A new year, for me, always is a moment to look back and reflect on the previous year. While any of the previous 7 years have been exciting and dynamic with a love relationship ending, a new one starting, moving to another country, personal crisis and spiritual growth, world-wide travel for many months a year and much more, 2011 has been a milestone year like no other.
I wrote this note in February during intensive satsang with the Zen
Master Dolano in India. I just found it back now and realise that this
was such an important revelation. Maybe this resonates with you. Maybe like
I did you recognise the suffering of it all. I, from my side, am happy
it is all over.
Voortbouwend op wat ik in antwoord aan Omnipleasant (zie vorige blog) al schreef nog het volgende:
Als ik terugkijk op het spirituele pad dan is het voor mij een pad
geweest dat leidde van 'geinstitutionaliseerde spiritualiteit en religei' vol
(bij)geloof, ideeen, dogma's en modellen naar steeds meer directe eigen
ervaring met (uiteindelijk) verlichte masters als gids.
1. Ik ben ooit begonnen met een jaartraining Raja yoga. Dat was in 1988 en was inclusief een enorme hoeveelheid
uiterst gecompliceerde (Indiase esoterische) theorie. De meditatie en asanas waren zinvol,
maar van de theorie kreeg ik alleen maar hoofdpijn ;-)
Het verschil tussen ‘awakening’ en ‘enlightenment’
Ik schrijf normaliter in het Engels, maar omdat ik deze blog schrijf op verzoek van een bezoeker op mijn weblog - dank voor de vraag Omnipleasant - gaat deze even in het Nederlands. Dus bij deze een poging een antwoord te geven op de lastige vraag over het verschil tussen ‘ontwaken’ en ‘verlichting’.
Dolano, as did Osho, introduced us to the idea of relating rather than ‘relationship’. Relating is something that happens in the here and now, relationship is a construct that tries to fit the other person in a fixed role and creates an idea in our head about what this relationship is. Making it a thing, rather than a happening.
Also in this case, I understood what Osho meant. But since the Intensive Satsang relating has become a reality. How does that look? For me it means that, often to my own surprise, I interact and relate to strangers in a way I previously did not do. What I also experience is that I am more curious and much less judgmental towards people I meet. Dolano talks about ‘relating to intelligence or the Buddha in everyone’ and I see that happen from time to time. It is lovely because it feels a bit like everyone is a friend or at least an interesting person to meet.
Awakened life after Dolano Intensive Satsang - part 2
Back in Holland, now and a year ago
For me it is also interesting to look back at April 2010 and compare it with April 2011. In both cases I came back from 4 months in Asia (mainly India) after having done groups, retreats or, this time, satsang. Last year, and I wrote about that too, it was a big shock to come back to Holland as the whole dream Sannyasin life of groups, meditation, celebration and transformation made room for the ordinary Dutch reality of work and a ‘normal’ life. I then felt that the Dutch conditionings, mainly those related with (hard) work, jumped on my back and many other thoughts and ideas made that I quickly felt rather miserable. All I wanted really, was to leave the country.
A new life after Dolano Intensive Satsang
28 April / 11 May 2011
Doing Intensive Satsang with Dolano has, without any doubt, been the most life-changing ‘thing’ I have ever done. I am writing here about it for myself and to share it with others who have done the intensive from whom I’d love to hear their experiences ‘post-Dolano’ or comments on what I wrote. How has it been for you after ‘Dolano’?
Whether for others reading this text makes any sense I don’t know, but I will try to write it in a way that it is also accessible for other advanced seekers on the path who might be interested in doing Dolano Intensive Satsang. She is an enlightened master in India who facilitates a one-month transformational process which she also calls ‘The last satsang’ or ‘The end of the path’.
For more on Dolano, including open Satsangs you can listen to, see: www.dolano.com or www.friendsofdolano.org.
“….you get a feel for how willfulness is replaced by a sense of flow.”
“When you get out of the driver’s seat, you find that life can drive itself, that actually life has always been driving itself. When you get out of the driver’s seat, it can drive itself so much easier – it can flow in ways you never imagined. Life becomes almost magical. The illusion of the “me” is no longer in the way. Life begins to flow, and you never know where it will take you.”
"When you think you understand, you don't. When you perceive directly, there is no thinking. You KNOW that you are alive, you do not THINK you are alive."
