Sunday, June 2, 2013

Masks

Life is a strange and beautiful dream. When I remember this, I have peace. When I look around and am grateful for things and people, see them with love instead of fear and hate, I have peace.  Even the things that make perfect sense to fear and hate. When I simply embrace them too.....I am free. This is who I am and who  I work to be. This is my quest.

No state is sustainable. Every thing and every moment is transient. This is a huge challenge for me. If you don't like change, in a world that constantly changes, its gonna be a bumpy ride. I try to free fall into it all. Realizing I don't have any control, nor did I ever. 

Too much change and instability as a child planted these seeds in the soil of the personality this life. Now as an adult I work to pull these weeds from my garden. Sometimes I am able, other times I still need to work at it. I see the announcement of a deep seeded issue when I have a big reaction to someone or something. The bigger the reaction, the more personal the material. So life points the path out to me and all of us in this way. 

Yet, most choose to not see it. They choose instead to blame those close them. Unable to truly know and see  themselves, unable  or unwilling to identify and  drop the mask of their incomplete self. Its almost as if they hold on as tight as they can to an image they created of who they need to be in the world. No matter how deep this lie goes. 

It is like we go through life with our ego in the driver's seat. And it rips little pieces of other peoples personalities, external wealth or fame, way of seemingly being in the world. Like ripping pictures from a magazine. I want these eyes, this kind of nose, these lips. I want these clothes to cover this type of body. Imagine what that picture looks like. And abstract, mishmash of nothingness. Certainly not real. Just an imaginary person. That is the person one wants to walk through life as ?????? Not me. 

I was talking to a friend of mine awhile back. He shared that I was emotionally immature. He had the grace of sharing a lot as we are similar but we laughed about it all. I realized he was right. I am emotionally immature. The paradox was that as I saw this and admitted it for the first time to myself and then to others.....THAT was a big step towards emotional maturity. This is the trippy and paradoxical way the world works. I love it.

I am a walking contradiction. An eternal paradox. What can be true for me in one moment can change entirely in the next. I am just an ever-changing  human in this way. I allow it. And sometimes I judge it. Am confused by it. So what is wrong with being confused. When I used to tell my dear Roy London.....I don't know!!!! His reply was always....Oh good!!!! Now we can begin.

I have been so blessed in my life for many years to have had wonderful teachers come in. To show me the way. Even when I did not learn what they spoke of until years later. I stilled learned it. I learn everyday and am grateful for that. I feel them and I hear them and I know they are and will always be with me. Life is a beautiful dream. Our loved ones never really leave us. 

It saddens me how many masked people I encounter everyday. Even many close to me. I choose to not wear this mask. I choose to explore and embrace all aspects of myself. Even those that some would say are ugly or horrific. I choose to live a whole life. And that may be lived alone as so many choose to hide and cower form truth. Even their own blessed one. 

When one does not live that way they are judged and condemned by some. They are blamed and considered a loose cannon. A cannon that blows to shreds  untruths that it encounters. And so it is. This is my path. Even when I am not right, which is often. I am always right in revealing, allowing and sharing MY truth. 

"Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are really  princesses just waiting to see us just once be beautiful and courageous.  Perhaps everything terrible is, in its deepest being, something helpless that seeks our help."

Rainer Marie Rilke

Within this shadow, this part we hide from, is great beauty and treasure beyond belief. To hide from ourselves is a dangerous game. It is to live half of a life. It is to never truly  know oneself. It is the "not to be" of  "To be or not to be." It is a tragedy. I choose to be.....

There are no chosen people as I hear some religions say. We are ALL chosen. We are all the same. No matter what you do, where you live, how much money you have or make. We are all in the same boat dealing with the same stuff. 

I pray you begin the journey of removing your mask so as to live a more complete and glorious life. It is not easy but nothing worthwhile is. And like everything, it is as difficult as we make it. 

Live to Love.....yourself first.....xxxoooo