Striving for absolute
Absolute love
Absolute courage
Absolute ahimsa
Absolute authenticity
To be the same alone and in presence of other people and beings, no matter who they appear to be nor who I think they are, no matter what I do for them nor what they do for me. To be free of being affected by circumstance, environment, time, space (illusion).
My inability to achieve this will always bother me.
My hypocrisy will always bother me. I cheat, lie, and fail at self discipline in various ways, big and small, just like everyone else.
I am often successful at hiding it from others, and especially myself, but I am not able to avoid it.
Ultimately, nothing that I can do or not do proves any of the ideals (the yamas and niyamas) for which I strive once and for all. They must be maintained just like everything else. When I take time to stop and examine my habits and behavior, I am humbled and pray for forgiveness for my shortfalls, giving thanks for the mercy of om, divine mother and father, which truly sustains the world, universe, myself, which are in reality one and the same (even though I can’t claim to be successful in truly realizing it and always living that way.)
My attempt at love is to try to find the essence in all things and love that. I fail because I get distracted by my senses and the illusion of bodies and my personal emotions, desires and fears. The urge to experience sensual pleasure of the objects that I desire is all but impossible to resist, as is being hypnotized by the manifested world all around me. I forget that the essence that I seek is beyond the realm of the senses. In this, I worship and love the false and not the true.
I confess that for me, erections and various other manifestations of testosterone are very powerful temptations among an infinite number of other temptations which I indulge and resist. Rajas (passion) and tamas (inertia) are also temptations which I indulge and resist; I try to manage these things on my own partly because I am ashamed, partly because it is easier than involving others, partly because I don’t want to get trapped in karma with them (which is actually very much out of my control), and partly because I don’t want to disturb, or bother, or possibly hurt people around me. (And let’s face it, some of what I do to manage these things neither I nor other people really understand or really want to know about.) I attempt sattva (compassion) and sometimes feel like I fail and sometimes like I succeed. All of this comprises the habits which I and other people call a person Thomas Collier born, living, and dying in the world, which I have come to know is ultimately an illusion.
I also confess that I have been unable to stop my habit of scheming and planning and even practicing yoga to achieve small and petty goals and results. I realize that I probably won’t achieve complete freedom from that habit. Actually complete freedom from it would not really be desirable, as it would also engender a selfish type of laziness. I don’t know if Thomas Collier is meant to live in a completely spontaneous way until maybe the last moments of his current life. I may never feel or be spiritually mature enough to be able to live that way.
Experience, no matter how pleasant or unpleasant, or incessant or gross or subtle does not by itself yield a final state of “OM”.
I surrender; I will never be perfectly virtuous enough for Truth. (But do I really surrender?)
What I see and what my experience has shown me is that every desire that I have acted upon has been tainted with selfishness in some way. I know that I may never be really sure of my motives beforehand, never completely free of ignorance and selfishness; regardless, ready or not, life goes on, and I must participate.
The beauty of the gross and subtle has tempted me and prompted me to explore sex, erotic things, and sensuality. I felt scared and ashamed of that. My erotic and sexual and sensual ability as well as my experience of desire and fear is changing, perhaps due to the practices that I perform, perhaps simply due to the process of aging and enduring life, perhaps due to the mercy and grace of om. Some of the patterns of desire and fear and sensuality will remain, some won’t.
I have felt and continue to feel unworthy of the beautiful things and beings; I would rather leave them in their beautiful, undisturbed state free of me and my ignorance and dirty unworthiness.
The more I examine and look at the intentions and motives behind the actions that I perform and the decisions that I make, the more I realize that it is all tainted by my selfishness. I don’t see an end to it.
Must I give up even the pleasure of sharing and experiencing breath and nakedness alone and/or with others in order to enter the realm of Truth?