Accepting what is is one of the trickiest things I have encountered.
Today I woke up with a deep sense of unease, panic and fear. It was quite uncomfortable — especially because I was not conscious of any specific reason to feel this way. I was searching for any open train of thinking that might be causing the sensation.
I was doing it under the guise of being aware.
Very often we can confuse being aware with being controlling. What I was doing was an activity. I had become identified with my ego and I was now trying to “solve” my uncomfortable feelings — all the while fooling myself that I was just being aware.
Being aware is not an activity. It is my natural state. Anything that I do will only take me away from awareness.
I was analysing my thinking because I wanted to get rid of the uncomfortable feeling. The resistance is not always obvious. And because the ego took the disguise of awareness, it became that much more difficult to realise it.
I am noticing the ego and mind resorting to subtler and subtler tricks as the days go by. I am having a lot of fun pulling the curtain off the ego and shining a light on it.
I was standing in my balcony and there was a nice breeze blowing.
Suddenly I realized that the feeling of the cool breeze on my face, and the feeling of uncomfortable tightness in my gut, were equally out of my control and equally mysterious.
I usually do not worry about the origins of the wind — then why was I worrying about the origins of my inner discomfort?
How does it matter what’s creating my panic and anxiety? What am I going to do by finding out the exact reason? The moment I find the cause, I will want to find the cause of the cause. Its a never ending pursuit which will finally end in ‘I don’t know’. But the energy spent in the pursuit is absolutely pointless.
No answer is going to satisfy the ego. It is the ego’s trick to keep the mind occupied with the chase.
Knowing it experientially is the only way to accept what is. It cannot be done with intellectual understanding.
Life is going to keep giving me new exercises everyday. Today it was a panic attack, which allowed me to get a deeper understanding of the ego. I am so grateful.