Living Without Stress

We were discussing the various ways in which the mind creates stress and can stress ever be overcome.
"M" said, "I just can't seem to overcome this feeling of hopelessness".  "In some sense I know that I am the cause of it, but in another sense it seems that my circumstances contribute to it and are largely a cause of it."  "I do still experience happiness from time to time, but still I am haunted by the feeling that things could be better."  "Sometimes I feel I am in a rut and it depresses me to no end."

Isn't it important first of all to be able to look at a situation with a clear mind?  This is one of the hardest things to do because we are caught up in the emotion of  self created doubt and fear.  We are a product of self induced illusion.  We are always looking for the ideal, the way things should be, instead of facing the reality of what is.  Once we cease this activity of constantly trying to live up to a defined image, then something may happen which allows us to see very clearly the cause of our misery.  Mostly we want to find some sort of escape from reality or what we perceive as reality.  We may see a psychologist, take drugs, drink alcohol, have sex, eat chocolate, or any number of other activities that may be utilized to escape.  None of these things are inherently bad or evil.  But the fact that we use them as a mechanism to cope with our feelings of discontent and fear leads to aberrant behavior or behavior modification.  Behavior modification is simply a modification of ones psychological and emotional programming.   It does nothing to get to the core of the problem.

You are a product of your environment both physically and psychologically.  You have been programmed (or brainwashed) to think the way you do by what you experience and believe.  Your beliefs are you they are not separate from you.  You look at the world though those beliefs, they "color" everything that you are exposed to.  When you look you do not see reality, you see your interpretation of reality with all its prejudice, narrow mindness, and utter lack of compassion.  Look at the world through your misery, you created it, it is not separate from you.  You are the misery that you see.  When you realize this in the absolute moment, not as a conceptual thought, but as a face to face fact that cannot be disputed, then perhaps something will happen that will change you forever.  But you will never realize until you are able to let go of all the psychological garbage that you have accumulated.  All your petty beliefs which have so far done nothing but add to your confusion, conflict and fear.

We are talking about freedom, not freedom from something, but freedom that is the outcome of the negation of what should be and the acceptance of what is.  The truth of the moment cannot be realized directly, it is when all has been negated including and most especially the self that thinks it knows.  You have heard me speak of the undefined, this is what we are referring to.  It is a state of awareness that transcends your conditioned mind.  It is finding peace in the midst of the chaos of belief and projection of that belief.