Leave the Light On
If I were to take off my glasses, place them on the table and ask “what do you see", everyone would agree “I see a pair of glasses.” We have named objects in this world so that we can communicate with each other.
Now let’s say we are out to dinner with a group of friends. We are having a wonderful time, laughing and enjoying each other’s company. We are sitting outside and the weather is glorious. The waiter brings the food and apologizes that one of the orders is delayed and will be coming shortly. Everyone continues to be engaged in a light conversation, except for the person whose food didn’t arrive with the others.
Suddenly, there is no lightheartedness to be found in that friend, when just moments before she was lively and full of laughter. The other friends are still lighthearted. They don't see what that woman (now in pain) sees. What happened? Why don't they see what she sees?
What makes us like light switches that get flipped on and off so easily? Was there not an expectation in that moment, an expectation that her food would arrive with the others? Certainly, that is what every restaurant aims to do for they don’t want unhappy customers, but the question we should be asking is why should that event cause negativity?
Life comes to us in those moments to show us how there can be nothing but conflict and pain in living a light-switch type life. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be shown a movie of my life and all the moments that Terri “wigged out” because her expectations weren’t met. Ha!, and I thought “War and Peace” was a long movie…
The minute that friend realized that it was her food that was delayed, was the moment her mind stole the moment from her with a dialogue such as “Seriously? Oh my God, I’m never coming here again. That’s ridiculous.” That dialogue is what I have often referred to as “the past”.
That woman is the only person that can see that specific dialogue that is playing out in her mind in that unwanted moment. Her other friends have their own dialogue that is playing out in their minds, and none of us know what the mind in another is specifically saying to them because it is based in past identification.
In the illustration above, that (old) dialogue was identified with by a part of that woman that she had no awareness of, and due to the fact that any identification is negative in its nature, that woman became the instrument of negativity. It happens as quick as flipping off a light switch.
Why does that negativity then continue to be held onto instead of dropped in the moment we realize it’s there? How many of you have been captive of negativity for weeks or even months? The reason is that that negativity constantly replays itself in our minds over and over again. The world calls this dwelling on things. The truth is, it is the mind dwelling on itself using our attention, because we have to ask “would we replay painful images in our mind so that we could relive that pain?” No, we certainly would not.
We have to remember that if we aren’t present in those unwanted moments, the moment will be attended to with a lower set of eyes that can only see what IT wants and needs to see in order to remain itself – a conflicted self. It (the past) literally tells us what we are seeing, and that seeing is based on the content of itself.
If that is true (and it is), then we never truly see what happens in any given moment. We only see what we are being given to see by our own minds and what it is telling us we are seeing, which is always based from past experience.
If we want a different life, to bring something new into this world, we have to learn to leave the light on. What I mean by that is in those what we call unwanted moments, we have to remember that Life is not taking something from us or trying to harm us, no matter what the voices of the past are telling us in those moments. We have to see those voices for what they are, just a mechanical process that hijacks our attention in the moment because we weren’t aware of any other possibility.
Life is trying to show us in every moment that the only way to truly live is to be in the flow of Life and what IT wants. Not an easy thing by any means, but it’s the only thing that heals. Life is a correcting force. Let it do the correcting.
Exercise for the Week: See if you can catch the part of you that wants you to wallow in negativity. As well, if you notice your child doing the same, share this information with them as clearly as you are able to. Turn the light on and remember that your true wish is to want what life wants.
Image Courtesy of: https://pixabay.com/photos/person-human-child-girl-blond-1132308/