This time-place, at its essence, is not different than everything before and everything after. Individuals, bodies, systems, entities, groups, civilizations appear, evolve, and disappear in the past present and future. The person Thomas Collier at its essence is not really anything special or unique, nor is the story he calls his own. Neither are the thoughts, emotions and pain-pleasure that sometimes disturb his personal peace dramatically. Who I am at my essence has no attributes and owns absolutely nothing.
I often feel like I am living out a story of trying to prove my worthiness. I participate in systems and relationships that require that I do things to prove that I am worthy of food, shelter, social acceptance, pleasure, and affection. I can’t escape the feeling of unworthiness permanently, no matter what I do or where I go. A significant factor that contributes to the situation is that I won’t just accept things (or myself) as they are. The personal, communal, mental and physical habits that I continue to indulge leave me very far from being able to live happily in a cave, existing on air or subtle cosmic energy, or perhaps just eating things that I find around me that occur spontaneously in nature, so I must participate. I am aware that I may find myself without the ability to do things that prove that I am worthy of support, pleasure and security for some amount of time before I die. Saying that this scares me is an understatement, especially as I know that I often fail to help others in that situation. I see other people around me and notice that I can even lose the mental and/or physical ability to do the most basic things in order to take care of myself and others. Terrifying.
I notice a system that has always been around in one form or another in varying levels of complexity, with various characteristics, requiring varying levels of sacrifice, allowing varying levels of individual expression. It seems to occupy a considerable amount of human experience and attention. When I imagine a world without a system, it is very frightening, as I am aware of how we depend on it for food, shelter, protection, and ease of cohabitation. As far as I can tell, its destruction would come with a considerable amount of chaos, pain, and suffering. Herein lies another reason to participate. At the same time, I am aware of how I use it as a distraction and way to avoid dealing with things (people, duties, commitments, pain, relationships, emotions, circumstances) that I don’t want to deal with. I am afraid of how reliant I am on it and how addicted I am to it. At this point I feel like separation or escape from it will only happen when I die. Like everything else, there are many characteristics of a system, some that even seem diametrically opposed to each other. Sometimes a system is useful, sometimes it is a hindrance. I am aware of how it obscures a clear experience of reality and how it helps me co create and maintain a false sense of self.
I often come back to the urge to apologize for living my life and trying to explore the question “Who am I?”. I feel this urge so often that it feels like an inseparable part of me. I experience the urge to apologize to others for not being able to manifest and maintain a world that they are happy with, even though I know that I am not the only person or thing responsible and neither is any single other person or thing.
More and more lately, I know that my personal story of being born on July 31, 1967, living and dying as Thomas Collier is false. I devote time and effort searching for a way to prove that I exist beyond that to myself and the world, but I feel like I always fail, just like I fail at proving or living any attribute, characteristic, or austerity in absolute terms. This is exactly as it should be (always has and always will); manifestation is a relative realm of temporary experiences and objects. All I can do is know the falseness of the personal story and the mind-ego and use the tools that I have come upon through study and practice of yoga to attempt to consistently operate from that place, even when doing so isn’t pleasant, easy, or logical. I will not always be successful in that. Despite many years of sustained effort, strong personal emotions, the fear of death and pain, and the desire for pleasure that I experience still influence my actions and thoughts. This tells me that I am not fully established beyond the personal story and preferences of mind ego.
I am sorry that I have difficulty in enjoying the chores and work and expressing a cheerful attitude towards them. My mind has been conditioned to work towards a paradise state in the future where sacrifice and maintenance will no longer be necessary, and focusing on that end state contributes to my inability to stay aware of the eternal bliss in whatever work I happen to be doing or pain that I happen to be experiencing. To be honest, I just plainly don’t like a lot of it and I am consistently aware of the futility of it all. I often feel overwhelmed and discouraged by the to do list that never goes away and instead grows in length and/or complexity. The truth is, I usually find more pleasure in just experimenting with breath, posture, contemplation, attempting meditation, and just being. I feel fortunate for the times when I have been able to do so. I am thankful for being able to find practice in all sorts of varied environments and circumstances. I am particularly grateful for the time that I spend in a somewhat natural environment, as the experience feels restorative and pleasant in a way that overly man-made environments do not. Experimenting with breath, posture, contemplation, attempting meditation, and just being doesn’t plant and harvest food or provide or maintain shelter and protection and so I must also engage in action. Decisions and actions are absolutely required; consequences, results and karma absolutely unavoidable.
My mind also has a habit of ruminating on the past and finding dissatisfaction with the present. Anger comes up, sadness comes up. The experience of those emotions wakes me up to the realization that I spend a considerable amount of my time fighting ghosts (thoughts/memories/ emotions) and creating a paradise which ends up being too complex and burdensome to enjoy maintaining.
