Letting Go of the Mask 3

Last time, (see Letting Go of the Mask 2), we looked at one way of practicing meditation, as one of the that tools we need, to help us find our way back to the way God made us, before the world stepped all over our grace.

Prior to that, (see Letting Go of the Mask), we looked at how we need to be willing to bend to God’s will as well. The next tool we will examine, is a combination of ‘steadfast awareness and inquisitiveness.’

You were born an image of God. Then you became ‘worldly conditioned.’ In that conditioning, you attached meanings to events that were hazardous to your health. It’s not your fault. It was a meticulous assault, directed by the devil himself (see Revealing the Hurt). Everyone else’s souls were manipulated with the same poison.

However, it is your total responsibility to uncover what happened, what the nature of reality really is, and to determine how it is possible to return to your Creator – essentially, unfettering yourself:

Definitions change as knowledge increases. Carlos Castaneda

Everything about how your life has been lived, and who has been in charge, must come under acute scrutiny. In that process, you will deconstruct your false self: setting yourself free from your old opinions, turning off your autopilot, and take the helm of your life’s direction.

What it is not, is a one-on-one battle to try to silence that critic in your head. It doesn’t know how to be neutral. Ego is hard-wired to be on the attack, because its very survival is contingent upon you being dependent upon it. It hates you, because you are necessary as a ‘host’ for its parasitism.

However, it can be neutralized with the power of truth. For example, it might accuse you of being stupid. Instead of kowtowing, ask your heart (not your head), ‘Is that really true?’ Your heart will answer, ‘No;’ and your heart never lies.

Focus on what happens to you physically and emotionally, when you have lived in agreement with the lies fluttering about in your head. Respond to that apparition, saying, ‘I’m far better than that.’

The voice in your head will hiccup in disbelief.

Ask yourself, ‘What would my life be like, what would I be like, if I didn’t believe this lie?’ ‘What would happen if I instead focused upon the wonder of how God made me?’

Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous – how well I know it. Ps. 139:14 NLT.

The voice gulps.

Commit to being kind and loving with yourself every time that inner critic barks. Do something that you don’t think you deserve, e.g. be still with yourself for 30 minutes, take a walk on the beach, get yourself a root beer float.

Let’s say ego tells you not to go to a party that you’ve been invited to, because, it says, the people will make fun of you because you’re such a geek. Moreover, it appears to be empathetic towards you, saying it knows just how you feel; and then suggests that you reach for that bottle of wine in the kitchen, to make yourself feel better.

What if you said to yourself, ‘Who says I’m a geek? It’s just that old lying ghost in my head. I don’t need a judge in my life anymore. It only brings me grief. I’m not every believing anything it ever says again.’ And, you go to the party!

Ego moans.

However, what if you gave in to the voice? It will definitely berate you the following morning about your drunkenness – that same behavior it suggested you indulge in.

Instead of offering your backside to be scourged, what if you responded with, ‘Yes, I did something that was not in my best interest. I’m going to forgive myself for my unconscious behavior and act differently for my greater good?’

The voice begins to dissipate…

You see how much more powerful it is when you exhort yourself, give yourself another chance, and hold out for love and hope?

That can only happen when you stop judging, hating and punishing yourself. Instead, continue to ask powerful questions to help dethrone that mental tyrant.

For example, ‘Can I allow myself to decide that I’ve been punished enough?’ Could I let go of wanting to punish myself? Will I let it go? Wouldn’t I rather be free? Can I stop from planning any more punishment against myself in the future? Could I let these feelings go? When will I do these things? Is there any reason that moment can’t be right now?’

Questions are powerful! That voice in your head cannot stand up to honest inquiry; nor can it conquer love. If it says that you have a monster inside of you, tell that villain to show it to you. It can’t, because the monster doesn’t exist – it never did.

Everything your ego tells you is a lie. Whatever it says, answer with ‘Who cares?’ And shower yourself with the truth, a response opposite to the accusation. Always ask yourself, ‘What is real, true and important here?’

