7-27-15 Today I was meditating on tension I was feeling and it became very clear how the focus on tension really distracted me from being still or being present with my whole being. I could feel that tension take up everything, occupying my mind entirely and yet I knew it wasn't the whole of my existence. Sitting with that awareness helped me step back from the tension and realize that my identity didn't have to be defined by it and that I was allowing it to define my sense of awareness and being moreso than it actually might be.
7-30-15 I had a realization today about how I handle closeness with people. I only let people in so far before I start to push them away. It's a fear of abandonment. I'll abandon a person before they abandon me. Looking back on my history of relationships, familial, romantic, and otherwise, I see where I felt I was abandoned and consequently how this pattern developed out of that as a response to possible rejection. Nonetheless it hasn't helped my relationships with people in the past. I do feel I've changed it somewhat and I know that because I've let some people into my life enough for them to at least be some what close to me.
8-1-15 A long. hard conversation with Kat this morning really helped me appreciate on a deeper level how my issues have hurt the people in my life as well as appreciate how stillness is helping me go deep into those issues and see them from new perspectives. I can be an asshole sometimes to the people in my life and I really own that in a way I haven't before. Thankfully I am with someone who is willing to give me the benefit of the doubt and stick it out with me, even when I have made some hurtful choices. And I see how in making those choices I have sabotaged myself with her and with other people...but I also know I can take control or I can be defined by my issues. I'd rather take control and become a stronger, better person for it.
8-9-15 The qualities you want to embody are already within you. That's what Dzogchen offers in regards to working with a quality you want to cultivate. You aren't cultivating, so much as finding it, because its already within you. In my work with stillness, I've been realizing that in going deep within myself I can find my inner resources to draw on. They are already there. I don't have to look elsewhere. I think that in finding and working with the concepts and practices of Dzogchen, I've found a path of internal work that has allowed me to go further than I ever have in resolving my issues. And in stillness I'm finding clarity about who I am and who I want to be.
8-13-15 When I feel scarcity I feel tension and so I've been paying attention to that tension, acknowledging and then letting it merge into the wholeness of my being. This seems to be helpful because it causes me to recognize that the tension is just a moment, as opposed to all of me and that the moment will pass. It's not my identity. In Awakening the Luminous Mind, the author discusses how the tension is the pain mind and that pain mind is a distraction from being present...however to deal with the pain mind, you have to accept the pain, and care for it. You need to not judge it. I've always been judgmental of myself, but I'm finding that just being with the pain is helpful for coming to a different place with it, one where it doesn't occupy my thoughts, but instead is just part of me without encompassing me.
8-19-15 Sometimes I feel envious of some of my fellow authors. They understand the business of selling themselves and their products and services better than I do. I have written more books than most of them, but they've leveraged themselves as a business better than I have. Erik, my astrologer, told me that one of the reasons I'm here is to learn about business, and I am. It's a struggle sometimes. I see what other people do and it seems to come to them much easier. Some of it, I think, is that their writing is focused toward a wider audience that wants the traditional magical material. My writing is focused on edgier topics, with more of a niche audience. I see that with the response and lack of response that occurs around the topics I post about. When your writing is on the edge you get challenged more, either out of skeptical disbelief or envy on the part of other part for not thinking of it first. Still all I can do is keep learning the lesson I am learning about business and being a successful author. I've stumbled a lot on this journey, but I keep picking myself back up, determined to succeed.
8-20-15 One of the ways I'm learning how to work with tension is recognizing the importance of not acting on it right away. Yes I feel it and I hold space with it, but before I do anything else I just let myself feel and wait before I make a choice. I give myself time to fully get to the heart of it and then make an informed decision. To often, in my past, I've just reacted to tension and more often than not I haven't really liked the consequences. I let the tension define me, instead of defining it...now I'm defining it.