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Letting Go by David Hawkins

Letting Go by David Hawkins

by Parker · 296 things on Twos

The Pathway of Surrender
“The kingdom of heaven is within you.” - Dr. Hawkins
“What you are seeking is not different from your very own Self.” - Dr. Hawkins
The major requirement for the journey is a willingness to let go of the attachment to your current experience of life.
The “small” part of ourselves is attached to the familiar, no matter how painful or inefficient it is. It may seem bizarre, but our self with a small “s” actually enjoys an impoverished life and all the negativity that goes with it: feeling unworthy, being invalidated, judging others and ourselves, being inflated, always “winning” and being “right,” grieving the past, fearing the future, nursing our wounds, craving assurance, and seeking love instead of giving it.
“The Self of the teacher and that of the student are one and the same.” - Dr. Hawkins.
We are all connected at the energetic level, and a higher vibration (such as love) has a powerful effect on a lower vibration (such as fear).
“Inner disarmament first, then outer disarmament.” - The Dalai Lama
“Be the change you want to see in the world.” - Gandhi
Because we are all part of the whole, when we heal something in ourselves, we heal it for the world.
Each individual consciousness is connected to the collective consciousness at the energetic level; therefore, personal healing emerges collective healing.
By changing ourselves, we change the world.
As we become more loving on the inside, healing occurs on the outside.
The mind, with its thoughts, is driven by feelings. Each feeling is the cumulative derivative of many thousands of thoughts.
Because most people throughout their lives repress, suppress, and try to escape from their feelings, the suppressed energy accumulates and seeks expression through psychosomatic distress, bodily disorders, emotional illnesses, and disordered behavior in interpersonal relationships. The accumulated feelings block spiritual growth and awareness, as well as success in many areas of life.
Physical: The elimination of suppressed emotions has a positive health benefit. It decreases the overflow of energy into the body’s autonomic nervous system, and it unblocks the acupuncture energy system (demonstrable by a simple muscle test). Therefore, as a person constantly surrenders, physical and psychosomatic disorders improve and frequently disappear altogether. There is a general reversal of pathologic processes in the body and a return to optimal functioning.
Behavioral: Because there is a progressive decrease of anxiety and negative emotions, there is less and less need for escapism via drugs, alcohol, entertainment, and excessive sleep. Consequently, there is an increase in vitality, energy, presence, and well-being, with more efficient and effortless functioning in all areas.
Interpersonal Relationships: As negative feelings are surrendered, there is a progressive increase of positive feelings that results in quickly observable improvement in all relationships. There is an increase in the capacity to love. Conflicts with others decrease progressively, so that job performance improves. The elimination of negative blocks allows vocational goals to be more easily accomplished, and self-sabotaging behavior based on guilt progressively diminishes. There is less and less dependence on intellectualism and a greater use of intuitive knowingness.
Indeed, it’s advisable to avoid gushing enthusiasm. It is a setup for a letdown later. Therefore, rather than enthusiasm, quiet observation will serve you better.
We carry around with us a huge reservoir of accumulated negative feelings, attitudes, and beliefs. The accumulated pressure makes us miserable and is the basis of many of our illnesses and problems.
We carry around with us a huge reservoir of accumulated negative feelings, attitudes, and beliefs. The accumulated pressure makes us miserable and is the basis of many of our illnesses and problems.
It is not thoughts or facts that are painful but the feelings that accompany them.
It is the accumulated pressure of feelings that causes thoughts.
The great value of knowing how to surrender is that any and all feelings can be let go of at any time and any place in an instant, and it can be done continuously and effortlessly.
What is the surrendered state? It means to be free of negative feelings in a given area so that creativity and spontaneity can manifest without opposition or the interference of inner conflicts. To be free of inner conflict and expectations is to give others in our life the greatest freedom. It allows us to experience the basic nature of the universe, which, it will be discovered, is to manifest the greatest good possible in a situation.
We have three major ways of handling feelings: suppression, expression, and escape.
Suppression and repression. These are the most common ways in which we push feelings down and put them aside. In repression, this happens unconsciously; in suppression, it happens consciously.
The pressure of suppressed feelings is later felt as irritability, mood swings, tension in the muscles of the neck and back, headaches, cramps, menstrual disorders, colitis, indigestion, insomnia, hypertension, allergies, and other somatic conditions.
When we repress a feeling, it is because there is so much guilt and fear over the feeling that it is not even consciously felt at all. It becomes instantly thrust into the unconscious as soon as it threatens to emerge.
Blame is placed on people, places, institutions, food, climatic conditions, astrological events, social conditions, fate, God, luck, the devil, foreigners, ethnic groups, political rivals, and other things outside of ourselves. Projection is the main mechanism in use by the world today. It accounts for all wars, strife, and civil disorder.
Expression. With this mechanism, the feeling is vented, verbalized, or stated in body language, and acted out in endless group demonstrations. The expression of negative feelings allows just enough of the inner pressure to be let out so that the remainder can then be suppressed
The expression of a feeling, first, tends to propagate that feeling and give it greater energy. Second, the expression of the feeling merely allows the remainder to be suppressed out of awareness.
If we dump our negative feelings on others, they experience it as an attack and they, in turn, are forced to suppress, express, or escape the feelings; therefore, the expression of negativity results in the deterioration and destruction of relationships. A far better alternative is to take responsibility for our own feelings and neutralize them. Then, only positive feelings remain to be expressed.
Escape. Escape is the avoidance of feelings through diversion. This avoidance is the backbone of the entertainment and liquor industries, and also the route of the workaholic.
We can avoid our own inner selves and keep our feelings from emerging by an endless variety of pursuits, many of which eventually become addictions as our dependency upon them grows.
People are terrified of facing themselves. They dread even a moment of aloneness. Thus the constant frantic activities: the endless socializing, talking, texting, reading, music playing, working, traveling, sightseeing, shopping, overeating, gambling, movie-going, pill-taking, drug-using, and cocktail-partying.
When we let go, we immediately feel better. The body’s physiology changes. There are detectable improvements in skin color, breathing, pulse, blood pressure, muscle tension, gastro-intestinal function, and blood chemistries. In the state of inner freedom, all bodily functions and organs move in the general direction of normalcy and health. There is an immediate increase in muscle power. Vision improves and our perception of the world and ourselves changes for the better. We feel happier, more loving, and more easygoing.
The real source of “stress” is actually internal; it is not external, as people would like to believe.
The more fear we have on the inside, the more our perception of the world is changed to a fearful, guarded expectancy. To the fearful person, this world is a terrifying place. To the angry person, this world is a chaos of frustration and vexation. To the guilty person, it is a world of temptation and sin, which they see everywhere. What we are holding inside colors our world. If we let go of guilt, we will see innocence; however, a guilt-ridden person will see only evil. The basic rule is that we focus on what we have repressed.
Stress results from the accumulated pressure of our repressed and suppressed feelings. The pressure seeks relief, and so external events only trigger what we have been holding down, both consciously and unconsciously.
A negative feeling instantly causes a loss of 50% of the body’s muscle strength and also narrows our vision both physically and mentally.
