All posts by JJ

Nature of the Mind: Part 2 – The Small Mind

Imagine you are looking out of a window at a busy road with countryside in the background. When I do this exercise with someone I tell them that this is their mind. There goes a car (thought), you see a cloud passing slowly (an emotion), a tree is blowing in the wind (a feeling), all passing through the scene (your mind) at different speeds.

We do not choose for a particular car (thought) to come into our minds, it just appears and then it is up to us to decide what we do with it. For the untrained mind, the thought takes control. The ‘car’ drives us ’round the block’ of our minds, entertaining us with negativity, anger, pain, regret and/or sorrow. It is when this is happening, that we are truly locked into an invisible prison that all of our senses are oblivious to.

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We do not choose the majority of thoughts that come into our heads. The only choice we have is what to do with that thought once it is there. To tell yourself not to think about something is still resisting and in turn, gives that thought life. Not thinking of pink elephants is a prime example.

The trick is to simply observe and purge. ‘Oh, I’m thinking this negative thought, that’s ok, it is not mine, and now I choose to let it go.’

Negative attachment is still attachment!

I discovered that by using the words ‘I don’t know’ to EVERYTHING that came into my head be it thought, song, discussion, argument, anything… that my mind eventually quietened. At the beginning was resistance. My brain double and trebled the amount of noise, and in turn, I had to use ‘I don’t know’ in excess of 100 times a minute! But eventually things just calmed, the frequency of thoughts and songs etc became less as I worked toward a lasting quietness. Continue reading

Understanding Soul Contracts: Agreements We Made Before Coming to Earth

Before we are born we are asked just one question by our soul family. “What is it you would like to learn this lifetime?” It is then, in our answer, that soul contracts are formed. 

If we wish to learn patience, we will not ask to be surrounded by Zen Masters, but rather people (siblings for example) who will push our buttons and annoy us to the ends of the earth. If we wish to learn love, we will be shown hate, and no matter the lesson, we ask that the opposite be brought to us for example, if self confidence is chosen, then friends in disguise will come and step on us.

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It is within this very principle that all soul contracts are based, for it is only in being stepped on that we have no choice but to learn to STAND UP for ourselves.

Self development can be a deeply painful process that by nature requires us to be scrubbed. It is in the repetitive scrubbing of a diamond that it gains its sparkle and we are no different. There are two kinds of pain, learning pain and abusive pain. While the latter serves little to no purpose, the former is fundamental to our growth as human beings.

Other than beginner’s luck, which (in my opinion) is the universes way of showing us that we can achieve a high level of success, with of course, practice; the first step to growth is being knocked off balance.

We get removed from center by ‘x’ amount which is directly proportionate to how much we have chosen to learn. It is through learning and growth that we come back to our center with the tools that were required to bring ourselves home.

The flip side of our return to balance is expressed directly as growth.

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The universe in its infinite love for us will continue to send us lessons, and one of the most frustrating truths to accept is as follows: ‘Wow, you learned a lesson, you overcame a problem?

Congratulations, here is your reward… ANOTHER problem.’ Each time we show the universe that we can take the heat, life becomes a little hotter! It is simply one of the painful aspects to this path of learning, yet it is beautiful because of the growth we experience from it.

The main thing to remember here (going full circle) is that it is our friends who come to teach us these lessons. It is our soul friends who (by our consent) hurt us, our friends who betray us and our friends who give us our opportunities to learn.

In order for these experiences to seem real, we naturally forget that they are our friends when we cross over the river of forgetfulness (birth). If you would rather be happy than right, just pretend that they love you, it will definitely change your perspective!

The Nature of the Mind ~ Part 1

       The nature of the mind is both incredibly simple, and incredibly complex. It has an infinite number of ways you can program it, and in todays world, the majority of programs created keep you in bondage. Its purpose is like a rubik’s cube, it is there to challenge us and to encourage us to attain higher states of consciousness that allow us to see deeper, think clearer, and know more.

humanmindpictureAs many of us know, the joy found in solving puzzles is only achieved when we have taken the time to figure it out, and then actually solve it. This applies to the mind as well, except it is a little bit more open. We are all solving this puzzle together, and each of us has a piece.

Of course, we need to listen to each other fully in order to create that harmony, and often, language is the misconstruer of ideas.

Have you ever met someone in the street and had a conversation with them, walked away and thought, “hold on, I just told them ‘a’, and if I told them ‘a’ then they are going to think ‘b’, and if they think ‘b’ then they are going to work out ‘c’, ‘Oh my goodness, I just told them ‘c’?

Woah, hold up a minute, you haven’t told them ‘c’, you simply told them ‘a’. So what happened? It is the nature of the mind to make logical conclusions, however if we are operating within a limited mental data set, then the conclusions that we make may not be so logical.

The mind, with the regular training we all get in todays world, negatively embellishes a situation, scenario or thought process and spirals it out of control until we are all panicky and fretting over nothing. In fact, this happens especially much when the stress levels get higher than what is able to be sustained by the body.

It is in this moment, in the prison that cannot be seen, smelt, heard nor touched that the universe gives us the opportunity to recognize what is really going on, and to overcome.

But the key actually lies in the focus on what you want. If you’re trying NOT to think of something, it just reinforces it. It’s like telling you not to think of pink elephants, you don’t have a choice.

Observing is the first step to see what your mind is actually saying, and why. Listening, paying attention. However, that is just the beginning. One must step into the place of creation in order to actually get there.  You are all 4 elements combined, not just one, or another.

The simple fact of the matter is that we are not the mind nor are we the body; we are that which was never born and can never die. The mind and body are the price of entry for learning in this space/time continuum. Please remember guys, we are not humans pretending to be beings, we are beings pretending to be human.

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A Buddhist walks up to a hotdog vendor and says ‘make me one with everything’ he gives the vendor a $20, the vendor takes the money, and then goes to hand him his change. The Buddhist looks at him simply and then waves his hand, saying only: ‘Change comes from within’.