Maybe it's common, but I know when I didn't like something or felt uncomfortable about something, the other needed to be bad.
I had a hard time with the idea that something might just not be a good fit for me. You had to vilify the "other" - person, way of life, job, etc. - to feel safe with yourself. It's so nice to feel that slipping away. It feels healthy and expansive to just enjoy people for who they are and where they are.
This feels to be coming largely from an acceptance of myself where I am. I don't have any programs like I used to when I get together with people. I am happy to just be with people as they are and not feel needy or stressed while we're hanging out or after. I can enjoy the time together and that's about it.
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In a conversation with a friend the other day: I don't like people branding themselves as it psychically sets them up as an expert, an expert on what and why. With how tech works now, anyone can be an expert and then you have to immediately measure up to that. The idea of community with experts doesn't exist. Everyone is immediately subject to the expert and no one has value that can be that great. Most likely the expert also doesn't communicate that they need a community. They just need a following.
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I keep learning about being present and being grateful. I went on a hike w/ Mom today. I had a topic I wanted to bring up that has to do with her future living arrangements. The old me would have tried to get it done quickly as soon as we started hiking, almost frustrated we even had to discuss it. Today, I just wanted to try and enjoy the hike and my Mom. I waited to see when it might come up naturally and not let it upset her. I'm glad that's how it unfolded. I like the less driven, more present me, possibly my True Self showing up.
I talked back and forth with someone working in this area as well, and she struggles with the phrase or concept of just "letting it go." She's right. It's easy to flick that out there to yourself or someone else really casually, but it can be super hard to execute, like you never cared to begin with, or super hard to grasp. So it's not easy.
This has been a challenging week for me on a few days, but I keep just trying to let it go and be thankful. I'm surprised at how I've magnified Jay's faults at work to where I've been blind to what's been good. I think some of the issues we've had have really caused this to drag on for years as well and we've had times where I didn't think we'd make it. I think there are hard talks so to speak, where it's a reckoning of something serious that needs a big discussion around it. We've had those. The problem for me, I had overemphasized all Jay had done that wasn't right to me (and I was sometimes right) that when we needed to really talk about something serious, I'd sort of worn out my welcome.
I'm surprised at the steady state of negativity I live in as I shift to more one of being in the present and being grateful or at the very least, observant of the beauty around me. I was driving home from Mom's and briefly, the old tape started playing: I can't believe they live this far out in the woods, Mom should be doing something about her money, etc. I just stopped myself and almost laughed. This is insane. I'm driving through a forest. I just had a good hike w/ my Mom. My mind though wants to find something negative, my ego. Instead, I just started looking and observing and naming all that was beautiful all the way home and wow, it was just so different. It's becoming easier to accept what's happening with my Mom and just let it all be what it is.
Be responsible, be present, but have a different attitude and approach.
I also felt bad I haven't seen the good that's been happening here. Time with the grandson that lives here. Being incredibly close to nature. Peace and quiet. I felt convicted. I realized how selfish I've been. Enough of all of this.
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"It seems to me that contemplation makes it almost inevitable that your politics is going to change, the way you spend your time is going to be called into question, and any smug or inferior social and economic perspective will be slowly taken away from you. When anyone meditates consistently, the things that we think of as our necessary ego boundaries—giving us a sense of our independence, autonomy, and private self-importance—fall away, little by little, as unnecessary and even unhelpful. This imperial 'I,' the self that most people think of as the only self, is not substantial or lasting at all. It is largely a creation of our own minds. Through contemplation, protecting this relative identity, this persona, eventually becomes of less and less concern. 'Why would I bother with that?' the True Self asks.
If your prayer goes deep, invading your unconscious, your whole view of the world will change from fear to connection, because you don’t live inside your fragile and encapsulated self anymore. In meditation, you are moving from ego consciousness to soul awareness, from being driven to being drawn. Of course, you can only do this if Someone Else is holding onto you in the gradual dying of the False Self, taking away your fear, doing the knowing, satisfying your desire for a Great Lover. If you can allow that Someone Else to have their way with you in contemplation, you will go back to your life of action with new vitality, but it will now be smooth, a much more natural Flow. It will be “no longer you” who acts or contemplates, but the Life of One who lives in you (see Galatians 2:20), now acting for you (Father) and with you (Holy Spirit) and as you (Christ)!" - Richard Rohr