The suppressed and repressed feelings seek an outlet and utilize the events as triggers and excuses to vent themselves. We are like pressure-cookers ready to release steam when the opportunity arises.
If, through constant surrendering, we have let go of the pent-up store of anger, it is very difficult and, in fact, even impossible for anyone or any situation to “make” us angry. The same, therefore, goes for all other negative feelings once they have been surrendered.
True love is free of fear and characterized by non-attachment. Fear of loss energizes undue attachment and possessiveness.
When the pressure of suppressed and repressed feelings exceeds the individual’s tolerance level, the mind will create an event “out there” upon which to vent and displace itself. Thus, the person with a lot of repressed grief will unconsciously create sad events in life. The fearful person precipitates frightening experiences; the angry person becomes surrounded by infuriating circumstances; and the prideful person is constantly being insulted.
Everything in the universe emits a vibration. The higher the vibration, the more power it has. Emotions, also, because they are energy, emit vibrations.
The energy field has traditionally been called an “aura” and can be seen by people who have been born with or learned the ability to see vibrations of that frequency. The aura changes color and size with emotions.
The mind has no dimensions or size and is not limited in space; therefore, the mind transmits its basic state via vibrational energy over an unlimited distance. This means that we routinely and unwittingly affect others by our emotional state and thoughts.
Because emotions emit a vibrational energy field, they affect and determine the people who are in our lives. Life events become influenced by our repressed and suppressed emotions on the psychic level. Thus anger attracts angry thoughts. The basic rule of the psychic universe is that “like attracts like.”
Because all living things are connected on vibrational energy levels, our basic emotional state is picked up and reacted to by all life forms around us. It is well known that animals can instantly read a person’s basic emotional state.
Letting go involves being aware of a feeling, letting it come up, staying with it, and letting it run its course without wanting to make it different or do anything about it. It means simply to let the feeling be there and to focus on letting out the energy behind it. The first step is to allow yourself to have the feeling without resisting it, venting it, fearing it, condemning it, or moralizing about it. It means to drop judgment and to see that it is just a feeling. The technique is to be with the feeling and surrender all efforts to modify it in any way. Let go of wanting to resist the feeling. It is resistance that keeps the feeling going. When you give up resisting or trying to modify the feeling, it will shift to the next feeling and be accompanied by a lighter sensation. A feeling that is not resisted will disappear as the energy behind it dissipates.
As you begin the process, you will notice that you have fear and guilt over having feelings; there will be resistance to feelings in general. To let feelings come up, it is easier to let go of the reaction to having the feelings in the first place. A fear of fear itself is a prime example of this. Let go of the fear or guilt that you have about the feeling first, and then get into the feeling itself.
When letting go, ignore all thoughts. Focus on the feeling itself, not on the thoughts. Thoughts are endless and self-reinforcing, and they only breed more thoughts. Thoughts are merely rationalizations of the mind to try and explain the presence of the feeling. The real reason for the feeling is the accumulated pressure behind the feeling that is forcing it to come up in the moment. The thoughts or external events are only an excuse made up by the mind.
As we become more familiar with letting go, it will be noticed that all negative feelings are associated with our basic fear related to survival and that all feelings are merely survival programs that the mind believes are necessary. The letting go technique undoes the programs progressively. Through that process, the underlying motive behind the feelings becomes more and more apparent.
To be surrendered means to have no strong emotion about a thing: “It’s okay if it happens, and it’s okay if it doesn’t.” When we are free, there is a letting go of attachments. We can enjoy a thing, but we don’t need it for our happiness.
Feelings come and go, and eventually you realize that you are not your feelings, but that the real “you” is merely witnessing them. You stop identifying with them. The “you” that is observing and is aware of what is happening always stays the same. As you become more and more aware of the changeless witness within, you begin to identify with that level of consciousness. You become progressively primarily the witness rather than the experiencer of phenomena. You get closer and closer to the real Self and begin to see that you had been duped by feelings all along. You thought that you were the victim of your feelings. Now you see that they are not the truth about yourself; they are merely created by the ego, that collector of programs which the mind has mistakenly believed are necessary for survival.
Often we have let go but think that we haven’t. It will be our friends who make us aware of the change. One reason for this phenomenon is that, when something is fully surrendered, it disappears from consciousness. Now, because we never think of it, we don’t realize that it has gone.
When we have been letting go for a while and have begun experiencing what is really going on, we will laugh at our thoughts. Thoughts are fakes, absurd make-beliefs that obscure the truth. Pursuing thoughts can keep us occupied endlessly. We will discover one day that we are right where we started. Thoughts are like gold fish in a bowl; the real Self is like the water. The real Self is the space between the thoughts, or more exactly, the field of silent awareness underneath all thoughts.
Thoughts are like bait to a fish; if we bite at them, we get caught. It’s best not to bite at the thoughts. We don’t need them.
It is often beneficial to look at some commonly held beliefs and let go of them right in the beginning, such as: (1) We only deserve things through hard work, struggle, sacrifice, and effort; (2) Suffering is beneficial and good for us; (3) We don’t get anything for nothing; (4) Things that are very simple aren’t worth much. Letting go of some of these psychological barriers to the technique itself will allow an enjoyment of its effortlessness and ease.
Every human desire seeks to ensure one’s personal survival and the survival of one’s identified groups, such as family, loved ones, and country.
Humans fear, most of all, the loss of the capacity to experience. To that end, people are interested in the survival of the body because they believe that they are the body and, therefore, they need the body to experience their existence.
Because people view themselves as separate and limited, they are stressed by their sense of lack. It is common for humans to look outside of themselves for the satisfaction of their needs. This leads them to experience themselves as vulnerable because they are insufficient unto themselves.
There is a simple way to become conscious of the underlying emotional goal behind any activity through use of the question, “What for?” With each answer, “What for?” is asked again and again until the basic feeling is uncovered.
The continual question, “What for?,” reveals that basically there are feelings of insecurity, unhappiness, and lack of fulfillment.
Every activity or desire will reveal that the basic goal is to achieve a certain feeling. There are no other goals than to overcome fear and achieve happiness.
Emotions are connected with what we believe will ensure our survival, not with what actually will. Emotions themselves are actually the cause of the basic fear that drives everyone to seek security constantly.
Briefly, everything emits energy, either positive or negative. Intuitively, we know the difference between a positive person (friendly, genuine, considerate) and a negative one (greedy, deceitful, hateful).
The map of consciousness
The Map of Consciousness (see Appendix A) provides a linear, logarithmic view of this nonlinear energetic terrain. Each level of consciousness (or attractor pattern) is calibrated on a logarithmic scale of energetic power, ranging from 1–1000. The level of Full Enlightenment (1000), at the top of the Map, represents the highest level attainable in the human realm; it is the energy of Jesus Christ, the Buddha, and Krishna. The level of Shame (20) is at the bottom, close to death, representing bare survival. The level of Courage (200) is the critical point that marks the shift from negative to positive energy. It is the energy of integrity, being truthful, empowerment, and having the capacity to cope. The levels of consciousness below Courage are destructive, whereas the levels above it are life-supportive. A simple muscle-test reveals the difference: negative stimuli (below 200) instantly weaken the muscle, and positive stimuli (above 200) instantly strengthen the muscle. True “power” strengthens; “force” weakens. Above the level of Courage, people seek us out because we give energy to them (“power”) and we have goodwill towards them. Below the level of Courage, people avoid us because we take energy from them (“force”) and we want to use them for our own material or emotional needs.
