VALIDATION

Recently I came across this quote by Brene Brown on a friend’s Facebook timeline, and it inspired a mini (paradox) post on validation… and now this more full-fledged one. This exposition need not be viewed as a “higher perspective.” (In anything I offer, it’s isn’t about higher or lower perspective, but simply direct seeing. As Awareness.)

So, let’s look directly at what’s been said in the quote.

It suggests that we can only totally trust the other’s experience (yes, correct). Giving their account total trust necessarily means we have a blank slate with zero assumptions and projections, that is, we have no idea what it’s like to be them (in their shoes) and we can only simply accept their experience. So, if it’s impossible to directly, inwardly know their experience, no matter how closely we listen via the mind, no matter how well we imagine, no matter how similarly we might think we’ve experienced something, then we cannot possibly validate it, as we can only validate what we know exactly and directly. And if we cannot validate it, we cannot invalidate it either! (Nor can we have empathy in the meaning of “being in their shoes.”) So, “empathy” can only mean simply accepting another’s experience, which can just be called Love, no?

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CAN ONE EVER BE INVALIDATED?

Would I be (in)validating your experience if I said to you that no one can possibly (in)validate your experience?

*****

Truth is Paradox series

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FEELINGS AND THEIR “BYPASSING”

Feelings are, by definition, meant to be felt. That’s why they are called feelings!

When identified with mind, we equate and conflate expressing feelings with the fueling and fanning of thought.

The thing is, if you rationalize away feelings with thought (it’s not really happening, I shouldn’t feel this way, I should know better, on the positive side… etc), you are repressing and bypassing,

AND

If you construct narratives around feelings (thinking that these are expressing feelings), you are also bypassing!

Feelings can only be felt.

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BEING/DOING AS ONESELF

In the moment you think you are doing something:

– to serve/help another
– to save something
– to make a difference/impact
– to ‘give back’
– to be a better person
– to transcend yourself
– to join a higher cause
– to leave behind something

It is all about you!

(And it is merely the other side of what we routinely or typically label selfish and narcissistic.)

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THE MYTH* OF PHYSICAL SPREAD

First, any sharing/offer contextual to the current pandemic does not imply that I’m refusing to comply with the present guidelines and mandates in all their unequivocal strictness. As one does as a respectful house guest, I’m happy, able and willing to follow the rules of the house exactly as laid out. Not because I necessarily believe in them, but just because. Just to be amenable and cooperative, as it doesn’t matter to me either way. Besides, in this case, I have been following (most of) the presently mandated protocol anyway, for more than a decade. In fact, this writing arises from a period of social (+media) distancing, which will promptly resume.

Now, on to the piece of writing.

For all of us who believe in space-time and materialist laws, the study of data around physical spread and contagion is interesting. Sure. I’ve seen a few sophisticated ones thanks to beloved ones sharing them with me, with particular note to the much circulated one published by Tomas Pueyo. (Though, it’s not clear to me how he ends up using a mortality rate of 1% instead of any other number between the 1-6% that was the obtained range from China/Asia, or the 2-3% used in other models, and it makes a significant difference. With mortality rate being inversely proportional to the number of actual but unreported cases estimated backwards, his selecting the lower mortality rate projects a far, far larger number of actual cases floating around in the WA area. Even the most sophisticated thought process and beautifully presented data *can* end up being torturing data to tell any story!)

When the belief in space-time ceases, however, one realizes that in the moment a ‘virus’ shows up anywhere, it is simultaneously and instantaneously present everywhere. Like a thought arising in One consciousness. If something arises in the Ocean, it is instantly in all the ocean, regardless of where in the Ocean the manifestation is first/most apparent. An apparent you or me being this wave or that wave, is still the Ocean alone.

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BHAVATU SARVA MANGALAM

Bhavatu sarva mangalam means wishing ultimate well-being to absolutely one and all: to (as) the One whole.

The virus, too. That asks to be welcomed, received, accepted.

