01 May The Way Of The Way 276

When we “spiritually” awakened, we feel as when we sometimes awaken from a long sleep: great, peaceful and energized.

These feelings are engendered by gratitude, kindness and accepting an obvious truth.

When we are grateful, we are great-full; we feel great. It is easy to be grateful when we don’t forget that however difficult our circumstances, they could always be worse. Moreover, if we are not blinded by selfishness, we are grateful as we’re aware of the millions whose circumstances are far worse than ours and who would love to be in our shoes; unless we much complain, in which case they would rather be in their own shoes.

Precluding us from awakening is selfishness, when we perceive ourselves as apart and separate from everything that is not ourselves. This duality leads to stressful interactions with others and our environment. We dispense with duality and in turn are at peace when we truly treat others with the kindness we treat ourselves. We do so upon realizing that while each of us and everything is a unique temporary manifestation of the universe, we and everything essentially are the entire eternal universe.

While our socialization, education and experiences lead us to thinking there is much we know, we truly know virtually nothing. Thinking we know much precludes us from experiencing the now as it unfolds; instead, we experience the now as illusions based on the stories, meanings and generalizations our mind has created. However, in the overwhelming vastness of the eternal and ever changing universe, it is absurd to think we know much of anything. When we accept this obvious truth, we can easily dispense with our illusions. Then, we are energized by our curiosity as everything is as it is, new and fascinating.