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Browse published articles attributed to Gina Charles, with full-archive search.
For the past several years I had been hot on the lookout for my elusive life purpose. I had already spent many years of my life doing what I believed I was meant to do, until it was time for me to move on from that, to something new. I never anticipated doing anything new. I didn’t know how to do that.
I read a true story once about a guy who suddenly became inexplicably interested in photography. He surrendered to this strong interest, and indulged himself. One day he came across a flyer advertising a free local photography meeting, and decided to attend. When he got there, he found a group of mostly seniors, sharing stories about their photographs.
When my insides started ringing like the bells of a five-alarm fire, I didn’t know what was happening. That strong, engulfing feeling of anxiety rose up like a life-threatening wave, sweeping me away from the inside. The first time I experienced this, it took my breath away, literally.
There is only Consciousness and unconsciousness. We are either awake, or we are sleepwalking and sleeptalking. We are either lucid, or we are submerged in and believing unnecessary, unexamined, unfounded thoughts and beliefs. These thoughts and beliefs create our reality, and how we experience our lives. Right now. Try this: • Unclench your teeth. • Relax your shoulders. • Notice and loosen all contracted muscles. • Take 1 slow, deep, relaxing breath. Doesn't that feel better? When we notice thought, we wake up to the bigger picture and free ourselves.
We desperately want change in our lives. We’re out there making one effort after the next, only to find that we are running in place. We all know the meaning of insanity, doing the same things and expecting different results. So we switch things up, and try new things. How is it that we push, and nothing seems to move? Somehow, some way, we are having the same thoughts and emotions, supported by the same unnoticed, underlying beliefs. Same programming, same outcomes. The Universe likes to keep it simple.
We see and experience our lives through the filters of our history, beliefs, stories and learned behaviors. The ultimate filter is the mind-made identity. We don’t see the world as it is, we see it as we are. -Anais Nin When we recognize thought as something separate from Self, we are Awake. We step outside of the limitations of thought, into our own Awareness and boundless possibility. It is here that we may bloom into our own Greatness. Stay Awake with me. EMPOWERMENT: Today I will be the eyewitness to thought.
Thought is the limitation within which I have this human experience. At first, that may be a slippery concept to grasp. Beyond the understanding that I can think, and fall immersed into thought, is the concept that I can step out of thought. As long as I’m experiencing life from inside the box of thoughts, stories, beliefs, and mental conjecture, my happiness will be a temporary candy coating. Jumping out of the box is equivalent to gaining lucidity, or waking up to being present in the moment, outside of unneeded thought.
The Master Of Ceremonies Have you ever noticed how the mind narrates life as you’re experiencing it? I have. Sometimes, the thinking mind starts chattering the minute I wake up in the morning. It’s as if thought were standing at the ready, salivating. The mind springs into action even before I can open my eyelids, spewing prediction like it had a crystal ball.
It’s early. I can hear the birds chirping outside while sipping my coffee. I have the whole day ahead of me. There are things I’d love to do, and things I have to do. Then it dawned on me. If I have access to the control panel of this ride, then maybe I should begin my day in a more empowering way, instead of at the mercy of where the chips may fall.
The age-old quest of knowing oneself feels necessary and essential. We think finding out who we are is of upmost importance, and feel incomplete in some way without a story of self. Well, of course we would. The self loves self. It loves the idea of itself. It loves the description and labels. It loves the perpetual possibility of being special, better than yesterday, or the next guy. We end up living our lives in service to building, polishing and enhancing our identity. The good news is, this is all okay, because you are not the self you speak of.
I used to think surrender meant giving up. The connotation reeked of failure. Surrendering to anything felt like backing down, or caving in. My thinking mind considered surrender a dirty word, while my drive and commitment ate surrender for breakfast. Well, that’s before I understood what it really meant. Unconditional acceptance is surrendering my thinking mind’s desire to constantly control it all, even in so much as an approval or disapproval.
Problems are like the little paddles in a pin ball machine, that influence and guide the ball one way or the other. If the paddle hits the ball just right, it can propel the ball in an advantageous direction. You’re the little ball, and your problems are the paddles that guide you one way or the other. What determines your direction is your state of being. If you are submersed in unexamined thought, you mistake the “problem” as threatening, or as an obstacle. This creates resistance and a feel-bad experience.
As I begin this week, I remind myself that any one of my endeavors will only turn out as good as the quality of the experience I had completing it. Everything is being evaluated through the filters of the thinking mind. We experience the tasks at hand through rote thought and learned behaviors. Eventually the mind drifts into negative thinking and we wonder why we feel bad and our endeavors turn sour. When you lose touch with inner stillness, you lose touch with yourself. -Eckhart Tolle
I value the power of positive thinking. Until I can step outside of, or turn thought off completely, I can choose positive thought. If I’m going to live in a story, I’ll at least try to make it a good one. That said, be leery not to wander too far into The Valley of Faux Mercy. The thinking mind likes this place, as it perpetuates thinking. Whether I am submersed in negative thought, or I am submersed in positive thought, I am still submersed in thought. It’s all still thought.
I saw this post online that said, "Attention is the root of all evil." I wondered how that could be. We are our Attention, after all. That's our real Self, Awareness. And our Awareness, Attention, or Focus, is our magic wand. We get more of whatever we point it at. So, is attention the root of all evil? Not literally, but yes, our attention absolutely has the potential to be perceived as negative, harmful, even evil. It would have to be that way, here, in this place we call life. This is a place of duality. What then is the duality of our Awareness?
Honoring my truths is a fancy way of saying surrender. It is to unconditionally accept the truth of the moment, no matter how much it makes me want to spit, run, or fall to my knees. It took me a long time to sit with that inner burn of acceptance. But little by little, as my own smoke cleared, my mind began to notice how that burning and chu ing recycled itself into my own personal rocket fuel. With baby steps, I practiced being with the burn of acceptance, and I got better and better at it.
What’s preventing you from hearing your own Guidance? Turning down the unnecessary, unfounded, negative static of the thinking mind, allows us to better hear and feel our own Guidance. The first step in doing this is to notice thought. Catch thought in action, ranting on in its unexamined, relentless chatter. Now take your focus off of what the mind is saying, and put your mentally quiet focus on your body, your breathing, how you feel in your skin, or other stimuli of the present moment. Listen quietly. Perceive without mental evaluation.