Cat Satsang

Chasing what’s not available can be a long time embedded groove and habit. Especially if this was the dynamic with primary caregivers. Mom, dad, brother, sister were not available and innocently a learning that I have to chase their attention became the norm.

Seeking out what’s not available became an unconscious, shadowy movement and impulse. The root driver of ‘ambition’. Scanning the environment for what’s the most unavailable, unreachable situation, group of people, person or circumstance I can get. Because if I do, “mom and dad” so to speak will love me, care for me, validate my existence, I’ll be seen, cared for, admired etc.

And if the most unavailable is unreachable or unavailable to me then I’ll turn it around and barricade my pain with the self-defense of being unavailable to them. Then I’m untouched. You didn’t reject me, I rejected you.

At the root of it is a deep pain of having realized as a baby, toddler, child that Mom and Dad’s love, care, attention were not a given. I have to do some work here. And this work becomes the work of a lifetime. In every situation, in every interaction. The primary situation was and is too painful to digest. It’s too much for a baby, toddler, child to digest this information even if it is understood on some cellular level. It’s too painful.

And as a byproduct of this deeply embedded groove, what is available is not seen, recognized, it’s overlooked. Because it doesn’t require chasing, contorting. It isn’t the false drug of seeking what inside is believed to be the only way to survive. I need mom and dad’s love, care and attention otherwise I will die. So it’s a survival instinct at work, to scan, to seek, to chase, and to try to ‘win’ the desired object or person’s attention, love, recognition, admiration -whatever it is.

From the groove’s perspective availability is uninteresting. It needs the chase, it needs the drug because it’s programmed to believe that its’ survival depends on it. It’s innocent. Mercy on the groove. And the groove will deny this six ways to Sunday. It won’t allow itself to be seen because it’s only operational in the shadows, in the dark, the dark cave of the hurt little one.

Some things won’t budge till we sit with them. They’ll keep calling and aching till we give up our running away from feeling as shitty as we really feel.

No amount of trying to turn away will work. And no amount of talking to someone about it will make it better. Time to turn in. Curl up on the couch, fetal position and let whatever’s here be here.

All the effort of turning away once halted will turn into exhaustion. Exhaustion is good. It means you’ve stopped running.

Un-seriousness is not a bad thing. To not be so serious about everything. Not in the immature sense where everything’s a joke. But in a not taking things personally or fixating on fleeting things kind of way. (When you can help it because sometimes you can’t and that’s okay too.)

Seriousness creates heaviness. Seriousness comes with an agenda, an endgame, a strategy. It’s keeping logs of conversations, rapports and agendas. Taking a stance and holding up barricades of defense and apprehension.

Unplug the serious socket for a second. Bring in some lightness and openness. Shake it off, literally. Especially if you’re being invited into a serious conversation or a very serious decision. Take a step back and shake it off. Feel your feet on the ground and the length of your exhale. Disengage from the story or the ongoing conversation. Unplug. Drop the whole thing.

Check in with your immediate experience. Ask yourself, what’s going on here? Underneath all the seriousness. Is there something that I’m running away from? Lurking beneath the surface driving this behavior? What’s luring me into the seriousness of it all? What are the bare basic facts of this moment without any overlay?

Once this self-honesty comes in then lightness and newness can come in too. Freshness. Seriousness often comes with a stench of stale. Lightness breeds freshness, brightness. And it’s not the newness or freshness that the mind projects but newness in spontaneity. Things you didn’t plan on doing or saying just happen. Not in an impulsive trying to get away from yourself kind of way. But an unplanned, unserious, flow and availability.

And what can stifle this flow are the personal self explanations of why I think I did this or said that. And the mind coming in this way to feel like it’s in control somehow of what’s happening. That it decided, you decided to do this because… blah blah blah. And it’s not true so it throws off this natural flow. It’s like throwing a wrench in there, the wrench of fear of not being in control.

It’s good to recognize this wrench and acknowledge this movement of trying to explain things you can’t explain. It’s much cleaner and smoother just admitting I don’t have a clue what’s going on and I don’t need to. And sort of knowing that it’s okay not to understand or try to explain.

Because there’s an intelligence which doesn’t need to be understood in the moment. And it’s in that letting go of understanding and explaining that you kind of sidestep a lot of unnecessary suffering, seriousness, heaviness and load. Instead you’re operating from a more solitary perspective of self-honesty, lightness, a willingness to feel, a non-rush, clean air, open space, an ability to move, not just outwardly but inwardly. You can move, you’re not stunted.

So just become aware of the stench of seriousness and shake it off. Walk away. Dis-engage. Follow the exhale. Look at a bird. Look up at the sky. Move, make weird sounds, smell some lavender. Resource.

