Yesterday I sat by the turquoise sea and watched the clear waves fold over by the shore. The rhythmic woosh of the water filled my ears, along with chattering and playing.
It should have been an idyllic moment. It was for a few seconds – absolute bliss. Then, suddenly, a state of uneasiness came over me and I wanted to leave.
I recognized the state and stayed put. Accepting that I had no control over my feelings, I sat firm in my uneasiness.
You see, it doesn’t matter where you are, who you’re with or what you’re doing. If the mind is uneasy, your reality is uneasy.
If you react to uneasiness by leaping up out of desperation (as I have often done), then you don’t allow the mind to settle naturally – as it always will when you don’t make it into such a big thing.
That doesn’t mean it’s never appropriate to run away at full speed without looking back. Sometimes you can just feel in your body that it’s absolutely the best option.
The issue is when it becomes a habit, as external changes are never more than a temporary drug for the soul.
You can spend your whole life running, but all you’ll ever need is right here in the only life that exists. Now.
I have experienced staggering shifts in consciousness in a matter of instants, where one reality has suddenly looked radically different. Like if you wet a painting until the colours merge together into new, unrecognizable shapes…
But, when I fall down the trap of trying to analyse why I feel like I do, and what I can do to make myself feel better, I reinforce the painting that’s already there and those shifts tend to elude me.
It’s also difficult to make creative and healthy changes when you’re entirely focused on something that’s already been created.
Making external changes is part of the adventure of life.
Yet, the totality of your reality is always created and experienced on the inside.
That’s just how it works.