And death, too. That asks to be welcomed, received, accepted.

In 2006 I sat on the bed by my beloved family member, telling me they couldn’t live anymore, that they might just have to take their life. I heard myself saying spontaneously, that I completely understood. That I wish they’d live by my side, that I would miss them dearly, but if this was right for them, I’d never blame or wrong them for it, or even entertain thoughts that it shouldn’t be so. And that I’d do my best to live Life. Bhavatu sarva mangalam.

In 2014 I did that again with another beloved family member, though from a physical distance.

In 2017 I sat completely unexpectedly in Indian district and state high courts, in multiple plea hearings for a cruel and wrongful incarceration, saying bhavatu sarva mangalam. Wishing the highest and best also to the devious, corrupt, malicious, cruel people present in the courtroom, who had trapped my beloved one. Not praying for a “win,” but only that universal order be served.

In 2019 I got news of a past partner having done the unthinkable. Right here. Bhavatu sarva mangalam.

In 2019 I also got news of the one-and-only music guide on the planet who matched step with me all the way into shunya, having suddenly departed. Poof, just like that. Bhavatu sarva mangalam.

Bhavatu sarva mangalam is not a preventative, defensive, wanting, yearning, may-this-or-that-happen stance. It is an abiding knowing that in universal order is every benefit and every lesson exactly as it must be. It is knowing that Life and Love have no opposite.

Bhavatu Sarva Mangalam is the only ‘prayer’ I’ll ever (not)have, never needing utterance.

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THE UNCONSCIOUS DEATH BIAS

In refusing to realize who we truly are and continuing the belief in limited and mortal identities, the mind is plagued with what can be called an unconscious death bias.

Everything done then, from “living life fully” to “being safe and responsible” to “leaving behind a legacy” to “preserving the traditions” to “fighting for this or that” to “loving fiercely” (to “respecting the masters” or abiding by “the law of karma”) is being done from the unconscious death bias. From this bias, (apparent) physical death itself is pre-programmed in “our” consciousness like a thermostat setting, and we never discover that the mind is powerful enough to align with whatever “cause” or “disease” or “event” to then manifest/actualize this death. 

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WHAT MATTERS

If you think you are being helpful and responsible and sincere by sharing/spreading information that raises alarm, fear, anxiety and panic — even if this information is factual data on disease trends, deaths etc — please do look again. If you think all the physical things you do can stop (or delay or contain) the spread of something (as) highly contagious (as thought), please do look again as well.

Yes, that’s what every materialist scientist / physician will say — that physical measures count.

Yet, Awareness reveals that only that which plagues as mind plagues as body. One’s immunity is in one’s thoughts and emotions, beliefs and attachments. The moment these ease up is the moment You are the expansive space for healing and wholeness, for affirming Life.

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UNINTERRUPTED BY THE VIRUS

I suddenly see that this virus thing brings into focus the inherent sustainability of the life flow I’ve been living — absolutely nothing has changed in my flow. I see as few people as I always do and I still see the people I always do. My “work” and small income are unaffected, my eating and outing patterns are also the same. (If anything, more people have the pause in their flow to work with me online in the guidance sessions, and those who already see me regularly in person for music or guidance, experience being in my presence and/or singing as strengthening to their immunity). 

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THE NEUTRALITY OF ENLIGHTENMENT

The neutrality of enlightenment is that nothing (no-one-thing) is either wanted or resisted. It’s seen that wanting something is, paradoxically, resisting it; and resisting something is, paradoxically, wanting it.

Once it is seen that the ‘it’ (that is wanted or resisted) is I, ‘it’ must (appear to) either dissolve in or merge with I. If ‘it’ is a natural (universal) preference/wellbeing, the merge appears as a having of it. If ‘it’ is not a natural (universal) preference/wellbeing, the dissolution appears as a healing of it. In actuality, neither a having nor a healing is happening, only the (already-always) wholeness of Self is realized, and so appearing as manifest.

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