[b]A common misconception is that an avoidance strategy should come before anything happens. The reality is that it’s the opposite: it’s very easy to get hurt, but avoiding getting hurt is usually not possible. What you have to do is learn to mitigate the damage by avoiding a potential bad outcome.
In a perfect reality, you don’t have to defend yourself. No one would want to hurt you. That’s called being a social being. It’s something that is very hard to teach, and something that takes a lot of practice. And you could never reach that level of competence, even if you try as hard as possible for the rest of your life. You could never be completely safe, as long as there is some sort of chance that something bad could happen to you.
In terms of damage mitigation, consider
a) not going where there is harm
b) learning how to control harm, by avoiding the worst kind of harm.
But as this game continues, and this life continues, I’ll learn new skills, skills that make it possible for me to live in a world that does not have
a) harm
b) harm that I have to work at avoiding.
As the game continues, my powers will grow, and my skills will improve. I am learning to do “less”, but the fact remains that everything we do comes from within. The best we can do is to learn how to do it the way nature intended it. The best we can do is become perfect humans that never become harmed, and eventually do not harm. I do not know of anything else we can do in this imperfect world that works. Maybe we should give up on all this technology, and let nature run it’s course.
I’m learning to enjoy imperfect beings who are making progress to learn how to live. When humans are not in control of their biological processes, they tend to get angry, upset and fearful. Our minds and emotions try to defend against it, as best they can, by concocting reasons to make us feel safer and more comfortable. But we’re still not fully human when we’re relying on fear to keep us safe. When we’re able to see through fear to reality, we open up to the bigger picture, we stop living in our own little box of self-made, self-imposed fears, and we step out of the little black prison of our mind. When we do that, we begin to open ourselves up to a new level of peace and tranquility. All the things we want to change in our lives begin to change simply because we’re no longer living in self-doubt, self-loathing, and self-destructive tendencies. When we’re willing to face this, we open ourselves up to a new future and a future that, at the same time, brings more peace and less fear. When we stop the insanity, we start becoming healthier, happier and free. And that’s the point that all of our fear is leading us to.
How often have you been told that you need to look in the mirror and be okay with yourself before you can heal? How often have you been told to not judge yourself, stop being judgmental and take a long hard look in the mirror? These simple instructions are absolutely important, because it’s the truth. When we’re able to see the bigger picture, we can see that we’re human. We’re all flawed, but so what? We’re all here to learn and to improve, and that’s what life is all about. But we don’t have to let fear dictate our lives. We can stop reacting to fear and start acting on reality. We can start facing what’s coming, and that’s something we can control. That’s the biggest leap we can make: from living in fear and reacting to it, to taking action and then not worrying about what comes next.
As we continue the journey towards awakening, we often get into ruts that are so deeply ingrained that they go from a deep pit to a deep hole. Because we find it so hard to step out of the old ways of thinking, it’s tempting to stay in these old, worn down holes until they wear us out. Our thoughts and our actions can begin to mirror each other, creating a cycle of fear, negativity, apathy, and hopelessness that just seems to keep repeating itself. These thoughts and these behaviors can make us feel as if we’re drowning in a sea of old habits and old fears. We see the patterns and we see the holes that we’re stuck in, but we can’t seem to figure out how to step out of them. We’re stuck. We’re tired of being scared and tired of trying to run away from our fears. We don’t know what to do. We’re scared, and we feel trapped, and that’s why we’re stuck.
We’re also not completely sure what we’re getting into when we step out of these holes and into the new ways of thinking.
The key is to face and accept the truth. The truth is that we’re all human and we’re all flawed.
Here’s what’s crazy: when we live in fear, we actually become MORE vulnerable and MORE exposed to life. And in our attempts to protect ourselves from things we don’t really want, we actually make ourselves more vulnerable, more open, more exposed, and more vulnerable to things we DO want. A good example of this is when someone wants to harm us physically or emotionally. As we try to defend ourselves, we become vulnerable. In that moment, we make ourselves more likely to be harmed. But it doesn’t have to be a physical harm. It could be the financial drain or emotional anguish of not being able to do the work we want in life. It could be the guilt of not giving a little more to people we care about. It could be the fear that if we step out, we won’t know what to do or where to turn. But whatever the danger, when we stop ourselves and live in fear, we increase our vulnerability and increase the danger to us.
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