Spirituality and Emotions
I have had a very quiet week here in South Africa so I am sharing my favorite 12 pictures of all time. If I had to delete all but 12 - these would be the ones to survive. Tomorrow morning I am off to a 4-day adventure to the Rio Dos Elefantes River Camp and very excited about a change in scenery. The river promises a plethora of abundant water life - hippo, elephants, crocodiles and birds. I look forward to sharing these photos next week.
My topic for the next few weeks. Spirituality and Emotions!
Have you ever wondered if the Buddha was ever sad? Did Jesus get jealous? Did Mother Teresa have bouts of depression? Anger, spite, resentment, rage, jealousy, envy, fear, worry, shame to name a several. Have you ever wondered what happens to these pesky 'negative’ emotions as a person becomes enlightened? I think many of us have the idea that as we grow along spiritual lines that life will be all sunshine and rainbows. That idea could leave us either spiritually by-passing our own troubling emotions by pretending we aren’t having them or standing in judgment of ourselves and others for not getting it quite right. I thought to address our emotions during the next few weeks might be good just in case you or someone you know is being hard themselves or critical of others for not getting the whole darn process perfect.
There is a term in yoga called Svadhyaya which means self-study. Svadhyaya is the study of scriptures as well as the study of oneSELF. It’s the process of turning your attention inward, observing and reflecting upon your thoughts and emotions, reactions and habits, beliefs and desires, for the purpose of having a deeper experience and understanding of our true nature. This ties in perfectly with the quote from Socrates, "An unexamined life is not worth living." Ready to do a little self-study?
I do believe that the Divine state of being is predominantly comprised of peace and happiness. As many of you know, Chapter 15 “Unconditional Happiness”, from the Untethered Soul by Michael Singer is my ‘go to’ chapter when I am feeling anything less than grounded, happy and enthusiastic. When so called negative emotions arise in me, I know that somehow, I have strayed from my spiritual home-base and initiate my process of pivoting back into ownership and Spirit-centered identity.
(Let me interject that I am not talking about emotions that arise as an appropriate response to a life situation - such as the loss of a loved one, a diagnosis or other actual events in the present moment. The bigger work concerns persistent, inappropriate to the moment emotions that seem to run our lives and keep peace and happiness elusive.)
As a foundational context I would like to suggest that your entire life from your appearance to your disappearance in the body that you currently occupy has all been a part of your sacred journey. It is not that everything up until the moment you saw the "light" was an accident or wrong and the rest of it has been right. It is all as it should be. Not everyone, but some of us, travel some of this incarnation unconsciously (what Dr. Michael Bernard Beckwith called sleepwalking) and then we awaken to various degrees and travel some of it consciously. See if you can accept for the moment that our entire experience belongs to us in full and our work is to sort that out so that we can move forward in as powerful a way as possible. With this as our foundational idea, let's discuss four powerful aspects of emotions over the next few weeks to help us to understand the arising of them and how we might use awareness to navigate them more easily.
- The shift from victim to victor - Giving up the blame game
- Accepting the blessings - Getting into right relationship with the past
- The unyielding power of integrity on our mental, physical, spiritual and emotional health
- Making room for what is trying to emerge by means of you
This is way too big a topic for this venue but let us begin. For now just turn up your awareness. Especially if the qualities of peace, happiness and love are not flowing pretty freely in your daily experience. And do this with the utmost of tenderness and compassion. The purpose of the effort is a holy one and the benefit to you, your life and the entire planet is worth it.
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