Peace (600): This is experienced as perfection, bliss, effortlessness, and oneness. It is a state of non-duality beyond separateness and beyond the intellect, as in the “peace that passeth all understanding.” It is described as Illumination and Enlightenment. It is rare in the human realm.
Joy (540): Love that is unconditional and unchanging, despite circumstances and actions of others. The world is illuminated by exquisite beauty, which is seen in all things. The perfection of creation is self-evident. There is closeness to unity and discovery of Self; compassion for all; enormous patience; the feeling of at-oneness with others and a concern for their happiness. A sense of self-completion and self-sufficiency prevails.
Love (500): A way of being that is forgiving, nurturing, and supportive. It does not proceed from the mind; rather, it emanates from the heart. Love focuses on the essence of a situation, not the details. It deals with wholes, not particulars. As perception is replaced with vision, it takes no position and sees the intrinsic value and lovability of all that exists.
Reason (400): This aspect differentiates humans from the animal world. There is the ability to see things in the abstract, to conceptualize, to be objective, and to make rapid and correct decisions. Its enormous utility is problem solving. Science, philosophy, medicine, and logic are expressions of this level.
Acceptance (350): This energy is easy-going, laid back, harmonious, flexible, inclusive, and free of inner resistance. “Life is good. You and I are good. I feel connected.” It meets life on life’s terms. There is no need to blame others or blame life.
Willingness (310): This energy subserves survival by virtue of a positive attitude that welcomes all expressions of life. It is friendly, helpful, wants to assist, and seeks to be of service.
Neutrality (250): This is a way of life that is comfortable, pragmatic, and relatively free of emotionality. “It’s okay either way.” It is free of rigid positions, nonjudgmental, and noncompetitive.
Courage (200): This energy says, “I can do it.” It is determined, excited about life, productive, independent, and self-empowered. Effective action is possible.
Pride (175): “My way is the best way,” says this level. Its focus is achievement, desire for recognition, specialness, and perfectionism. It feels “better than … ” and superior to others.
Anger (150): This energy overcomes the source of fear by force, threats, and attack. It is irritable, explosive, bitter, volatile, and resentful. It likes to “get even,” as in “I’ll show you.”
Desire (125): It is always seeking gain, acquisition, pleasure, and “getting” something outside oneself. It is insatiable, never satisfied, and craving. “I have to have it.” “Give me what I want, and give it to me now!”
Fear (100): This energy sees “danger,” which is “everywhere.” It is avoidant, defensive, preoccupied with security, possessive of others, jealous, restless, anxious, and vigilant.
Grief (75): There is helplessness, despair, loss, regret, and the feeling, “If only I had … ” Separation. Depression. Sadness. Being a “loser.” Mournful, as in “I can’t go on.”
Apathy (50): This energy is characterized by hopelessness, playing dead, being a “drain” to others, being immobilized, and the feelings: “I can’t” and “Who cares?” Poverty is common.
Guilt (30): In this energy field, one wants to punish and be punished. It leads to self-rejection, masochism, remorse, “feeling bad,” and self-sabotage. “It’s all my fault.” Accident-proneness, suicidal behavior, and projection of self-hatred onto “evil” others are common. It is the basis of many psychosomatic illnesses.
Shame (20): Characterized by humiliation, as in “hanging your head in shame.” It is traditionally accompanied by banishment. It is destructive to health and leads to cruelty toward self and others.
In general, we can say that the lower end of the scale is associated with lower vibrational frequencies: lower energy, lower power, poorer life circumstances, poorer relationships, less abundance, less love, and poorer physical and emotional health. Because of the low energy, such needy people drain us on all levels. They tend to be avoided and find themselves surrounded by people on the same level (e.g., in jail).
The fastest way to move from the bottom to the top is by telling the truth to ourselves and to others.
On the Map of Consciousness, the chakras calibrate as follows: Crown (600), Third Eye (525), Throat (350), Heart (505), Solar Plexus (275), Sacral or Spleen (275), Base or Root Chakra (200).
Every negative feeling impairs a body organ and, as the years go by, that organ becomes diseased and eventually fails to function.
There is a scientific basis for the observation that self-awareness is increased much more rapidly by observing feelings rather than thoughts. The thoughts associated with even one feeling may literally run into the thousands. The understanding of the underlying emotion and its correct handling is, therefore, more rewarding and less time-consuming than dealing with one’s thoughts.
In the beginning, if one is unfamiliar with the whole subject of feelings, it is often advisable to begin merely by observing them without any intention of doing anything about them. In this way, some clarification will occur about the relationship between feelings and thoughts. After there is more familiarity, some experimentation can then occur. For instance, certain areas of thoughts that tend to recur can be set aside and the feeling associated with them identified. The feeling can then be worked with by first accepting that it is there, without resisting it or condemning it. And then one begins to empty out the energy of the feeling directly by letting it be what it is until it runs out. Somewhat later, the former thoughts can now be looked at and their character will be observed to have changed. If the feeling has been totally surrendered and let go, usually all thoughts associated with it will have disappeared entirely and been replaced by a concluding thought which handles the matter quickly.
It is all right consciously to push away as much of the emotion as we are capable of at the moment. The emotion can be reduced in intensity by sharing the feeling with close friends or mentors. By merely expressing the feeling, some of the energy behind it is reduced. It is also alright in this circumstance consciously to utilize escape mechanisms, such as going out in a social situation to get some distance from the upset, playing with the dog, watching television, going to the movies, playing music, making love, or whatever one’s habit is under the circumstances. When the feeling has been reduced in its sheer quantity and intensity, it is best to start letting go of small aspects of the situation rather than the overall situation and the accompanying emotion itself.
Every strong emotion is really a composite of a number of subsidiary emotions and the total emotional complex can be disassembled.
Handling a crisis from the emotional rather than the intellectual level will shorten its duration dramatically.
It is said that most people spend their lives regretting the past and fearing the future; therefore, they are unable to experience joy in the present. Many of us have assumed that this is our human fate, our lot, and the best that we can do is “grin and bear it.”
One of the most effective tools for handling the past is the creation of a different context. What this means is that we give it a different meaning. We take on a different attitude about the past difficulty or trauma, and we acknowledge the hidden gift in it. The value of this technique was first recognized in psychiatry by Viktor Frankl. He explained the approach—which he called “Logotherapy”—in his famous book, Man’ s Search for Meaning. His clinical and personal experience demonstrated that emotional events and traumatic occurrences will change considerably and be healed if a new meaning is placed around them. Frankl told of his own experience in the Nazi concentration camps wherein he came to see his physical and psychic suffering as an opportunity to achieve inner triumph. “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way” (Frankl, [1959] 2006).