When you become aware of your old ways of being, and choose to do otherwise, (taking on God’s ways), you will have real freedom…

And a great road will go through that once deserted land. It will be named the Highway of Holiness. Evil-minded people will never travel on it. It will be only for those who walk in God’s ways; fools will never walk there. Is. 35:8 NLT

So you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then. 1 Pt. 1:14 NLT

The final tool we must utilize to get our lives back, is ‘action.’

‘Transforming moments’ consist of revelations (ah-ha moments of truth) that can literally change your life. However, they can only do so, if you implement them. You cannot wish your problems away. You must reach out to God and challenge your inner adversary. He will move on your behalf, but you must act first.

When you do that, it opens the way for you to create something new – a life that you want, by putting your faith in your God-sent transformation moments and acting upon them. You must participate in getting back the life that you were meant to have.

You have a personal responsibility to get right with God.

Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body. 1 Cor. 6:19, 20. NLT.

Because you are God’s house, He holds you ultimately responsible for the state that it’s in. If you allow or facilitate it to dilapidate, you are forcing that dilapidation onto Christ, mocking His sacrifice for you. You must clean God’s house, which includes disinfecting your thoughts, because the mind can pollute the body:

“For from the heart come evil thoughts…” Mt. 15:19 NLT.

So, let’s do this! Let’s bring all our tools to bear, to root out all the elements of our past that we’ve created, embellished and latched onto; and free ourselves from who we are not. We begin by sleuthing through the muck or our nebulous, ego-assisted constructs – wherever they may lie, and whatever they may be.

They may lie within the realm of what we think we know, (i.e. our Life Story), or in the dominion of the things we know that we don’t know, (things we could have sought after to create a better life, but didn’t, because we were too attached to our false beliefs), or within the sphere of what we don’t know that we don’t know, (those things that can only be perceived through conscious awareness).

We are on a quest to eradicate our misery and suffering, which can only be accomplished if we discover how we first built our prison, and the reasons why we felt that we had to. Then, we can understand the extent of what it has cost us, so that we can be motivated to tear it down. That way, we become the conscious cause of how our lives are turning out, rather than being at the effect of our unconscious actions.

Yes, we’re talking about change, and change is work; but the alternative is to keep living lives of suffering that have a propensity for an early and final death. Or, our lives can become living paths to joy, peace and love, when we return to the perfection that Christ sacrificed His life for.

So, let’s take a leap of faith and leave our assumptions behind, as we search our inner and outer selves – always lathering love and compassion upon ourselves, no matter what we find…

STEP ONE: THE VOICE JOURNAL

Get yourself a journal and keep it with you for one week. Pray for clear-cut discernment every morning as you begin your quest. During this time, write down everything that that voice says. How do you know when it speaks? It will consist of every thought that doesn’t exhort, exalt or love you.

In addition, write down what you were doing at each moment the critic assaulted you, a description of the environment you were in, what you told yourself, how you reacted, and how you felt about it.

At the end of the week, read your entire journal; and you will have a crystal-clear picture of how your relationship with that devil in your head operates. I can assure you that there is nothing redeeming about it, and you will be extremely motivated to get this thing out of your life.

LISTEN UP! HAVEN’T YOU HAD ENOUGH? DO THIS THING. IT’S FOR YOU. YOUR LIFE IS AT STAKE. YOU MUST BECOME AN ACTIVE PARTICIPANT IN THIS WORK, OR YOU WILL REMAIN TRAPPED IN THE PUTRIDITY OF YOUR UNCONSCIOUSNESS.

We will discuss your revelations next week…

Goodnight and God bless.

Letting Go of the Mask 2

Last time, (see Letting Go of the Mask), we began to examine a path for freeing us from the way that life has indoctrinated / traumatized us into reacting to it, with patterns of unconscious knee-jerk reactions, instead of living full-out as God intended.

We also discussed some of the vital tools that we need, to bring us success in our venture to return to our real self. We looked at the necessity of having willingness to follow Jehovah’s guidance and introduced ourselves to the concept of meditation as well. Today, we will examine one simple way to meditate.

