Wait for the time; don't be in a hurry.
Every bud takes its own time to bloom;
Don't force a bud to become a flower.
- Sri Sri RaviShankar.
All the characters dancing around the Buddha in the following graphic are the same essence morphing into this and that.
All illusions...
The Buddha realises this and becomes quiet. No longer affected.
From Equianimityandpeace:
I noted to myself that I craved to halt my thoughts, craved to eliminate my pain.__________________________________________________
I craved to eliminate my sorrow. My loneliness. My suffering. I craved to overcome my fears. I craved to keep myself safe.
I realized that I was drowning in negative thoughts and that I was CHOOSING to believe in them. But I learned through intentional focusing on positive affirmations, meditation and prayer, that it was only my mind stabbing me to death.
you “normally” do not “choose” your own thoughts. They just happen, just like digestion. And if you had a bad experience, your mind recreates the negative thoughts without your conscious consent but you are forced to relive them endless times per day. If you let this happen automatically, you are creating a serious headache in your own mind. You may catch a glimpse of it within a nightmare you have had in the past week, but it is there.
It is only through conscious intervention that you can make your mind change course from automatically recycling negative thoughts. This is just like your breathing. You breathe automatically, but you CAN choose to influence your breathing, you can hold your breath if you are going to dive deep in the water, or you can consciously “slow down” your breath if you are relaxing in meditation and prayer.
Once I realized I did in fact have “some” ability to control my own thoughts, I consciously redirected the thoughts to positive uplifting notions. I noted that I had built such a large ego over the years that the collapse of it dragged me down in a catastrophic fashion. A big ego is different from self esteem. Both were destroyed, but I learned to regain self esteem through positive affirmations and knowing that the negative thoughts are not reality. I believe having a positive self esteem is important, a big ego…not so much.
The characters, threats and situations that dance on your MENTAL CANVAS - if you believe they are real, they will stab you. If you realise they are not real, all fiction..they cannot harm you.
Remember the characters, threats and situations you were dancing with, in 2006, 2007, 2008.
Time has passed. And always does. You are here. And hale and hearty. With a roof over your head, food in your stomach.
The 'Buddha within.' is always at peace. The deep, calm, serious, peaceful person who is reading these words...
No reason to worry because strictly speaking, you can never be sure whether you're awake or asleep...