Every life experience, no matter how “tragic,” contains a hidden lesson. When we discover and acknowledge the hidden gift that is there, a healing takes place.
The shadow is all the repressed thoughts, feelings and concepts about ourselves that we do not want to face.
Fear of life is really the fear of emotions. It is not the facts that we fear but our feelings about them. Once we have mastery over our feelings, our fear of life diminishes. We feel a greater self-confidence, and we are willing to take greater chances because we now feel that we can handle the emotional consequences, whatever they might be. Because fear is the basis of all inhibitions, mastery over fear means the unblocking of whole avenues of life experience that previously had been avoided.
Thus, the man who successfully handles the crisis of losing a job will never again experience that same fear. He will, therefore, be more creative on the next job, willing to take the necessary risks to make it a success. He begins to see how that haunting fear of job loss had severely limited his performance in the past, made him fearful and cautious, and cost him his self-esteem due to his kowtowing and compliance with his superiors.
The world can only see us as we see ourselves.
The price of holding on to smallness can be demonstrated with muscle testing. The procedure is fairly simple (Hawkins, [1995], 2012). Hold in mind a mean, petty thought and have someone press down on your arm while you resist; notice the effect. Now choose the exact opposite view. Picture yourself as being generous, forgiving, loving, and experiencing your inner greatness. Instantly, there will be an enormous increase in muscle strength indicating a surge of positive bio-energy. Smallness brings weakness, sickness, disease, and death.
Greatness is the courage to overcome obstacles. It is the willingness to move to a higher level of love. It is the acceptance of others’ humanness and having compassion for their suffering by putting ourselves in their shoes. Out of the forgiveness of others come self-forgiveness and the relief of guilt. The real payoff we get is when we let go of our negativity and choose to be loving; we are the ones who benefit. We are the ones who gain from the real payoff. With this increased awareness of who we really are comes the progressive invulnerability to pain. Once we compassionately accept our own humanness and that of others, we are no longer subject to humiliation, for true humility is a part of greatness.
When that inner emptiness, due to lack of self-worth, is replaced by true self-love, self-respect and esteem, we no longer have to seek it in the world, for that source of happiness is within ourselves. It dawns on us that it cannot be supplied by the world anyway. No amount of riches can compensate for an inner feeling of poverty. We all know of the many multimillionaires who try to compensate for their inner sense of hollowness and lack of inner worth. Once we have contacted this inner Self, this inner greatness, this inner completion, contentment, and true sense of happiness, we have transcended the world. The world is now a place to enjoy, and we are no longer run by it. We are no longer at the effect of it.
The end result of the conscious handling of emotions is invulnerability and imperturbability. Our inner nature is now bullet proof. We are able to go through life with balance and grace.
The way out of apathy is to remind ourselves of our intention, which is to get higher and freer, to become more effective and happy, and to let go of the resistance to the technique itself.
Another way out of apathy is to look at the payoff we are getting out of the apathetic attitudes. The payoff may be in the face-saving excuses to cover up what is actually fear. Since in reality, we are very capable beings, most “I can’ts” are really “I won’ts.” Behind the “I can’ts” or the “I won’ts” is frequently a fear. Then, when we look at the truth of what is behind the feeling, we have already moved up the scale from apathy to fear. Fear is a higher energy state than apathy. Fear at least begins to motivate us into action and, in that action, we can again surrender fear and move up to anger or pride or courage, all of which are higher states than apathy.
Apathy and depression are the prices we pay for having settled for and bought into our smallness. It’s what we get for having played the victim and allowed ourselves to be programmed. It’s the price we pay for having bought into negativity. It’s what results from resisting the part of ourselves that is loving, courageous, and great. It results from allowing ourselves to be invalidated by ourselves or others; it is the consequence of holding ourselves in a negative context. In reality, it is only a definition of ourselves that we have unwittingly allowed to happen. The way out is to become more conscious.
What does it mean, “to become more conscious”? To begin with, becoming more conscious means to start looking for the truth for ourselves, instead of blindly allowing ourselves to be programmed, whether from without or by an inner voice within the mind, which seeks to diminish and invalidate, focusing on all that is weak and helpless. To get out of it, we have to accept the responsibility that we have bought into the negativity and have been willing to believe it. The way out of this, then, is to start questioning everything.
As we replace “I can’t” with “I won’t,” we uncover all of these feelings, which can then be surrendered. We see that learning to dance means we have to be willing to let go of pride. We look at the cost and ask ourselves, “Am I willing to continue to pay this price? Would I be willing to let go of the fear of not succeeding? Would I be willing to let go of resisting the effort required? Would I be willing to let go of the vanity so that I could allow myself to be awkward as a learner? Could I let go of my stinginess and smallness and be willing to pay for the lessons and give the time?” As all of the associated feelings are surrendered, it becomes very clear that the real reason is unwillingness—not incapacity.
As we examine our “I can’ts” and find out that they are really “I won’ts,” it doesn’t mean that we have to let go of the negative feelings that result in the “I won’ts.” We are perfectly free to refuse to let go. We are free to hang on to negativity as long as we want. There is no law that says we have to give it up. We are free agents. But it makes a big difference in our self-concept to realize that “I won’t do something” is quite a different feeling than to think that “I’m a victim and I can’t.”
Blame is the world’s greatest excuse. It enables us to remain limited and small without feeling guilty. But there is a cost—the loss of our freedom. Also, the role of victim brings with it a self-perception of weakness, vulnerability, and helplessness, which are the major components of apathy and depression.
The first step out of blame is to see that we are choosing to blame. Other people who have had similar circumstances have forgiven, forgotten, and handled the same situation in a totally different way.
Blaming others or ourselves is simply not necessary.
One of the laws of consciousness is: We are only subject to a negative thought or belief if we consciously say that it applies to us. We are free to choose not to buy into a negative belief system.
For negativity to apply to our life, we must first subscribe to it and, secondly, give it the energy of belief. If we have the power to make negativity manifest in our life, obviously our mind also has the power to make its converse come true.
As we stop giving authority and energy to all of the negative programs that stem from our own thinking, we stop giving away our power to others and begin to own it back again. This results in a rise of self-esteem, the return of creativity, and the opening of a positive vision of the future that replaces fearfulness.
Simply put, we are either positively or negatively influenced by the company we keep. It is unlikely that we will overcome an inhibition if we choose to be in the company of others who have our same problem.
Instead of suppressing the feeling, if it is allowed to come up and be relinquished, we can quickly jump from grief to acceptance. The continuing grief over a loss is due to the resistance to accepting that state and allowing the grief to expend itself. The persistence of a feeling is due to the resistance to allowing it to be relinquished (e.g., “Cry me a river”). Once we accept the fact that we can handle grief, we are already up into pride. The feeling of “I can do it” and “I can handle it” brings us to courage.
Once a man has fully let the grief come up and totally freed himself from that suppressed energy, he is peaceful and his view of his own masculinity changes. He realizes that his masculinity is now more complete. He is still just as much of a man, but now he is a man who can also be in touch with and handle his own feelings. Consequently, he is more adequate, more capable, more well-rounded, more understanding, more mature, more capable of relating to and understanding others, more compassionate, and more loving.
