Life is a never-ending journey. We all go through and experience the full range of human experience: joy and pain, laughter and tears, victory and defeat, expansion and contraction, highs and lows, gain and loss, strength and weakness, health and illness, ease and disease, freedom and bondage, ecstasy and heartbreak... and all the grey areas in between.
This is the nature of this dual universe. This is the natural way of life. All that arises must dissolve. All that comes together comes apart. All forms and phenomena are impermanent. No-thing lasts forever. All things are in constant change and constant flux. This is the indisputable truth of reality - this is the true nature of reality. Forever swinging from one pole to the other and back again... yin, then yang, then yin, then yang. On and on and on.
In our lives, we experience first hand that when we try to grasp at this eternal flux - to change this flux, to control this flux, to capture and hold and freeze this flux, to rewind this flux, to fastforward this flux - and we inevitably learn that this control is only an illusion. A futile delusion. Ultimately, there is no controlling and containing and grasping this eternally changing interconnected flow and play of opposites that is reality. Things come, and things change, and things go - and this is the way things are. If we resist this, and refuse to come to terms with this - we will suffer. We will forever be trying to grasp the river in the palm of our hands, and always flailing in our frustration and futility. If we accept this truth - if we accept the true nature and way of reality - then we can let go of our desire to control, our need/desire to predict, our desire to go back to the past, our desire to change what is... we can truly, deeply, deeply let go... and finally end the war within. Finally be completely at peace with what is - ALL that is.
Let me use concrete examples. Let me use my life, my experience, my story.
I am at an interesting place in my life. In many ways, I feel better than ever before. I am living on my own, I've met some really cool people, I am going to school on my path to being a teacher of spiritual transformation and healer, I have so many people to love and be loved by, I have passions and creative impulses and the means and motivation to use that creativity and share it... I have so much to be grateful for and in many ways I am at a further evolutionary point along my journey than ever before. I have so many awesome dreams and visions that I am working on creating and looking forward to manifesting and experiencing in my future. My future is bright and the present isn't too bad either, if just a little overcast some days.
However, there are certain aspects that I wish I could change about my current situation. In many ways, as a natural result of the eternal law of cause and effect (karma), I feel that I am not living in the way that would bring about OPTIMUM health and happiness and vitality. I have not been sleeping properly for many months now, and I have been dealing with a chronic form of sleep deprivation. I am literally functioning at sub-optimal capacity brain-wise for months now. I don't concentrate properly, my energy throughout the day are much lower than they used to be when I was younger and more active. I am not as sharp and energetic and quick/witty as I used to be. I have a different sense of self. Socially, I am not as extroverted and fearless and energetic as I used to be. I feel like I used to reach out more, and make others laugh more. I engaged others more. I am more inward-going and to myself now.
My digestion and eating have suffered the past few months as well. I feel under-nourished a lot of the time, sometimes I try to eat breakfast and things I used to eat easily, like cold cereal, and nowdays even though I am hungry I can hardly finish a third of the bowl. I can feel myself losing muscle mass and my physical body is getting less comfortable the more muscle I lose. Between the overall lack of sleep and lack of eating over the past few months, my vitality feels at an all-time low... or at least the lowest it has felt in a long time. As a result of low vitality, I am not as productive, not as social, I don't feel as confident about myself, and I don't live to the loudest and brightest degree that I know I could be living.
Now, let me go back to the start of this journal and the main topic of this little monologue. Duality, the eternal flux of opposites, the impermanent nature of the universe, grasping, judging, suffering, and letting go.
This too shall pass.
That is the truth - the eternal, undeniable truth about ALL apparent phenomena in the universe. All that "arises" in the universe is but a temporary reconfiguration of the eternal energy, the ONE unified field that is the all. All things come together and are "born/arise/manifest".... they sustain for a certain amount of time... what we call "life" or "existence... being....". and then they "die/dissolve/come apart/unmanifest"... back into "nonbeing" or "nonexistence". This is the law... thus, simply... ALL that is born, must die, eventually. Whether that is people, situations, events.... EVERYTHING is impermanent, everything is transitory, no-thing lasts forever.
This too shall pass.
This simple phrase, and the truth it conveys, could apply to so much of my personal situation these past few months. New relationships, potential relationships, broken relationships, evolving relationships, change of job/work life, moving out living on my own. The transitory nature of life and reality has been on full display - when I look at it I truly realize this.
In regards to my current situation... this Truth is a comfort to my spirit and a foundation of strength. Seeing things with this perspective of truth taps in to the deep well of wisdom within me, and looking back throughout my life, I can see the eternal flux... and I can have faith... more than faith... KNOWING that my future will change again for the "better" and these things will turn around. In regards to my health and vitality... I have seen it decline in many ways from the time I was a teenager and especially from the time I was a very active, athletic and bright, bubbly, energetic child. I am now, at 23 years old, about to be 24, aware of how different I feel physically and energetically than how I felt at 16, 14, and even 10 years old. Right now, on a relative level, on the level of the physical body and it's energetic functions, I do not feel optimally well right now.
