A LOOK IN THE MIRROR
humility & honesty
For us, this journey is about connecting in the deepest and most direct way that you can with your authentic experience -- being honest with yourself and allowing the darkness to reveal you to you.
This tends to take an immense amount of humility to actually see yourself where you are at.
When you enter into the darkness, there's no real way to escape those structures of yourself that are in the background that you're unknowingly always trying to avoid. They're amplified when everything is removed.
All those different compulsions, obsessions, patterns, strategies and neurotic behaviors that are always a part of your psyche in the background are exposed. However, this self image doesn't match your projected self image. This creates an internal conflict and requires a kind of humility to look in the mirror and actually admit to what you're seeing -- the actuality of yourself.
The tendency is to manage your experience and go towards how you think you should be, how you want to be or how you present yourself to be. You're then being moved by an unseen resistance.
The invitation here is to ever so humbly, honestly and simply be with yourself as you actually are.
"WE AWAKEN THIS TENDERNESS FOR LIFE,
when we can no longer shield ourselves from
THE VULNERABILITY OF OUR CONDITION, FROM THE BASIC FRAGILITY OF EXISTENCE."
~ Pema Chödrön
I'm scared. I'm lonely. I don't like this. I don't want to be here. I want to go home.
There is a small part of everyone who, at times, feels these very simple child-like feelings in the dark.
The honesty component is about being able to admit these smaller parts of ourselves that are there in the field.
People tend to unconsciously deny and defend against their projected self image.
By pushing away and not acknowledging these smaller parts of ourselves, it creates so much tension and resistance in our system and most people don't even notice that they have hardened.
In having permission to feel and be honest with these parts of ourselves, we allow fear, sadness, and discomfort to be present. This sense of allowance naturally creates space and gives way to new depths in ourselves.
A DOORWAY
into the subtle
As we genuinely include all parts of ourselves and settle in our body, we begin to drop into a sense of receptivity and naturally attune to softer and quieter realities.
The darkness then invites us into a shift of belonging -- from belonging to the surface to belonging to the deep. A shift from the biggest and brightest to the softest and quietest.
As we begin to value this subtle world, it's nuances and delicacies begin to open in us. Although it may not produce any kind of significant event or peak experience, we uncover a totally new sense of calm, connection and wholeness.
From here, nothing needs to be done, changed, fixed, healed or transformed. It is not through our will or strength that we enter but simply through relaxing back into it.
Even with nothing special to show for ourselves, we rest in an entirely new and intimate world of meaning.
"IN THE BEGINNER'S MIND
there are many possibilities
IN THE EXPERT'S THERE ARE FEW."
~ Suzuki Roshi
When we enter into the darkness with a beginner's mind, we have a humility that allows us to quietly listen and gently feel our way through into something new.
Without this receptive quality, we tend to make a plan and move in predefined and conditioned ways. We then bring our preconceived notions of how should be and get fixed in trying to produce, perform and replicate our ideals.
When we're not stuck on achieving any specific outcome, result or goal, then our skills and strategies are useless and we can so very simply lay down our sword and shield and be with the truth that is right in front of us.
A REAL
possibility
What is it like to pause and explore why am I doing this? Is it because I am uncomfortable?
Look at the need for resolution - for an immediate solution. Look at how we say or do something to produce a change.
When we're moved in that way, we've lost something really pure - a real possibility for something unexpected to emerge in the space.
With patience, in the face of all this uncomfortableness, there the Unknown emerges.
take notice of the underlying sensations
THAT ACTUALLY INFORM YOU ABOUT HOW YOU FEEL"
~ Peter Levine
In the vast unknown of the darkness, we invite you to use your body as an anchor.
To settle into a simple and intimate relating with what you're feeling in their body.
To nurture and tend to your hearts.
To receive care.
To discover the depths, richness and subtleties in nothing special - in the utter simplicity of your being
"TO EXPERIENCE EMBODIED AWARENESS,
take notice of the underlying sensations
THAT ACTUALLY INFORM YOU ABOUT HOW YOU FEEL"
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope.
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love.
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith.
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought.
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing."
~ T.S. Elliot
" No pratices are even necessary
for this quest"
- Ramana Maharshi