Nisargadatta Maharaj
Now this is an interesting one. For me, the first time I fully realised this it was like an awakening. We are so conditioned (brainwashed you could also say) into putting thinking above everything else that we are not even able anymore to see what is right in front of us. What is existentially true. Because our thinking clouds everything.
The change of year, for me, is always a time to look back on the past year. What has happened? Have I grown? What where the challenges and difficulties?
Rough rides in Pune
2010 was, again, a very very special year for me. It started where I am now, at the Osho Meditation Resort in Pune, India and last year, on the first of January, I was in the middle of a 3-week breath work training. A group that was so intense that my girlfriend said I was ‘green’ and I felt fucked up most of the time apart from just after Dynamic Meditation. It was a beautiful healing journey, but not an easy ride. But as with these processes; rough rides often lead to blissful states. My next group was Path of Love, not a beginners group either, but after 3 weeks of breath work I sailed through it and gave myself so totally that I had never imagined I could.
“Without a deep sense
of purpose to direct your daily life, you will be directed by externals –
financial need, your children’s needs, your lover’s needs – and you will begin
to blame them for your lack of fulfillment. You will feel trapped in obligations,
and your resentment will show.”
David Deida, Blue Truth, page 121.
“When you have the
courage to listen to your calling, all of life opens itself for you. When you
follow your bliss – that which touches you deeply inside – doors open for you. If you do not listen
to this calling, because you want to stay in your safe environment, life often dries
out.” Joseph Campbell.
Quote in Verlicht Leven (Enlightened Living),
Tijn Touber, page 17
Dear reader,
In the summer of 2005
the end of my relationship triggered a deep crisis which later turned out to be
the start of my healing and awakening process: A process of healing inner
(childhood) wounds and a process of searching for truth. My truth.
"At birth a person is soft and yielding,
at death stiff and hard.
All beings, the grass, the trees: alive, soft, and yielding;
dead, stiff, and hard.
Therefore the hard and inflexible are friends of death.
The soft and yielding are friends of life.
An unyielding army is destroyed.
An unbending tree breaks.
The hard must humble itself or be otherwise humbled.
The soft will ultimately ascend."
So interesting to read this verse again. For most wisdom and real understanding of life and our true nature we only need to look at nature as the Taoists so deeply did.
Jut reading this it strikes me again how our whole society focuses on how to become harder and tougher. Train, resist, develop will power, learn to fight, compete, work hard..... And yes, many, many break, just to be fixed again to continue with the same insanity.
Reading Jed McKenna giving out on spiritual
bullshit and love and happiness fairytales, I started wondering myself. Did I
somewhere get caught in the web of Maya, in the sweet slumber of the spiritual
supermarket rather than being on a true path of growth and awakening?
Almost all of what McKenna writes makes
total sense to me. But then he talks in one sentence about incense, mantras and
meditation as part of that New Age illusionary world of love and compassion.
But actually, I do get what he means. Yes, mantras are just there to bring you
in a trance, not to get any closer to awakening. Incense is just nice
decoration and, indeed, meditation can be an escape from reality rather than
diving into it. But at the same time meditation can be a tool to train observing,
a tool which is very useful when you are observing the tricks of the ego.
Of course I have been reading Jed McKenna’s book wondering where I am on the spiritual path and whether I am truly on a path of awakening, rather than a spiritual keeping the status quo stroll. Was my emotional and psychological breakdown of 5 years ago comparable with Lisa’s (a person in Jed’s book) and am I firmly underway to Human Adulthood? The last part I read in Jed’s book shows me that at least to some extent, the latter is true, that I am not selling you some pretty spiritual bullshit to decorate my ego but am actually truly involved in peeling of the many layers of ego and illusion.
Let’s look into this in more detail. It is about growing up, about breaking free from the bondage of parental beliefs and conditioning. About living your own authentic life instead of following the programming your parents put into your head.
“In an eyes-closed
being (JDG: unenlightened being), everything flows from fear; good and bad,
courage and cowardice, love and hate, all flow from the same well.”
Jed McKenna, Spiritual
Warfare, page 240/241
Dear reader,
After a nice day of
playing tennis and going to some of the concerts in the festival in town, I had
a good sleep but woke up very early. Tensions in my legs and worry about the
Mexico project kept me awake for at least an hour, long before I intended to
get up. So, in short, I got confronted with where I really am: I might be very inspired
by all the enlightenment stuff of Jed McKenna but am very clearly still one of
millions of ego-clad beings. And the key difference is fear.