Come back to yourself. Come back to the simplicity of you. Forget everything that happened yesterday. Last week. Forget everyone you met or didn’t meet. Forget the conversations you had or are supposed to have. Forget it all.

You don’t have to be anybody for anyone. You don’t have to be consistent or dependable. Any question you want to ask someone else, you can ask yourself first. See if this is something for the other or for you.

If you’re doubting someone actually wants to hang out with you or get to know you, ask yourself if you actually want to get to know them. If you feel like someone is obligated to you, ask yourself if you feel obligated to them. And be honest. Be real with yourself.

Come back to your solitude.

Come back to your realness.

The part that’s beneath the I’m bad, they don’t like me, I’m wrong. The part that doesn’t operate from I’m bad. The part that’s not overwhelmed by everything that’s happening ‘out there’ or happened or will happen. The part that doesn’t need to get anywhere or do anything because it’s already here.

It doesn’t need to reach out to anyone or fulfill any commitment or communication. It’s not concerned about these things. It doesn’t believe that this last text needs to be responded to or this email really needs to be addressed today. Or this post really needs to be published.

Come back here.

Tell the truth and trust your innermost.

You don’t have to figure anything out.

You don’t have to be smart.

You don’t have to lean forward and start doing.

Or try to lean back and stop doing.

Just give up.

You don’t know.

You don’t know anything.

And that’s the truth.

You don’t need to prepare.

And you don’t need to be prepared.

You don’t need to take measurements or make calculations.

It’s not crazy.

It’s not irresponsible.

It’s honest.

It’s real.

Allow yourself to make mistakes. Give yourself that room. That open space of spreading out. And allowing for mistakes to happen. Mistakes are not what you think they are. They’re not something ‘wrong’ that happened. Mistakes are wonderful open portals to living problem-free.

We’ve learned that mistakes are bad, a sign of failure, a sign of wasted opportunity. This is the conditioning – it’s the language of stunted growth. A language that doesn’t know love. We whiplash ourselves with guilt, shame, hopelessness, powerlessness, despair every time a ‘mistake’ is made. Especially when money is involved.

How did we come to learn these things?

Who originally taught us that?

What were their motivations?

Did they care about growth?

Through our conditioning things were forced on us all the time. And saying no to this force was seen as outrageous. We don’t even know it’s happening to us half the time. The dynamic is so off balance that when things are forced on us, we think we’re choosing them. And when we do actually use our inner guidance and listen to our inner authority to navigate our own experience, it’s seen as questionable behavior.

Maybe even a mistake, a problem, a waste, a very wrong thing – outright rejected by those around us. Those who never question. Those who think mistakes are calamities. Those who don’t prioritize growth. Real growth anyway. Instead they prioritize ideas of right and wrong, good and bad.

And so, when we’re growing out of this old way of being and relating in and to the world, we have to start noticing how we’re relating to our experience. What’s my dynamic with ‘making mistakes’? What do I do to myself or others when I make a mistake? How does it affect my inner world? Am I stunted? Do I never want to try every again? Do I feel like a waste of space?

If we’re not aware, the world will tell us we’re making a mistake all day long. Our whole life is a mistake. And we listen because we’re innocent. Mistakes and innocence are close relatives. You have to have real innocence to be willing to make mistakes. To fuck up. To do everything wrong.

Do I fall into an ocean of despair when I make a mistake? Do I punish myself?

Maybe as a child, you weren’t allowed to make mistakes. You had to get everything just right to prove yourself worthy of love or even physical care.

Seeing how mistakes are handled in our psyche, in our body opens up new possibilities, a new way of living, of approaching life, of relating to our experience. It creates space for questioning whether I can live in another way. Is there another softer, gentler way to be with mistakes?

Can I give myself permission to make all the mistakes I can make and to love myself regardless? To not berate myself or punish myself for being human? For my innocence.

When mistakes are permitted, given space, given love, given understanding, given breathing room – then possibilities open up. Problems disappear. Life becomes fun. Just because. Not purposeful and heavy. But purposeless and light.

When mistakes are permitted, you can play. Play with everything. How you decorate your home, what to buy, how you spend your time, how you garden. There’s open space. So there’s no rush and no time limit. There’s just availability. Possibility. Beauty. Abundance. Rest. And trust.

Trust that all is well. That it’s okay. Everything is okay. Good. In flow.

It’s not tight, limited and suffocated anymore. There’s room, it’s airy. It’s cool.

There’s no limitation on anything. You don’t superimpose limitations on yourself anymore where there are none. You recognize the limitlessness of reality. The “I’m not up against the wall all the time” reality.

