Lesson 32
I have invented the world I see.
This is the Divine Freedom we are gifted with, to create any world we would like. When things are going good, it is easy to take in this lesson but if things are not so good, it is rather tough to stomach this. I recall being on the Camino de Santiago and looking out over the Navarra region of Spain with it’s wind turbines, castles, and rolling hills, thinking to myself, “Wow, I created this experience of walking the Camino. I am so clever.” In the midst of the Spanish beauty that surrounded me, it was very easy to take responsibility for the world I invented in front of me. It was glorious. Yet a few days later, in the desert of Spain, when all sorts of “stuff” came up for me that was not so appetizing, the idea that I created that sort of world, didn’t sit so well with me. That I, and I alone, was the cause of my suffering. No one was around me to do anything to me, to hurt me, to even say anything to me. I was walking alone in my own thoughts of suffering and no matter how fast I walked, I couldn’t out walk them.
Maybe that day I was bored? Maybe things in my life were too perfect (I was walking the Camino for goodness sakes, what an opportunity!)? Or maybe those were just thoughts that I could no longer run from without the daily distractions in my life? It was a moment of reckoning for me, as we discussed yesterday, no one was causing my suffering but me and I was getting something out of it, I always had. In this case, I believe it was giving me something to do when I had nothing else around me.
I recall I once saw this picture of two cherub-like angels that looked so calm and peaceful. They looked like children and had big eyes, soft skin, and gazed up at the heavens with their chins resting on their palms. I couldn’t help but look at this picture and say “those angels look bored.” And in that moment I realized that I believe to live as an awakened being must be boring. This is because if you are awake to the world you don’t get upset, you don’t go through ups and downs because everything is neutral, and you have no dramas to keep yourself busy. Byron Katie once said “Who would I be without my story?” Exactly! It occurred to me looking at that picture that I would be one bored angel without my story.
This is what I was getting out of the world I was inventing; something to do. But the good news is that we can see our situation as we want to see it. I can either see that I am:
Not good enough.
Not awake yet.
Bored if I were to awaken.
Or I could see:
I am good enough.
I AM AWAKE.
I could never be bored living as an awakened being.
It is hard to imagine the latter as we have lived so long with our suffering that it often feels like a cozy blanket. Although we may be ready to let it go, there is still a part of us that feels naked without our suffering, without our story. We feel naked without drama in our lives. But like a kid with a toy she has outgrown, we can just put it down. We are free to put down our story and all that no longer serves us.
“You can give it up as easily as you made it up. You will see it or not see it, as you wish. While you want it you will see it; when you no longer want it, it will not be there for you to see it (ACIM Lesson 32 1:3-5).”
This is why meditation is wonderful. It gives us a moment to pause and observe the body and our thoughts. We can become aware of that which no longer serves us. And in that next breath, even before then, we can let it go, remembering that in any situation we can always choose love. No matter how far we walk or run or how much we drink, we cannot escape our thoughts and how those thoughts invent the world we see. If you have the courage, turn around and face those thoughts. You will see that you can either keep running from them or you can begin to love. Love it all. Circumstances do not create the world you see, you do.
Ask yourself today, what are you choosing to create with the Divine Freedom you are gifted? Is it serving you? Is there anything you are ready to put down and quit playing with? There is no better time to release it. There is no better time to claim who you truly are without your story.
Namaste.