“I don’t remember what
it means to work, to toil, to do something unpleasant. I don’t distinguish
between work and non-work, weekday and weekend. I don’t take holidays off or go
on vacations. I probably spend, on average, four hours a day working, but I
don’t think of it as work any more than I think of walking the dog as play or
shopping for lunch as a chore.”
“The idea of doing
something I don’t feel like doing is almost absurd to me. If something needs
doing, there will come a time when I feel like doing it. If that time doesn’t
come, it doesn’t get done and didn’t need doing. “
“I have no schedules
appointments or set hours. I have no concept of duty or obligation, or
responsibility.”
Too late for a full blog. I leave it at a quote to mull over:
"The reign of Big Brother is so firmly established that no alternative exists in the minds of men. The very concept of freedom has been so thoroughly abolished, is so absent from our collective worldview, that it is, literally, unthinkable. There is no possibility of human development in practice because it does not even exist in theory."
"There is no interest in freedom; it's all been channeled safely into non-threatening, ego-gratifying avenues; career and family, religion and spirituality, hobbies and addictions."
One of the main ‘characteristics’
of the enlightened beings is to flow with life, to flow with existence. There
is a deep trust and understanding that the universe manifests whatever needs to
be manifested. This probably sounds more spiritual or religious then most of
what I’ve written but it is of course what we make of it. If we start calling
it God or miracles we risk to be soon back to square one, to beliefs and
illusion rather than understanding and knowing. The awakened ones totally trust
the universe because they understand its laws. They can understand that someone
dying could be ‘right’ just like gravity pulling something down is just
following the laws of the universe. In religious terms this way of being could
be described as ‘Thy will be done’. It means that instead of letting the ego with
all its likes and dislikes, with all its ideas and beliefs and with all its
morality, lead in our lives we start looking for patterns and signs and let
life lead us.
Enlightenment,
awakening, liberation is all about freeing yourself from bondage, the bondage
of the ego, of beliefs of emotional investments of everything inside ourselves
that makes us not free.
I had a dream this
night which could be significant in this regard. Dreams can always be explained
in different ways but this was one that seemed remarkably clear.
I was led into a
prison cell which had been mine. It was very small, just a single bed with a
meter beside it. And in my dream I realized this is where I had lived. Then I
was led out of the cell and out of the prison. While I waved to my fellow
prisoners, who now stayed behind, I cried.
Reading about
awakening, and more even, the awakening process I realise I am somewhere caught
halfway. The process is when your cosy little world with all its beliefs,
comforts and tranquilizers falls apart. Something like that happened when my
last relationship ended but it still was more typical psychological crisis or
depression with emotional wounds like my fear of abandonment triggered than a
true awakening. That process has started later with workshops, courses, reading
and meditation that showed me that what I always thought I was is not what I
am.
And even more: that what I thought life is is
not what it is. Life used to be a nicely ordered thing where high on top of the
‘important list’ was ‘work’.
The path, I already
found out, is hilly and unpredictable. Healing, awareness, let alone
enlightenment are not like training for a marathon. It is not that you simply
have to run more to progress more, let alone that you can say anything about
how you’ll feel.
Like probably most people, I
started off on the path of healing and spiritual growth (or however you want to
call it) to become happier. Or, as it was in the beginning: to become less
unhappy. Then healing happened, emotional releases and catharsis took place and
even very noticeable physical changes have shown me that healing is a reality.
But without really planning
it, from a path of therapeutic healing (albeit using much more effective tools
than psychotherapy) I ended up on a path of deconditioning and meditation. From
healing wounds and old pains I ended up on a path looking for truth. And,
without ever desiring it, I have come in contact with masters whose only
interest is in leading their disciples to enlightenment.
Do you know that feeling of ‘I have to….’? In the past days I have been
observing my mood and my thoughts and have discovered that one of the
things that negatively affects my mood more than anything is the feeling
of ‘I have to’. Of course this happens when I procrastinate work, but a
certain unsettled feeling is sometimes even there while I am working. Also when I do not really have to work and am just reading or
relaxing often there is this feeling that ‘I have to do something’. And
there is always something. Some DIY in the house, shopping, an e-mail
that still needs to be replied, etc. etc.
As I understand it at the
moment, there are two beliefs active here:
1. I can only relax after I have worked hard and well, when work is
finished.