Get yourself a silent timer that plays a pleasant tone (like a bell or a gong) at preset intervals. These sounds offer a gentle reminder to stop chasing after your thoughts, (which you will do repeatedly when you first begin this practice) and return to just noticing what is presenting itself.

Find a quiet place, free from distractions like music, media devices, or other people. In the beginning, you will find yourself squirming, because it will be uncomfortable just being with yourself. So, if you feel that you absolutely need music, limit it to instrumentals only, so as to not fixate on lyrics.

Wear loose clothing and find a comfortable place to sit with your spine erect, and your eyes open. We are learning to stop resisting reality. When your eyes are closed, you tend to engage in useless mental chatter.

Speaking of that, be aware that that voice in your head will fight you every step of the way, because it knows the moment that you become truly conscious, it will become insignificant. Ego will use mental abuse, confusion, distraction and even sleep, to stop you from waking up. In the beginning, it will be successful. Don’t judge yourself for losing a round(s) to your old enemy. You will gather strength through Christ and prevail with practice.

The most important thing in this entire process it to be kind and compassionate to yourself!

Set your timer for one minute; and then add a minute a day, until you can mediate for one full hour. Repeat that hour daily, for the rest of your life. As a result, you will achieve better focus, concentration and awareness.

You will be more peaceful, happy and be able to live in the present moment, where all reality is lived. Thus, you can spend much more time on your God Channel.

Breathe slow and deep – in through the nose, out through the mouth, relaxing after each exhalation. This makes you an active participant and acts as your point of focus. Focusing on your breathing initiates the beginning of your awareness. It is one of your God-connections. You can’t stop breathing because God breathes you. It is a celebration of life.

As you sit still, staying with your breath, you may want to count them to help you focus, or, use guided imagery, e.g. ‘Breathing in, I accept life; breathing out, I release love.’

Meditation looks easy, but de-conditioning yourself an arduous (yet doable) task. Your ego will declare war – flooding you with your fears, parading your strategies to try to avoid life in front of you, and shame you for those ‘weaknesses.’

We lovingly notice, without making excuses. Instead, we consider what has been motivating our unworkable actions, and then look for the lies in the construction of those motivations. With recognition comes dissolution. All the while, we give ourselves love and compassion, without condemnation – knowing that just like everybody else, we have done our best to make our way in this world.

That voice in your head will tell you that meditation is stupid, and that it doesn’t work. It will also say that you’re stupid, and that this path is too hard. Ego will try to cajole you into returning to your distraction patterns, telling you that your life is fine just the way it is, (because it lives off of your suffering). It will tell you that you’re not meditating the right way, to keep you unconscious, inferring that you’ve failed again.

Ego want you ‘dead in the head.’ However, all you have to do is to kindly and lovingly acknowledge, that in this moment, you lost your concentration again; then let the thoughts go, and take the next breath. You refrain from beating yourself up for building a false mind, (your collection of masks). Everyone has some degree of a similar brainwash.

Everything that has worth, (peace, love and joy), is foreign to our false mind. The sacred things live in our spiritual space. When we gain awareness of our mind / spirit conflict, we can shift to the spirit and let our reactionary state go. Our quality of life is entirely dependent upon the quality of the relationship we have with ourselves and God.

Meditation is a way of bringing you back into spiritual alignment, by helping you shed more of the world’s influences. It reveals how you’ve been living your life and what that has cost you. In that aligning, you discover your highest and best path for pairing back up with your Creator.

If you’re putting off meditating, look to how you put off everything, and commit to stepping over that.

During meditation, if an old belief presents itself, examine it for its veracity. If it’s a lie, let it go, return to your breath until another one pops up, and rinse and repeat. You can’t overdose on truth. Peace comes with truth. If you experience stress and resistance, celebrate! It means you’re on the cusp of a good, healthy change.

You’re not trying to get something. Instead, you are learning how to live in the present moment. It’s the only place where you can commune with God.

