Living Inside…OUT!

Nothing is more exasperating than is the state of apathy. Our society is riddled with ruthless spiritual indifference toward that which would truly serve them well in the bigger picture of Life. People are simply creatures of habit and do nothing to change this, even when their conventions cause harm in their own lives.

Nothing matters to the general populace beyond the pursuit of their own comfort, gratification, financial security and social status. Most people live in a convoluted mental illness due to their willful insistence upon living in emotional self-righteousness.

The pedestrian mentality lives from the outside in through deeply-held beliefs that people have many emotional needs that must be fulfilled in order to be “happy” and “secure.” To the pedestrian mentality, life is dangerous and the only protection from its discomforts is either “luck” or the delusion of an omnipotent God who has some obscure plan for humankind that nobody knows about. These genetic perspectives of the pedestrian mind-set compel the majority to live in the pernicious mentality of the collective unconscious.

It really is that simple. Yet most find it very difficult to find the door through which they entered this life because their need for comprehending exceeds their willingness to understand.

The door is Karma. This is why it is essential that people understand their Karma beyond mere comprehension of thoughts and ideals. Most people miss the richness of Life due to their way of deciphering how anything pertains to them as individuals, reducing their lives down to making assumptions and drawing conclusions from the outer world to the inner.

For the most part, people are so overly indulged in their distractions that they cannot recognize that which IS from that which IS NOT. They simply refuse to expand beyond their common, reasonable, logical pedestrian mind-sets.

People find it very difficult to awaken to the fact that what lives within them is directly mirrored in what they can recognize in the outer world. In fact, the only “face” they can see is the reflection of their own energetics. While they like to convince themselves that they are looking at other people or outer conditions, the fact remains that they are simply seeing the reverberations of our own energetic intensity echoing back from others and Life itself.

What was lost is found only from the state of the within, which was forsaken due to fear. Fear makes people paranoid. They become suspicious and insecure due to the unwillingness to realize the presence of Love within. The “common sense”of the collective unconscious is used as the logic and reasoning to interpret life, but it is this same flawed logic and reasoning that confuses them and confounds the authentic purpose of this lifetime.

It is only in consciousness that we truly understand what it means to live from the within. That which lives deeply within cannot be realized through logic or reasoning…this awareness can only be realized through direct experience. To have this kind of direct experience we must become profoundly simple.

That is what the practice is all about…to simply become so simple that the essential state of Love becomes the obvious truth of Life. Nothing is hidden from us in this lifetime. We just don’t know where to look. We are so obsessed with the outer and the belief that our analytical thinking will bring us digital results. It will not. It cannot not. We must be willing to give up logically weighing the options that we believe denote our outer results and begin to explore what lies within that the eye cannot see and the ear cannot hear.

One evening, the sun was setting and a neighbor found Rabia, a Sufi master, searching for something on the street. She was an old woman and everyone loved her. Many of course due to Rabia being a Sufi Master thought her a little crazy, but she was a beautiful person-so they all rushed to help her and they asked, “What has been lost?”

“What are you searching for?”

She said: “I have lost my needle. I was doing some needlework and I have lost my needle. Help me! You are so kind!” So they all engaged in the search.

Then one man, seeing the fact that the street was so big and the needle was such a small tiny thing and that unless they exactly knew where it had been dropped it would be almost impossible to find it, came to Rabia and asked: “Please tell us exactly the spot you lost your needle.”

Rabia said: “I wish you had not asked that question because in fact I have not lost it outside my house, I lost it inside my house.”

They all stopped searching and said: “Crazy woman! Then why are you searching here outside in the street when you have lost it inside the house?”

Rabia said: “There is much darkness. Here is a little light. How can you seek when there is darkness? And you know I am poor, not even a lamp with me. How can you seek when there is darkness? So I am seeking here because still a little sunlight is left, and still something can be done to search.”

The people started laughing.

They said: “You really are crazy! We know that in darkness it is difficult to search, but then the only way is to borrow a lamp from somebody and search for it that way.”

Rabia said: “I never thought you people were so wise. Then why do you always seek outside yourselves? I was just following your ways. If you so understand why don’t you borrow a lamp from me and search inside? I know the darkness…of my hut and a lamp is needed.”

Then Rabia said: “Find your inner lamp and you will discover the smallest thing within you is the biggest and most important discovery of your life.”

A perfect metaphor for seeking the state of our inner Being within.

Most people do not seek the meaning of Life beyond merely existing comfortably in this world. It is easier to invent a philosophy that is gratifying to their ego and call it “meaning.” Most merely live to survive through familiar patterns of emotionality. It is difficult to help people with all of the “safeguards” they have built up in their minds trying to avoid the inevitable suffering they cause throughout their lifetime.

I cannot fight against this type of apathy. All I can do is bring it out from the shadows and into the light where it can be seen for what it is. Sad to say, most people prefer to where sunglasses to avoid the glare of their own spiritual indifference.

I invite you to seek the rarified air of no-thingness. If you can be mindful, observant and not allow yourself to be easily seduced by the confines and illusions of emotional proprieties such as self-grandeur…you have found a Teacher to help guide you. I will offer all I can to help those who are truly willing to realize the need for spiritual awakening.