2. Work is ‘hard work’, it is not fun, it is not light and playful.
I have written quite a few notes on conditionings, and since I continue
to discover more conditionings in myself and in my fellow countrymen, I
will write more. But before that, maybe it is interesting to read a few
quotes of Osho:
"The mind is within you, but it is really a projection of the society
inside you. It is not yours. No child is born with a mind. He is born
with a brain. The brain is the mechanism; the mind is the ideology. The
brain is fed by the society, and every society creates a mind according
to its own conditionings.
Unless you drop your personality you will not be able to find your individuality. Individuality is given by existence; personality is imposed by the society. Personality is social convenience.
Society cannot tolerate individuality, because individuality will not follow like a sheep. Individuality has the quality of the lion; the lion moves alone. The sheep are always in the crowd, hoping that being in the crowd will feel cozy. Being in the crowd one feels more protected, secure. If somebody attacks, there is every possibility in a crowd to save yourself. But alone? - only the lions move alone.
And every one of you is born a lion, but the society goes on conditioning you, programming your mind as a sheep. It gives you a personality, a cozy personality, nice, very convenient, very obedient. Society wants slaves, not people who are absolutely dedicated to freedom. Society wants slaves because all the vested interests want obedience.
Osho One Seed Makes the Whole Earth Green Chapter 4
I just completed an intensive group called Path of Love (www.pathoflove.net). It comes in the form of a residential silent retreat that leads you deep into yourself. Despite having done about 30 weeks of these kind of groups and meditation retreats, this was a mind-blowing experience that, once again, went even deeper than anything that came before.
I won’t go into detail on what we did. That is kept secret in order to keep the surprise factor for all those that still want to do the process. But for all those that have done some serious emotional work there will be no really new things in it although the structure is ingeniously put together. And of course not knowing what is going to happen helps to go deeper.
For me, the path of healing and spiritual growth continues to be the most rewarding and interesting thing I ever did. The deeper I dive inside my unconscious, my emotions and my childhood wounds, the more fascinating discoveries I make. The latest one is about fear.
Many, if not most of us, might say that fear plays no role worth mentioning in our lives. Materially we have everything we need, so what is there to be afraid about? For me, before I embarked on a path of healing and awareness, I thought that most emotions did not play a role in my life. I thought I had no anger, no sadness and no fear. Only there was this feeling that ‘something’ was missing. That, there must be more in life than this. And I did experienced stress on a regular basis.
In this weblog I write something that I haven't written about before. It is about what it means to be a Sannyasin. Two and a half years ago I took Sannyas and received a new name: Deva Geetesh. This is something that only weeks before I never imagined I would have done, but when I did it I felt I had no choice. Let me explain and tell you my story. Before writing about Sannyas though, I need to write something about me getting to know Osho.
A few years ago I did different courses for personal development and Buddhist and Taoist meditation retreats. Mainly in Thailand, but also in Europe. Over the course of less than a year, during those travels and in some of those courses, I met a number of people with interesting, non-western, names. These people were on a path of healing and spiritual growth, but they were different from most other ‘spiritual’ people I had met. They were down to earth, non-serious and above all, very alive. The women struck me as very sensual and beautiful.
You haven’t heard from me for a long time. While enough has happened I did not feel like writing. But now I have some interesting experiences and insights to share. Last week I did a primal therapy training in Osho Miasto in Italy and beside many other fascinating experiences and new insights one was really remarking.
One evening we did the Evening Meeting. That is a meditation which includes a video of the enlightened master Osho. The idea is not just to listen to the text but to be present in a meditative state. According to Osho what is relevant for you, for your healing or spiritual process is what you will pick up, consciously or unconsciously. In spiritual development it is not about intellectually understanding issues, but about being touched by what resonates in the depth of your being. This evening was going to surprise me.
On the video a woman asks a question: “I have come to understand that my belief is that nothing of value can be achieved without hard work…..” and she continues with her question which I forgot.
If you are on a path of personal (or 'spiritual' if you prefer that word) development, like me, you keep getting new insights about life in general and yourself in particular. One insight that I got over the last days, weeks and months is about connection. I am sure that being connected (I explain later what I mean with that) is vital for everyone but in my case being connected is almost a synonym of 'happiness' whereas being disconnected of 'unhappiness'.
Connected to what or who?
