joyful

CLEAR YOUR SH*T OUT

Dr. Amanda Love Leave a comment

CLEAR YOUR SH*T OUT 

Be a vessel for source

We all have shit.  Lots and lots of shit.  We are full of it.  Most are solely consumed in it and don’t even know it.  It is the source of our dissatisfaction, our disempowerment and our suffering.  So what is all of this shit and where does it come from?  It is all of the stories, beliefs, opinions, ideas, judgments, and everything we think we know about stuff and life.  Essentially it’s everything we make up about who we think we are, what life is and the rightness or wrongness of what’s happened or is currently happening to us or in the world.  The source of all of our shit is our own thoughts and beliefs about stuff and the societal conditioning and norms that we learn from others and take on as our own.  We are often extremely convicted in our shit.  It gives us a sense of personal individual identity.  To let go of it means that we have to admit defeat to the fact that we actually don’t know and accept that which often feels unacceptable to us.  For many this is a tall order and most would rather keep their experience of dissatisfaction, disempowerment and suffering than dismantle their personal ego.  

Outside of the obvious, and perhaps it’s all obvious, you may wonder why anyone would want to clear out their shit and give away everything they think they know about life.  Well besides knowing your power, feeling fulfilled and ending suffering for yourself, it is also the gateway to being a vessel for source and living joyfully in levity and service.  When we empty out all of the shit inside of us, our mind and body become a clear container for life to be as it and move through us in the most precise, gracious and graceful ways.  It is only from this state of emptiness of self that we can truly be of service to others and life without any personal agenda whatsoever.  It is a state of true allowance and a giving to, rather than attempting to get anything at all to happen or be any way other than it is.  To our minds this might feel or seem like lack of progress or forward momentum, but to all of our souls it’s a welcome home.  

All progress is to get to better or get to perfection, but when you accept that as the current state then all of the sudden there is no where to get.  You’ve instantly arrived where you have been trying to get.  Again most people’s minds will fight this tooth and nail because it means that whatever you’ve thought about something, some injustice you feel you’ve seen or experienced, something you’ve perceived as not right, must be forgiven and allowed to return to its natural state of wholeness within your mind.  Our minds experience this as failure and yet paradoxically we become more free and in connection with all of life when we stop fighting.  This is healing, and beyond that, this is healed.   

THE JOY OF BEING A VESSEL 

Surrendering self

There is tremendous joy in surrendering to what is and becoming an empty vessel of pure service.  To give your life over to that sourceful intelligence that created the entire universe, that put galaxies in place and planets into orbit, which sees and knows way beyond what the human mind does, relieves so much pressure on your system.  For some this might not seem all that exciting on initial thought.  To give away our agendas of all the things we think we want, that feel important to us, and simply be moved by the source of life itself can feel scary to the mind.  We may feel loss of control.  We might have thoughts that we will be purposeless if we don’t have a clear trajectory of what is next.  We often fear the quiet, the silence or non-activity because it seems to threaten our worth and sense of contribution, safety or survival.  Most people lack trust in the silence so they fill up the spaciousness of their mind with as many thoughts as possible about everything that has happened, is happening or might happen.  In this way we can’t hear in the silence, and feeling nothing is there, we busy ourselves as much as they can so that we don’t feel the uncomfortableness of the fertile spontaneous present arising of the mystery of silence.

Much to your surprise you might discover that on an appearance level your life doesn’t look that much different when you give away all the stuff inside of you that keeps you full of your own self.  You may live in the same place, have the same job, be engaged in the same relationships, yet even though things look the same on the outside, where you are coming from on the inside is completely different.  Coming from your current thoughts and beliefs about stuff versus coming from pure emptiness that remains when you give away all of that stuff, generates a completely different experience even it looks the same from the outside.  The level of presence, connection, ease, purity, depth of impact and non-attachment you feel is worlds different than what most people are experiencing inside of their minds in their day to day experience.  

There really is nothing greater that I’ve found than giving away the personal mind stuff and being open to whatever is present.  To be available in this way allows you to feel rested inside of every single moment.  There is no time or place where you need to leave this rest to go outside of yourself and meet something other than you.  All of you is included inside of the moment when you drop all of your ideas, thoughts and agendas about what’s happened or is happening.  Here you experience magic in action, because your mind doesn’t have it figured out yet, but somehow that which knows all moves through you.  What comes through is stuff you wouldn’t have even been able to figure out or make up.  You know, but don’t know how you know.  You do, but don’t really know what you are doing.  Yet eternal yumminess is all you ever experience no matter how things unfold and you realize your tiny little person mind could never take credit for it all.  This is mastery of the yourself to the point where you are willing to surrender yourself completely to all of you rather than just what you think you are.  This brings an indescribable peace to your experience because you no longer have any personal attachment to anything that happens, and paradoxically in giving yourself away you finally experience the freedom you’ve always innately longed for.

