Just now I watched a lecture given by a Taiwanese spiritual teacher. I had viewed it back in 2018, but because her words always comforted me, I decided to view it again, to see if there was any wisdom that I had forgotten.
Her lecture usually started with comments and stories from participants. In that lecture I viewed, a woman said that she consulted a guru about taking her child to the US, and the guru said not to travel together with the child, lest something bad would happen. Hence the woman asked the teacher about this, to help her decide whether to travel together or separately.
The teacher’s response was not about traveling. That’s not the point. The point was, what had attracted the woman to consult the guru in the first place. Or to put it another, how did she attract the guru in the first place?
This point coincided with what I realized upon waking up yesterday. I realized that I attracted the comments of my friends Beth and Patricia to push me to walk away from my relationship with the guy upstairs, because of my insecurities. First there was my insecurity, then I allowed it to multiply or dramatize itself, which opened me up to the inputs of my friends.
Second comment that the teacher made was not to focus on whether the woman should travel with or without her child. The point was never A or B, up or down, left or right. When we turn our attention outward, we tend to focus on doing the right thing, like getting the right job, having the right marriage, etc. The point is to experience us, to see our true selves, to know ourselves, to discover our essence, etc.
Again, this coincided with what I have been discovering. Although my friends Beth and Patricia strongly advised me to walk away from that relationship, and I agreed with their arguments because they were logical, and even the dating book by Ellen Fein and Sherrie Schneider started to make sense though I would qualify it at a fundamental level, somehow deep down inside, I am still struggling to go down the right path that everyone so strongly suggested. Because by going down my own path—not listening to anyone and keeping my relationship with the guy upstairs—I am discovering more and more about myself, coming to terms with everything (bad) about me, and accepting them. I feel that there is more value to me in going down my own path, though it’s a really unorthodox and tumultuous path! But then, I don’t need to align myself with everyone else, I don’t need to align the nature of my relationship with everyone else’s. What is there to align with? One friend ended up in a divorce and several relationships that didn’t work out and now alone. The other friend has been with a married man with no concrete schedule to being single and only empty promises, yet she’s afraid to reveal the details to her other friends for fear of their disapproval. This is not to criticize or disapprove of them, but to emphasize the point that there is no perfect relationship, yet I have been instructed to have one. Makes sense?
So the Taiwanese teacher wanted to redirect the woman’s attention back into herself, to see the emotions and thoughts and whatever else were activated when she chose a path that she wanted to go on. Instead of following an external opinion, seek within herself. Put her power back into herself, instead of allowing someone else to choose her path for her. The down side of disempowerment is that no matter what others tell you to do, eventually you are the one who has to take responsibility for their advice. So might as well listen to yourself, and believe in yourself!
One thing that the teacher said that I found really helpful was to observe, accept, and experience the fear that propels us to act. When we feel and acknowledge our fear, stay in it, and do whatever we have to do while being immersed in it. Experience the totality of our fear.
I don’t think I can do that. I am very averse to my fears. So I have a lot of resistance, restraint, coping mechanisms, etc.
There’s another point by the teacher that I don’t understand. She said by observing the fear within, we get to see deeper, and discover the power and trust in our existence. Then we can stand firmly in our power, to make our decision from there, and trust our decision.
What we need to align with, is not any external standards or advice, but our life’s essence, our vibration, our pace and rhythm. We walk our own paths. If we feel fears, then walk with our fears, move forward with our fears. The point is to experience ourselves with our fears. By doing so, we get to learn what exactly we need to know. This is the path of our life, as this is the only way to see the lesson and purpose of the fears.
I randomly clicked on that lecture to watch, but now I wonder if the universe had a message for me … I have been working on my wound of emotional neglect, again, and finding another guy won’t heal that wound, so does that mean I don’t have to meet L tomorrow?
To be continued …
