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Originally Posted by wolfgaze
Tevelygo, what you're touching on here is something very important -- non-attachment... We can consciously evolve and progress to a state of being where we are no longer seeking acceptance/wholeness/completeness from 'externals' (individuals/relationships, material wealth/possessions, etc)... Where your sense of self (identity) is no longer reliant on the influence of others or on having to control/manipulate your external life circumstances and situation... This requires extensive inner-work, but it's absolutely achievable.
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Oh I think I heard about non-attachment before but I possibly don't fully understand the idea. Also, I do want to actually feel involved in life. I was very detached from a lot of things before, especially people. And so I was not really living a big part of life. It might be easier to want non-attachment when one has already experienced a lot of stuff like good meaningful and strong real life friendships and a real romantic relationship.
Does this make sense?
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You know that familiar state of consciousness where your physical mind is constantly chattering about how certain individuals need to treat/view you a certain way, or how a certain set of external circumstances need to always be present in order for you to feel 'okay' inside.
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Not really familiar with that, constant chattering sounds draining. I'm kind of nonverbal in my head.
As for the external circumstances, sure, I do want some things and do like to achieve those. It's a natural instinct that I don't really want killed. To be more precise here, I'd be able to choose to go and vegetate for the rest of my life - no suffering but also no involvement in life, just eat, drink, sleep - but I don't really want that just yet. A part of mine wouldn't mind throwing in the towel like that but the rest of mine doesn't.
I would not call it a "certain set of external circumstances". It's a bit more flexible view than that. So maybe that's not an issue in my case?
I guess, on second thought, with people specifically maybe I did want a "certain set of external circumstances". Some regularly available connections and good feelings with people.
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in order for you to finally accept your 'self' and to be free of suffering. We live in a physical reality marked by constant change - and it's an impossible feat to exercise any control over how others choose to operate, and impossible to control the totality of our external circumstances (which are constantly subject to change)...
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Interesting worldview. I'm a bit different, as in, I don't really see everything as constantly changing... yes changes do happen sometimes though.
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The less you (psychologically) attach yourself to externals - the more you will allow yourself to connect with the deeper/higher aspect of one's own nature that exists within all of us - and this is the path to finally securing total self-acceptance, completeness/wholeness, and peace of mind!
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Yeah like I said I've heard of this before, but I have a different philosophy.
I mean... What I'd like to achieve is maybe partially overlapping with this but in another way it's different.
Here's what it is: I'd like to be able to live life fully with the aspects mentioned above. Experience connection with people more while being able to deal with all of it in my own way that works for me. If there's such a way. It includes self-respect of course, so I would agree on self-acceptance (I just call it self-respect).
I am not entirely sure what's meant by completeness/wholeness.
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However I need to stress this... What I'm describing does not lead to a state of isolation or an experience of disconnection from others... It may seem that way early on, but that is not the final outcome or end result. As you consciously shed and transcend limiting ways of thinking and perceiving about yourself and others - you start to experience less and less barriers, less division and separation... And not just with other people, but with everything. Very hard to explain this with words but it is a state of awareness in which you are no longer identified with your physical form and with the temporary and conditioned aspects of your 'human identity'... You discover a 'sense of self' rooted in something much deeper, and transcendent... Not asking anyone to take my word for it - but to keep an open mind about this notion...
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I might be able to do this at age 70, I doubt I can before. I'm not trying to be facetious lol, I just don't feel capable of being this transcendent mentally.
And... I've already had enough isolation and disconnection really. So my gut tells me the right direction for me is more involvement. Unless I really do find it's not possible.
But! I did solve the current circumstance that was posing an issue - I managed to talk with that friend of mine and it actually ended up well!! And I understood some things I didn't before! That's why I'm past that crisis thing that was building up for a while.
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When a life experience is overwhelming and too difficult and challenging for us to consciously process, reconcile, and accept - it's like the mental/emotional reaction gets 'stuck' within us, and has no where to go (can't be released)....
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Yeah, I get what you mean. For me a complicating factor is that I'm alexithymic, which means that my brain is neurologically different in terms of emotion processing, so for me such things are more challenging to consciously process than for the average person. I did get a lot of my emotions shut down a long time ago and trying to get back to normal with them no longer shut down means a lot of pain with that.