The psychological basis of all grief and mourning is attachment. Attachment and dependence occur because we feel incomplete within ourselves; therefore, we seek objects, people, relationships, places, and concepts to fulfill inner needs. Because they are unconsciously utilized to fulfill an inner need, they come to be identified as “mine.” As more energy is poured into them, there is a transition from identifying with the external objects as “mine” to being an actual extension of “me.” Loss of the object or person is experienced as a loss of our own self and an important part of our emotional economy. Loss is experienced as a diminution of the quality of ourselves, which the object or person represented. The more emotional energy invested in the object or person, the greater will be the feeling of loss and the greater the pain associated with the undoing of the bonds of dependence. Attachment creates a dependency, and dependency, because of its nature, intrinsically carries with it a fear of loss.
Within each person, there is the child, parent, and adult. When grief comes up, it is rewarding to ask, “Within myself, is it the child, parent, or adult that is the source of this feeling?” For example, the “child” within a person is scared that something will happen to a beloved dog. It wonders, “How will I make it?” The inner adult also feels grief, but the adult accepts the inevitable. The little kitty or doggie is not immortal. The adult in us regretfully accepts that impermanency is a reality of life. We accept that our youth is not permanent, that many romantic relationships are not life-long, and that our dog will one day die.
Because of the nature of attachment, the first state preceding the actual experiencing of loss is that of fear of loss. This is usually defended in one of two ways. One is to increase the intensity of the attachment by ever-persistent attempts to strengthen the bonds. This approach is based on the fantasy that “the greater the bond, the less likelihood of loss.” However, this is the very maneuver that often precipitates loss in personal relationships, because the other person struggles to be free of the possessive attachment and the amount of restrictive control they feel being placed upon them. Thus, because what we hold in mind tends to manifest, the fear of a loss can, paradoxically, be the mechanism of bringing about that loss. The second way that fear of loss is handled is by the psychological mechanism of denial which is, in common language, called “playing ostrich.” We see this around us every day in its various forms of refusing to face the inevitable. All the warning signs are there, but the person does not take heed. Thus, the man who is obviously in the process of losing his job tends not to notice. The partners in a marriage that is going down the drain take no corrective action. The person with a serious disease ignores all of the symptoms and avoids medical attention.
Anger results from prior refusal to accept the fact that all relationships and possessions in this life are transitory. Even the physical body, which is our biggest attachment, eventually has to be relinquished, as everyone is aware.
The Serenity Prayer of the 12-Step groups: God, Grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the Courage to change the things I can, and the Wisdom to know the difference.
The basis of all mourning and loss is attachment, plus the denial of the transitory nature of all relationships. We can begin by looking at our lives, identifying those areas of attachment, and asking ourselves: “What internal needs are they satisfying? What feeling would come up if I were to lose them? How can my inner emotional life be balanced so as to decrease the extent, degree, and number of attachments on external objects and people?” The greater our attachment to that which is outside of ourselves, the greater is our overall level of fear and vulnerability to loss. We can ask ourselves why we feel so incomplete. “Why am I so empty within myself that I have to search for solutions in the form of attachment and dependency on others?” We can begin to look at our own inner areas of immaturity. Specifically, we need to examine: “Where am I looking to get love rather than to give it?” The more loving we are, the less vulnerable we are to grief and loss, and the less we need to seek attachments. When we have acknowledged and let go of all negative feelings, and we have graduated from smallness to the recognition of our greatness so that our internal joy comes from the pleasure of giving and loving, then we are really invulnerable to loss. When the source of happiness is found within, we are immune to the losses of the world.
Over two thousand years ago, the Buddha made the observation that the basis of all human suffering was due to desire and attachment, and human history has merely proven the truth of his teaching. What is the solution to that dilemma? As we can see, it is only the small aspect of oneself that becomes attached. The smaller self buys into the frightened, inadequate set of programs that we have unwittingly allowed to run us. The purpose of letting go is to de-energize these programs so that they no longer run us; then, we are free to expand into the greater awareness of our Higher Self.
We are at all times surrounded by love, which is unlimited. Love is automatically attracted to the person who is loving.
Immunity to grief of loss occurs when we replace dependence on the small self (the personality) with dependence on the Self (the Divinity within). We look for security to the Self, which is eternal, instead of to the small self, which is transitory.
As we let go of fear, we find that behind it, there is often anger at the object of fear itself. The willingness to let go of the fear and overcome it already moves us up to the next level, which is anger. The fact that we can face this combination of fear/anger feelings and surrender it moves us instantly up to pride and courage.
One excellent experiment is to let go of the fear of fear itself. When we stop being afraid of fear, we notice that it is just a feeling. In fact, fear is far more tolerable than depression. Surprisingly, to a person who has been in bad depression, the re-emergence of fear is welcomed. It is better to feel scared than hopeless.
One of the laws of consciousness: What one holds in mind tends to manifest.
Any thought which we consistently hold in mind and consistently give energy to will tend to come into our life according to the very form in which our mind has held it.
Finally, I let go. I experienced the relief of surrender in that I just totally gave up: “There is absolutely nothing I can do to help her. The only thing left to do is just to love her.”
A higher vibration, such as love, has a healing effect on a lower vibration, such as that in the patient’s case, fear. This love is the mechanism of reassurance, and very often we can quiet another person’s fears by our mere physical presence, and by the loving energy that we project to them and with which we surround them. It is not what we say, but the very fact of our presence that has the healing effect.
We might picture love to be like the sunlight and negative thoughts like the clouds. Whereas our higher, greater Self is like the sun, all the negative thoughts, doubts, fears, anger, and resentments that we hold dim the light of the sun and, finally, the light comes through only weakly. It was Jesus Christ who said that we all, with faith, potentially have the power to heal. The saint, or person of high consciousness, is by definition one who has removed the clouds of negativity and radiates the full healing power of the sun. That is also why saintly beings have such magnetic power that they attract multitudes to their physical presence.
Unconditional love has the greatest power of all, and that love is the power of the celebrated saints. Unconditional love is also the power of the mother and of the father, the presence of whom is so essential to the children’s learning to love as they grow. It was Sigmund Freud who observed that the most fortunate thing that can happen to us growing up is to be our mother’s favorite child.
By the very nature of our being and by the very nature of the life energy that flows through us and empowers us to breathe and to think, we all have that same vibrational energy level of love within us.
If, in looking at ourselves, we see that we have allowed the experience of our own nature to become blocked off by extensive fears, then we can rediscover the love within us by utilizing the mechanism of surrender and, thus, letting go of the clouds of negativity. By rediscovering this inner love, we rediscover the true source of happiness.
The average human, Jung said, would much rather project his shadow onto the world and condemn it and see it as evil, thinking that his problem is to battle with evil in the world. In actuality, the problem is merely to acknowledge the presence of such thoughts and impulses in ourselves. By acknowledging them, they become quiet. Once they are quiet, they no longer unconsciously run us.