THIS, TOO , shall pass. It is very important that I do not judge myself negatively for this phase of my life, not beat myself up about falling short of somehow idealized view of human "perfection", and not see the situation through an impartial and distorted lens, failing to see all of the wonderful growth and expansion that has been/is taking place within me spiritually as well, at the same time as this little "contraction" in my denser, physical body and thinking mind.
These cycles of part of life. Some times in our life we experience radiant health, blossoming vitality, physical beauty, sharp mental clarity, abundance of energy, and so on. Other times in our life we feel weak, we feel tired, we feel exhausted, our minds are foggy, we are low on energy, we are slightly anxious or depressed or stressed, we don't look our best, or feel our best. Where as the shining sun of radiant health is "yang", the cool dark night of un-ease is "yin".
The great thing about life is... the scales WILL tip back in the opposite direction eventually. Especially when will, intention, and effort is applied in that direction. That is exactly what is happening. I can already see the many goods that is coming out of this somewhat rough period for me. I am experiencing first hand the "un-wellness" that I eventually want to help coach people out of. I am experiencing the raw caterpillar state before transformation and renewal and grant me an experience of life as a butterfly that I can hardly imagine now. This time is giving me the motivation to honestly and squarely look at all my habits - how I choose to spend my time , what I choose to spend my days doing - and resolve to make changes where needed so as I can live a more productive, healthy, balanced, aligned and fulfilling life.
Now, this is where the main topic of "not grasping" the past and "coming to peace with the natural flux of life as it is" comes in. I COULD, if I choose to, judge myself negatively for these changes that have happened in my self and my personality over the past months or so. I could choose to view all these changes negatively, not see any positives to the changes, and just get down on myself, idealizing my past and wishing that I could get back to how I was then, while hating and loathing how I am now. That approach, however, is NOT healthy. And yes, I have been there. Done that. I know. I have had to expand my perception on the entire situation, however, to enlighten myself and free myself from the burdens of guilt, shame, self-doubt, and isolation that such a negative self-perception brings. I had to widen my lenses and see the bigger picture.
In the bigger picture, life is all about balance. Life never stays the same. All things change, constantly swinging from one pole to the next and back again. Life has its seasons. Sometimes, things are at the height of yang, and sometimes, things are at the height of yin.... and the rest of the time there are in the area in between. Sometimes in my life I have been profoundly healthy and profoundly happy... other times I have been very low and down in body, mind, and spirit. At some times in my life I have had more strength and fitness and energetic radiance and energy... and at other times I have been more sedentary, more inward, more still, less physically strong, lower on energy, etc etc. It's just the cycles of life.
I have learned that I shouldn't get down on myself because I am going through a period in the cycle where I am weaker, or not as vibrantly healthy, or as outward-going and extraverted... it is a part of the cycles of life. I have been in a more inward, yin, inward-going, solitary, chill, flowing, watery, still state of being... and that is perfectly ok. It is exactly what I needed at that point in my journey for my growth. I have not been as much in a very yang, outward, active, socializing, engaged, fiery, moving state of being... and that is perfectly ok. It was necessary for me to experience so that I learn what I need to learn on my never-ending journey of growth and discovery. Part of the reason for these cycles has to do with my change in lifestyle over the years - more herb smoking, reading, meditating, slowing down, going within, journaling, introspecting, etc... it was a different phase and stage of life than earlier phases in my life when I was spending my days always out with friends, socializing, joking, playing sports, working out, sleeping more, eating more, being more productive, and so on.
In my more inward-going cocoon phase that I've been in... I have transformed TREMENDOUSLY. I have gotten to know myself on a deeper level than perhaps ever before. I have looked at my self honestly... I have been so much by myself that I have had nowhere to run and little to distract me from myself... I have had to look at myself. Learn about myself. My relative "strengths" and my "weaknesses"... the journey that I have been on so far that has made me who I am today. I have become familiar and have had to work on the most important relationship in my life - my relationship with myself... which is fundamental to my relationship with the rest of all of life. I have faced my inner dragons, and I have overcome many of them, and I continue to do so every day. I am aware of my limitations, and my patterns, and how I would like to change to overcome them, and every day to embody more and more of the infinite potential that I know I AM.
So... to sum up. Life is a crazy journey man... for all of us. None of us are in this alone. We all have our struggles and battles within. We all have our tests. Our hardships, our hurdles, our pains and our sufferings... things we wish we could change about ourselves and the world... none of us are alone. We are not a-lone... we are all-one. Thus, we should see this CLEARLY... and have compassion for every single other human being in existence... because we are all on this crazy journey called life together. We all face the struggles of life, struggles of being human, we all want happiness and we are all trying to get through our individual shit to the other side of peace, lasting happiness, and freedom. The good news is... we sometimes get a peak on the other side of the shit... and we love it there, and our soul is at rest. The better news is... if we really put our hearts, minds and souls into it.... we can rest in that meadow on the other side of the shit for longer and longer periods of our days... we can learn not to take this shit too seriously... to see it, acknowledge it, smell it, gag a bit, feel it... and then let it go, don't let it keep us down in it forever... and use it's offensive shitty smell to get out of it and lift ourselves to the meadow of light... where we can be free and dance in the sun forever... dancing in the eternal flow of yin and yang, knowing the futility and silliness of ever trying to control such a vast, eternal and magical flow as this.
