JOURNEY

What I write is nothing new. It's been written countless times before, in as many ways. Each way is a reflection of the writer's journey. I can only give an account of my journey, and whether or not that is of use to another, 'it is what it is.'
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How long that phrase has been applied, or in what ways, I do not know. I've known the phrase for some time, and given mental assent, but not until this week have felt its potency and effect.

It seems all troubles have their playing field in the mind. That is not to dismiss pain by saying, 'It's all in the mind.'

Rather, the troubles a person experiences (me included) would not exist if they did not play in the mind.

I might still feel pain, but it would simply be, without agitation, and pain would not be a problem.

I know this to be true, and am bold to say it, but still timid about putting it into practice, as the habits of the mind still argue. There has to be a turning point.

Some (me included) have suppressed pain, physical and emotional, to not feel it. From experience I'd say that suppression is not a sustainable solution. Besides, it hinders all choices for living freely.

When 'It is what it is' moves from mental assent to deep feeling, there is a shift in reality from agitation of the mind to peace and stillness. As metaphor, it is like moving from the storm to its calm eye.

From that place of quiet, my experience of life becomes smoother and more effortless, and there is a natural flow with the energy of love for love itself.

The calm lasts only so long as 'It is what it is' remains pre-dominant. When the mind is allowed to play again, with its endless comments of anxiety, judgment, and opinion, the troubles return.

Well, ending anxiety, judgment, and opinion would end nearly all of social media, wouldn't it? It would, unless that were replaced with calm observations and shared experiences.

'It is what it is' reveals a greater Self, the deep of consciousness, the Lord I am, to which we all (me included) belong.

By shifting my awareness from its mental playing field to the magnificent empty canvas of the greater Self, I come, as it were, through the veil and into the Holy of Holies within the heart space. The 'Within the Veil' meditation assists.

There is no wiggle room for the mind on an empty canvas that likes to remain empty. Most of what is considered normal mental activity, such as wanting things a certain way, becomes at cross purposes. To abide with the divine, the only course is to let it go.

I do not claim to have mastered this step (or would forever dwell in the divine presence, even while in the body). But I see before me a vista that is beautiful to behold.

​Universe May Be Conscious

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog (German: Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer), also known as Wanderer above the Mist or Mountaineer in a Misty Landscape, is an oil painting c. 1818 by the German Romantic artist Caspar David Friedrich.

... In Caspar David Friedrich’s iconic Wanderer above the Sea of Fog (ca. 1818), a man wearing a dark green overcoat and boots overlooks a cloudy landscape, steadying himself with a cane. Mounted on a dark, craggy rock face, the figure stands at the center of distant, converging planes. Art historian Joseph Koerner, a professor at Harvard University, notes that the midpoint of the painting rests at the man’s chest. “The heart is the center of the universe,” he says.
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​....In 1808, Friedrich courted controversy when he completed one such landscape, Cross in the Mountains (1807–08), which he painted as an altarpiece. Featuring the crucifixion at the top of a mountain, with three beams of light reaching into the moody, high-contrast sky, the work posits that nature—which takes up more of the frame than Christ himself—was itself divine....

​From the article, 'Unraveling the Mysteries behind Caspar David Friedrich’s 'Wanderer''.

The images below were collected from the internet this week.