Consciousness in Bloom

Recently you may have found yourself around someone expressing their anger at the situation they were in. You may have felt as the energy was sucked out of the room. Either the person was angry at you for something you are being blamed for or maybe they had an outburst at a hapless driver who suddenly had to merge into the lane in front of them to make their turn in time. Whatever the case may have been just try to notice where the anger came from. What we think about affects what we experience next. When we rush to get to a destination, be it to get to somewhere we are driving, or be it expressing anger, frustration, or hatred to get what we want sooner rather than later, by being assertive and patient, we miss moments of life, rare opportunities that are there just for us, so that we can be open to receiving bliss. This is what people don't realize they are missing every time they look into other cars at the other people driving them and plead with them to drive faster. As we drive, I admit, that it is easy to jump to an objective conclusion before we know all the facts. To quote my friend and yoga instruction Allison, "what we see of them [others] - what we think they feel - is the reflection of our own thoughts. Yet we mistaken our feelings for some type of objective conclusion." Remember that not everything is at it seems. Your senses can be deceiving you from the truth.

  "In a controversy the instant we feel anger we have already ceased striving for the truth, and have begun striving for ourselves."(Buddha)  

If you are reading this then you may be aware that all humans are complicated. We all suffer at some point, some more than others. And at this point in the timeline of human existence people have started to rely on external objects to relieve the suffering. What do we suffer from? From commercials, billboard advertisements; from caffeine, tobacco, alcohol, anti-depressants, anti-pyschotics, uppers, downers, psychedelics, narcotics, hallucinogens, and all the other drugs; from politics, governments, wars, human/civil rights violations, environmental degradation, pollution, terrorism, and Fox News. We are overwhelmed and bombarded by the news of what's happening all over the world. We use whatever we can to hide behind, to resist experiencing the suffering we hear about on TV. 

Sometimes it's a good idea to take your mind off everything your planning to do for yourself that day and distract yourself for a little while by doing something that makes other people happy. The things we use to distract ourselves affect your energy for the day in different ways.  Offer to clean the dishes for someone after they cooked, let them relax while you do some extra work to show your gratitude. 

"Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared." (Buddha)

The next time you accidently bump into a friend at a cafe and they do something that makes your day, ponder for a moment at the possibility of one of the millions of different things that could gone differently that day to have prevented your "chance" experience with that friend. Had you not stopped to tie your shoe lace, stretch your hamstrings, take a few cleansing breathes in and out, smile at the people jogging by, would you have been able to run into your friend at the cafe? Or would you be on a couch watching TV because you pulled a muscle jogging?  Or somewhere else? The few extra minutes you take to cook a healthy breakfast in the morning, to do a couple selfless acts for a family members, friends and/or complete strangers, to stretch, breathe, tie your shoe lace and smile at people, are what make it possible for you to be in the right place at the right time.

When alive, the body is supple, yielding. In death, the body becomes hard, unyielding. Living plants are flexible. In death, they become dry and brittle.                               Therefore, stubborn people are disciples of death, but flexible people are disciples of life.     - Lao Tzu

The world we live in thrives off the awakening of conscious people. Active people. Who bring with them grounded principles and a balanced approach to sustaining life, community, and the environment. People who despite being stuck in traffic are aware of every moment. They are grateful for what they see: cars, people driving them, bikes, pedestrians, buildings, billboards, signs, trees, clouds, and animals. Because by being grateful for everything they encounter they are able to break through the labels people put on the things around them, and experience everything as if it was the first time.

If we could see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our whole life would change. (Buddha)