What makes the endless television programs, which are concerned with mayhem and its various forms, so attractive? It is because what is being acted out on the screen, where it is safe, are all the forbidden unconscious fantasies in our own psyche. Once we are willing to look at the same movies on the TV screen of our own minds and see whence they really originate, the attraction of such “entertainment” disappears. People who have acknowledged the content of their own shadow have no interest in crime, violence, and fearful disasters.
The term collective unconscious means that everybody has these thoughts and fantasies. There is nothing unique about any of us when it comes to the way we symbolize our emotions. Everybody secretly harbors the fear that they are dumb, ugly, unlovable, and a failure.
We have the unconscious fantasy that fear is keeping us alive; this is because fear is associated with our whole set of survival mechanisms. We have the idea that, if we were to let go of fear, our main defense mechanism, we would become vulnerable in some way. In reality, the truth is just the opposite. Fear is what blinds us to the real dangers of life. In fact, fear itself is the greatest danger that the human body faces. It is fear and guilt that bring about disease and failure in every area of our lives.
We could take the same protective actions out of love rather than out of fear. Can we not care for our bodies because we appreciate and value them, rather than out of fear of disease and dying? Can we not be of service to others in our life out of love, rather than out of fear of losing them? Can we not be polite and courteous to strangers because we care for our fellow human beings, rather than because we fear losing their good opinion of us? Can we not do a good job because we care about the quality of our performance and we care about our fellow workers? Can we not perform our job well because we care about the recipients of our services, rather than just the fear of losing our jobs or pursuing our own ambition? Can we not accomplish more by cooperation, rather than by fearful competition? Can we not drive carefully because we have a high regard for ourselves and care for our welfare and those who love us, rather than because we fear an accident? On a spiritual level, isn’t it more effective if, out of compassion and identification with our fellow human beings, we care for them, rather than trying to love them out of fear of God’s punishment if we don’t?
One particular form of fear is what we call guilt. Guilt is always associated with a feeling of wrongness and potential punishment, either real or in fantasy. If punishment is not forthcoming in the external world, it expresses itself as self-punishment on an emotional level.
Remaining unconscious of guilt (repression), however, does not solve it. The guilt re-emerges in the form of self-punishment and through accidents, misfortune, loss of jobs and relationships, physical disease and sickness, tiredness, exhaustion, and the multiple ways the ingenious mind figures out how to bring about the loss of pleasure, joy, and aliveness.
Physical disease is unlikely to exist without guilt, and guilt is a denial of our inner intrinsic innocence.
Most of the consciousness programs boil down to this essential point: become aware of what we are buying into, what we are accepting daily. Let’s look at what we have already been programmed with and begin to question it, disassemble it, and let it go. Let’s wake up and free ourselves from being exploited and enslaved by the negative programming of the world. We will see it for what it is, which is an attempt by others to control us; exploit us; extract our money, our services, our energy, our loyalties; and capture our mind.
When we see the truth of how programming happens, we will see that we are the pure, blank computer. We are the innocent space in which the programming is occurring.
Once we have looked deep within ourselves and found that innate inner innocence, we will stop hating ourselves. We will stop condemning ourselves and stop buying into the condemnation of others and their subtle attempts to invalidate our worth as human beings. It’s time to re-own our own power and stop giving it away to every passing scammer who jiggles our fears and shakes loose some money out of our pocketbook or enslaves us to their cause, living off of our energy. It’s easy to get away from all that fear because we have the power of choice now.
There is one thing the world does not want us to find out and that is the truth about ourselves. Why? Because then we will become free. We can no longer be controlled, manipulated, exploited, drained, enslaved, imprisoned, vilified, or disempowered. Therefore, the inner voyage of discovery is cloaked over with an aura of mystery and foreboding.
The real truth is that, as we go within and discard one illusion after another, one falsehood after another, one negative program after another, it gets lighter and lighter. The awareness of the presence of love becomes stronger and stronger. We will feel lighter and lighter. Life becomes progressively more effortless.
Every great teacher since the beginning of time has said to look within and find the truth, for the truth of what we really are will set us free. If what is to be found within ourselves were something to feel guilty about, something that is rotten, evil and negative, then all the world’s great teachers would not advise us to look there. On the contrary, they would tell us to avoid it at all costs. We will discover that all of the things the world calls “evil” are right on the surface; they are right on the top, as the superficial, outer thin layer. Beneath these errors is mistakenness. We are not rotten—only ignorant.
As the quantity of guilty fear and the energy accompanying it are relinquished, we will notice that physical diseases and symptoms begin to disappear. The capacity to love ourselves in the form of increased self-esteem returns and with it comes the capacity to love others. Being freed from guilt brings about a renewal of life energy.
We have unwittingly bought into a system of negativity that is currently running the planet. To make wrong and to make guilty is really a form of cruelty, is it not? We have allowed others to program us with methods of self-torture, and we can see that we have retaliated by inviting others to torture themselves in return. We have allowed ourselves to be manipulated by guilt, and we turn it around and use that same mechanism of guilt to try to exploit and control others.
The degree to which we have not allowed ourselves to experience the reality of our true Self is represented by our resentment toward those who have actually done so. We resent their aliveness in the areas in which we feel disabled. This sobering truth is represented by the story of the man who walks along the beach and comes upon a fisherman with a pail full of crabs. He says to the fisherman, “You’d better put a cover on that pail or the crabs will get out.” “Well, no,” said the wise old fisherman. “There is no need for that. You see, as one crab crawls up the side of the pail to get out, the other crabs reach up and grab him and pull him back down. So there’s no need for a cover.” As we keep letting go, getting lighter, and becoming freer, we will, unfortunately, see that the nature of the world is like that pail of crabs. And, then, the full extent of its negativity becomes apparent. When we become totally aware of the bill of goods that we have been sold, it is very likely that we will feel anger and a strong desire to become liberated from the constraints of negativity.
The essential point of freedom is whether we have chosen consciously to fulfill a certain want, or whether we are just being blindly run by unconscious programs and belief systems.
The desiring was actually the obstacle to its achievement or acquisition. This is because desire literally means, “I do not have.” In other words, if we say that we desire something, we are saying that it isn’t ours. When we say that it isn’t ours, we put a psychic distance between ourselves and what we want. This distance becomes the obstacle that consumes energy.
The impossible becomes possible as soon as we are totally surrendered. This is because wanting blocks receiving it and results in a fear of not getting it. The energy of desire is, in essence, a denial that what we want is ours for the asking.
In a freer state, that which is chosen manifests in our life effortlessly. We surrender the emotion of desire and, instead, merely choose the goal, picture it lovingly, and allow it to happen because we see that it is already ours.
In a lower state of consciousness, the universe is seen as negative and denying, frustrating, and reluctant. It is like a bad, stingy parent. In a higher state of consciousness, our experience of the universe changes. It now becomes like a giving, loving, unconditionally approving parent who wants us to have everything we want, and it is ours for the asking.
