The question we must all ask ourselves is: “How could I have been so WRONG?”

The word “wrong” here means having a strong emotional sense of certainty about some aspect of our life or about a particular event, only to find that the foregone conclusion we have come to is not what we thought or hoped for.

“What in your life is calling you,
when all the noise is silenced, the meetings adjourned, the lists laid aside,
and the wild iris blooms by itself in the dark forest,
what still pulls on your Soul?”
~ Rumi

In this sacred sutra, Rumi implies that something is “pulling” upon our Soul that is more important than the noise in this world and in our minds. Deep within our emotionality we come to certain conclusions about events and circumstances that we are so sure are “correct”…only to find that our assumptions were not as advertised.

Every one of us thinks from various mental cognitions that eventually become the perceptions that we can hold in mind. The insatiability of emotional instincts perpetuates our DNA and few of us are ever willing to withdraw from this.

On the other hand, the mental acuity that occurs through meditation distances us from our emotionality and DNA. Through meditation we can self-observe and allow for the inner acumen to prevail. Here, we live choicelessly and make merciful decisions that are non-dualistic and insightful to the situations and people that we currently face.

Sad to say, most people merely relegate their mind to the acute ineptitude of their emotionality (survival of the fittest mentality) only to find that they misinterpreted the situation and caused useless and unnecessary resistance through conflict.

This repetitive and mundane pedestrian mentality governs our collective mental illness through conflict, which looks harmless to the unconscious mind, where it resides disguised as our “individuality.”

This systemic mental illness of raw and brutal self-righteousness is based in the concept of being “RIGHT” through brute force and the common logic of fear of survival. We still live as animals that are vicious and seek only to feather our own nest at the cost of anyone who appear to, through our pedestrian perceptions, be in our way.

What we define as “unacceptable” is typically a matter of our mental state of duality. We “think” from the genetic preferences we harbor in our emotional body and, rather than allowing for any true realization, we ago on searching for “higher ground” where we believe we will be “safe” from the evidence that would reveal just how frivolous we really are. We resist being shown through “criticism” how wrong we are about what matters most in this life.

When we are placed in situations or positions whereby we are faced with the seeming “unacceptable,” we bend and contort our thoughts to create a “right” and a “wrong” in order to have a good argument, through logic and reasoning, to deal with the “unacceptable” by appearing to be “right.” We allow these misinterpretations to cause us to turn away from the importance of living by making what is essential appear to be “unacceptable.” What is absolutely essential for inner maturity and spiritual awakening is rejected for the matter of self-preservation of our pride and ego.

To the pedestrian mentality, the discipline it takes to mature into the state of Love is inconceivable, impractical and, therefore, unacceptable. Willful ignorance makes a lie out of the Truth.

The problem is that we cannot ignore our life and eventually it all catches up to us, one way or another.

So, what is it that we find so “unacceptable” about the Truth?

The Truth is the pull of the Soul. We feel the presence of Truth, but cannot truly respond to it because we find it “unacceptable” to our human tastes. These “tastes” are rooted in the state of our emotionality and its need for constant gratification. If you are diligent and have a sense of the importance of realizing what is “unacceptable” to the “sensibilities” of the ego, then you are in the correct inner posture for spiritual awakening.

Listen to what Jesus and Buddha have to say about what is essential and “unacceptable” to the human mind – and see if your mind can detect the real subject of their words:

“Woe to you who allow the body to rule over you. Putting your trust in the world, the world has become your god. You are destroying your souls with the desires that burn within you.” ~ Jesus – The Book of Thomas the Contender

“Those who realize that the body is no more substantial than the froth that floats on the waves of the sea, realize that this life is nothing more than a mirage.” ~ Buddha – The Dhammapada

What most people who are not living in the authentic do when confronted with the Truth is just shake it off. We are a frustrated people, always in fear of our life and trying to control it through ambition, pride and willfulness. Living in this way, we lose the ability to recognize Truth and its importance to this life. So our life perpetuates nothing but the illusion of our delusions, which we use to comfort and console us while succumbing to our mediocre minds.

We refuse to hear anything that threatens our lifestyle or criticizes our actions. The pedestrian mentality is oblivious to the “still small voice” that lives in the gaps and spaces between our thoughts. Our opinions, emotional tastes and mental dispositions are far too important to us.

“Neti neti” means “neither this, neither that.” It means that nothing IS as it may seem when we exist from our perceptions based in pride, self-righteousness and ignorance. Taking sides of “liking” and “disliking” reduces us down to our genetic preferences and produces thoughts that are one-sided and oftentimes inaccurate. This intolerant attitude about people, situations, events and circumstances leads us to live in our own personal disdain, and to act, live and think from our personal violence.

Nothing in our life can change as long as we think from polar opposites, which creates dualistic thinking. When we can clearly realize that this state of the mind is always in conflict with itself, pitting one idea or thought against another, we can then realize how divided we are by our genetic preferences.

To live in the state of “neti neti” means that we do not use our minds to choose or pick thoughts that coincide with our genetic heritage. It means that we learn tolerance to live with our thoughts, but not AS our thoughts.

Do this observation exercise: For 5 minutes each day, just observe your thoughts and write them down randomly as they come to you. Observe (non-critically) the tone and the texture of them. This exercise will help you understand how you have defined your entire life through assumption, prejudice and genetic preference. From here, if you are willing, you can separate from these states of mind by no longer indulging the emotionality of the body that is telling you to believe in or obsess on certain thoughts that it deems desirable or absolutely necessary.

Truth is caught through consciousness. Consciousness is the derivative of Silence…of meditation. We must seek the rarefied mind that holds no human preference as its state of being. To the masses this looks impossible, unacceptable. But to the diligent, the devoted, those who are intrigued by harmony rather than conflict, this methodology is the “PULL” to a lifetime where Love is the only Truth of living that matters.