Starting to Be

Your personality owes his existence for a great deal to the fact that you are 'doing' all kinds of things, which he in return can use to 'think something of it'. When you find yourself having nothing to do for a while, your personality therefore always suggest some form of activity. Whát it is that you should do is not that important, although something 'nice' would be appreciated. As long as it leads to anything that he can use to create and maintain himself it is fine with him, and this may vary from reading, biking, phone calls, watching tv, sleeping, thinking, working in the garden, to going to an entertainment center or going shopping, just to name some examples. Your personality always needs something to focus his attention on. And preferably he will of course prevent that this situation can occur in the first place.

An alternative for these moments can be found in being fully present in this situation of non-activity, which your personality labeled as unwanted, and simply live through it for a while, in the mean time becoming aware of all the issues your personality now comes up with and what it is like when you do not immediately respond to them. Now how bad is this? To your personality, doing nothing almost equals stop living, and his reaction to this initially is likely to be quite strong. And seen from his perspective, there is a truth in this assumption, since you do not have anything to do for hím. Your personality will at first look at this period of inactivity as a kind of 'radio silence', where he simply waits until you allow him to join again. This part of the exercise has nothing to do with the experience of actual being, however, it is a natural initial response which is likely to occur during relaxation exercises and other forms of shifting the focus of your attention as well. Do make a serious attempt while practicing to go beyond this period of time in which your personality waits in silence, however, do not force it on yourself.

The essence of Being is about the mental state in which you find yourself, rather than in the absence or presence of outer activity. Being implies trusting the moment itself, that it is right the way it is - even if you cannot explain this to yourself ', but also the future which can be right for you without your personality giving you the idea that he shapes it or needing his consent on it. And trusting the past to be good the way it was without your personality judging it as such. Only through this attitude you can allow yourself to no longer have your personality act out its judgments and interpretations, because now it is already good without anything within you having been involved: this makes your personality judgments unnecessary and thus useless. 'Good' as used here does not mean that it meets certain standards or values you have adopted, it means that you accept that-what-is and because of that no longer have to choose for resistance or change (a reaction which is triggered almost automatically when you choose non-acceptance), and that you are now free to choose other sources of inspiration: your inner Self. Otherwise this would be considered a weird thought which would suggest that you were to act low profile and become a willingness toy for other people and circumstances.

A beginning of Being can be obtained by focusing your attention as much as possible on the present (following your breath usually is a fine tool to help you divert your attention away from the processes in your head to something else), and tell yourself that you want to accept that it NOW is good the way it is, and that you want to deal with the absence of control and its accompanying personality thoughts. And since your personality cannot offer you this, you now have automatically invited your inner Self into the process.

Your personality will want to be able to trust first and then let go, you will find that reality is, that you first let go and then gain trust: since only after you have let go, you can experience your inner Self, which is the only aspect that can give you real Trust, it does not come from your personality judging a new situation as pleasant or good.