HealthyPlace.com Anxiety and Panic Community

PAEMS

back to
anxiety-panic
community

send this page
to a friend

Panic Anxiety Education
Management Services

{short description of image}

Resistance (part 2)

When we meditate, we can see very clearly the mind and how it works. It will either throw us back into a past event to ponder over. It will tell us we had better consider what we will do after we finish meditating. It will throw us into a fantasy to avoid sitting in the present moment or it will judge what is happening now - boring, not working, we are really meditating now, how long have we been meditating now. It can't sit in the present. It needs to be in control. It can't absorb it's self. That is a paradox.

Awareness can be absorbed totally in the present moment. The mind needs to have a running commentary on what is happening. So, in our waking moments, our mind is constantly nattering and chatting to us. Allot of the thoughts just fly on through. Some have much more weight to them and we listen and react to those thoughts. Very few of us actually live fully in the present moment. We spend a major proportion of our waking moments pondering what happened in the past (he said, she said and then I did), or in the future (I"ll pick up the kids, then shop or should I shop, then pick up the kids - and don't forget the baked beans"). We are doing all our normal activities. Our body is going through the motions but our mind is else where.

A simple exercise to undertake is to just notice how we drive the car. Are we actually driving the car or are we in automatic pilot and our mind is off somewhere else? Many people are shocked at how very little time we spend in the present moment. The present moment is where life is truly lived.

It must be pointed out that mind is not just replaying the negative experiences, but also the pleasant and positive experiences. We do react by being happy and joyful with these mind states. However, the basic point remains the same. We are not really open to experiencing what is happening right now. It is still past experience and so are not living now but in effect in the past. It is like listening to a favourite piece of music over-and-over. We are not finding new pieces of music we enjoy and therefore are not expanding or growing. Plus the danger is that the mind is in control of the feelings we are experiencing.

It is a roll of the dice as to what it will pull up for us to replay. It may be positive and happy or it may be very negative. It is usually the negative experiences that have so much energy in the mind because they are not resolved or dealt with, so will surface again-and-again to actually be dealt with. So if we have a large bag of unresolved negative experiences that we carry around with us, the chances are we will live in a negative mindset much of the time.

So once we observe this fact, consider how much we are at the mercy of the mind and the random scenarios it may throw up. There is allot of junk floating around the mind. If we are unaware of the power and control of the mind in our lives, chances are it is reeking havoc. The mind is the culprit for all (OK, the majority) of our woes and "bad" feelings and our sense of self. There is a few things that need to be pointed out, the mind does all of this for three reasons. They are known as :
1. the fear of the unknown (as the mind has to live in the context of the known, it is the known and can't exist in the unknown territory),
2. the fear of losing control (it is always in control when we are unaware or agreeing totally with what it throws at us, plus losing control is akin to being in the unknown), and
3. the fear of non-existence (which links with fear of unknown and losing control, the mind cannot conceptualise it's own non-existence ,death, and is incredibly fearful of this unknown situation). The past is known, the future is unknown. So the mind throws the past into the future to make it a known. The present is judged according to the past so then becomes a replay of the past. All of these fears can be seen as the culprits underlying the majority of our reactions. They can be also be seen as the basis of the ego's self defence. The ego being this concept of "I" - the separation from all. The mind is the house of the ego. It can be seen that the ego is a tightly bound intertwining series of thoughts that tell us that we are this - "I". When we loosen these thoughts, we loosen ourselves also from the bondage of ego reactions and self created misery. We can allow ourselves to be more freer and open to what is really happening right now - that which is called life.

As we increase awareness of the workings and influence of the mind in our life, we can start to see the tricks and games the mind plays. Start to consider the mind as a separate person and listen to what it is actually saying to us. Also, at this stage we start to see that as we try to make changes in our life, our mind will resist with all it's might. The three-headed fear dragon raises it's head and the mind just doesn't want to play along with us. It has a great deal of energy tied up in doing things certain ways based on all our past experience. It is like we have worn paths through our minds that are now major highways and we want to now redirect the traffic onto a dirt side road that is full of brambles and unknown ditches. The mind says "No thank you, I'd rather go by the quick highway".

We will meet what is called resistance. It is fine and dandy to see that change is needed - putting those changes into effect is another matter. Don't despair. We each have the tools and weapons we need to enforce those changes. Awareness is our shield that the mind cannot combat and the skill of letting go is the sword that cuts away the only bonds that tie us to our reactions to thoughts put up by the mind. Along with these are our will power, motivation and creativity - the mind can try to loosen these powers, but can only do so if we allow it. Also housed within the psyche is our intuition - a great source of wisdom for us to use in our life.

top | continued | articles index
Parts 1 2 3 4 5