"You are not your mind" ...
I cannot live with myself any longer. This was the thought that kept repeating itself in my mind. Then suddenly I became aware of what a peculiar thought that was. "Am I one or two or three? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two or three of me: the "I" and the self that "I" cannot live with and the child I protected. "Maybe", I thought "only one of them is real".
I began looking outside of myself for scraps of pleasure and fulfillment, for validation, security, and love...
The word enlightenment conjures up the idea of some superhuman accomplishment, and the ego likes to keep it that way, but it is simply your natural state of felt oneness with Being. It is a state of connectedness with something immeasureable and indestructable, something that, almost paradoxically, is essentially you and yet is much greater than you. It is finding your true nature beyond name and form. The inability to feel the connectedness gives rise to the illusion of seperation, from yourself, consciously or unconsciously, as an isolated fragment. Fear arises, and conflict within and without becomes the norm.
As a child from an abusive home, the beatings.. the violence.. lack of food, and roaches.. I somehow seperated from myself and made two, and even three. The one on the outside .. and the one on the inside, and the child I protected. For years I was told I had schizophrenia.. I had begun living in my head.. conflict, absolutely. I thought .. how can a man choose to beat a child if the child was good.. but.. the child was no good. Only a man would beat a worthless child.. so therefore I became worthless in my mind.
As years went along.. everyone saw someone, a body.. a smile on an occasion.. a pretty face, but .. what they really saw was a child of no good. I kept telling myself that.. my thinking became a disease, a way life.. who I was. I hide myself from myself, and everyone around me. I began to protect this child from anymore harm.. I became three. Who you saw on the outside.. the worthless child, and the child I protected from anymore harm.
I am one. Just me... It made no difference the child. It could have been another .. but it happened to me. I did no wrong, and therefore I am not worthless. His sickness was his own... not mine.
I cried when I learned that today... can one feel utter freeness? Is there such a thing.. ? yes... the weight of years lifted from my body. I could stand up.. I went outside ... everything looked different for the first time in my life. I saw just me.. and learned that in my head .. only thoughts and they are nothing until you act upon them :)
Buddha's simple definition of enlightenment... "the end of suffering". .. but what is left when there is no suffering?
only peace :)
Thank you Tobias for everything you taught me.. all the struggles, the tears.. the pain I have carried all my life is now gone. I sit here and smile, and laugh.. I have become one :)
~ ghost writer...