Peculiarly, the unconscious will allow us to have only what we think we deserve. The more we hang on to our negativity and the small self-image that results, the less we think we deserve, and we unconsciously deny ourselves the abundance which flows so easily to others. That is the reason for the saying, “The poor get poorer and the rich get richer.” If we have a small view of ourselves, then what we deserve is poverty, and our unconscious will see to it that we have that actuality. As we relinquish our smallness and revalidate our own inner innocence, and as we let go of resisting our generosity, openness, trust, lovingness, and faith, then the unconscious will automatically start arranging life circumstances so that abundance begins to flow into our life.
The general progression of the levels of consciousness, as we go from the lowest to the highest, is to move from havingness to doingness to beingness. At the lower levels of consciousness, it is what we have that counts. It is what we have that we want. It is what we have that we value. It is what we have that gives us our self-image of worth and position in the world. Once we have proven to ourselves that we can have, that our basic needs can be fulfilled, that we have the power to provide for our own needs and those of others who are dependent upon us, the mind begins to become more interested in what it is that we do. Then, we move to a different social set in which what we do in the world is the basis of our value and how others rate us. As we move up in lovingness, our doingness is less and less preoccupied with self-service and becomes more and more oriented to being of service to others. As our consciousness grows, we see that service, which is lovingly oriented toward others, automatically results in the fulfillment of our own needs. (This does not mean sacrifice. Service is not sacrifice.) Eventually, we become convinced that our own needs are automatically fulfilled by the universe, and our actions become almost automatically loving. At that point, it is no longer what we do in the world but what we are that counts. We have proven to ourselves that we can have what we need, that we can do almost anything, given the willingness. And now what we are, within ourselves and to others, becomes most important. People now seek our company, not because of what we have, not because of what we do and society’s labels, but because of what we have become. Because of the quality of our presence, people just want to be around us and experience us. Our social description changes. We are no longer the person who has a fashionable apartment or big car or a bric-a-brac collection, nor are we labeled as the President of the So-and-So Corporation or a member of the Board of Directors of some organization. Now we are described as a splendid person, as somebody whom people just have to meet, just have to know. We become described as a charismatic person. This level of beingness is typical of self-help groups. In self-help groups, no one is interested in what others do in the world or what they have. They are only interested in whether or not we have achieved certain inner goals, such as those of honesty, openness, sharingness, lovingness, willingness to help, humility, genuineness, and awareness. They are interested in our quality of beingness.
Glamour: A World Problem by Alice Bailey
Once we have relinquished the glamour, it will be relatively easy to surrender the desire itself. If you let go of the romanticization of the cowboy, for example, then the cigarette or the cheeseburger that he was handling in the commercial will lose its appeal. In fact, much to our surprise, we will find over and over again that the desire was attached to the glamorous fantasy; there was no reality in it in the first place. Because there was no reality in it, the world is constantly selling us dishonesty, catering to our desire for that romantic, glamorized aspect. It promises to make us more important than we really are. Glamour at that level of dishonesty is a fake.
The way to become that exciting person whom people want to know is very easy. We simply picture the kind of person we want to be and surrender all the negative feelings and blocks that prevent us from being that. What happens, then, is that all we need to have and to do will automatically fall into place. This is because, in contrast to having and doing, the level of being has the most power and energy. When it is given priority, it automatically integrates and organizes one’s activities. This mechanism is evidenced in the common experience, “What we hold in mind tends to manifest.”
Let’s look at the term “selfishness” as merely describing the collective motivations and modes of operation of the small self that is a genetic aspect of the mind which, due to our own naïveté, we allowed ourselves to be programmed with, and which we are now resolved to deprogram in reverse, like the “uninstall” command on a computer.
The reason to let go of selfishness is simply because it is impractical. It doesn’t work. It’s too costly. It consumes too much energy. It delays the accomplishment of our goals and the realization of our wants. Because of its very nature, the small self is the creator of guilt and its self-perpetuator; that is, out of guilt we strive to accomplish and achieve success. Then, when we achieve success, we feel guilty because we have it. There is no winning of the guilt game. The only solution is to give it up, to let it go.
Instead of the motivation of selfishness and desire, we can much more effortlessly bring into our life that which we want by envisioning what we wish to have happen. We do this by declaration of our intention, by acceptance, by decision, and by the act of consciously choosing.
We typically feel so much guilt about anger that we find it necessary to make the object of our anger “wrong” so that we can say our anger is “justified.” Few are the persons who can take responsibility for their own anger and just say, “I am angry because I am full of angriness.”
One of the great secrets of relationship is acknowledgment. The behavior of others toward us always includes a hidden gift. Even if that behavior appears negative, there is something in it for us. Very often that something appears in the form of a signal to us to become more aware. Let’s say, for example, that somebody calls us “stupid.” Our natural response is one of anger. We can use the energy of that anger consciously: “What is that person asking me to become more aware of?” If we ask ourselves the question, we may come to the realization that we were being self-centered; we were being uncaring; we were failing to acknowledge them; and we were not being conscious and aware of what was going on in the relationship. If we constantly follow this procedure, we will come to the awareness that everyone in our life is acting as a mirror. They are really reflecting back to us what we have failed to acknowledge within ourselves. They are forcing us to look at what needs to be addressed. What aspect of our smaller self needs to be relinquished? This means that we have to constantly let go of our pride in order to undo anger, so that we can be grateful for the continual opportunities of growth with which we are presented in the course of everyday experience. To do this, we have to resist the temptation to indulge in making ourselves and others “wrong.” If we look at the “small self” aspect of ourselves, we will see that making ourselves and others “wrong” is one of its favorite activities (e.g., politics and the media). This is because the small self is ignorant of better ways to accomplish our goals. It does not see the alternative, which is choosing to change a situation out of free choice. One way we force ourselves out of unsatisfactory situations is by making ourselves or the situation “wrong.” Instead of merely choosing to find a better job, for instance, our smaller self makes the job, the boss, and fellow workers “wrong.” Because of the picture of wrongness, the situation now becomes intolerable, and we are forced to change it. How much easier it would have been had we just simply chosen to move on to a better situation. However, because of our sense of obligation, guilt is very often the block to this simpler way. In other words, because of what has benefited us in a situation, we feel guilty about leaving it. So the unconscious ingeniously has created the whole mechanism of wrongness to force us out of dead-end situations. This often happens in interpersonal relationships where we feel that we have to make the other person “wrong” in order to justify leaving them. Resorting to the mechanism of wrongness is simply a denial of our own freedom to choose.
This whole arena of anger can be offset and prevented when we see the enormous value of simply acknowledging the gestures of others toward us. This means to acknowledge all of their communications to us. For instance, if friends call us on the phone, we thank them for calling us. The reason for doing this is that it makes the other persons feel complete and secure with us. It is an acknowledgment of their value in our life, and everyone feels pleased when we acknowledge their value.
By this simple mechanism of acknowledgment, it is possible, within a matter of days, to transform all of one’s relationships in a rather dramatic way. This acknowledgment does not have to go on in the outer world but can take place within oneself. As we examine our relationships, we can ask ourselves, “What have I failed to acknowledge in those with whom I have daily contact?”
