Common Irritations You Can Use for Your Liberation
There are innumerable variations of the things that hook us. Some are indirect attacks and others are direct attacks on our shining self-image. Below are some common hooks that lead you to get stuck staring at the image in the pool. To be free, we must give up the need to impress others with a shining self-image.
• Someone says or does something that you disagree with and
think is wrong hooking your need to be right.
• Someone makes a mistake hooking your need to correct
others and impress them with how much you know.
• Someone says or does something you think is stupid or wrong hooking your need to criticize others.
• Someone is late hooking your tendency to get impatient.
• People are talking in a group hooking your need to brag.
• Feeling unimportant, a nobody, starts hooking a desire to be
famous as if having your name known makes you important.
• Feeling poor and not feeling respected by others hooking
a desire to be wealthy so that you will be respected.
• Your loved one is not behaving as you think he or she should
hooking a need to control them so they’ll do it your way.
• Your loved one is talking to an attractive person hooking
feelings of jealousy, anger, insecurity, and possessiveness.
• Being criticized hooking an urge toward fight-or-flight.
• Being outdone by someone else hooking an urge to compete.
• Being laughed at or made fun of when you do something
hooking a desire for revenge.
• Being rejected for a job or date hooking a self-critical urge.
• Being told directly or indirectly you are wrong hooking an
urge to yell and tell the person off!
How can we use these common irritations—hooks—to achieve our liberation? The clue is in the word question; it has the word quest in it. When we question, we initiate the inner quest for our freedom. If we don’t question, we live like a fish at the mercy of all those fishermen. We stop getting hooked when we stop taking the bait, and start seeing the hooks hidden in the flashy lures of life.
Try questioning your automatic reactions with acceptance, compassion, and empathy. At the same time, you must be sure to refrain from any outer actions. You are engaging in an inner quest to find your freedom and not an outer quest for approval. Below are some common hooks that we get free of by questioning them.
• Someone is wrong. Do I really need to point this out? Or am
I trying to impress others? Do I really need to impress them?
• Someone is making us wait. Do I really need to say anything?
• Someone mispronounces a word. Do I really need to correct
him? Is it really necessary? Or am I just showing off?
• You feel inferior since you can’t afford expensive things that
others can: car, clothes, and so on. You think, “If I had moremoney then people would respect me!” Would they respect me or the money? Wouldn’t I do better to confront the issue of how I deserve to be treated with respect just because of who I am as a person and not because of what I have?
There is a difference in having wealth and fame without being attached or hooked by them. The difference is in being able to remain loving and spiritual while having fame and wealth. It is realizing they do not grant happiness and peace. Surely, it is easier to be spiritual in a sanctuary far from the narcissistic temptations that confront us daily. Of course, we must beware of spiritual narcissism. Imagine two people sipping green tea and discussing spirituality. Both are smiling and smugly thinking, “I’m more spiritually advanced than you! I’m at a higher level!”
• Today, practice unhooking yourself by engaging in the inner quest with a question when youfeel hooked.
Friday, October 29, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
Dying as Narcissus & Finding Freedom
The spiritual traditions suggest that we need to rid ourselves of our ego-based motivations or, as I prefer to call them, the narcissistic demands of our idealized self-image. The goal is to die as Narcissus and be reborn as a person living from the empty, non-grasping heart. We can then love freely without sticky fingers.
Unlike these traditions, I believe we can harness our narcissistic motivation. In short term psychotherapy, we call this paradoxical intervention or prescribing the symptom. Rather than trying to counter hate, we harness its energy and shift it back to love. We use the acronym face. We need to feel instead of repressing and denying our negative emotions and the underlying issues associated with them. And we do this with acceptance, compassion, and empathy for these emotions and issues. As we empathize with our lower nature, the reptile and the hurt child in us, we transform ourselves and realize our higher loving nature.
Pema Chödrön presents a formula for freedom that she calls “the four R’s”: recognize, refrain, relax, and resolve. First, we need to recognize that we are feeling hooked. I would say, we must first notice that we feel irritated and stressed. Next, we must refrain from acting on the impulse, the urge. She uses the analogy of scratching. We must “refrain from scratching.”
Then we relax and face the urge. She calls this step “relaxing into the underlying urge to scratch.” To me, it’s important that we breathe deeply so that we can relax and feel with acceptance, compassion, and empathy what the urge is telling us.
We give the urge space. If we can relax and feel the urge as it is without trying to change it, fight it or flee from it, then we can redeem the reptile in us. By refraining from fight-or-flight and relaxing, we have a chance to gain freedom and insight.
