November
12, 2006
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Martin Luther King, Jr., in being asked to publish some of his
sermons, wrote in the preface to his book, ". . .
a sermon is directed toward the listening ear rather than
the reading eye. . . I offer these discourses in the hope
that a message may come to life for readers of the printed
words." This is my hope for you, dear reader.
--Rev. Linda
November 12, 2006
WOODLAND MUSINGS:
Splitting Wood
This morning we continue with our November theme of Woodland
Musings, and the title of my talk is Splitting
Wood. When I chose this title from all the brainstorming
work we did in the EMC meeting, I thought it would be
perfect for this message dealing with the pain-body, that
split we so often feel within us, the ego and the ecstasy.
As it turned out it was even better than I thought.
Now you know when it comes to splitting wood that the
longer the round, the more difficult it will be to split.
Also, it’s better to use a "wood splitter's
maul" rather than an ax because it’s less inclined
to stick in the wood than the ax head, and the steep slope
of the maul increases outward pressure on the wood—makes
it split better.
And if you position yourself slightly uphill from the
round to be split, this employs weight and leverage to
maximize effectiveness of the blow. And you want to make
the best strike you can EACH time. Never make a half-effort,
even if you have to rest between swings. Light strikes
seldom split wood and almost always discourage and tire
you for no gain.
I’m sure I don’t have to make the connections
for you. The metaphysics are pretty obvious, choosing
the rounds to split, using appropriate tools, positioning
yourself properly—in thought—and doing your
best.
But before I really delve into our topic, I want to share
with you this story from our Native Americans friends.
One night an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle
that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the
battle is between two ‘wolves’ inside us all.
One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret,
greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority,
lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is
Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility,
kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion
and faith."
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked
his grandfather, "Which wolf wins?"
The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."
My talk this morning is exactly about that, the one we
choose to feed. I want to look at “thinking.”
I’m taking a meditation class, in the second week
now, and we have to meditate 15-30 minutes twice every
day. And the whole point is just to become aware. Thoughts
come and we get entangled in them, charmed by them. But
then we “wake up,” become aware the thoughts
are “running,” and we return to the mantra.
And that’s the way it goes, over and over. And it’s
okay. Because it’s just stress release, a letting
go of the thoughts, without giving them any significance
or power.
And through this practice it becomes very obvious, as
Eckhart Tolle says in his book A New Earth, that
“The greater part of most people’s thinking
is involuntary, automatic, and repetitive. . . Strictly
speaking, you don’t think: Thinking happens to you.
. . ‘I think’ is just as false a statement as
‘I digest’ or ‘I circulate by blood.’”
(p. 129)
Oh, excuse me, I’m busy right now circulating my
blood. Oh, I’ll be with you in a minute, I am beating
my heart. Sorry, I can’t talk right now, I have to
digest my dinner. Call me back in about 3 hours.
We don’t do these things. They happen automatically.
And so do thoughts. That’s just the function of the
brain—to produce thoughts. The brain doesn’t
“think.” There is a thinker within us which
does think, but it is not the brain. That which thinks
is the mind, not the brain.
What the brain does is take all the past thoughts we
“thunk” (the brain can never have a new thought)
and record them, and then play them back to us—constantly,
incessantly, non-stop—until and unless we become
aware of them. And what did we say last week awareness
is? The Presence.
And by the way, those brain recordings are not facts
from the past. They are our perceptions of the facts of
the past. So what we’re really doing is reliving
our perceptions of the past over and over and over again.
If we’re letting those thoughts control us,
rather than us becoming aware of them.
These automatic responses of our bodies, including the
brain, are fine—in fact, they’re great and we
need them to be in this realm, to live on this planet—they’re
fine as long as we don’t identify with them as who
we are. Can you imagine what your life would be like if
you completely identified with the beating of your heart?
“I don’t have time for you right now, I have
to beat my heart. Yes, I’m beating my heart, I’m
beating my heart. Oh, I think I’ll slow it down a
bit—beat, beat, beat. . . beat. . . Ah, nice. Oops,
speed up a little. . . “
What would you think if you saw someone doing that? They’re
crazy, right? Insane. Yet, the brain is just an organ
like the heart, doing it’s job, just the way it’s
supposed to. But we have become so identified with the
brain functions, we think those old thoughts—a lot
of them from way back when we were little kids—are
who we are now. And that identification with the brain
thoughts as who we are is what has been called the ego.
It’s the unobserved self we think we are. I’m
a person who’s afraid of snakes. I don’t like
spicy food. I’m allergic to apple pie. I think overcast
days are the pits.
Next time you find yourself making these kinds of statements—I’m
a person who, I like, I don’t like, I am, or I’m
not, or I think—stop and ask yourself who’s
speaking. Is this my brain—ego, contrived self—or
is it my Higher Self, my divine Self speaking?
Now it’s bad enough that we have this computer-brain
organ that runs constantly and that we think is who we
are, but there’s another aspect that’s maybe
even worse, and that is that these thoughts carry with
them emotion, which we also identify with as who we are.
And as we think these thoughts they produce reactions
in the body in the form of emotions. These emotions feed
the thoughts which then go crazy in their feeding frenzy.
