(Written March 27, 2010)
I visited our new art gallery this week. One of the exhibits was an audio with a surround sound of 40 or so speakers. The written description provided before entering the exhibit implied that there were some darker, downward spiral aspects to it, but I still wanted to experience it because of my enjoyment of similar exhibits before.
As I sat with my eyes closed listening to the profound experience of an orchestra as it was played through this immense surround sound system, I caught myself leaving the magnificence of my now to worry, and supposedly prepare for the darker aspects I was informed were to come. I caught myself in the midst of doing this and thought, “what a waste, to chose to focus on, and try and prepare myself for something that might be coming, and totally miss the beauty and enjoyment I was having in the present moment.”
Afterwards I wondered, how much do I do this? How often do I leave this wonderful moment to worry about and try and protect and prepare myself for something that may or may not be coming in the future that I am concerned may not feel good? Furthermore, I have just created the experience I was trying to avoid, by going through this preparation for a fall I might take onto the downward spiral. What a mismanagement of my thoughts, time and focus. I really want to be allowing each moment of joy to be its pure, enjoyable expression of bliss, untainted with worry about the supposedly impending fall.
And what if (as so often is) the supposedly impeding fall (that thing we worry about happening) never happens. Those moments of pure bliss are gone . . . and for what? Whatever preparation I thought I was doing to protect myself was a waste of my time and energy. And really what kind of preparation do I think I am doing, or can achieve? And by “protecting and preparing” myself so that the fall is not so painful, I am actually making myself a better match to it and, therefore, expecting it, which will just create an even bigger experience of it.
If I live each moment fully present in its beauty and perfection and allow the rare moments of downward spiral experience to be handled by my ability and confidence to refocus, how many more moments of being who I really am will I recoup? If I am not protecting and preparing and worrying about the possible 'not wanted experience', how many more moments do I leave for my enjoyment of the wanted experiences? I am thinking there are probably enough to tip the scale to allowing who I really am the majority of the time.
What a life awaits without changing a thing, except being present and not worrying.
No comments:
Post a Comment