J came to me totally turulated, her husband had packed up and left her. She was distraught. She described the disaster in a way youd expect her to. He did this and I feel that, and poor me and nasty him. I said to her you only have two choices, see this differently or just give it time. You cant change the reality that he left, you can only change how you deal with it She didnt want to wait for the three years it takes to get over most dramas, she wanted to get through this now, permanently and without holding anger for the rest of her life. It took 2 hours.
This second law of nature challenges our conventional way of looking at things. The ego sees the world and thinks how can I change it, your true nature sees the world as asks how can I change my attitude to it. In other words the ego wants the world to look how it sees right, and to look less like it sees wrong. Whereas the true nature, knows the world is perfect and it is our ego thats screwed up.
The two most important words for the ego, are blame and victim. The two enemies of our true nature are blame and victim, because by using these two instruments of deception we can avoid what nature intended. We can avoid growth.
We need to make a choice around how we are going to think about life. To think one way when all is going well, and another when all is not going well is delusional. There are those who dont have any interest in spiritual practice or healing, until something goes wrong. But this is a delusion of the ego, it wants an all upside existence. When all is great who cares about balance? When all is crappy, I do but this individual does not understand the teaching of natural law. It says that the downer they are trying to heal with balance, was caused by imbalance. It is a way of life, this balanced thinking, not just a one off flash in the pan when life is crappy.
P came to me for help. He was a tennis pro and was rated in the worlds top 100. He was having periods of depression after tournaments. We looked at the process of his thinking and it was all based on winning. When he won he was as high as a kite, but after he was low and depressed. I explained the laws of balance, uppers and downers, he got it. I said so are you going to cool your celebrations of uppers. He replied no way, now I know what causes the downers, its ok, Ill just take a few days off with my dog on the beach to let them go through me.
We make choices, if those choices are about accepting rather than fighting reality, we have grown. More than a better or worse way to be in the world, this second law of nature is about how to think about our choices, have real expectations and stay centered in life.
We all want to deal with the challenges of life in the best and most effective way possible. To deal with the dramas as they happen and stay open hearted and devoted to our family and work. We dont want problems, especially the same ones recurring over and over. Yet, for the most part they do. We can change our city, change our lover, change our job but nothing helps in the long term, until we change the way we think about things.
For me, it is like not being bitten by the same dog twice. If something happens that disturbs my heart or mind, I try to find the cause so that it wont be an issue if it happens again.
I went through a divorce that hurt. I healed my pain after 2 years but didnt want it all to happen again. Or, if it did happen again, I didnt want to nearly die like that first time again. So, I studied the science of letting go, of relationship and applied the laws of nature to the whole thing. After getting past blame and victim, which took another 2 years I found the answers and since then, I have had several important relationships break and Instead of becoming vitriolic, I have been able to stay loving all the way through those breakups. It still hurts, but I know how to deal with the hurt so much faster.
In knowing the difference between my constructed ego, conditioned responses and true nature, drama has become an opportunity to grow through my own blockages. Like one relationship where I invested over $150,000 in a business together and when we broke up she took my half of the business. I looked at it from a different viewpoint, not a victim (she took) instead of invested (helped her). This way, I didnt waste my whole energy fighting in court and got back to living with love. I stay friends with her even now. Really is shouldnt take more than an hour or so to deal with this stuff, instead of years of resentment.
Nature never grows in straight lines. Every day the weather is different. Trees grow fast one season and slow the next. It seems, if we observe that nature grows in cycles, and we see these cycles are between chaos and order, (same as challenge and support, growth and rejuvenation) that our lives too, have periods of calm and periods of turmoil. Some people think that turmoil is normal and productive, others think that calm is normal and productive. But neither is true.
There is a tension which is called life, that tension is an active tension, a joyful bright and affirmative tension. Below that tension, life becomes slothful and valueless, self depreciating. Above that tension life becomes stressful, hyperactive and rigid. Your body knows the difference. Jammed shoulders and stiff necks come from hyper tension obesity and pot belly come from sloth. Your body knows the ideal tension.
So it is not a matter of avoiding tension or challenge because this is just one side of natures coin. Nor is a matter of infatuation with sloth and peace. Maximum growth occurs between too much and too little tension and we, like nature will swing along this path, making adjustments as we go. Those infatuated with peace will get huge challenge. Those infatuated with challenge will get huge peace.
H came to me. He had a stroke some 12 months before and was undertaking remedial work to get functionality back into his body and mind. He wanted to heal at the cause, and we discussed the sudden rest that he had been given by nature. I was always healthy, happy, working on the business, keeping fit, doing yoga. I cant understand why me I asked how much of your life was devoted to just being. To just being you He replied we used to go on holidays and I would watch the TV every night with my wife I responded yes, that is not what I am talking about. I mean closing down, really concentrating on rest, allowing your whole being to be in the moment He replied I dont understand what you are talking about I said I know and welcome to a stroke
Imagine a magnificent ocean, a wide expanse of magnificent seascape with blue sky, vast expanses of tranquil and wonderful oceanic stillness. Beautiful isnt it. If you were watching TV, reading a magazine, meditating you might not notice it. That stillness is your true nature and you cant experience that by relaxing in front of TV. It requires a certain tension to find it. Now imagine you are in the scene, now you are on the water in a boat, now there is a different perspective, now it is not a scene but an experience of a scene, there is a sense of self consciousness. Now you will tell me how it feels to be in that scene. One is the spontaneous awareness of a scene, the other is a personal experience I .
