Sometimes, the scariest, most threatening place to be in is…
Our mind
Because that’s where our ‘demons’ seem to hide and are ever ready to reveal themselves. That’s where the courtroom with judge, jury and prosecutor are in full flight. That’s where our stories are crafted with incredible speed and unparalleled catastrophizing.
Dear friends, as I was in meditation earlier today, I became aware of something true about a situation I was in. The conditioned mind ie Ego/ASS immediately went scrambling for evidence that would refute this truth.
What it found instead was another truth, not one that was contrary to the first but one that gently asserted itself as equally valid and equally deserving of trust.
Two things can be true at the same time. And yet, the Ego/ASS is often too eager to embrace one and dismiss the other.
These days, we might refer to it as cognitive bias. And, if you haven’t already realized this, cognitive bias keeps us trapped, imprisoned in the same belief system that offers us a false sense of security by virtue of being familiar, all the while preventing us from acknowledging and accepting other truths.
Actually, it is probably more accurate to say other valid aspects of a situation rather than other truths.
Why do I say that?
Because the Truth is always free from our perceptions and our stories about it. It’s a felt thing in the body well before the mind provides an interpretation. But I digress.
What I want to say in my message today is that when we repeatedly choose to be comfortable with our cognitive biases, we are trapped. We can never be free.
We can never feel the peace that we truly, deeply desire and wish to be re-acquainted with. You see, cognitive bias is like quicksand that holds us from the ocean of truth that we know is there but cannot seem to get to.
And rather than give ourselves permission to notice this quicksand – which fills our mind – we avoid it.
Because truth, which actually releases us from the quicksand, is, to the mind that has become comfortable with bias, too bright, too freeing, too unsettling. It literally threatens our sense of comfort. It shows us that relying on the comfort that familiarity offers us is, in fact, avoidance.
And so, we avoid sitting with our mind and letting the ‘demons’ therein reveal themselves.
We avoid the ‘courtroom’. We try so hard to protect ourselves ie our fragile Ego/ASS from crumbling in the face of truth, of valid yet different aspects of the one situation.
But you see, the Ego/ASS’s tolerance for change drops further and further with each avoidance of truth.
So, how do we avoid?
We find our echo chambers, places where all we hear is what we are comfortable with, that don’t upset our tolerance.
We distract ourselves with conversation, media, phones, activities, food…all of which are inherently neither good nor bad, but which, under the control of our Ego/ASS serve to reinforce and protect our bias and keep us from what is true and what is truly freeing.
‘The truth shall set you free’ might seem like a Biblical platitude but when we hear it in our heart, we cannot help but be warmed and illumined by its truthful radiance.
What’s more, its light draws out the truth from within those ‘demons’ and actors in the courtroom of our mind.
We see them, no longer as threats, but as friends bringing us gifts – yes, even the most reviled and terrifying ones, each revealing different aspects of the same situation.
Dear friends, be willing to risk sitting among the demons and perceived threats in your mind. Be willing to let them show you the truth within them which they all hold because you see, as it says in A Course In Miracles,
Nothing real can be threatened
Nothing unreal exists
Herein lies the peace of God
Now, given that sitting in our mind can be scary if not terrifying, it helps to do it with someone who is willing to enter that courtroom with you.
Someone who will not try to force or bully or shame you out of your comfort but who will offer their heart to hear what you dare not hear yourself or hear by yourself.
Reach out to such a person. Life gives us the gift of one another. Let us receive the gift without indebtedness or shame but with trust, with openness, with willingness.
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