Dr. Amanda Love, Chiropractor, Network Spinal Analysis & Somato-Respiratory Integration, Boulder, Colorado

DELUDE YOURSELF INTO TRUTH

Dr. Amanda Love Leave a comment

DELUDE YOURSELF INTO  TRUTH

Using what you already know

So often we don’t want to believe what is true.  We would rather believe untruths that feel bad, then truths that feel good.  We like to hold onto stories that create distress for us rather than generate stories that create a sense of inner peace.  When I speak of the word truth what I am pointing to is the ultimate source of goodness from which all, include us, arises.  Truth accepts all as it is.  Truth is vey different than rightness.  Rightness has to do with human preferences and judgment.  Truth sees no right or wrong, but rather the pure perfection that is all.

You may ask why it is that we don’t want to see the pure perfection that is all?  Well because we have preferences of how we think or want life to be, mostly our life.  So we forego truth and find ourselves in a world of right & wrong, good & bad, confusion, judgment, lack, separation and polarity.  That is the world of untruth, of which we have deluded ourselves into believing as the truth.  We have done such a fantastic job at deluding ourselves into untruth (mostly unbeknownst to ourselves) that all the conflict, confusion, lack and separation feels very real to us.  It feels like the truth.  Like the reality.  We are very convinced of it.   

It can be challenging to dismantle our thoroughly deluded beliefs in untruth because they seem so real and like all we’ve ever known.  Rather than attempting to change every stinking untrue belief you have, which is a lot by the way, the best way I’ve found through is to continue the strategy of delusion, but use it for truth instead.  This may seem a little crazy at first, but I assure you it’s the surprisingly sane route and will get you more of what you actually want in this life rather than what you think you want.  You may wonder how you might exactly go about deluding yourself into truth.  Well you are already kind of a master of this, it’s simply that you are using your skills in a slightly different way.  First simply recognize that everything you see, think, feel, or sense is based on some belief that you have, some meaning you’ve given to your experience, whether or not you are aware of it or not.  All interpretation and meaning is based in belief.  If you are perceptive you can begin to see that you are creating this entire experience of what you call reality.  Reality isn’t out there somewhere in some physical object over there.  Reality is in your head, well not literally in your head, but inside your psyche, inside your beliefs.  When you realize this, like really get it, then you can see that you and you alone get to delude yourself with truth or untruth.  The power is in your hands, or better said your mind.   

DISCERNING TRUTH

Following what feels good

Now some of you may still be a bit confused about what is truth and what is untruth.  Truth is the perfect acceptance of exactly what is.  Untruth is all the stories, meanings, and interpretations we create about what is.  One of the ways to discern this more and more for yourself is choosing to believe what feels better.  Say for example you are presented with a situation.  Let’s say you unexpectedly got fired from your job or you lost your entire business overnight.  Pick whatever is most applicable for you.  For most people this would be hard to accept.  I know very people, who if presented with this situation, would have no thought about it and would joyfully go about their day, that is unless they were ready to quit their job or let go of their business.  The reason for this is that we have umpteen-million things we think this means for us.  Maybe it’s a loss of financial support so we wonder how we will eat or pay bills, maybe it’s a loss of purpose so we wonder why we even exist, maybe is a sense of betrayal from the universe and we wonder if God even cares about us, maybe it’s loss of connection with others and we feel all alone now, and on and on and on.  None of these thoughts feel good.  In fact they all feel really, really bad.  

Many of you have heard me say this, but one of the beliefs I choose to live by is that if things feel good they are closer to the truth than things that feel bad.  Said another way if things feel bad they are less true than things that feel good.  In the above example believing  that losing our job/business overnight means we won’t eat, pay our bills, have purpose, are alone and that God doesn’t care, are all less true than what would feel good to believe.  What would feel good to believe is that we will be able to eat abundantly, pay our bills, that we are on purpose, that God does care, and that we are more connected than ever before.  This is closer to the actual truth, but this is hard for us to believe because of how we’ve either been conditioned or conditioned ourselves.  So you see this is where delusion comes into the picture.  We must delude ourselves into the truth, and I promise you it will feel like delusion to your mind even though it is more true.  It is quite the seeming paradox.  Your mind most likely will not want to believe what feels better to believe, but with some persistence you can get your mind to do so, because after all you are the one in charge of your mind, nothing and no-one else is.  

This is a really fun game to play with yourself.  It will also radically change your experience of life.  Life will become less and less of a bummer because you will less and less be perceiving things in ways that feel bad.  You will create more and more of what you actually want, which is simply to feel good.  We think we want all the stuff, the house, the kids, the cars, the friends, the relationships, the businesses, the travel, the purposes, but what it all boils down to is that we want to feel good.  When you feel good you radiate.  You are naturally and effortlessly of service.  There is nothing in particular you have to do to fulfill your purpose.  You are your purpose.  This is to live truth.  Truth feels good.  

Dr. Amanda Love, Chiropractor, Network Spinal Analysis & Somato-Respiratory Integration, Boulder, Colorado