For me, there is no paradise state in the future where sacrifice and maintenance will no longer be needed. Acquiring more possessions, relationships, and luxury means more commitment and maintenance. Perhaps this is not true for someone else; it is not my place to say, and everyone must come to their own truth through their own experience. I try not to get in the way of anyone’s attempt at paradise; I am not always successful at that, and I realize that my attempts at helping people to achieve even one aspect of their paradise eventually fails or fades. From my perspective, my version of paradise often seems dramatically incompatible with people around me, and that is what it is. Contrary to how it may appear in the situation, this is not a problem, as that experience changes just like everything else. The only real problem is that I take the mind’s limited view for truth and follow it, believing that it will lead to a final ending called heaven. My mind lies to me that it is or will be completely content with simplicity when usually it is not. It also says that it will finally find permanent contentment and security after just the right experience or combination of circumstances and that ends up being a lie too. It is extremely helpful in life to remember that the mind’s contentment is small and always only temporary (if it happens at all). Its perspective is merely one of an infinite number.
(I surrender. I am sorry that) I am unable to achieve and maintain an energetic and joyous heart and express it. I am often more occupied with anger, sadness, unworthiness, addiction, and bondage. I hide these things from other people and spend a considerable amount of time and effort looking for and attempting lasting happiness where it will never be found.
(I surrender. I am sorry that) I don’t find as much pleasure in modern civilized life as most people. I usually choose to stay aware of the burden and falseness of it as part of an effort to maintain my commitment to the desire for what is Real and True. How effective this really is, the mind can never know. I admit that there’s part of me that experiences pleasure from the comfort, convenience and aesthetically pleasing surroundings, pictures, people, and objects. There’s also a part of me that is afraid of my dependence and finds the cost of these things unappealing, yet I can’t seem to end my body-mind’s fascination and addiction to them once and for all; nor can I free the body mind from action and bondage once and for all.
I am sorry for the times in the past present and future when I treat people, circumstances, or things that I am attracted to like objects to be achieved or acquired.
I am sorry for the times in the past present and future when I treat people, circumstances, or things that I am not attracted to like obstacles to be overcome or avoided.
I am sorry that I am not beyond Hatha yoga.
Truth is, I find enjoyment in exploring the body mind ego in ways that are generally not appropriate for me to put on public display or share with most people. I get lost in it sometimes and fail to follow through with my other commitments. I know that I am supposed to grow up and move beyond Hatha yoga, but I do still enjoy her, and it may always be the case in this lifetime and an unknown number of future ones too. I also admit that part (maybe a lot) of what I call Hatha yoga other people would call selfish, indulgent, addictive, dirty, and sexual; sometimes (maybe a lot of the time) I judge myself for these things and feel guilty about it. If the guilt is part of the experience, so be it.
I am sorry that I enjoy getting rid of things and simplifying more than acquiring, that I enjoy silence more than conversation, empty space more than full, and being moderately busy or not busy more than overly busy.
I generally enjoy just having an erection with another man more than full blown sex or ejaculating. (And actually even that may be changing to an even more subtle experience for an unknown period of time. This scares me because I feel like it’s just another thing that will contribute to my feeling of isolation, and also I admit that I sometimes miss the experience of care-free erotic pleasure and youthful embodiment. It is no surprise that this desire (along with many other desires that I nurture and maintain) brings me to many more births. I am even aware of the part of me that desires to return to the delusion of working towards a state of never ending pleasure, self realization, and liberation through sensual experience and goal achievement. Knowing the mind as I experience it, I can say that only an infinite number of births and deaths will cure me of that one.
I try to suppress, manage, divert or hide these tendencies in order to please others; doing that eventually leads to resentment that causes me to lose patience.
Please, feel free to call me by a more appropriate name: christian hatha yogi faggot freak closet over-eater shitter cheater vow-breaker narcissist hypocrite porn addict.
I probably will never get beyond the need for mantra repetition. I see the value of always coming back to it, as I am aware of the mind’s tricks, and that following the delusional thinking associated with its desires and fears is ultimately the cause of a lot (if not all) of my problems and unhappiness. Mantra japa (repetition) helps to break the obsession with delusional thinking. My mind is a stubborn one and won’t let go of its delusions easily. Some would call me lazy, stubborn, and/or stupid for staying with it, I don’t care.
Experience tells me that all of the practice doesn’t free the body mind from sadness, anger, addiction, illness, or pain, nor does it free me from doing mundane work, but it is the primary thing that I see as worthwhile. At the same time, it is important to perform my duties, some of the duties I like, some not. Sometimes I feel resentment for the bondage and pain. Sometimes the feeling of resentment is strong and I feel like breaking things and fighting. Sometimes I do those things.
It’s easy to experience that an exalted state is spiritual in nature. My experience is that it’s more difficult to maintain spiritual awareness (divine oneness) in the midst of mundane daily life, pleasure and pain, desire and fear. This is the path that we have all been given, whether we are aware of it or not, like it or not.
The best that I can do is devote time to “practice” and also devote time engaged in daily activity and commitments, attempting a realistic and healthy balance. I do not and will not always maintain that balance.
