVING NO NEED TO KNOW, AND BEING PERFECTLY OKAY WITH THAT. IMAGINE EVERY NEXT STEP BEING REVEALED TO YOU WITHOUT HAVING TO SEARCH, SACRIFICE OR WORK HARD FOR IT. WILL YOU … IMAGINE LIVING AS LOVE? |
