Thank you for your honesty and calling me on my crap. Despite my severe lack of emotion, some must be in there somewhere because

A. I did post about my issue, and
b. your response struck a chord.

I'm going to do my best to live in the present, and be patient. I want to keep calm even when I'm wronged, and just try to love and accept people.

I can't let my own resentments eat me alive. I've certainly hurt many people in my past as well...

I can change my reactions and my attitude...

Thank you!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/24/2011 10:19PM by Lost Mystic.

Bump

And you can change that paradigm.

Every one of us has to deal with the emotional fallout from being victimized. The intrusion of the cult into your little world of meeting your craving for the cheese ball/cider triggered a release of resentment.

This is a helpful cue for you to make progress with your own mental state in the coming year. There are many ways to connect with a way of being in the world which is above the fray. It is not easy to find a spiritual path for yourself but the search is personal. The paths to inner peace are ALL CORRECT! They all have a deep inner truth, wrapped in myth. Not all of them are exploitive.

After pausing with my hands on the keyboard for a good ten minutes, I want to pass along to you the most important principle that I learned from Buddhism: There are two persons inside your head and one of them is not real. This fundamental principle, over several years, enabled me to detach my identity from my negative thoughts.

It is like finding the Golden Ticket in the Wonka Bar.

Every other aspect of mindfulness stems from this awesome realization. The rest, the deeper understanding of the egoic self I learned about from Eckhart Tolle, first reading "Silent Speaks" then "The Power of Now."

You have every right to hang on to your anger and be triggered by Christmas or Easter, or nothing at all. But no one lives inside your head but you, lostinutah, so why not have joy? Why give those bastards the power to wreck the happiness you now have at your fingertips now that you are free.

You owe it to yourself to furnish the inside of your head beautifully, feeling the joy of the Messiah and having your spirit soar without the dead tentacles of Mormonism pulling you down.

I wish you the best - a heaven of cheeseballs and Martindale's!

Anagrammy

Except you're talking to a different Lost.

And I'm a nevermo, so have never belonged to a cult...

And I'm an atheist and don;t believe in the messiah...

And I've been reading Buddism for years...

And a lot of my so called anger was all tongue in cheek, for the most part, even though I do resent having Xmas shoved down my throat...

But other than than, Mrs. Lincoln...

Maybe it was just that once sentence that was directed at you - stuck in the middle of it all. It just seeped out of her subconscious while she was giving lost mystic a little input.

I totally get the seperate/false self. I keep falling into the trap of identifying my identity with it...

I think I'm going to delve deeper into Buddhism again.

I started this thread in response to anagrammy's post in my "heartless...survived suicide" thread

In Siddhartha, the Buddha compares a persons thoughts to a river. The true self rests on the bank and observes. We are not our thoughts, we are the observer.

I always loved the river analogy because I also use it to visualize thoughtless or cruel statements made by others as leaves floating past on my thought stream.

Ana

and is kind of mind boggling. He told me, "You are not your thoughts." AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

He had me get a book called, "Get out of your mind and into your life." Might help.

This is an interesting concept to me.

My knee jerk reaction is to say it sounds like a poorly integrated personality to attempt to separate inside one's own head like that.
I freely admit my knee jerk reaction is completely uninformed!

Can some of you explain a bit more, or deeper, or link me to something good to read on the subject?

It is not separating.
You should try it some time.

You must actually practice it. This is what Zen meditation is.

The simplest explanation is one we all can understand. We have a stream of thoughts going through our mind, often called the "stream of consciousness." Sometimes we have a commentator who says, "Whoa, where did that thought come from?" Who is that commenting on what is being thought?

In Buddhist thought, it is Being. Being is not the same as soul, being is the real you--your essence. The thought stream, called affectionately as "monkey mind" represent random firings of the subconscious. We become happier when we understand that having the confusion of thinking our random thoughts are "who we are" can lead to misery and prolonged suffering.

Suffering comes from attachment to negative thought firings or to desire, i.e., "If I only had a spouse, I'd be happy." If you think this thought and focus your life on that "need," you deny yourself the joy that would otherwise be available to you as a single person surrounded by the love of others and the beauty of nature.

I recommend starting with viewing "Little Buddha", the movie. If you find yourself drawn to the ideas presented there, then get some books by Eckhart Tolle, he also has a website. He set me clearly on my path. I then read "The Third Christ" by Deepok Chopra and realized that Jesus was an enlightened master whose message was grossly distorted by those desiring to use people's desire for a better life to enhance their power.

A good book on the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path would be good to get the basics in an organized fashion. I look to Sharon Salzberg "Lovingkindness" for learning how to use meditation to achieve a changed paradigm and a more charitable view of others. "Zen Heart" is also highly recommended by therapists here in Berkeley.

You are already on a very personal journey. Your path will not be the same as mine. If you learn to follow your instincts--go where you are drawn, you will find yourself growing stronger and more sure of what's right for you.

This is the area that people surrender (to Jesus, to Mormon GA's, to the Pope) and it atrophies. So be patient with yourself and give your inner wisdom facts and time. If you do that, the path will unfold, the answers you seek will become obvious.

Best of luck

Anagrammy