By relaxing and feeling our irritation, we encourage the underlying issue to emerge so that we can heal it. Finally, we then resolve to keep interrupting “our habitual patterns.” These patterns interfere with our freedom, peace, and happiness. On the one hand, they are ways that we seek to maintain an idealized image and gain love and approval. On the other hand, the patterns are developed in childhood to avoid our parents’ anger, disapproval, rejection and abandonment. The early origin of our patterns makes them difficult but not impossible to eliminate and replace.
• Today, experiment with the four Rs: 1.) recognize you are stressed in an interaction with another at home or work; 2.) refrain from your habitual reactions (raising your voice in argument, defending your actions, verbally attacking the other's point of view, etc.); 3. ) relax your body and mind with a few slow, deep breaths (from this relaxed you can choose what you will say or do rather than react blindly to the other's comments; 4.) resolve to keep breaking your patterns so that you can achieve inner freedom and relief from stress.
Unlike these traditions, I believe we can harness our narcissistic motivation. In short term psychotherapy, we call this paradoxical intervention or prescribing the symptom. Rather than trying to counter hate, we harness its energy and shift it back to love. We use the acronym face. We need to feel instead of repressing and denying our negative emotions and the underlying issues associated with them. And we do this with acceptance, compassion, and empathy for these emotions and issues. As we empathize with our lower nature, the reptile and the hurt child in us, we transform ourselves and realize our higher loving nature.
Pema Chödrön presents a formula for freedom that she calls “the four R’s”: recognize, refrain, relax, and resolve. First, we need to recognize that we are feeling hooked. I would say, we must first notice that we feel irritated and stressed. Next, we must refrain from acting on the impulse, the urge. She uses the analogy of scratching. We must “refrain from scratching.”
Then we relax and face the urge. She calls this step “relaxing into the underlying urge to scratch.” To me, it’s important that we breathe deeply so that we can relax and feel with acceptance, compassion, and empathy what the urge is telling us.
We give the urge space. If we can relax and feel the urge as it is without trying to change it, fight it or flee from it, then we can redeem the reptile in us. By refraining from fight-or-flight and relaxing, we have a chance to gain freedom and insight.
By relaxing and feeling our irritation, we encourage the underlying issue to emerge so that we can heal it. Finally, we then resolve to keep interrupting “our habitual patterns.” These patterns interfere with our freedom, peace, and happiness. On the one hand, they are ways that we seek to maintain an idealized image and gain love and approval. On the other hand, the patterns are developed in childhood to avoid our parents’ anger, disapproval, rejection and abandonment. The early origin of our patterns makes them difficult but not impossible to eliminate and replace.
• Today, experiment with the four Rs: 1.) recognize you are stressed in an interaction with another at home or work; 2.) refrain from your habitual reactions (raising your voice in argument, defending your actions, verbally attacking the other's point of view, etc.); 3. ) relax your body and mind with a few slow, deep breaths (from this relaxed you can choose what you will say or do rather than react blindly to the other's comments; 4.) resolve to keep breaking your patterns so that you can achieve inner freedom and relief from stress.
Friday, October 15, 2010
When Devils Are Angels
So the way he [Meister Eckhart] sees it, if you're frightened of dying and you’re holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace then the devils are really angels freeing you from the earth.
It’s . . . how you look at it.
—Louis (from Jacob’s Ladder)
How can we find freedom, peace, and happiness when stress irritates and bedevils us? We can see ourselves as ascending the ladder of love leading to freedom, peace, and happiness only to keep getting hung up in our ascent. When stress strikes us in daily life, we get irritated. In our irritation, it is as if the Narcissus in us feels attacked. We suddenly fixate our focus on preserving our idealized self-image. The paradox is that we must let go of our image by diving down into the depths of our heart so that we can resume our ascent to love.
We find our liberation in our heart as we lovingly accept the irritating flaws in ourselves and others with compassion and empathy. Irritation can then lead us to liberation.
Buddhists use the term attachment to convey how we get hung up. In the March, 2003 edition of Shambhala Sun magazine, I found an article that clarifies the concept of attachment. The article was by Pema Chödrön and was entitled: How We Get Hooked and How We Get Unhooked. The article introduced the Tibetan word shenpa which is usually translated as attachment but is better described as “hooked.” Feeling hooked is experienced as a “sticky feeling.” You could say, getting unhooked involves detaching from the outer world and attaching to the empty non-grasping Holy Grail of our heart that we become free.