Relax and let all your thoughts come, see them for what they are, and let them go. Instead of being afraid, be curious. Your thoughts are not you. They are illusions. Here’s something for you to ponder, ‘Who is thinking your thoughts? Who is watching them?’

If you quit meditating because you come up against something that you think you can’t handle, don’t judge yourself. Simply recommit. Each time that you meditate, step further into those thoughts and emotions that frighten you. With every crescendo, take a deep breath and discover the meanings that you’ve attached to those thoughts and to your associated physical reactions.Discover what made you think that they were true, and when you see they have no healthy purpose, let them go.

When you sit still with fear, it will dissipate. If you are squirming, you’re on the verge of discovering another way that you resist suffering. If you feel that you are reaching a ‘breaking point,’ realize that this process is not a punishment, and know that you are on the edge of a life-transforming revelation.

As you face that fear, let it wash over you instead of running from it; and your struggle will end.

Resistance is a force – showing up as confusion, self-criticism, self-sabotage, perfectionism, blaming, envy, busyness or procrastination. If this approach fails, (eventually, they all do), we judge ourselves for our failures. However, if we return to our meditation practice to discover our ‘resistance pattern,’ we can drop it and be open to whatever happens next.

The mind will lose its frenzied ways, taking on greater clarity, with which we can identify our habits and who we are trying to be when we try to hold our world together with unworkable beliefs. Simultaneously, we’ll discover the ways that we punish ourselves for falling short. We let them go, and have compassion for ourselves for thinking that these patterns would protect us.

There is nothing in your head that can really hurt you. It is the ignorance and denial about the nature of what you have unconsciously let live there, that brings pain. A thought is only an ephemeral wisp, an emotion just a form of energy.

When a thought arises, instead of letting it hook you by giving it importance, question it:

‘Who would I be without this thought?’ Replace it with a thought that loves you.

Meditation is not about eliminating your thoughts; the mind never ceases to think. It is about disarming them.

Then, we lavish forgiveness on ourselves for what we’ve ignorantly said or done to ourselves and or others. In addition, we stay on the hunt for any other covert ways we’ve used to hold tight to those unworkable beliefs and set them free.

Remember that you must implement the revelations you gain in meditation. When you shed that person that you thought you were, you can remodel your inner space to hold peace love and joy. Then, your outer world will reflect the same.

When we become open to every present moment, we can be part of the unfolding of life, accepting what is presented to us, without suffering, because we no longer make life, the events in it, or ourselves, wrong anymore.

We can give up having to know what happens next. We appreciate the gift of life and the contributions that we are here to make, spreading the love. That’s what living in the kingdom of God is all about. Stay tuned…

Goodnight and God bless.

Letting Go of the Mask

I kindly urge you to read the previous blogpost series entitled Revealing the Hurt, (see Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3), so that you can more clearly understand this continuation of our journey…

We are ready to learn how to get back to who God made us to be, to walk away from that false person inside who loathes themselves, lives in fear and walks alone. It is done by breaking the pattern that keeps drawing us back to our destruction.

As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his foolishness. Pr. 26:11 NLT

There is no problem with anyone who lives as their authentic self. It’s that mask that we hide behind, that we built to hide our imaginary flaws, which keeps us from living life in all its glory.

We cannot pause to take life in, because we’re too busy running from our past, and what we’ve made it mean. Ironically, we cannot heal, until we embrace those unworkable patterns that make up our unconscious behavior and acknowledge what we’ve been up to. We have been prisoners of our own thoughts.

In that prison, we fluctuate falling into two pits – one fraught with thoughts of inadequacy and loveless-ness, and the other burning with your desires for what you think you do not have.

Yet knowing that you suffer from an unavoidable condition, is by no means a reason to condemn yourself! You deserve compassion for having had to endure the unconscious cruelty that has been handed down to you. And so, does everyone else.