So what do I mean with 'being connected'. Connected to what or who? The answer to that question is 'connected to myself'. So what does that mean? In the first place it means being connected to my body. When I can feel my body I am present, there is awareness or consciousness. In the second place it means being connected to my emotions. When you really consciously experience your emotions, there is a beautiful aliveness in it. Whatever emotion it is. So I am not talking about being swept away by anger or sadness. No I mean whenever you experience your emotions without resistance and without emersing into your drama. Then there is connection...
The Japanese – the perfectionists
Reis/Japan | My weblog
|
01 Juni 2009 | 14:45:33
Where: Japan
When: May 2009
Japanese psyche – the perfectionists
Dear reader,
Back for my second visit in Japan, I will write a bit more (for previous blogs see Blogs about the Japanese) about this fascinating country with its fascinating culture. Before I continue let me say that I am loving it here like I did the previous time. The food is amazing, the people extremely helpful and friendly, public transport among the very best in the world, and the Zen temples and gardens beautiful and great places for meditation. But in this weblog I will focus on one typically Japanese character trait only.
Of course it is impossible to generalise the people of a country with 127 inhabitants, but there are certainly certain characteristics that are typically Japanese. One of the first one that springs to mind is perfectionism. I have a perfectionist streak myself and in the enneagram I am the number 1, the perfectionist.
So the Japanese are a good mirror for me. And, they are more perfectionist than me….
In my previous weblogs I wrote a little bit about work and the need to control. The world is full of control freaks and I was one of the worst of them. That has changed. It is not all history but for me the need to control is much less than it was before.
When a friend told me about how my last blog triggered him - he recognised himself in it - I replied him with an e-mail that, with some alterations, I publish below.
Knowing that you suffer from a need (or obsession) to control is only the start and not enough to change it, because it is something that is really in your system, it becomes part of you.
For me the change, the healing, has happened due to three things:
1. External circumstances that forced me to let go
2. Many healing workshops and sessions and healing meditations
3. Meditation and awareness
Control is a defence mechanism. There are many different reasons why people develop a need to control, but let me analyse a bit my own one as an example.
My work as meditation – 2 - An old job with a new quality
Where: Pune, India
When: April 2009
Dear reader,
I wrote in my previous weblog about how in work being in the moment and focusing on the process of the work rather than on the outcome can change the quality of your work experience. This of course is true for any experience in life. When you are fully aware, completely in the here and now and without any thoughts about other things, life gets a totally different ‘flavour’.
A few weeks ago, I worked for one week in the Indian city of Pune with the local authorities (Pune Municpal Corporation). My task was to lead workshops on how to create a city-centre urban renewal and mobility plan: An exciting job and also a very new experience for me. My younger colleague had prepared the outline of the workshop with his colleagues in Holland and it was up to me now to lead the workshops. In the weeks prior to the work I did feel a slight nervousness about how to do this, but as I was too busy with meditations and workshops in the Osho Meditation Resort I did not pay too much attention to these feelings and trusted that things would go fine.
The three days before my workweek I did a workshop called ‘passion for life’ and at the very end of it,
Work as a meditation – 1 - Changing the way we work - April 2009
Where: Pune, India
When: April 2009
Dear reader,
Over the last years you have been able to read some weblogs from me about my work. Or rather, about what to do for work. I do have a profession as a civil engineer and traffic planner and a job, but since I started my inner journey of personal or spiritual growth and healing (or whatever you want to call it) my attention and interest has shifted from the outer to the inner. And with that I found myself less motivated for my work.
At the same time I am aware of the unique work I do travelling around the world make cities and traffic more sustainable. It is work that gives me a lot of freedom, work that is badly needed and much asked.
After more than three years I have still not decided where to go with this but I have shifted my focus. Previously I was trying to make a decision about what to do. Do I want to become a therapist or a meditation leader? Do I want to continue with traffic planning but change the focus of the work? Etc., etc. Never did I get a clear answer to these questions.
Now I realise that it need not be that black and white: I either do this or that. I could explore both fields and also change the way I work, by using my work for my inner process for my personal growth and for meditation. That is what this weblog is about.
When: 3 days in March 2009 (plus a total of about 7 pre- and after days)
My fasting experience and the positive health effects of fasting
Dear reader,
You haven’t heard from me for a long time. I have been busy with work and holidays in different parts of Asia. I could write more about my other experiences since I have had so many amazing experiences since we left India early January, but then I never catch up. So more here about more recent experiences.
A short while ago I finished my first ever fast.