• Today, notice when something someone says or does hooks you and you become angry, hurt, sad, or depressed. Take a deep breath and just consider how feeling hooked is an opportunity to use irritations for our liberation. We'll go into this in upcoming posts.
It’s . . . how you look at it.
—Louis (from Jacob’s Ladder)
How can we find freedom, peace, and happiness when stress irritates and bedevils us? We can see ourselves as ascending the ladder of love leading to freedom, peace, and happiness only to keep getting hung up in our ascent. When stress strikes us in daily life, we get irritated. In our irritation, it is as if the Narcissus in us feels attacked. We suddenly fixate our focus on preserving our idealized self-image. The paradox is that we must let go of our image by diving down into the depths of our heart so that we can resume our ascent to love.
We find our liberation in our heart as we lovingly accept the irritating flaws in ourselves and others with compassion and empathy. Irritation can then lead us to liberation.
Buddhists use the term attachment to convey how we get hung up. In the March, 2003 edition of Shambhala Sun magazine, I found an article that clarifies the concept of attachment. The article was by Pema Chödrön and was entitled: How We Get Hooked and How We Get Unhooked. The article introduced the Tibetan word shenpa which is usually translated as attachment but is better described as “hooked.” Feeling hooked is experienced as a “sticky feeling.” You could say, getting unhooked involves detaching from the outer world and attaching to the empty non-grasping Holy Grail of our heart that we become free.
• Today, notice when something someone says or does hooks you and you become angry, hurt, sad, or depressed. Take a deep breath and just consider how feeling hooked is an opportunity to use irritations for our liberation. We'll go into this in upcoming posts.
Friday, October 8, 2010
Creator Consciousness & The Alphabet Universe
Ben then told me, “The Kabbalah uses the 72 names of God. These names are really attributes of God we want to connect with in our life. They are sequences of three Hebrew letters. These sequences are found encoded in the Bible in the book of Exodus chapter 14 verses 19, 20, 21.” He stopped for a moment to take a drink of water out of baked-clay cup. It looked like a clay version of the Holy Grail. He offered me a sip. I took one. I felt as if I was taking communion, even though communion was Christian and not part of Ben’s tradition.
Picking up where he left off, he said, “These verses tell the story of Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt and saving them by parting the Red Sea. I will show you a chart of all the names. By simply scanning the letters without even being able to read them, you will be seeding creation consciousness within your soul. You will be activating these dormant qualities of the Creator in whose image you are made. This is something to do daily.”
At that point, Ben reached into a large wooden chest and pulled out a sheet of parchment with sequences of three Hebrew letters.
Ben then said, “We live in an alphabetic universe. The twenty-two Hebrew letters are energy forces with distinct vibrational frequencies that are the building blocks of our material universe. Letters form words.
“Words form sentences. Sentences form paragraphs and so forth. Likewise all matter making up our universe is composed of molecules and atoms as well as electrically-charged subatomic particles such as protons, electrons, and neutrons.”
I was captivated by his comments. “Rabbi Ben, recently, I have been haunted by the practical everyday implications of the words from the Gospel of Saint John: ‘In the beginning was the Word’ followed by ‘And the Word became flesh,’ thirteen verses later. Rabbi Ben, what you say ties in with this. In the beginning of anything we do are the words we think and then these words become fleshed out in action within the material world.”
Ben listened intently. I then said, “At the beginning of any project we state what we will do and then we translate our words into action.”
“Yes. Precisely!” he affirmed my extension of the biblical reference beyond its religious meaning.
Then he said, “But even more than this, the Creator, blessed be He, created the universe this way. Therefore, it can be said that we are behaving in the image of the Creator when we apply this principle of how our words become flesh.”
Ben and the cave began to fade. Our meeting was over. Sometimes there was a sense of transitioning back to sleep. At other times I wouldn’t remember our meeting ending; I would just wake up the next morning feeling refreshed and inspired.
Following tonight’s meeting, I fell fast asleep only to be awakened by a flash of lightning followed by a crack of thunder. It was as if someone flipped on the light in my room and crashed together cymbals over my head.
The flash of lightning paralleled the flash of insights that lingered in my mind from my first meeting with Ben just a few hours earlier. I lay there contemplating Ben’s teachings. Eventually, as the thunder and lightning subsided, I fell back to sleep.
• Today, think of yourself as a creator made in the image of the Creator and not a reactor. Remember that in the beginning is your word and your word in the form of words and images or pictures become the flesh of your life. Set your intention to focus on desired outcomes and not on feared outcomes. Focus on what you would love to have happen and notice how smoothly your day goes.
