Morning Sitting

I am fragmented; all in pieces.  It's so noisy inside.  What's my head, my emotions, my sensations are in chaos, jumbled.  Everything is racing as if there's some emergency.  Just getting enough quiet space inside to even begin to get a sense of myself in the present time and space is an effort.  Yet, I'm able, to some degree to let this be and try to watch.  So much going on and none of it seeming to go anywhere.  I do what I can to practice, to make the effort, losing my place, forgetting where I started, where I left off.

T T T

I was given a book, in passing, actually, because I'd been seen to be interested in a type of interest.  It was the beginning, in a sense.  In fact, I'd been searching for a long, long time.  I'd explored many philosophies, many practices.  But, this book pointed to something I'd been looking for, something I'd hoped for.

I'm lazy.  I dream of great possibilities.  I've been blessed with a decent intellect and excellent health.  I've been fortunate, in life, in having been able to accomplish a few things without a lot of effort.  I've been with this "study", this practice, this way - on and off - for a long time.  Admittedly, more off than on.

I read other things from time to time.  I hear people speaking of other paths, other practices, from time to time.  I can't imagine, or entertain the idea of, trying something else.  I haven't even really begun this yet.  I'm just beginning to put my toe in the water with this.  My efforts are small, my attention weak.  There's no point in looking elsewhere when I've barely begun this.  This is what some part of me, central to who I am,needs.              

Appreciating Others

I read 2 quotes today that touched me:

“Pierre's insanity consisted in the fact that he did not wait, as before, for personal reasons, which he called people's merits, in order to love them, but love overflowed his heart, and loving people without reason, he discovered the unquestionable reasons for which it was worth loving them.”

― Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

"Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don’t." – Bill Nye, the Science Guy.

If I were only that insane.  If only I could remember that.

Instead, I'm a very critical, impatient, judgmental person.  I have a strong ego.  I find fault.

And, yet, I know that what Bill Nye said is true because I've seen it, over and over.

But, how to love someone who wants to control you, wants to prevent you from what you want?  How to love someone who wants to cheat you?  How to love someone who wants to hurt you?  How to love someone who's world view is nearly opposite yours?

Ego

Sitting was difficult this morning; not an unusual occurrence.  I watched a series of Is pass through, quickly, as I tried to maintain some attention on the exercise; not very successfully.

I usually forget, when I'm speaking, when I'm thinking, in every situation that I have any attention at all, that it's only 1 single I that's present.  Whoever is present, at any given moment, I think of as I.  But, occasionally, this morning, it's clear that it's just a tiny fragment.  Who is it?

Later, I read several things online that reminded me of my own professional egoism.  I felt an intense reaction of distaste before remembering my own egoism in similar situations to those described.  

Outside of securing the necessities of life:  food, shelter - most of our activity, attention and energy seems to be spent satisfying the insatiable craving of the ego.  What is there that can give some balance to that?

How to Work?

My attention was/is muddy this morning.  I don't know how to Work.  Between those rare gifts of clear, bright Presence and my usual state of complete sleep there seems to be an expanse of degrees of attention.  

Clearly there is some desire for a High, an Altered State of Consciousness but I can't Do that.  I can't make that happen.  I've been there but - is that desire...?  

And, so, to the morning Work.  What's there?  Who's there?  

Is it possible to be in a meandering daydream, memory, and still have sensation of my body?  Who's daydreaming?  Who's aware of my body?

What is Work?

What calls me?

Sitting was difficult this morning.  I never know why.  To sit and be present, in my body, where I'm sitting, would seem such an easy thing.  Not this morning.  I was immediately off - so many places, doing so many things, planning so many things, working things out, in my head, in my imagination.  And, then I'm back.  It's something I haven't seen clearly.  What brings me back?

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I do want to say that I don't find lead meditation as useful or as interesting as this.  To have someone lead me through a similar process seems to me to appeal to a part of me that isn't necessarily interested in seeing what's actually going on.  I have my own Work.  I need to see what's actually happening; what's actually at work.