Everyone has that faultfinder in their head. It is modeled after, and moderated by, the devil himself. But those who love Jesus possess a vital edge:

Little children (believers, dear ones, you are of God and you belong to Him and have [already] overcome them [the agents of the antichrist]; because He who is in you is greater than he (Satan) who is in the world [of sinful mankind]. 1 Jn. 4:4 AMP

God has a good plan for you; and if you remove the gulf between you and Him, He will see that you gather the fruits of it. It doesn’t matter what you have thought or done. When you confess and repent, it’s a new game. Jehovah wipes the slate clean and undoes the damage that you wreaked in your ill-begotten state.

Yet God will not violate your free will. You must pray for His help; you need to choose the Light. Realize that if you could have fixed your problem(s), you would have done so by now. It’s just that you were knocked off your divine path as a child, and you need Him to get back on it.

What happens when you don’t? We’ve seen good Christians fall, even when they’re doing their best to be godly. Didn’t they have enough faith? I don’t think that is the answer in most cases.

First, many people mistakenly think that the devil takes a hike when you saddle up with God. Just the opposite! He double downs on his efforts to separate you from your Creator. It’s going to be up to you to not to listen to or act upon his suggestions.

Secondly, we swim in sea of humanity, whom for the most part, are godless – either by choice or through ignorance. It can break us down, back into the mire of our old ways. We aren’t even aware of it until our lives begin to crumble once more…

Still, we can always return to God and begin anew. Yet, what if we could greatly reduce our ‘backsliding,’ and thus, our valleys of suffering and spend most of our time on the peaks of life’s joys?

After 50 years of researching human behavior, I have amalgamated a particular pathway that works for me. In fact, it brought me back from the brink of death, and it continues to do so.

How does it work? We must become a detective to acutely investigate all of the sneaky ways the world tries to pull us down into its miserable muck. In addition, we apply that same process to uncover all of the games that we unconsciously play, to satiate the desires of the flesh.

It allows us to become hyper-aware of all those shenanigans and nip them in the bud when they first raise their ugly heads. It also reminds of to enlist the Holy Spirit to come back home – to reclaim our perfection through Christ.

You don’t have to understand that perfection, you only have to embrace it. You already possess all the attributes of His Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Gal. 5:22, 23.).

By getting out of your head and back into your heart, you will manifest these qualities; and then love, acceptance, and happiness will lose its elusiveness. Self-judgment will be a bygone practice, and you will attract that person who will share with you, your rediscovered joy.

This is the most important task that you will ever take on, because it is a matter of life or death – to either live in and by the light of God, or to remain in darkness and die by degrees.

Like any endeavor in life, you must possess the right tools. For this path of recovery, (in sequence of application), they are: willingness, God, meditation, steadfast awareness and inquisition, and action.

WILLINGNESS

No one can give you your life back. You must take it back; and you can only do that if you are willing. Jehovah will not work on your behalf unless you are willing to follow His lead.

That’s why it is so important to make sound decisions (in alignment with God), because in order to preserve your free will, your Creator must let the consequences of your free-will choices play out. Better to have your outcome to be favorable through intentional choices rather than have them based upon those you make unconsciously.

Finally, you must be willing to change your ways of being and doing in order to shed that unworkable life that you suffer through.

GOD

(You can’t call Jehovah a ‘tool,’ because He is the center of everything we need to live our highest and best life. But humor me, just for the sake of presentational syntax.)

Maybe you’re thinking, ‘I can change my life by myself.’ How’s that working for you? Clearly, for many people, it is not. We all need help to rise above the fearful chaos that was thrust upon us as a child and from the unique model that we morphed it into. Given that most people share in that all too common affliction, we must reach out to the only solution – the hand of God.

Jehovah is love. So, He is whom we must go to, to restore the love in our lives. When you return to Him, He covers you with His forgiveness, and no longer remembers your past thoughts and deeds (Is. 43:25). If God forgives you, who are you to not forgive yourself?

When you embrace the guidance of your Creator, that devil-inspired-and- encouraged voice in your head, will be reduced to an impotent squeak (Rm. 16:20). God will heal your wounds (Ps. 147:3) and place you back on your path, for achieving the life that He has planned for you (Pr. 3:5, 6.).

God helps you make all the right decisions in life by filling you with His wisdom, when you are ready to receive it.