Picking up where he left off, he said, “These verses tell the story of Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt and saving them by parting the Red Sea. I will show you a chart of all the names. By simply scanning the letters without even being able to read them, you will be seeding creation consciousness within your soul. You will be activating these dormant qualities of the Creator in whose image you are made. This is something to do daily.”
At that point, Ben reached into a large wooden chest and pulled out a sheet of parchment with sequences of three Hebrew letters.
Ben then said, “We live in an alphabetic universe. The twenty-two Hebrew letters are energy forces with distinct vibrational frequencies that are the building blocks of our material universe. Letters form words.
“Words form sentences. Sentences form paragraphs and so forth. Likewise all matter making up our universe is composed of molecules and atoms as well as electrically-charged subatomic particles such as protons, electrons, and neutrons.”
I was captivated by his comments. “Rabbi Ben, recently, I have been haunted by the practical everyday implications of the words from the Gospel of Saint John: ‘In the beginning was the Word’ followed by ‘And the Word became flesh,’ thirteen verses later. Rabbi Ben, what you say ties in with this. In the beginning of anything we do are the words we think and then these words become fleshed out in action within the material world.”
Ben listened intently. I then said, “At the beginning of any project we state what we will do and then we translate our words into action.”
“Yes. Precisely!” he affirmed my extension of the biblical reference beyond its religious meaning.
Then he said, “But even more than this, the Creator, blessed be He, created the universe this way. Therefore, it can be said that we are behaving in the image of the Creator when we apply this principle of how our words become flesh.”
Ben and the cave began to fade. Our meeting was over. Sometimes there was a sense of transitioning back to sleep. At other times I wouldn’t remember our meeting ending; I would just wake up the next morning feeling refreshed and inspired.
Following tonight’s meeting, I fell fast asleep only to be awakened by a flash of lightning followed by a crack of thunder. It was as if someone flipped on the light in my room and crashed together cymbals over my head.
The flash of lightning paralleled the flash of insights that lingered in my mind from my first meeting with Ben just a few hours earlier. I lay there contemplating Ben’s teachings. Eventually, as the thunder and lightning subsided, I fell back to sleep.
• Today, think of yourself as a creator made in the image of the Creator and not a reactor. Remember that in the beginning is your word and your word in the form of words and images or pictures become the flesh of your life. Set your intention to focus on desired outcomes and not on feared outcomes. Focus on what you would love to have happen and notice how smoothly your day goes.
Friday, October 1, 2010
Yur Thoughts Mark Your Soul Rabbi Ben cont'd.
Ben first talked about the Mussar. “The goal of the spiritual practice of the Mussar is to live an ethical life. This involves more than actions in the outer world. It includes our thoughts and our speech. Not only is it what we say to others, it’s also what we silently say to ourselves.”
“So it involves our inner life as well,” I said. “Reminds me of the training I received at the Institute of Living. As a psychiatric hospital, it was considered one of the last bastions of long-term in-depth psychotherapy. In my training there, I learned that to do analysis or therapy, we need to monitor our own thoughts, fantasies, and feelings as they arise in reaction to what the patient says and does in the session.”
“Yes, your analytic discipline is similar to the Mussar and to the Kabbalah,” he said. “The difference is that the purpose of spiritual discipline is to develop the soul by connecting with the Light of the Creator.”
Ben paused and then said, “What I am about to say is very important so listen very carefully. What we say or do leaves its mark on our soul. That includes what we say silently about others as well as what we say out loud to others. And it also includes what we say and do to ourselves. Self-condemning or self-indulging words and actions affect our very soul as well.”
“So you might say,” I began slowly, carefully choosing my words, “our soul is like a garden where we plant soul seeds.”
“That’s good,” he said. “Please go on.”
“So when we think, speak, and act in ethical, that is, in loving and kind ways then beautiful flowers bloom. And when we act harmfully and unethically in harsh, unkind ways, we allow the garden of our soul to become overgrown with weeds. The weeds choke off the flowers.” I surprised myself with the idea of seeing the soul as a garden.
“Excellent,” Ben said. “Where did you come up with that?”
“It just came to me as you spoke about the Kabbalah,” I said. “Now thinking out loud, I suppose it springs from my experience in working with people in therapy.”
“How so?” he asked.
“Often at the beginning of my work with a patient, the state of a patient’s soul is depicted in dream images. I can recall patients who presented dreams of a vacant lot overgrown with weeds situated in a rundown area of a city. I also remember dreams set in a barren wasteland with no growth. No vegetation. Nothing.”