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This is when it becomes an 'issue' for us and results in fears, sensitivities, and insecurities which can stay with us for a long time. Since the individual doesn't know how to work through (process) the challenging mental/emotional states that have surfaced - the instinctive reaction is to more or less push it away by trying to consciously avoid it or block it from our everyday state of consciousness... To push it into the subconscious mind, only to have it continue to affect us (subconsciously) and only to have it re-surface in a serious way later on in our life experiences...
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Exactly!
I blocked out so much of the world by my quit from emotionally reacting/being involved in stuff. I blocked out so much I started being nonfunctional though I wasn't too bad. But it was not sustainable forever... The rest of what you say about internal issues is also true, though since I'm alexithymic, I will never get to feel these things in the same way as most people.
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Sometimes you hear of individuals breaking down and allowing themselves to be vulnerable - and then an avalanche of previously suppressed/repressed emotional activity just pours out of them. Something they had been holding onto for a long time - because they previously could not consciously process it in a healthy/functional manner. And this is no knock on the individuals either - this is a natural part of the 'human experience'. What I'm describing above happens to everyone in some for or fashion - most evidently during our childhood/youth.
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My emotional shutdown and disconnect happened when I was a teenager.
Can I ask, what do you mean by "allowing themselves to be vulnerable"?
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When we can and do consciously 'process' life's events and experiences in a healthy and functional manner - there is still emotional activity that surfaces, but it doesn't become 'stuck' inside of us and cause prolonged problems and conflicts. It's like it washes over us and passes through us. It doesn't get held onto and stored within us...
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This would be good to have.
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This all ties back to one's state of awareness and conscious development ... The broader and more expansive our state of awareness, and the more refined our state of conscious development is - the more adept we become at being able to consciously process life's interactions and experiences in a healthy way... The less likely we are to accumulate 'emotional baggage' that would otherwise interfere wth our ability to experience contentment and peace of mind...
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Yeah I do try to increase awareness of my internals, I just don't think I can have this very broad/expansive awareness and all that non-attachment in the way described, not for a few more decades at best.
But I do know that emotional baggage needs to be treated in some way so I get that part of your idea.
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Originally Posted by wolfgaze
About 10 years ago I tried two different types of prescription medications - for about a year total... I also had issues with side effects and additionally had an extremely challenging withdrawal experience when I discontinued use of one of them. It wasn't long after that I realized that I wasn't going to be able to 'fix' my internal 'problems' with any type of quick-fix external solution (in this context, a pill)... I didn't know how I was going to heal myself - but I knew (in my case) I wasn't going to continue my previous 'strategy'... I had to continue searching...
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I completely agree that pills are just a "quick fix". Funnily enough, they don't even provide that "quick fix" for me anymore. There was a medication that worked for a short time before a negative thing happened to me and then the medication's effect was overpowered by it: it was bad enough to shut down my emotions including the positive motivation I got from the medication previously...
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In fact, I would later go on to experience the life-changing healing that I had longed for, for so long... And I can only tell you in hindsight that I now view my previous (and ultimately unsuccessful) efforts and strategies for healing myself with complete acceptance and understanding - because I realize that I necessarily had to explore and experience what ultimately would not work out for me, in order to finally guide/steer myself down the path that would bring about my healing and an end to my suffering. It's kind of like you're searching the entire house for something and you don't find it until you have looked everywhere else first and where it could not be found. You had to look everywhere before you would finally lead yourself to it's actual 'location'. Think of it kinda like a process of elimination.... You keep searching, and after enough searching you finally discover what you've been seeking all this time... And it changes everything!
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Oh I'm not blaming myself for not having solved stuff yet. I get your analogy though I'd change it a bit: while searching, a tornado arrives and the whole house crumbles on your head.
Then if all the debris didn't hit your head in a deadly enough way, you maybe find some seemingly insightful bit lodged somewhere among the bits and pieces in the ruins and then you rebuild that house and in the process of rebuilding you may lose that bit (maybe not but maybe yes) and then the same repeats and so on.
See why it's so non-trivial?
Can you tell me what this thing was that you were seeking and once found, it changed everything? If it's not too personal?