We definitely do not thrive when we depend solely upon our own cognition. THAT IS OUR PRIMARY PROBLEM!

For as he thinks within himself, so he is. Pr. 23:7 NASB

We literally become what we think. If our focus is on God and what He thinks, we will understand all that is true and good for ourselves and everyone else:

…those who seek the LORD understand everything. Pr. 28:5 CSB

Living without the wisdom of God is not an option for those who desire a good life:

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Hos. 4:6 NKJV

We must look at what we have wrought, and learn:

The ear that hears the rebukes of life will abide among the wise. Pr. 15:31 NKJV

When we have God (perfect love), we can cast our fears away:

“Do not be afraid…I am your shield; your reward will be very great.” Gn. 15:1 CSB

MEDITATION

We first encounter the word ‘meditate’ in the Bible, just before Isaac encounters his bride-to-be (Rebekah):

And Isaac went out to meditate in the field toward evening. Gn. 24:63 ESV

God also gives us clues on what to meditate about:

“Study this Book of Instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night so you will be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do.” Josh. 1:8 NLT

…whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things. Phil. 4:8 NKJV

So, meditation is not a foreign or objectionable concept to God. We are commanded to contemplate His word continuously. That way, we can accurately apply it, which makes for having a great life. In addition, we also find that meditation is also a tool for making the mind a ‘still place,’ to prepare us for communing with our Creator (Ps. 4:3, 4.).

I bring this up because there are many false notions about meditation in some of the body of the church. Some even go so far as to describe it as a process for emptying the mind, which allows the devil to rush in and set up house. This is a total misconception. Furthermore, that devil has already taken residence in your head a long time ago, in the form of ‘ego.’

Meditation is a tool for slowing down the mind, creating a pace where we can watch it and the ego do their worst – looking for the lies we’ve created that bind us. Then, we can unravel them.

It is also a very powerful tool to facilitate our re-entry into the present moment, freeing us from the past, to contemplate a different way of being. If we stop running from the present moment and from ourselves, we can deconstruct our impressions of the past, and create a space where God can come and heal us from our self-inflicted meaningless meanings of hurt.

When we take care of our present moment, we can help bring about fulfilling consecutive moments (i.e. our future).

Meditation helps you embrace whatever life is offering, (whether or not it is attractive to you), and be happy in that moment. It frees you up from the deluge of your opinions and from the punishments you administer to yourself when you don’t meet them.

In other words, it helps you exorcise your false persona, so that your focus is trained upon what is beneficial to you and not to that voice in your head.

Lastly, the practice of meditation is for enlightenment (spiritual growth), and it’s good for your health (lowers blood pressure, reduces anxiety, sharpens your focus and increases your compassion). It reveals the qualities of your spirit to enable you to see who you really are, and be able to fall back in love with yourself.

In a nutshell, it is for unlearning what you think you know. This can be very scary for those who are strongly attached to their mask. Ironically, it is that very camouflage that perpetuates their suffering…

Next time, we’ll look at a simple method of meditating…

Goodnight and God bless.

Letting Go of the Mask

Commit to being kind and loving with yourself every time that inner critic barks. Do something that you don’t think you deserve, e.g. be still with yourself for 30 minutes, take a walk on the beach, get yourself a root beer float.

You see how much more powerful it is when you exhort yourself, give yourself another chance, and hold out for love and hope?

The final tool we must utilize to get our lives back, is ‘action.’

You have a personal responsibility to get right with God.

There is nothing in your head that can really hurt you. It is the ignorance and denial about the nature of what you have unconsciously let live there, that brings pain. A thought is only an ephemeral wisp, an emotion just a form of energy.

Still, we can always return to God and begin anew. Yet, what if we could greatly reduce our ‘backsliding,’ and thus, our valleys of suffering and spend most of our time on the peaks of life’s joys?

Like any endeavor in life, you must possess the right tools. For this path of recovery, (in sequence of application), they are: willingness, God, meditation, steadfast awareness and inquisition, and action.

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