I probably skipped a day of eating some time in the past when I was sick, but I never fasted when healthy. Not even a day. I am also pretty skinny so people tend to think that fasting, for me, is not a good idea. But fasting is not something you do to lose weight as the weight generally comes back afterwards. Fasting is something you do to detox yourself. Something you do for your health. Fasting could, so I have been told, even remove the imbalances from your body that disabled you to gain (or lose) weight.
Leading Meditations - The joy of facilitating healing
Religie/Meditatie | Meditation
|
29 Maart 2009 | 15:40:54
Where: Koh PahNgan, Thailand
When: March 2009
Leading Meditations – The joy of facilitating healing
Dear reader,
In the previous weeks, for the first time in my life, I have been leading meditations. Here on a beautiful tropical island in Thailand, separated from the nearest town by a boat trip, they provide a daily space for free meditations. Me and my girlfriend have taken advantage of that possibility to lead meditations. Now that I am officially a Universal Healing Tao Instructor (and experienced in many other meditation techniques as well), it is nice to get a taste for teaching or leading groups in the healing arts.
What to write about. I haven't written for soo long that it is difficult where to start. Since my last blog I have been travelling in India and Thailand (where I am now) and there is so much I could write about. But there is one topic that springs to mind: Marriage in India!
Indians are crazy about marriage. It almost seems like they think the only purpose of life is to get married. if you are in your 30's and not married, people think that there is something wrong with you. Many years I read the books of the great Indian enlightened master, Osho, who was very negative about marriage. I never understood why. Untill I went to India...
It has been ages ago since you heard from me and that is not because nothing is happening. I spent a few weeks in Australia and the last 6 weeks in India but I simply had no real urge to write. Yes part of the reason of not writing was that I have been working (both in Australia and India), been meditating (in India) and not been travelling alone (when you travel alone there is, at least for me, a greater urge to write)...
But the main reason of not writing has been that I had no urge to write. This is quite unique for me as I have, in the previous years, had a very strong urge to write, an urge to share my experiences with others. There is something behind this. One reason for the need to write was my need to be heard. This is something many people have as our society, our teachers, our priests (for the most unlucky ones) and our parents often want to make us something else than we are. Or, as also happened with me, we do what we think others (parents, teachers, friends, society, etc.) want from us to get approval and love, or what we think is love.
Hou haven't heard from me for a long time. I have been too busy to write. I recently started what you could call Jeroensjourney 3. A 7 months journey through Australia, India, Thailand and Japan.
After two weeks for work and pleasure in Australia I am currently for work in Pune, India. Last week I did an amazing healing and meditation workshop about healing childhood issues and parental conditioning here in the Osho Meditation Resort in Pune, called Primal Rebirth.
It was an amazing week and I literally feel reborn. Looser, relaxter, more sensitive, happier, calmer.... All great. Life is such a gift! But the vast majority of the people lives only such a small part of their real potential. In these courses I feel how I become more and more myself and each time I discover that there are old wounds that I did not know about and that were healed. Wow..... Thank you existence for having put me on this path!!
McCain:
More trouble for US to come if he were elected president?
Dear reader,
Like 4 and 8 years ago I am closely following the US elections. And like 4 and 8 years ago I am stunned that a candidate who is clearly not what the US needs right now seems not on track for a landslide loss. Eight years ago there was a very intelligent candidate who understood the real problems we are facing (like climate change) and who later even won the Nobel Prize, Mr. Al Gore, against a candidate, Mr. George Bush, who had screwed up every business he had been in in his life and who had no clue what was going on in the world.
The American people elected the latter one (GW Bush) and he even made a bigger mess than I could ever have imagined.
Eight years ago, after 8 years of a democratic president, the US was a very wealthy country with a budget surplus and low unemployment. After 8 years of Republican reign the US...
- Is more unpopular than ever (which also affects the economy),
- Has a much larger national debt than 8 years before,
- Has a national currency that is worth much less than 8 years earlier
- Is still spending billions every month on a war that has given terrorists more, rather than less, space to play by overtrowing a dictator (Saddam Hussein) who hated Al Queda
- Is in a big banking crisis because banks had gotten too much freedom to do whatever they like
- Has a higher and faster rising unemployment
- Is a country where people have to leave their houses by the thousands because they can no longer pay the mortgage (believe me there are some troubles in Europe, but that doesn't happen here).