“Interesting,” he said. “Please continue.”
“In some cases, by the time therapy was completed, I can remember the dream images of lush gardens, green forests or vast fields of colorful wild flowers. I suppose you could say the soul of the patients with these dream images had grown, couldn’t you?”
“Absolutely,” Ben affirmed. “Everything we say and do affects our very soul. The Mussar and Kabbalah tell us that scratches or marks are made on the soul by what we say and do.”
Ben then spelled out the practices a little more specifically. “First, you are to learn to become more aware of what you are thinking, feeling, saying and doing. The Mussar recommends that you list the soul-traits you want to work on developing. They suggest such soul-traits as: honest speech, humility, trust in God, compassion, loving-kindness, dignity, courage, surrender of the ego, fear (or in today’s language, awe) of God, moderation, concentration, passion or zeal, and equanimity. He conveyed this information with a grave solemnity in his voice: this was a very serious practice.
Ben continued: “You do this by keeping a journal of your inner and outer life each day. At the end of the day, you review how you did in living up to the soul-traits you are working on.”
• Today, every so often, monitor your motivation. Check in to see where you are coming from when you say something. Ask yourself, "o I really need to say that? Does it really add anything to the conversation? Am I trying to impress? Am I putting down someone to elevate myself? Remember, the words of the Indian saint, Swami Rama, "Only one who remains unaffected by honor or insult, can keep the divine flame alive."
“So it involves our inner life as well,” I said. “Reminds me of the training I received at the Institute of Living. As a psychiatric hospital, it was considered one of the last bastions of long-term in-depth psychotherapy. In my training there, I learned that to do analysis or therapy, we need to monitor our own thoughts, fantasies, and feelings as they arise in reaction to what the patient says and does in the session.”
“Yes, your analytic discipline is similar to the Mussar and to the Kabbalah,” he said. “The difference is that the purpose of spiritual discipline is to develop the soul by connecting with the Light of the Creator.”
Ben paused and then said, “What I am about to say is very important so listen very carefully. What we say or do leaves its mark on our soul. That includes what we say silently about others as well as what we say out loud to others. And it also includes what we say and do to ourselves. Self-condemning or self-indulging words and actions affect our very soul as well.”
“So you might say,” I began slowly, carefully choosing my words, “our soul is like a garden where we plant soul seeds.”
“That’s good,” he said. “Please go on.”
“So when we think, speak, and act in ethical, that is, in loving and kind ways then beautiful flowers bloom. And when we act harmfully and unethically in harsh, unkind ways, we allow the garden of our soul to become overgrown with weeds. The weeds choke off the flowers.” I surprised myself with the idea of seeing the soul as a garden.
“Excellent,” Ben said. “Where did you come up with that?”
“It just came to me as you spoke about the Kabbalah,” I said. “Now thinking out loud, I suppose it springs from my experience in working with people in therapy.”
“How so?” he asked.
“Often at the beginning of my work with a patient, the state of a patient’s soul is depicted in dream images. I can recall patients who presented dreams of a vacant lot overgrown with weeds situated in a rundown area of a city. I also remember dreams set in a barren wasteland with no growth. No vegetation. Nothing.”
“Interesting,” he said. “Please continue.”
“In some cases, by the time therapy was completed, I can remember the dream images of lush gardens, green forests or vast fields of colorful wild flowers. I suppose you could say the soul of the patients with these dream images had grown, couldn’t you?”
“Absolutely,” Ben affirmed. “Everything we say and do affects our very soul. The Mussar and Kabbalah tell us that scratches or marks are made on the soul by what we say and do.”
Ben then spelled out the practices a little more specifically. “First, you are to learn to become more aware of what you are thinking, feeling, saying and doing. The Mussar recommends that you list the soul-traits you want to work on developing. They suggest such soul-traits as: honest speech, humility, trust in God, compassion, loving-kindness, dignity, courage, surrender of the ego, fear (or in today’s language, awe) of God, moderation, concentration, passion or zeal, and equanimity. He conveyed this information with a grave solemnity in his voice: this was a very serious practice.
Ben continued: “You do this by keeping a journal of your inner and outer life each day. At the end of the day, you review how you did in living up to the soul-traits you are working on.”
• Today, every so often, monitor your motivation. Check in to see where you are coming from when you say something. Ask yourself, "o I really need to say that? Does it really add anything to the conversation? Am I trying to impress? Am I putting down someone to elevate myself? Remember, the words of the Indian saint, Swami Rama, "Only one who remains unaffected by honor or insult, can keep the divine flame alive."
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