There is a lot of talk about “detachment” in many spiritual teachings and an imbalanced ego can take up this pointer as a “practice” to execute. Trying to detach just becomes another attachment, an attachment to a “detached living”, and it’s just as dysfunctional as an imbalanced/fear-based attachment. An imbalanced ego force cannot really understand what the pointer of detachment refers to, the very basis on an imbalanced ego is “lack” and it will try to fill this lack through any practice, or technique, it can get its hands on, including the pointer of detachment – you can see people trying to detach as a means of escaping life, as a means of seeking some place of peace or bliss, or even as a means of looking superior, all of this is just the imbalanced ego in play. The pointer of “detachment” in its true sense simply describes the natural state of being where the ego is not the dominant force (making it a balanced ego) – what I call “inner wholeness” is this natural state of being, and its hallmark is the sense of total inner independence/freedom. Anyone on the journey towards inner wholeness is inevitably signing up for the state of total inner independence, there are no convenient “hold backs”, you don’t get to keep a few dependencies, or bargain with the process.
In most cases, it’s the imbalanced ego that motivates the journey towards inner wholeness, when it’s tired of the suffering created by its imbalance or fears. The paradox is that the cost of coming to inner wholeness is the dissolution of the force of this imbalanced ego that started the search – it can come as a shock when this process really starts getting active in deconstructing this imbalanced ego force (what I also call the “negative ego”). This process is relentless until the negative ego is completely dissolved, without a shred being left off, and sometimes the intelligence of your life-stream will use some “aggressive” tactics (called fierce grace) to deconstruct some stubborn patterns of holding-on, however you can be rest-assured that your well-being is always taken care of and these tactics are just to dent the imbalanced ego structure. This process is not pleasant for the “negative ego” part present in you, however as long as you understand that your life-stream has the intelligence to take care of your well-being, and is only working to bring you to a place of total alignment, you will not buy into the “tantrums” thrown by the negative ego as it dissolves. There is a very strong presence of grace (life’s intelligence) that operates during this process which becomes highly evident to you soon enough.
The destruction of dependencies
The negative ego is a lack based force that’s highly insecure and hence clings to several dependencies for a sense of pseudo-security. These dependencies eventually become shackles that don’t allow a free movement of intelligence within you. You are no longer in the flow of your life-stream’s intelligence, rather you start compromising, constantly, by buying into the negative ego’s fear-based projections and perceptions. This lack of “flow” in your life is crippling to your being which is always, naturally, inclined towards evolution or growth – you can’t change this nature in your being, or life-force, to be constantly growth-oriented. Soon the pressure of resistance, created by the negative ego, is at loggerheads with the pull of your life-stream towards growth (and this can be a very painful state of being due to the immense conflict/opposition in your energy), and this state of inner conflict creates a very strong negative vibe in you that attracts struggle. Eventually, you get tired of this struggle and are finally willing to give up your resistance, sometimes purely out of exhaustion, and thus allow the pull of your life-stream to take over. A better place would be to “consciously” let go of your resistance and allow yourself to merge with the natural pull of your being/life-force, which would take you towards inner wholeness and towards your natural expression (rooted in constant growth and evolution).
A hallmark of this process working in your life is the dissolution of factors of dependency. Any reality in your life that’s rooted in a sense of fear-based, or lack-based, dependency is eventually brought to a dissolution to allow for the creation of a new reality that’s based out of inner freedom and wholeness. In any case, the dependencies never felt good to you, you were just clinging to them out of fear, or from your sense of lack, so even if you fret this process during this “dissolution phase” you will inevitably be grateful for the inner independence that you finally come to. True abundance is this state of inner independence, it’s your natural state of being, and you always know when you inhabit this state of being. Dependencies make you powerless, they cause you to resist your natural expression, they make you work against your integrity, they force you to compromise on your truth and hence sap your spirit at many levels – I am not talking about symbiotic dependencies required for your functioning/survival (like depending on your milk-man to bring you milk), I am talking about psychological dependencies created from a place of fear/lack.
One of the core dependencies that is destroyed is your dependency on the negative ego’s perspective. This dependency is at the root cause of fueling the momentum of the negative ego in the first place – or quite simply what I call the momentum of negativity in the mind. You can read this post – Dissolving the negative ego – for insights on how the state of conscious allowing (allowing without identification) causes the release of the momentum of this ego force. The post – Reaching a state of total allowing – deals with how one becomes open to this process by consciously moving into a state of allowing by connecting with your space of being. All that’s needed for the deconstruction of the negative ego is that you become open, in your being, to allow your life-stream’s intelligence to start working – you do that by consciously letting go of being identified with the negative ego, and thus not protecting its presence in you, allowing it to be deconstructed.