This is the difference between who you are naturally and who you become with ego. The ego creates self consciousness, a sense of ME in everything. When we are in every scene, the dialogue is me, me ,me ,me, I, I, I, I , I the conversation is I feel this, I believe this, I want this, I like that, I am doing this and soon I will be doing that. It is my business, my house, my cat, my dog In this dialogue you and everything around you are merged, inseparable. You will even say my children
The benefit of this conversation is that you take everything personally so you are highly self conscious about what you do. The problem is that you expect this Me, or that I, to be fixed and rigid. You build your life around mine, My, our, me, I, us. That is akin to saying the boat in the ocean is fixed and the ocean is happening around it. Or, more poignantly, sitting on earth, which is spinning through space, and saying, ah look at all the stars in space spinning around my earth, me, my home
The ego thinks it is the center and that all else is floating past. It has opinions about everything and will give advice but rarely receive it unless it agrees with pre existing beliefs. So the ego becomes rigid, it becomes solid, or at least people hope that it is solid. Then, challenge happens and the only way to stay solid, is to accuse the ocean of making a mistake, or the stars for holding a full moon, or the past life for bringing bad karma. All blame so that the ego, which is really nothing but a collection of erroneous beliefs, can stay rigid and fixed.
This is like a tree in the forest refusing to bend when the wind blows, because that wind should never be blowing here in the first place
Ys origins are European. Her heritage is Catholic and her mother died recently. Her mother was 90 years old and had cancer. The mother died overnight with very little discomfort. Y went into drama and grief, she held that grief for months and months. When she finally came to me for a consult I asked why. Her answer was because this is normal for our culture I asked her what she wanted from me and her response was I want to forget my mother because it is time to get over this grief I said That is not how you get over grief, grief isnt necessary in the first place Her response was it is in my family I offered my condolences and told her I couldnt help.
When the way things are becomes fixed, we have no way to change the consequence. When the ego becomes so fixed, it is like calcification in the muscles of our body, no blood can travel there, so no healing can take place. Similarly, when the ego becomes rigid, no love, no consciousness can travel there, only rigid thoughts can enter. So, whether that lady Y, sat on the couch, watched TV, or did yoga meditation for the next 10 years, the ego was fixed, her beliefs unquestionable, nothing could penetrate her ego. Only her own death could make that shift.
We want something solid to base our life upon, but we have forgotten who we really are so we have started basing our life on that sense of I, or Me, or we. We have begun to believe that the intangible, flexible, ever changing, ever growing, adaptive ego, is fixed and so all the worlds problems become the conquest between egos. Your thoughts, which you think are right and my thoughts which you think are wrong and your right to act to change or exclude me.
Instead of this ego based thinking you can wake every day, ignorant. Yes, that is what I said, ignorant. You can wake every day as if you know nothing about anyone. You can enter the world open minded, open hearted, treating every challenge as an opportunity to expand your ignorance, and therefore become wiser, rather than righter. This chapter lists those opportunities and helps you grow, evolve and mature through them, rather than fix and avoid.
F, came to me for a consultation. He was a corporate tycoon and had a net worth of over a billion dollars. He was in his 50s and his partner was in her 20s. He was an athletic, clever and ethical businessman, with what seemed to be a quite stable existence. But, he was addicted to alcohol. The first 2 consultations we had, he turned up drunk so I refused to work with him.
Finally we made an appointment at 7.ooam and managed to share the morning. I opened the meeting. so tell me where you are atF well I have this alcohol issue Me. no, no, I dont want to know the outcome of the situation, I only work on the cause, your ego is getting drunk, because it isnt getting what it wants, not youF well I dont feel very happyMe no, no, I dont want to know the outcome of the situation, I only work on the cause tell me about youF I am in love. And I have pulled back from my business in order to make this relationship work, but she is still not happyMe F, if you were a tree and one day you said to nature, I am going to stop being a tree, I am going to stop making oxygen, stop all this photosynthesis, I am not going to draw water up through my roots, bugger it, I am going to spend my time cuddling a rose bush. What do you think nature would sayF, I have no idea what you are talking aboutMe nature destroys anything that does not fulfill its purpose. So, if a rose bush stops making roses nature would take all the materials and reuse them, thats the great recycling system of nature.F, soMe what do you think the purpose of a billionaire, aged 55 is?F I have no ideaMe maybe its to use the knowledge and power of their 55 years to create a bigger vision of what they can do in their livesF but I am tiredMe no, you are boredF yes, ok, I dont want to do more property dealsMe so, with your knowledge and power, what vision could you have for your life so that instead of taking less responsibility for the world, you take moreF but I just want peace and quietMe nature wont let that happen, you can hide on an island somewhere, and tell everyone how happy you are, but youll need lots of dope, rum and anything else to numb your brainF you know, I started drinking when I got bored, I thought it was time to stop work, but I love working, I just dont need to do the old stuff as much, I could put time into helping people and building homes for people, and I could have a family of my own but I need to do this, its been my dream all my life, man I forgot
F cried right there in front of me, for 10 minutes he cried.
Me wake up each day and ask, how can I take more responsibility. When a person starts looking to retire from responsibility, they retire from growth and life. And nature destroys anything that isnt fulfilling its purpose. Purpose means growth. Chaos and order.
http://www.chriswalker.com.au Chris Walker is a world leading change agent, an environmentalist and author of more than 20 books. Born and bred in Australia, he consults to people and organisations throughout the world on improved relationships, health and lifestyle through the application of the Universal laws of Nature. The result he offers is that we stay balanced, share loving relationships, work with passion, enjoy success, and live our personal truth. To learn more about Chriss work and journeys to Nepal, visit http://www.chriswalker.com.au -- http://www.chriswalker.com.au
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