Was this a decision, a choice? In some sense, yes. It was predicated entirely on the notion of choice. And yet, despite all my best efforts, somehow this choice was not available until the moment when it actually was. In the deepest sense, it happened by itself.
The person who appears to be choosing this or that is a disguise, a costume, a mask behind and through which Consciousness operates. When "you" believe in the reality of the disguise and lose sight of who is pinching who, then "you" enjoy the Divine Drama: the struggle, the horror, the hope, the advances and the setbacks, the whole apparent adventure, including the whole fascinating quandary of whether or not "you" are free to choose. When it is seen ( buy no one) that there is no one behind the mask, then the pincher and the pinched dissolve together. The hand moves away effortlessly. The dilemma evaporates.
Or maybe the pinch continues. After all, not every flower blooms, and only in the mirage of personal identity does this appear tragic. Consciousness (or God) has an interest, it seems, in experiencing absolutely everything; even failure, even addiction, even the holocaust. Unconditional love embraces it all, just as it is.
...Gradually the mind was being forced into a corner, and it was begin seen that liberation had nothing to do with improvement. That dream of getting control at last and finally triumphing is the Last Big Hope, the final disappointment. We no longer believe that a million dollars or an academy award will bring us lasting peace and happiness, but we still imagine that our ersatz version of enlightenment will. We're still taking the phenomenal dream and the "me" character to be real. We've switched from a worldly movie to a spiritual one, but we're still in the frame of duality and personal identity, trying to get somewhere in the movie. Even trying to get out of the movie is only another movie, featuring the same illusory main character. True enlightenment is not final victory; it is final defeat. It's outside the frame.
Identifying as Joan and seeking improvement is agitation. Peace allows everything. But it's not that peace is good and agitation is bad. Agitation can be fun. The story of being bound and trying to get free is a very entertaining story. Hollywood has made billions on it. The movie arises and disappears. The agitation comes and goes. Awareness accepts it all. There is never really a problem. The rope only looks like a snake. Look deeply into agitation, and you find only peace.
There is no choice because there is no thing at all. That word (enlightenment) truly points only to this that never arrives and never leaves. The mind just can't quite believe it. It's too simple. Too transparent. Too all-inclusive. It is literally beyond belief. Right here, right now. Just as it is.
....If you hear yourself thinking, "I've tried awareness over and over, and it doesn't work, I'm still smoking," that's thinking, thinking about awareness. It's thinking about "you" (a thought) using something called "awareness" (an idea) to achieve an imagined result (another idea!) That's not awareness; it's wishful thinking, followed by frustration and despair. Awareness isn't looking for any results or feeling depressed by past failures. That's all thought activity. Awareness sees without commentary or judgment. It has no agenda. It accepts everything as it is.
Suffering is an illusion that somethings needs to be different. Awareness is all-inclusive. Nothing is left out. Paradoxically, it is this very quality of total acceptance that has the power to dissolve all suffering. It's a great joke, a great mystery that the key to transformation is the complete acceptance of what is.
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