The price of inner freedom
The way life functions is that you need to surrender an old reality in order to allow a new reality – you have to make a conscious choice at some point. The price of coming to state of inner freedom is to let go of all forms of psychological dependencies arising from your insecurities – you don’t have to work at letting go of these dependencies, that will be taken care of by your life-force, all you need to do is be open to this dissolution as it happens. By being “open” I mean don’t panic, don’t get worried, don’t get anxious, don’t try to protect the negative ego, don’t try to hold on to a dependency (you can’t bargain with this process, it’s a 100% dissolution), and just trust in the intelligence of your life-stream instead of buying into the fear-based projections of your mind. The mind can create imaginations about becoming dysfunctional, and you can either buy into its fear and start trying to “hold on” again, or you keep staying true to the process by staying totally open in your being to see how it unfolds. Well-being will always be dominant when you are surrendered to this process, the only purpose of this process is to bring you to a place of inner independence so that you are no longer rooted in resistance, or imbalance, thus being aligned with the flow your life-stream’s intelligence.
This process has nothing to do with pampering the negative ego in any way, it’s about aligning you with your life-stream’s natural pull, towards your evolution as a “soul”, towards the growth path that you desire as a soul/being (stream of consciousness) to break out of unconscious/deluded living. When I say that this process will root you in a state of well-being, I am not trying to give an assurance to the fear-based ego, rather I am just stating a simple truth that your natural state of being is always felt as a state of inner abundance which reflects as well-being. You can’t know what your expression will be in the state of inner independence/wholeness, you can just know that it will be rooted in living from your true nature of fearless evolution, growth, wisdom, oneness and balance. The only reason to venture on this journey is when you feel that it’s your inner calling to stay true to this process of coming to a place of inner freedom and finding your natural state of being, any other deluded motivations coming from the negative ego will soon be disillusioned.
From a place of inner independence you will obviously have a non-dramatic, smooth and “quality” experience of physicality, but more importantly it allows your “being” to be free of the shackles of fear-based living/perception – it’s an “inner experience” of being free, that’s what true abundance is. Conceptual understandings don’t bring you to a place of inner freedom, the understandings are meant to be used to let go into the process of dissolution of the negative ego (which is a very physical process in many ways), and it’s an undertaking that requires your choice of not protecting the negative ego as it dissolves in force until it’s no longer a force in you – remember that you’ve been identified with the negative ego for a long time (may be lifetimes) and hence it takes time to let go of this identification (and it happens in layers); it can feel like a death of a part of you, like letting go of a strong addiction. It’s also a question of attitude, of connecting with your courage, it’s not about constantly seeking assurance, or reiterating that you feel “powerless” against the negative ego, you have to develop the willingness to let go of it, it’s your choice eventually – these pointers can be used as a sword, but you need to wield it.
hey sen, I agree with you that I sometimes fall into the trap of the pointer of being free. Do you suggest even letting go of that also. Great articles and thank you for your responses.
Elmir, the pointer of “inner freedom” is simply a sign post towards giving you an indication of the reason for letting go of the resistances, you don’t have to hold on to the pointer, you just need to get a sense of recognition of this possibility of being free. When you are “totally allowing’ you are not looking for freedom “from” anything, you have the freedom “to” allow anything.
Beautiful! I have been in the process you describe for aprox. 2.5 years, and have recently been described (by someone who knows me very well, I believe) as “… adrift, but within a context of being present and grounded.” I love that! I hadn’t thought of “adrift” as “allowing” until I read this post of yours. I can see now that there is more than one way to understand this word. Yes, it can mean “rudderless” as I believe my friend meant it (and I’m fine with), but it can also mean “allowing” life’s stream to turn me into its flow rather than paddling upstream as hard as I can, exhausting myself and getting nowhere in the process.
I know for myself, and maybe for a lot of us, it can be a specific event (or series of events) in our lives that precipitate the “breaking open” of our egos. It may be a loss of some kind (often the ending of a relationship, or the grief of mourning), but could also be the increasingly nagging sense that we’re not living our lives authentically, independently, creatively. There is then a window of time, during which we have the opportunity to change course. Maybe most of us try to push these feelings away – either with denial in the form of becoming as busy as we can, or with avoidance in the form of (pick one or more from an endless list) alcohol or drugs, food, television, career, relationships or “love” addiction (ie “focusing on the other rather than feeling)… All of this can serve to lull is back into business as usual.
I agree with you so much, that this process can take awhile. In my own experience, it has included low and high points. But being described as (and FEELING) “adrift, but present and grounded…” is as good as I’ve ever had it… and, for me, it’s a sure sign that I’m on my way to a good place… to my self.
Nice post, Sen!
~ 8090
Hey Sen, beautiful post. I’ve read in alot of your posts the term ‘Life-Stream’, what is the life-stream?
NJ, it’s simply the “non-physical” space of life which is focused on your “physical” body. It’s the non-physical intelligence that created all this physicality to start with.