It’s beautiful to give yourself absolute permission to make mistakes. Then a whole old worlds falls away. The bottom falls off. And a new fresh world beautiful world becomes apparent. Obvious. Like realizing you were in a trance and you’ve snapped out of it with the snap of a finger. And you can breathe again. Breathe fully.

You don’t have to run around like a headless chicken anymore. You can take your time. Settle in. Include everything that’s happening in the moment to be porous to this is ok. This too. I’m not running away with my experience anymore, like a thief in the night. I’m bringing it in, reigning in. To this openness. This new world. This recognition.

You can leave things unanswered.

You can leave things unfinished.

You can leave things hanging.

Unresolved.

Unmet.

You don’t have to leave yourself anymore.

For anything.

For anyone.

Move your body in the unmet, unresolved, unanswered.

Move it and shake it.

Do a silly dance.

A kiddy dance.

To shake off all the seriousness.

To come back to lightness.

To unfreeze the frozen, stunted, deer in headlights.

Be unreliable.

Be irresponsible.

Be completely useless.

Be a kid again.

Hang back.

Hang back.

Hang in the unknown.

With no closure, no duty, no obligation, no responsibility, no need, no role.

No idea.

You have to be willing to let it all go. Don’t hitch your wagon to that which is unpredictable. That which requires contorting on your part. Conditioning will say, that’s arrogant. Everyone will try to scare you. Your own mind most of all. But you just steady on. It is much closer to reality living in not knowing than it is living in a make-believe world that everybody happens to agree upon.

Know that you are not alone. Remind yourself in times of doubt of the teachers dead or alive who’ve lived and are living this path. Know that you are alone in that ultimately there’s only you. And in your aloneness, you can trust.

But your solitude will be a support and a home for you, even in the midst of very unfamiliar circumstances, and from it you will find all your paths.

Rainer Maria Rilke

No contract is a guarantee.

No spoken word is a guarantee.

No unspoken agreement is a guarantee.

Stay in your own integrity. Not as a hard impenetrable action, but as a relaxed and open resting. Fluid, gentle, soft.

Put everything your parents (thus the world) have told you, taught you, imprinted on you in one of those little play boats and set it on its way downstream – never to be seen again.

And breathe.

Taking power back from the teacher, taking the “I don’t know, you know” power dynamic back and trusting yourself. Trusting your inner guidance and the subtleties of what its’ picking up in an environment or in another.

It’s not arrogance as the spiritual ego would have you believe, it takes great courage to take that leap. There’s great equanimity in that. It’s moving with the flow of what feels right for you without taking pre-existing relationship dynamics into consideration. Or past. Or who you were 10 months ago or 10 minutes ago. And trying to maintain an image of consistency.

No one is consistent. Not even the teachers themselves. Looking for consistency in them will only lead to disappointment. Consistency can’t be found in another. Not another person. Not another thing.

You can’t see consistency. It’s not a thing. Nothing is consistent out here. Not in a traumatic way. In a loving way. Your safety, your consistency is prior to all things, before anything. But it’s not the safety and consistency the mind imagines of something that never changes. Someone. Some teaching.

Consistency is invisible. It doesn’t look like anything. It is the openness in which all non-consistency can play out. It is that which directs your inner guidance to the microsecond – this is right for you now.

It’s the openness of knowing but not holding onto anything too tight. And trusting the goodness of not gripping onto things, people, circumstances or situations. The goodness in the expansiveness of it.

Look back on your life and notice situations where big change happened. Where something ended. Notice how expansiveness was the byproduct of that ending.

With the willingness to let go of the familiar, so much opened up. So many possibilities, avenues, experience, learning. It expanded your consciousness, your sense of openness, possibilities you couldn’t see before suddenly became available to you.

Not premature and not too late. Everything is right on time.

This isn’t stagnant. It’s not this idea that the mind has of stillness as non-movement. This is all inclusive. It’s completely spontaneous. Organized. Efficient. But not in a mental way. In an organic wholesome way which doesn’t require a horizontal movement of time.

It doesn’t need anything from anybody. It’s totally egalitarian without trying to be. It doesn’t need recognition nor approval. It doesn’t hold grievances either. It’s clean. Pure. Fresh.

It’s not a drawn out process of having to ‘sit’ so that…. It’s not horizontal. Not linear. But it is cohesive. Whole unto itself.

It reigns in any outward movement of need or want and brings it back to wholeness. It dismantles rushing. It has no ambition and no endgame because it is complete already and always. There’s no seeking involved.

It’s a cool breeze. The rustling of the leaves. Sunlight on the pillow.

If it could speak it would say, there’s nowhere to go, no one to be and nothing to do. It’s the opposite of everything you thought you knew.