And we’re overtaken by them, completely absorbed
in them. And we can feel powerless against them.
Remember, the body does not know the difference between
an actual occurrence and just a thought about an occurrence.
Years ago I had a great fear of bridges. And if my partner
was late coming home, I’d always start thinking he’d
driven off a bridge and drowned. And that thought and
the emotions attached to it would have me worked right
up into a tizzy. I’d be pacing the floor, heart rate
high, really scared, totally convinced that he might have
driven off a bridge. Even if he didn’t even have
to cross a bridge coming home, that’s the thought
that would come up in my head and I’d be really scared,
ready to call the police. Believe me, I’m very grateful
to have been healed—completely—of that. I never
think that thought any more.
So what happens to all that energy those emotions produce?
There was a lot of energy produced with all that fretting
about my partner driving off a bridge. If I’m out
for a walk and I meet up with a loose, growling dog and
the thought that it could bite me and the emotion that
accompanies that thought overtake me, I’ll take some
action to protect myself. And in that action the energy
that was produced will be released. But if I’m lying
in a nice warm bed and I get lost in a thought and it’s
accompanying negative emotion about that dog, then that
fearful emotion has nowhere to go, and it’s stuck
in my body, playing havoc.
So, it’s really vital that we not get entangled
with those negative thoughts and keep feeding them into
an emotional frenzy, not only because we start believing
(or continue to support ourselves in believing) that these
ego thoughts are who we are, but because they’re
hurting us physically, as well. And it is causing us pain,
physical and emotional pain.
Tolle says, “Any negative emotion that is not fully
faced and seen for what it is in the moment it arises
does not completely dissolve. It leaves behind a remnant
of pain.” (p. 141) This old emotional pain is what
he calls the “pain-body.” It’s a huge part
of the ego. It’s an “energy field of old but
still very-much-alive emotion that lives in almost every
human being. . .” And the energy in this field of
the pain-body is not just our individual energy, it is
added to from the pain and suffering of all humanity.
Because at the energy level, we are not separate. We’re
all one.
Why do these thoughts keep coming up? Because energy
has to be fed. As long as the thought is sleeping, dormant,
we don’t’ hear from it. But the minute it gets
triggered, awakened by a whiff of some emotion it identifies
with, it wants to be fed. Like coffee in the morning wakes
you up and you want some. So this is when we have an opportunity
to break the cycle. To feed or not to feed. We feed with
more emotion, by adding more negative, emotional energy
to the energy field of the pain-body.
When we become aware of the thought and it’s accompanying
emotion, that’s the Presence in us. Awareness is
the Presence. It’s that Observer who knows . . .
it’s just a thought and I can change it. But It will
not choose for us. We have freedom of choice. And we are
free to choose to feed the pain-body, that energy field,
with more of those negative emotions, or not to feed it
by simply recognizing that it’s just a thought and
I can change it and staying in the place of the observer,
in awareness, in the Presence.
Now here’s some great news. We’ve already taken
the first step to this great freedom from the pain-body
just by realizing that we have one. Tolle says, “The
beginning of freedom from the pain-body lies first of
all in the realization that you have a pain-body. Then,
more important, in your ability to stay present enough,
alert enough, to notice the pain-body in yourself as a
heavy influx of negative emotion when it becomes active.
When it is recognized, it can no longer pretend to be
you and live and renew itself through you. It is your
conscious Presence that breaks the identification with
the pain-body. When you don’t identify with it, the
pain-body can no longer control your thinking and so cannot
renew itself anymore by feeding on your thoughts.”
(p. 161)
And then it begins to lose energy. Now we know energy
can’t be created or destroyed. So we don’t actually
lose it. What happens is, according to Tolle, “the
energy that was trapped in the pain-body then changes
its vibrational frequency and is transmuted into Presence.
In this way, the pain-body becomes fuel for consciousness.”
(p. 162) So if you feel like you have a big pain-body,
energy field, great! All the more energy to convert to
the Presence. Every negative emotion is an opportunity
for us, a gift. Do you see?
But it’s always our choice. So next time you feel
a negative emotion from the past (and by the way, all
worrying about the future comes from some belief from
the past), don’t fight it, because that’s just
feeding it with more negative energy, but completely accept—become
aware—that you are feeling this way right now. This
puts you and keeps you in the present moment. And because
you’re not identifying with it as who you are, not
trying to control it, or resist it, it can’t control
you. And you’re not feeding it. And you continue
to experience the Presence, in the present.
The pain-body has no power. Only our identification with
it causes suffering. When we stop identifying with it,
stop feeding it, it can’t use us any more, or renew
itself through us.
And we can support each other by not allowing ourselves
to be dragged into each other’s pain-bodies. So if
I’m telling you “my story” of how bad it
is, please be the observer. Because if you can be the
observer for me, it will help diffuse that energy. And
if you can remind me, from that observer place, that my
pain-body really seems hungry right now, maybe I can wake
up enough to become aware and experience the Presence
instead. And we can help each other fly.
So which wolf will we feed? The ego or the ecstasy? Let’s
choose wisely and do our very best to feed it the nectar
of the gods—awareness—rather than the same old
same old. And in that way we can split off that which
no longer serves us.
