Uncover Our Role in Our States of Living

Every one of us is looking for a few basic things. We want to feel good and we don’t want to feel bad. This is the difference between peace & happiness and pain & suffering. We should remain open to understanding how these states of living (peace, happiness, pain and suffering) develop in our life.

What brings about these states of living? Where do they come from? How can we affect these states? Why do they exist? When will it end?

Connecting cause and effect is critical to transforming our life. The only way to transform our life is to develop a deep understanding of our direct role in the development and experience of each of these states of living. There’s much we do every day to maximize the good and minimize the bad, we just fumble the ball, pay little to no attention and don't challenge our view of it whatsoever.

Elaborate orchestrations do not create peace and happiness.
Events and traumas do not create pain and suffering.

The mind is what highlights the states of living. The mind focuses on one set over the other set, and can move from one to another quickly. Realizing the powerful role our minds have in every bit of this process begins to place the wheel back in our hands.

When we suffer, instead of just being miserable with it, be curious about how the suffering develops and sustains itself. What are the factors that govern the development and the disipation of the suffering? How can we interrupt the development and quicken the rate of disipation?

When we're happy, really challenge the origin of that happiness. Is it somehow injected into us from some external source, or is it always underlying every moment of our existence and we just don't acknowledge it or actively ignore it? How many times have we felt happy and instead of embracing this state of mind, we push it away and attempt to silence it?

It can be scary to feel sustained happiness. It wakens up our mind and our awareness, and there's plenty we've ignored and for far too long. The flood of awareness can be overwhelming, so instead of focusing that awareness we shut it down completely.

Let us nurture all of our states of living. Let us get to know each.
Let us uncover our natural state and embrace it openly.
Let us have patience as we explore this wonder we call life.
Let us just be.