I keep coming back to attempting compassion and the faith that all of creation strives for compassionate love. Ultimately, I have no choice but to place the entirety of my successes and failures, all of the action, inaction, austerities, indulgences, intentions and emotions in this belief.
Then the questions come up:
Who is the receiver of this compassion? Only good or innocent people? People in need? Animals that we like? Animals we don’t like? Nature? Civilization? Only certain groups? Only friends? Only family? Only people who think a certain way? Only people who follow certain rules? Only the poor? Only the rich? Only citizens of a certain nation? Only people who look a certain way? Only people who pay us? Only people who perform or abstain from certain actions? Only people of a certain religion? Only people who “play the game”? Who or what has the authority to decide and who or what is the giver? And what defines a compassionate existence, what does it look like?
There doesn’t seem to be a logical resolution. Compassion says that everyone, regardless of their abilities, actions or characteristics deserves food and shelter, yet receiving without any effort to reciprocate and participate is not really beneficial to the system nor the individual as it often puts them in a state of dependence, unrealistic expectations, and/or delusion. I confess that I have been lazy at times (actually many times) in giving in such a way as to create dependence, while feeling pleased with my supposedly giving and compassionate nature.
I look closely and discover that the personal experience that I describe is universal and unique as well as neither unique nor universal.
The evidence points to a pervasive illusion of progress towards perfect paradise as well as the illusion of degeneration to utter and never ending chaos.
All of us say “I didn’t sign up for this” at some point.
Yes, I wanted to have the pleasure without the pain, but they are actually two sides of the same coin called experience and I can’t have one without the other.
Yes, there’s a part of me operating subconsciously that wants to be the exception, even though I know that I am not.
It is absolutely vital that I put forth effort in the quest for Om, and to attempt to help myself and others in some kind of lasting way that truly benefits.
Can I ever break my mind’s addiction to the false? How does one get beyond the ego with its addiction to problems and its obsession with time (past and future), planning to achieve pleasure and avoid pain, regretting or reveling in the past? The ego mind cannot get beyond itself on its own level. It can only be seen for what it is. Uninterrupted discriminative discernment between mind and atman is the only remedy.
What I am looking for is nowhere to be found in things, relationships, or experiences regardless of how intensely or minimally pleasurable or painful they happen to be to the body mind ego. It appears that one addiction just replaces another. I try to make the addictions more and more subtle.
I have been looking everywhere and anywhere for permission and validation. I’ve looked outside, inside, and I just never seem to find it.
Contentment is always tested. When I am aware of how my mind operates, I see that its very nature is rajasic and thus not content.
Summarizing my life experience, I see the foolishness of my mind. Wisdom eventually sees that all of the mind’s ideas to achieve unending and continuous security and sensual pleasure ultimately fail. How it sees the mind body ego that it calls its own is often (usually) not accurate. How it sees other people, beings, things and experiences is not complete and often inaccurate. What the mind takes for truth and reality are not really truth and reality. The mind is only an effective tool on the relative plane. I endeavor to move beyond letting it run my life. I start by attempting temporary breaks from it.
I am truly and completely stunned at my mind’s propensity to hide its desire to be an exception to the universal laws. It judges myself and other things and people incessantly. It always has an opinion and labels things as either good or evil, pleasurable or painful, and thus cannot see things as they really are. In this way, it is an obstacle to Reality.
Wisdom says that I am nothing; love says that I am everything; life goes on and on.
I admire a genuine moment of honesty. Even if it is in a dirty and nasty place of “sin”.
if part of humility is the feeling of unworthiness and feeling sorry for things, I accept it
if part of having open eyes is seeing the futility of everything but still acting, I accept it.
I experience fear when I realize that there’s little provision for illness, inaction, failure, old age and pain (vulnerability) in the position I currently have assumed.
I am caught in the web I have made. Nothing manifest (action or inaction) really does anything to set me free on a physical level (ego-mind-body). Rajas, tamas, and sattva each create their own type of bondage. Attachment to the manifest as well as the unmanifest each carries its own type of darkness.
truth and love are needed in the appropriate balance.
manifest and unmanifest are needed in appropriate balance (and I definitely struggle with navigating this one)
Even though I am aware of the futility of it all, the attempt at love is vital, and so the practice, maintenance, and discipline must continue. There is no cheating or short cut.
I know that I will always be an aspirant of the absolute and that there is no end to the endeavor (regardless of the mind’s desire). I will always try to prove my love and “worthiness” sometimes succeeding, sometimes failing. Every manifested being is also an aspirant, regardless of their awareness, my awareness or what happens.
I am thankful for attempting love beyond my personal concerns and also for forgiveness when I lash out, scream, cry and fail.
I am thankful for not needing to be free of anger sadness or any particular emotion or experience that I don’t like.
My personal view on things (as is everyone’s personal view on things) is merely perspective and not absolute truth.