When we stop pressuring others with our expectations, we create an opening for them spontaneously to respond positively to us. We can, in a prophylactic move, offset resentments by shifting what we have done for others from the level of sacrifice to the level of a loving gift. We can then acknowledge ourselves for this move and drop our expectations, which will dissolve the resistances in others.
We get what we want when we stop insisting on it!
The mind would like us to think that there is such a thing as “justifiable anger,” which takes the form of moralistic indignation. If we look at moralistic indignation, we will see that it is propped up by vanity and pride. We like to think how right we are in a situation and how “wrong” the other persons are. We get a passing cheap little satisfaction out of that, but our muscle-testing proves what the cost is to our overall emotional and physical economy. The price we pay for chronic anger and resentment is sickness and premature death. Is this worth the small satisfaction of being right?
The inner-actions between human beings are determined by the configurations of the vibrational energies that their emotions are radiating into space. The energy of the vibration, and the thought form with which it is associated, create a readable record.
As students of the martial arts are well aware, anger indicates weakness and vulnerability; it is seen as a tool that we are handing to our opponent. We can see from muscle testing why this is so. The angry person has already lost half his muscle power and has, therefore, lost the split second timing that is so decisive to victory in hand-to-hand combat.
Relinquishing anger brings us many benefits. We are free to experience emotional comfort and ease, gratitude for the daily opportunities to grow and heal, mutual caring with another without subtle “strings attached,” improvement in health, and more life energy. These breakthroughs allow us to move up to a more effective and effortless state of inner freedom.
The prideful person is constantly on the defensive because of the vulnerability of inflation and denial. Conversely, the humble person cannot be humiliated for they are immune to vulnerability, having let go of pride.
That which inflates the ego does not result in inner strength. On the contrary, it increases our vulnerability and overall level of fear.
When we are in a state of pride, our energy is dissipated by the constant preoccupation with defending our lifestyle, vocation, neighborhood, clothes, year and make of car, ancestry, country, and political and religious belief systems. There is a tireless preoccupation with appearance and what other people will think, so there is a constant vulnerability to the opinions of others.
When pride and self-inflation have been relinquished, there is an inner security that takes their place. When we no longer feel called upon to defend our image, criticisms and attacks from others diminish and finally stop. When we let go of our need for validation or to prove ourselves right, then the challenges against us fall away.
This brings us to one of the basic laws of consciousness: Defensiveness invites attack. An examination of the nature of pride facilitates the letting go of it, as it is no longer valued. It is seen for what it is, in truth: weak. The dictum, “Pride goeth before a fall,” prevails. Pride is thin ice, a poor substitute for that rock-like, real strength that comes from courage, acceptance, or peace.
When we have pride in our possessions or in some organizations with which we identify, we feel obligated to defend them. Pride in our ideas and opinions leads to endless arguments, conflict, and woe.
We do not feel comfortable in the presence of those who are prideful; therefore, pridefulness blocks communication and the expression of love. Although we love those who are prideful about specific accomplishments, we love them in spite of their pride and not because of it.
The smaller we feel within, the more we have to compensate for an inner sense of inadequacy, unimportance, and valuelessness by the substitution of the emotion of pride.
A truly humble person sees the critical verbalization by another person as merely a statement of the other person’s inner problems. For instance, if somebody were to say, “You think you’re pretty good, don’t you?,” what the truly humble person would see is that the other person has a problem with envy, and the question has no basis in reality in the first place. There is nothing to be offended by and no need to react. In contrast, for a prideful person, this question would be viewed as an insult and lead to hurt feelings, verbal comeback, or even a violent end in some cases.
Pride carries with it the desire for recognition from others and, consequently, there is a vulnerability to anger and disappointment if it is not forthcoming at some point. If we achieve a certain goal for the pleasure, enjoyment, love of accomplishment, and the inner joy that it brings to us, we are invulnerable to the reaction of others.
The problem is not that we have possessions, but that we have a prideful, possessive, and self-congratulatory attitude about them. It is the attitude of pride that creates the space for fear.
Pride, like all the other negative emotions, engenders guilt. Guilt engenders fear. Fear means potential loss. Pride, therefore, always means a loss of peace of mind.
The opposite of prideful acquisitiveness is simplicity. Simplicity does not mean poverty of possessions; rather, it is a state of mind. Another individual is worth millions of dollars, and she holds title to vast estates and possessions. Yet, as a person, she represents absolute simplicity. Her possessions reflect what the world has brought to her, and she takes joy in their beauty. Consequently, never a single criticism is made of her, nor do others express envy.
Possessiveness and attachment occur as a consequence of pride. Attachment is, therefore, a potential cause for suffering, because attachment brings about fear of loss and, with loss, we go back into apathy, depression, and grief. If we are prideful of a car and somebody steals it, we will experience anguish, pain, and suffering. If, instead, we loosely hold the car (emotionally speaking), and we enjoy its beauty and perfection and we feel grateful for having it, its loss will bring about only minor disappointment.
Gratitude is one of the antidotes of pride. If we happen to be born with a high IQ, we can be grateful for it rather than take pride in it. It’s not an accomplishment; we were born with it. If we are grateful for what has been given us and for what has been fulfilled through our God-given talents and endeavors, then we are in a peaceful state of mind and invulnerable to pain.
The difficult side of prefixing things with the word “mine” is the pride that goes with that sense of ownership. This makes us feel called upon to defend everything we label as “mine.” We can reduce our vulnerability by letting go of the desire to possess; instead of saying “mine,” we can use the word “a.” Not “my” shirt, but “a” shirt. Thus, we will notice that, if we view one of our thoughts as “an opinion” instead of “my opinion,” the feeling tone changes.
Instead of feeling pride about our thoughts, what is wrong with just loving them? Why not just love a certain concept because of its beauty, because of its inspirational quality, or because of its serviceability? If we view our thoughts that way, we no longer need the pride of being “right.” If we hold the same view of our likes and dislikes, we are no longer prone to argumentativeness. For instance, if we love the music of a certain composer, we no longer need to defend it. We might hope that our companion would also love it but, if not, the worst that we can feel is mild disappointment at not being able to share something that we personally value and enjoy. If we try this, we will find that people no longer attack our likes and dislikes and concepts. Instead of defensiveness, what they are getting from us now is appreciation. They understand that we appreciate certain things, and that is why we think the way we do. But they will no longer criticize or attack us. The worst we will get is perhaps a kidding or a quizzical attitude. Where pride is absent, attack is also absent.
That which we truly cherish and revere is protected by our own reverence. If we tell somebody that we do something because we get enjoyment out of it, there is really nothing much they can say about it, is there?
When we are open-minded, we are admitting that we are not in possession of all the facts, and we are ready to change our opinions as the situation unfolds. In this way, we do not box ourselves into the pain of defending lost causes.
The great teachers have said that the negativity which we see in a person or in society is really due to blindness, ignorance, and unconsciousness. This inner innocence, once it is perceived in others, is also perceived in ourselves. All that we did was done because we just didn’t know any better at the time. If we had known a better way at the time, we would have done it that way. “It seemed like a good idea at the time,” we say. We see that same blindness operating in others, and we can look past their character defects and see the innocent child within.