I hurt so much when I wrote this. Some days I still do although I know that acceptance will allow me to move forward for peace will come.
The Child in Darkness
Stop, this moment has been chosen
Forgive yourself
Love yourself
As part of the universe you have that right
Indeed the world is full of trickery
Do not allow this to be contained within you
Open your soul to the beauty that is forever intertwined within our world
Peace is asking for you
Life is asking for you
Energy wants you back
Difficulty and Sorrow want to keep you, to them say farewell. Thank you for the lessons
Strength has found its home safe within you
With this worlds wrongs and broken dreams
It is still a beautiful world
sen how does one make the jump from being joy oriented to love/wholeness oriented. What is the main hindrance to this evolution?
Abet, the “ego-force” is the hindrance, always. You can read about it in this post – identifying your ego-force
In phase 3, why does it feel like the negatives of the mind have a greater pull on you when you are tired? I wonder why I feel this way.
Andersson, it’s not that they have a greater pull, it’s just that your state of “allowing” causes the release to happen at a higher intensity. Being “tired” is also a state of allowing where you are not trying to control the mind and hence a release can happen. When your mind momentum dwindles away, you will not sense such a strong pull – for now, you need to allow this momentum to have a full flow in you, in a state of allowing, without trying to suppress or control it.
My experience with detachment is very much the way in which you describe it. Rather than an attitude or a state of mind it is more like a non-state which is free of any attitudes or mental positions. Detachment is this silent space where the mind is no longer infatuated with its own dialogues. The dialogues still happen somewhere in the background but they are given little importance.
I once shared the common misconception that most people seem to have about detachment being this cold state of indifference towards the world, lacking in feeling or compassion. Strangely its quite the opposite. From detachment emerges a deeper sense of compassion that is concerned only with reality and not the content. Just like a parent watches the children fondly at a playground without taking their playground politics seriously.
To me detachment is more akin in meaning to the word ‘natural’. Everywhere I look in nature detachment is the single guiding principle that unites us all. Attachment exists only in our imaginations. It is a fire whose fuel is fear.
I enjoy reading your posts Sen. When Truth speaks, it echoes for an eternity…
Nice description of detachment!
Shiv, thanks for sharing your insight
sen why this slow pace in between articles? you used to come out with a new one almost every day
abet: allow, let go, and trust. . .
Abet, no real reason, I just write when there is an inspiration to write
Why am I not aware of the silence in my mind? I feel once I spot it, I have to think about it. Sen, you mentioned your outter world resembles your inner world with that being said how does inner allowing effect your outter world? For me I kind of feel careless things that mattered before has little importance.
Elmir, there is no silence in the mind, the mind is the space of thoughts. Silence/peace is in the space of being, the background in which the mind operates. You need to find a balance between both, the mind and the space of being – it’s not about clinging to the space of silence and it’s not about being lost in the mind, it’s about a balance between the two. You can read this post for more insight – the space of being
Hi Sen, the very basic essence of life is trust ..all that i remember, i have learned.. everything till now is based on trust .. .. even this process..this journey …my commitment towards it.. every single moment was based on trust.. its becasues of immense trust I allowed myself to move beyond my limits.. but now i realize this is a ” mercy-less process” where every thing will be ultimately wiped off.. all our dependencies which are derivative of trust is set out to burn. .even though i have an understanding that: this could just be treachery played to trick down is also not helping out. Sen, what is beyond trust? again a point where in i just want to hold on for a while…
i can see that too, but too go through is more painful .. …. may be because i have not seen life beyond trust.. … feels like i am tracing a very narrow path… …. feels like i am gambling all my values and virtues for so called “inner freedom”.
Trust, the logic of “trust” is inherently flawed – if someone is truly good they will be good whether you trust them or not, if someone is truly bad they will be bad whether you trust them or not. Your “trust” does not change the nature of the thing you trust. At the most your trust can give you a sense of security, but such a sense of security is always resting on shaky grounds. So if life is a stream of well-being, it will remain so whether you trust it or not, and if life is not a stream of well-being it will remain so irrespective of whether you trust it or not. So in that sense trust just seems like an added imposition that happens from a fear-based place of not wanting to see reality as it is. As you can see in yourself, the moment your trust is shaken you fall into fear, and that’s what I mean by standing on shaky grounds.