You might think this is play with words, but I think it is good to get this a bit clearer.
I just moved two weblogs I wrote a year ago about 'The Meaning of Life' (click here and here) in this group of weblogs called 'The Purpose of your life'. Now that I read these weblogs back I see that they are all about flowing about being completely in alignment with yourself and the universe about being authentic self.
This, I would still agree is the meaning of life if we define this as 'how we are meant to life our lives'.
For me the difference between the meaning of life and the purpose of your life is the following.
Introduction to a new 'rubriek': The purpose of your life
Dear reader,
I wondered whether it is useful to introduce a new group ('Rubriek' in Dutch) on my weblog. I have come to the conclusion that this category 'The Purpose of Your Life' is a useful addition to all my existing groups. I will explain why.
The blogs in this group 'The Purpose of Your Life' which I could also have called 'The purpose of life' or 'The purpose of my life'or 'Finding the purpose of your life', will be different from what I write and wrote about in 'The Art of Living' and 'Creating Work you Love'.
I wrote in my previous weblog about a change of energy and how that triggers change, personal growth and healing in people. I have definitely noticed it myself in the last couple of weeks. It has actually been quite special.
About a week ago there was this strong sexual energy, I was super horney and it felt like my whole body was vibrating with this very strong energy. Actually, it was so strong that it was almost not pleasant anymore. Of course it did not help, to say the least, that my girlfriend is not with me at the moment.
But after a couple of days that went. And then something else came.
More and more people in my environment tell me that we are in a period of transition towards a higher vibration. For me, until quite recently, these stories always sounded to me as pretty airy-fairy [zweverig] and I put them on the same pile as people who believe in angels, higher beings, a personal god or life after death. In short, 'things' that we can say of, "it might exist but we can never know". For me spirituality has nothing to do with blind beliefs or assumptions that we can never proof. It is like believing in marsians or extraterrestians. "If you believe in them, fine for you, but I am not going to waste my time and energy on those kind of fantasies." Spirituality for me is pretty down to earth. Based on personal experience, not on questionable assumptions.
But this new vibration, in my own experience, seems a reality. So let me explain what it is - according to those who claim to know - and what my experiences are with it.
This period with a higher vibration can be called the new age. More specifically, it is the age of Aquarius, which, according to some has started around 2000 after more than 2160 years of the age of Pisces. But there is widespread discussion about the exact date with a spread of as much as 200 years! See here for more about the discussion on the 'when-question'. But whatever the date, I feel that we are somehwere in the transition period.
Other terms you might have heard in relation to this new age is "the fifth dimension" and the year "2012".
So until very recently I put all this in the category of "new age bla bla or pure nonsense", but that has changed. Not long ago I read a weblog (on punt.nl!) about the age of Aquarius, and what I read there made a lot of sense and matched with what I saw happen all around me in the world. So let me explain what my understanding of the whole thing is underneath.
This is a weblog I wrote quite a while ago. It is a follow up on the weblog about how my physical body changed.
How my personality changed
Dear reader,
After writing how healing and therapies changed my body I will write about what it of course was all about: to change my personality to become a more balanced, emotionally and mentally healthy and a happier person.
Let me begin to describe what my understanding of the word 'personality' is. Our personality is the set of character traits, habits, patterns and beliefs that we are born with or have developed in the course of our lives.
So one person is fearful, another is arrogant, another has issues with anger, another is extrovert, one eats to much, another drinks too much, one is very social, another a loner, one is perfectionist and ambitious, the other sloppy and lazy, one has fear of abandonment another a fear for commitment, one is self-confident another has a lack of self esteem, one trusts people and beliefs that others are trustworthy while another distrusts everyone, one beliefs that he has the power to create his own life while the other takes whatever happens in his or her life as the will of God, one has difficulty expressing his or her feelings, another starts crying at the smallest adversary, one is crazy about sports and the outdoors the other is a coach potatoe, etc., etc.
Holland beats world champion Italy 3-0 and vice-world champion France 4-1 (we're talking soccer)
Holland wins: National therapy
Dear readers,
I never have been a huge football (or soccer as the Americans say) fan. But I always liked the (World and European) championships where countries face each other. I couldn't care less if Rotterdam (Feyenoord) or Ajax (Amsterdam) wins because I have no particular connection with any city in The Netherlands. But when countries face each other something else happens. Here in Holland the wholecountry turns orange. I used to find that a bit stupid and did not participate in it. "That's for those simple people that go around shouting and drinking too much", was more or less how I felt about all the Orange craziness.
