YOU’RE THE LIGHT
Fear busting
In essence we are all light. We are not the forms, the identities, or the names we been given or have given ourselves. We are pure, radiating light. Even though this is true most of us do not experience ourselves as light. Rather we experience ourselves as a body and a personality that has thoughts, ideas and assumptions about what it is and what it’s not. The more thoughts we have about what we are, the less we know what we actually are. Thoughts create filters from which the light that we are bends and distorts itself. The more thoughts we have, the more twists and turns the light that we are takes, and the further we are from knowing ourselves. We become more identified with the forms and we forget the formlessness from which we came. This makes our experience of ourselves feel dense, solid, and often scary as we are disconnected from true source of self. We come to trust only what is physical, which is ever changing and provides no true stability, as we’ve lost sight of the light.
Fear of anything, regardless of what it is, is simply the loss of remembering self, or said another way, a forgetting of the light. When fear becomes the dominant lens that we look through the light can seem scary or overwhelming to us. That which provides rest, relaxation or levity becomes a threat, because it threatens our perspective of fear which feels very real to us and is our only known source of stability. Even though we may desire reprieve from the feelings, thoughts and sensations of fear, we desire more the stability in what we know, in what is familiar, even if it is unpleasant.
If we let go of our perspective of fear then we are left in uncertainty. We feel exposed and vulnerable and open. Rather than guarding ourselves against potential experience we open ourselves to experience. Experience is what it is regardless if we are open or closed to it. The only difference is in how we will experience it, how we will relate to and interact with it, and how we will move and participate with life or not. We can’t control experience despite our often galant efforts to do so. We are not the deciders of what occurs, but we are the deciders of how we experience what occurs. This is our free will, our choice and nothing or no-one can take that from us. We can only willing give away how we experience what is. This occurs when we default to programs and conditioning that say we are powerless and where we choose to believe that we have no other choice. Understand those beliefs and perspectives are required in order for one to disown their power to choose how they experience.
BRIGHTEN UP
Moving towards fear
Fear creates an experience of vigilance or an over attunement to our inner and outer environment. This may be thought of as sensitivity, but it’s a sensitivity in which one feels powerless or threatened rather than a sensitivity where one feels more connected and at peace with the light that they are. As we open and become less defended we actually want more sensitivity, more attunement and more subtle awareness. This is an indication of spiritual developmental progression, a movement towards remembering self. Yet we want it rooted in power and trust, not powerlessness and fear. When rooted in power it is the experience of co-participation with life, with the unfolding and there is agreement with what is occurring. When rooted in powerlessness it feels as though it is happening to you, as though you can’t turn it off and you have just have to be subjected to whatever is occurring in your inner and outer environment.
The funny thing about fear is that it all comes down to us not knowing what is going happen, yet how could we know what isn’t yet and why do we ever think that we should know. Fear is simply the resistance we have to not knowing mixed in while some thoughts that something bad might occur inside, or on the other side, of that not knowing. While we become overly identified with the physical so much so that we’ve come to gain our sense of stability in it, yet its blatantly obvious that there is nothing stable about the physical. Nothing is more certain than birth and death of forms, yet we continue to try to find our source of stability inside of them and get shaken up when they start to destabilize.
The way I see it is that nothing should be taken too seriously, even our fears, especially our fears. The moment we take them seriously is the moment we move further away from the light. I have a practice of opening into that which feels scary or unknown. When I feel fear I notice my tension, my clenching, my resistance and then I notice that I am the one doing all of those things – tensing, clenching, and resisting. In that moment of recognition I open and allow my experience rather than continuing to close off from it. See the experience is what the experience is, but I get to experience it how I want to experience it. Moving towards the uncomfortableness rather than away from it is key, is pivotal, is required for transformation of how we experience what we experience. In turning towards and opening, there is allowance to feel. To feel the feelings about the experience which may feel intense for a few moments, and then after that there is peace. There is no longer resistance. There is simply openness with the fear, with the unknown. Presence, breath and ease return.
The return of presence is the return of the light. No longer is our resistance to our experience blocking the light. Now we can see, less distorted, less filtered. This is the process of allowing the light that you are to become brighter and brighter. The brighter the light, the clearer you feel even though all is still a mystery. The unknown becomes exciting rather than scary. This is how you shine, how you radiate and how you move into greater coherence, greater wholeness, greater knowing of yourself. That is the entire spiritual game. Knowledge of self is the ultimate outcome.
Dr. Amanda Love, Chiropractor, Network Spinal Analysis & Somato-Respiratory Integration, Boulder, Colorado