The logic of total inner freedom is simple, it’s a state that’s not dependent on “anything” for its sense of wholeness. When your security comes from “trust”, it’s still on shaky ground because then you will constantly try to defend your trust and would be afraid of anyone who looks to take away what you trust. You can notice how people react in many emotionally imbalanced ways when their trust/faith is shaken down, in fact many wars (religious and otherwise) are found in the name of defending one’s belief/trust – underlying trust is the mindset of “wanting to believe” or “wanting to hold on to something”. You may notice the vibe of fear in your words, and this fear was always there it was just masked for a while in the temporary security of holding to a “trust”. The path towards total inner freedom is challenging because it requires you to let go of anything that you hold as a crutch for your sense of wholeness/security – that’s the simple logic. I “know” the well-being inherent to life because I’ve observed it scientifically that very nature of life is to move towards balance, but to “observe” life (and find its truth) I had to be open to seeing it as it was instead of wanting to see it the way I wanted to. When you try to trust something/someone you are indirectly wanting to see them as you want to see them rather than seeing them as they are. Once you see life as it is, why would you want to hold on to “trust”, you would just have a clear knowing.
You may want to let go of the tendencies towards “dramatic thinking”, and see that simplicity of inner freedom where you simply let go of the burden of a crutch. To live from a place where you don’t have to depend on your “trust” is freeing, you are open to life as it is and in this in openness you see its nature as it is, and what you will notice is that well-being is inherent to its nature (or your nature).
It’s really amazing, I still can find new layers of meanings in your writings even after re-reading them several times, as my process of allowing goes deeper. Till the last week, I had a relatively smooth experience of a constant but slow release. For the last few days, my release got quite intense and I experienced what you called negative ego in its full force trying to stick, a life sucking mite. I also allowed my hatred towards it, but I don’t buy it tricks thanks to your articles, which helped me a quite deal while I travelled through this tunnel of fears. As my life force dissolves this negative ego, it fights like a hell leaving me very fatigued and heavy right now, but I feel my being is expanded enough to allow this heaviness and uncomfortable feelings in my back, stomach & heart area, so I hang in there while it goes through me. Thanks to you, I know that it will also pass, leaving me liberated from my fears. Thanks again.
Hi,
I do agree with you, each time we read there are layers of new meaning in Sen’s writing.
This article resonates soo much with what I have experienced in last 8 months.. very true.. all the clutches & also the object’s of my desire in my mind .. what ever i have tried to hold are loosing there grip .. and as the objects of desire are dropping down( from mind into being ) by “SEEING it as it is ” there is release of lot of energy and free space .. but its really scary to enter this unknown space.. it requires complete authenticity to enter the free space.. but .. I still i keep looking for ..even the last most option to hold back.. even though for a small period ..though i know its not true.. because i am really exhausted,.. .. i feel i am almost there… but still there is something holding back.. .. pls. help..
Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free. – Jim Morrison
Hi Sen , When you say ” You can’t know what your expression will be in the state of inner independence/wholeness, you can just know that it will be rooted in living from your true nature of fearless evolution, growth, wisdom, oneness and balance” … i understand what you mean.. though i can sense the space expanding in me.. but it feels very scary for me to step into the whole space …i fear i may end up hurting people around me … for i have lived in self denial most of the time ..and all suppressed energy is now coming to the surface.. I allow it but during this allowing i am scared that i would actually hurt, some times become very violent to people around me( unreasonably) .. so most of the time i just “kill my time” in allowing ..rather that living from the space of being that is expanding in me.. actually i feel very uncertain to act from the space of being … how can it be that : there is soo much space available ..and still fear aspect of the mind is holding me from allowing me to enter in the space that is available with in me…
I’d like to thank you again for the conversation I had with you on the weekend, Sen, I’ve seem to grown a fair bit in my understanding. I don’t go looking for assurances or answers to every question that I have, as I’ve now realized that doing that is based in fear of doing something wrong or getting wrapped up in the mind’s worries.
I’m not going to ask questions, just post statements.
In the past couple days, I’ve been a sack (even more of one than usual) just wanting to be alone or inebriated, although I still don’t try and escape whatever I’m feeling. A bad mood came up when I got up today, but it flared into a pissed off mood for about 20 minutes. My body felt it, my body language shifted accordingly, and my voice went all bitter. I still had that window of inner observation while in it, so I wasn’t lost in it.
One of the friends who I thought had gone away during this reality dissolution seems to want to reconnect. The “me” of a few weeks ago would’ve questioned why this was happening, but I’m quite open to it, as the general thought is “He’s either changed his attitude towards this friendship or there’s something left to bring to light in me”. Whether or not he sticks around is not something I really care about.
I view BrainEv differently now too, it’s just a tool to aid in the release, I no longer look at it as some sort of savior.
Finally, the thoughts of lack, loss, and inferiority are coming up hard. It’s pretty difficult to just stay allowing of them, because they bring up a lot of negative emotions, mainly anger, to the tune of “This person does this and that and I’m stuck in this release, I want to have this and do that right now”. It seems hard to imagine being free of all of this because of where I’m at now, I guess because I’m in the painful part of this. Oh well, I suppose.
I don’t have any questions to be answered, as my understanding now is that constantly needing assurance means that I’m afraid of the fears/questions that arise, but if there’s anything in here Sen or anyone else would like to comment on, that would be cool.