I now understand that that was my ego speaking, the ego that judges playfulness and letting go of control as something 'bad'. (See my blog Procrastination and Playfulness: the soul child of the Enneagram). But now I am more and more embracing that part of myself and I realise that this kind of craziness is very healthy.
Last months I did a Sufi inspired retreat in Mexico. At the end of three days we were asked to make a commitment to let go of one 'bad habit', that bothered us.
In a way it is like stopping with smoking, deciding to eat healthier or going to bed earlier. Every bad habit, every emotional imbalance, every so-called personal weakness (nervousness, impatience, anger, anxiety), even every trauma, is not just something that we developed as a response to our life experiences or something we 'inherited' from our parents, but it is also something we DO, or at least something we ALLOW to happen. It might sound pretty harsh to say to someone who has been abandoned by both his or her parents at the age of three that his or her distrust of people of fear of abandonment is something he or she does or allows to happen, but in the end that is the truth.
But that does not mean that you can just say: now I stop doing this. It is not that easy, although in the end we can learn to indeed let go of the attachment to these habits and character treats and become really free of them. That is something for another blog.
This is about letting go of less dramatic habits and character traits, that however, can still have a very negative effect on the quality of your life.
I have always been interested in the weather. I like sunny weather and I hate rain or weeks of cloudy days that we sometimes have here in Holland, so I always, like many Dutch, pay attention to the forcasts and the weather reports.
And I have to say it is becoming more and more interesting. The weather is going more and more crazy every year, so much so that you wonder if we can still speak about climate. If there are days in Januari of 14 degrees and days in July of 12 degrees. What's then the climate if +2 is normal for January, and +22 for July?
For those few Ostriches (struisvogels) who still have their heads in the sand saying that there is no climate change, or that this is all perfectly natural, it is getting harder and harder. They have to stick there head deeper and deeper in the sand to limit their contact with reality. But this is not what I wanted to write about in this weblog.
At a nice dinner with work-colleagues yesterday I was asked: "Have all your meditation and courses in the last few years changed you?", "Or are you still the same Jeroen you were 5 years ago?"
My immediate answer was: "I have defnitely changed and am not who I was 5 years ago."
I mentioned a concrete example of something that had changed, but there is obviously much more. It is actually a very interesting question. Of course we all change. Everything always changes. Nobody is the same person he was 5 years ago. His or her body has changed and the life experiences of the previous years have also changed him or her. If everything goes well, our life experiences make that we do not only grow older but actually also grow wiser as we age. Unfortunately the opposite can also happen when over the years we get more and more imprisoned in our (limited) belief systems and psycho-emotional patterns rather than becoming freer and freer and freer of them.
In this weblog I will start to describe the physical, bodily changes I have experienced over the last years as a result of (holisitic) healing.
And when it comes to our psycho-somatic development we see that for most people the norm is to become stiffer and stiffer over time, both physically and mentally, until in the end this stiffness leads to pains and illnesses. Fortunately by healing this process can be slowed down and even be reversed.
In this weblog I will relate a bit about how I have changed. How is my current personality and body-mind different from the one I had about 5 years ago?
Today is my 40th birthday. That is quite a mile stone. But while some people might have the feeling at 40:
"I am getting old", I prefer the saying "Life begins at 40!".
But while I know this saying I wonder why they say so. Isn't it a bit weird that what for most people is more like halfway their life they say life is just beginning? I can only speak for myself but in a way I feel like that. In a way it feels like life has only really started a few years ago.
I wrote in my previous weblog about the number One personality of the Enneagram: The Perfectionist. I never have had any doubt that this is my ego-fixation, but writing about my playful and adventurous soul child I started to wonder how, in my life, I ended up being the Perfectionist and forget about my playful little Seven.
Welcome to the weblog that follows on jeroensjourney.punt.nl. Here I will update you on myexperiences in Thailand and India, and my personal inner or spiritual journey. After my healing journey described on jeroensjourney.punt.nl (with also information about Buddhism, meditation, Taoism and other healing practices), this weblog, from early 2007, relates about further healing and spiritual growth for an increasingly happy and true life.
With love from Asia,
Jeroen Deva Geetesh (jeroensjourney@gmail.com) (I check this e-mail not very often, so let me know, on my blog, that you sent me an e-mail)
