When you are a little kid it’s easy to know what you want and who you are; the world is all chocolate or vanilla. Then we start to grow up and away from the deeper meaning of ourselves. We develop the sense that there are these ominous things called decisions and consequently, mistakes. Some decisions lead to praise like finishing our home work on time. Some decisions bring ridicule: wearing a plaid shirt, polka dot shorts, and mismatching socks. Life becomes a long string of binary code- a series of yes or no questions: ask the cute guy on a date? Do I ask for the raise now or wait for my annual review? The sum of this algorithm begins building a new personality program, which we run over and over for the rest of our lives.
This code is the mechanism for our interpretation of the world around us and us within this world. We build ideas like public speaking is uncomfortable, I am not artistic/creative, or others are judging me negatively. Not all of these programs are necessarily detrimental or false but they are keeping us from seeing what is really happening. One term for this mechanism is preconception (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/preconceptions) some theologies refer to this as different minds or egos. So what’s the problem with preconceptions?
Well, when you are busy interpreting the world you are separated from life by a layer of thought and most of the time these thoughts are inaccurate. For example, how often have you misread someone’s tone of voice or an expression? After all, each person is running their individual program. For example do you see the word Good or Evil written below?
Good or Evil?
An excellent articulation of the impact this layer has on our lives is described by Eckhart Tolle in The Power of Now (http://www.eckharttolle.com/home/books/).
Luckily for me, I found Body Brain Yoga http://bodybrainyoga.com/. After a few months of practice I took one of the basic workshops called Shim Sung. http://www.dahnyoga.com/classes_services/basic_workshops/shim_sung. These two days have changed my life in the best of ways. One change was I was able to identify clearly for the first time, what some of my detrimental preconceptions were and where they came from. Seeing clearly the negative messages I was replaying in my mind gave me a skill with which I am now able to remove these detrimental thoughts.
Since Shim Sung I have been able to really live, in life-real life, not my internal commentary on what I am experiencing. This level of presence has allowed me to have a genuine connection with everyone in my life from my mother to the guy at the checkout counter. I also find that I have less chatter in my mind; this is really a help when meditating, as well as, truly listening to whomever I am speaking with. I am one step closer to being deeply at peace in my life.
And now I am off to class! I sincerely hope you are able to make every moment truly great.
Love and Light,
Katie
