consciously – Aspirational Adventures

Every move he makes is totally heart led. Photographed by me last week

I ended the last post with “Are we willing though to listen to our hearts and not our egos?” and feel I should unpack it a bit.

Logic isn’t bad. In fact going back to a previous post I think life would be easier if we didn’t put things into “good box/bad box” but the Eden myth lets us know humankind chose knowledge of good and evil over life, chose wanting to put things into logical boxes over wanting to trust in God/The Universe itself.

“Humans are primarily primed to be emotionally relationally led survival based beings. Egos don’t want to accept this which is where it all goes wrong. Sadly our world is obsessed with logic. The more they rely on logic the harder it is” Quotes from a conversation from the other day. Note it isn’t logic that is bad but the obsession with, the relying totally on logic that is the problem.

What is Ego though?

Ego is your idea or opinion of yourself, especially your feeling of your own importance and ability:

in psychoanalysis, the part of a person’s mind that tries to match the hidden desires (= wishes) of the id (= part of the unconscious mind) with the demands of the real world

Meaning of ego in English https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/ego

But this gets skewed when we have allowed ourselves to be shaped by outside influences – what are parents/friends/teachers/colleagues said about us, what we read on the internet/in newspapers/magazines/books of how we “should be”, when we listen to adverts of what we “need” to be happy. Then we slide logic into the mix and we get confused. We are listening to all those outside influences and not listening to our hearts, not hearing who are true, genuine self is . [see the picture]

NOTE – we are not to be our “best self” but our most genuine self. Best goes back to the good box/bad box, right/wrong mentality. My genuine self is true to me and through that of course I will be giving off a calm energy which will help those around me to be their most genuine selves.

So if our world is obsessed with logic how to we “fix the broken systems”? How do we get to that place of “spiritual and cultural transformation”?

I don’t think we can think this through, that we can logically find an answer. I think it is time to move to a different place, to a place of mystery, of deep spirituality, of not needing to understand but trusting that there is a better way, but something greater than us can bring us to this point. I think we need to stop putting our trust in what we can do and start resting in God/The Universe/Whatever higher power you wish to call it.

How do we do that you may be asking? Because ask you will because that is logical. I’m not sure that many religious organisations can help because there is too much emphasis based on “having the answers” to give to the world, rather than living out the answer, rather than loving people unconditionally – that isn’t logical.

Let us step into the mystery of God, of the Son of God walking the earth, even the death and resurrection of Jesus to be a mystery not to be something that we can say “he died because of this”. Though I do think it is alright to say “One of the many reasons Jesus died is to reconcile us to God but there are many other things that I don’t understand and don’t get and that’s ok”.

Let’s start saying “I don’t know and that’s ok” more and more. Let’s start working on getting rid of the rubbish that stops us from being our genuine selves, that makes us afraid to trust our hearts. Let’s be bold and know there is more than we know but we want to connect with that more than.

I wonder what would happen if we all did that?

The System is Broken

Taken from a private FB group I’m part, which is where the idea for this and the previous 2 blog post emerged from

I was hoping to say this post is, a sort of conclusion, a sort of answer if we are brave enough to do it, to the issues in the previous two posts, but as it has progressed I realise there has to be at least one more post.

One of the major reasons we finish up in jobs we’re not happy in, whether high paid or low paid, going too often for the miserable but respectable position is because we listen too often to the voices of others, even if that is not conscious. We want to fit in so we go for something that will “use our brains”, make our parents happy, earn us “enough” money which will lead to a “nice” house, lots of leisure time during which we will too often continue the patter of doing things that are subconsciously put on us by external voices. Yet in all this we are being logical. We are looking at things with logical eyes. We are not listening calmly and quietly to our hearts. In fact we shut our hearts out and then wonder why we see increases in depression, anxiety, and various other things.

Interestingly the person I mentioned in the 1st of these three posts has quit the job that was making her miserable, is now doing a selection of other jobs, is happy and is writing again.

Interestingly for myself I’ve just taken on 2 part time jobs, which I felt in my heart were the right things to do. I am back to being as busy as I was before lockdown and yet I am finding that I feel more creative, more able to write within the spaces that there are in my day. Following my heart even though it actually looks a bit full on and illogical has released me to write more than when I was trying to do things that seemed right.

In the last post the question was posed firstly by Gus Seth, then by myself, of how do we over come greed, selfishness and apathy and bring about a spiritual and cultural transformation.

The answer I think is so obvious – let go of trying to figure out things logically. Stop trying to work out how to change the system. Instead find those things that block us from listening to our hearts, be healed/set free of them and just listen. Then I believe we would do the jobs we liked, want to do the things that were needed to keep this world clean and healthy. We would care more for the planet, and each other, because we would be hearing it more. But this takes time

As a Christian I love hanging out with God. But too often in too many denominations to fit in you do have to let go of the magical mystery of God and go with your logical mind to fit in. It is not that you give up your intelligence to truly meet with God but you do have to let go of your logic to really enter into that mystery. As God says in Ezekiel,

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
Ezekiel 36:26

This must be on my mind because I did a post about this only last year which you can read here. Following on from that I think that when one has a heart of stone it is when one is using logic and working out what fit right, what will work properly. But we have to let God/The Universe/our therapy move us from the logical to the vulnerable heart, the fleshy heart, the heart that often doesn’t do the things society expects but in the end changes things by the energy that they release.

I also think this is why people do not rush to go to churches. They do not need another logical, rule based, fitting in with others system. They need a place where they can be free to be their genuine selves, free to fly, free to make mistakes and be picked up after. I could rant away about this for ages, but …

I also think that this freedom from logic and being able to let go of the blockages that hold us back from hearing our hearts is not just for those who meet God/Jesus, but is open to everyone. I also think that those who go to church often have not worked on freeing those blockages.

With all of this there is no logical system that will work, whether in prayer or in anything. There is a hanging out, a trusting, a deep listening, and then a bravery to go outwards into whatever comes next.

Are we willing though to listen to our hearts and not our egos?