Anam Cara - Discovering Your Being

The more that "little me" allows surrender the more is done. What is done is "good." This, I know, seems a value judgement. It might be better to say that "what is done is joy." No resistance. No getting in the way. No concern for results. Simply trusting what will be will be. This free flow of feeling energy is the experience of joy.

One of the greatest teachers of Being was the Chinese Sage Lao Tzu.

He advised, "The best way to do is to be." Another teacher of Being is the great William Shakespeare. He asked one of the greatest questions of all time. This was the question, "To be or not to be?" He asked in effect are we prepared to claim our birthright or miss the essentialness of life. We have been given the choice to decide "to be or not to be." Most of us ignore this question and thus never get to know the joy of being fully alive.

In this 21st Century of noise and haste the experience of being is too scary.

"To be" is allowing. It is accepting that we do not always know. It is the experience of presence, trust and faith in the moment. It is knowing that what needs to be done moves from love. This is not what we regard as "my love." It is the energy of love moving as one with and from the Beloved. It is the way Jesus, Buddha and Mohammed moved in the world. Theirs was the world of love in action.

"Being" is who you are.

You are a being of feeling. Without the free flow of feelings within your body you are alive but not living. We mostly avoid feelings until they surface in all sorts of ways unintended. When feelings are disallowed they turn from the flow of love to the desire for power. This usually means the desire for the "power over." This "power over" only serves to increase our sense of separateness from others and ourselves. With focus on this "power over" you might gain the whole world and you will lose more than you ever know.

How do you "come to be?"

You get quiet. You get quiet any way you can. You go inside and enter the heart. This is your feeling centre. Learning "to be" is learning to be at one with the heart. You open the heart in trust and faith that you are enough. Let me reassure you that each of you is "forever enough." All else is compensation if this experience of "being enough" is not a known experience. Otherwise we go on "doing" our life. We are condemned to limp through the world looking for a missing piece of ourselves. Doing "your life" will always in one sense leave you feeling lonely.

One of the greatest instructions in the Bible is, "Be still and know that I am God."

This is you. You are at one with God in stillness. In this stillness Universal Intelligence arrives. This is your "inner knowing self." This is knowing you are not separate from the Beloved. This is true intelligence. This is not just rational "thinking about." This is not just memory being played around with to make one feel good. This inner telling sense is the song of your heart. This song is always the song of love.

Much of the time we really do not love ourselves.

Many of us even find it hard to like ourselves. The increase in self-harm amongst our most vulnerable young people is a testimony to how little love is being demonstrated in our never enough society. We spend much of our time avoiding our feelings. We allow little in and we give little away.

We are rivers of energy contained tightly within the banks of judgement and unacceptability. Our young people are what I call "the people of the brand." Today as a young person you are more and more branded. You are less and less free "to be." If you wear the wrong brand of clothing or footwear you are emotionally branded. You are identified not as a being but as a commodity.

"To be," means learning "to be" essential. Our essence is love. When you drop all you are not then it is there. You are not "your emotions." You are not "your thinking." You are the one who witnesses. In truth there really is no "you." You are it all. You and the Beloved are forever one. To know this is grace.

To know this is a feeling experience.

You feel the experience of the essential. Love is essential. This is simply who you are beyond judgement. When you learn to be silently aware of the movement of the energy of the body you begin to glimpse moments of essentialness. These are moments of peace.

Just be still. Just be non-grasping, non-judging, non-wanting and non-doing. Just being no body seeking results all is well. You come "to be." You feel at home. Your field of vibration is raised. You are raised up.

To help learn "to be" use what is known as "A mirror technique." This is a simple body scanning exercise. This is also a Zen meditation practice. It is using a technique of simply scanning the body with awareness. This is an awareness of feeling in the body. You focus your attention on different parts of the body and become aware of the energy there. In this way you learn to know the difference between "feeling the feeling" and "thinking about the feeling."

We are often not aware of our bodies other than from the neck up.

When we are asked about "our feelings" we "think about" our feelings. I remember one of my meditation teachers telling me that in the West we have forgotten what it means to feel the physicality of our feelings. This teacher of meditation discovered when he first returned to England that the meditation techniques he taught seemed to be having adverse effects.

He taught a meditation technique which focused on developing insight. Only he found students were becoming depressed. Later he found they "thought about" how to achieve "insight" rather than discover insight as a feeling experience. Rather than being once removed from their feelings they started to be twice removed. He introduced a second meditation called "The meditation of Loving Kindness" to balance the overall approach.

When we "think about" our feelings we are not "feelings the feeling."

Feeling them means to be still and to be aware. Scan the body and feel the energy there vibrating. Make no judgement and do not label. This I personally find a very subtle sensation. As you proceed you find this is where the power of love resides. Love is the feeling of flow in the body devoid of judgment. This is your being. This is your being free. It is the freedom of allowing "what is" to be "as it is."

Life is a felt experience.

This is not "your life" as a feeling experience. Life is the movement of energy. It is not something you own. It moves thought the body. This energy expresses in many ways. It expresses uniquely and wonderfully. When this energy, that is love, is blocked it become the experience of disease.

This free flowing experience of life gets blocked when it becomes "our love" and "our experience." We highjack the dance of life for our own ends. This is what Jesus meant when he advised that to save "your life" is to lose it. He emphasised the error of trying to save something that belongs to no one but is the dance of the Beloved.

Practice feeling the feelings without labelling. Do not call them names. They are your energy locked into your personal cave of unacceptability. When you react to others it is usually because they are mirroring some aspect of this cave.

Learn a little tenderness primarily to yourself. Trust your heart "to be." It is OK. You are OK. You are forever OK. You are the diamond you are looking to find in the heart of the other or in the world of the outer. You are looking in the wrong place. Wipe the dust from your eyes and discover insight.

Look "to be" before you do.

© Tony Cuckson 2004

Tony Cuckson is an Anam Cara. This Celtic term means "Soul Friend." He specializes in providing insight for the spiritual journey, Irish Blessings, words of wisdom and finding inner peace. Visitors to Irish Blessings Matter website and Tony's Blog get the opportunity to develop a purpose driven life through articles, newsletters and other programs. Get your free report called "7 ways to it's a wonderful life" at http://www.irishblessingsmatter.com or visit Tony's Blog at http://www.irishblessingsmatter.info for the best resources on spiritual growth, spiritual cinema, spiritual parenting, spiritual coaching and spirit in business.