the news can only be good

I'm not sure it is helpful to talk about "awakened" vs. "not-awakened." If someone claims to be awakened, the reflexive response of the listener is to feel (perhaps only secretly) that they themselves are not, have not, will never have. And then they begin to vibrate in those terms and call to themselves more of the same sense of lack and despair and seeking behavior—completely overlooking the hopefulness of the message, if there is any. Awakening, as a process, means that you are noticing something that has always been happening, the workings of which were previously obscured in your attention. This noticing doesn't make you special. It makes you fully, happily, ordinary.

The message of non-dual teachings and of A Course in Miracles is that you can choose to stop focusing your mind on what you believe you do not have, in order to discover what you are. This is tricky. The best way to have more of a sense of fulfillment in your life is to come fully into the present moment and be here without complaint. This is the meaning of forgiveness. When you drop your complaint against what is, and against what you are, you learn that What Is has never had a complaint against you. This is the Atonement. Such good news.

When I speak of what is, I'm talking about this, right here, right now. Not something else. This ordinary, motley reality. This meat-puppet fixer-upper.

You cannot come fully into the present moment and also be complaining about what you think you do not have, or blaming someone for what you think they have done. And when you bring your attention into this litany of complaint that is the ego, or the false self, the wanter who lacks—you vibrate in such a way that you bring into your experience more of that. Wherever you place your attention... that's what you get more of.

When you hold a grievance against what is right here, right now—when you resist it, you literally betray yourself. You punish yourself. Your attention is directed to what is seemingly lacking. As you focus your attention, so do you experience. There's nothing mystical about it.

There is nothing you need to do, in particular, but there is something you can stop doing. You can stop focusing on the litany of complaint, the litany of fear. Just stop there and say, "okay—so be it."

You do this by just becoming aware of it. "Ah—there's the litany of complaint again, my old friend. Okay, I'll allow that to exist, but I won't give voice to it, I won't go into it. I'll just notice it, be aware of it. There it is. Fear, loathing, whatever... Okay. I won't try to fix it or do anything with it. I'll just stand here."

The spacious awareness, the silent sense of Being that was obscured from your attention by the litany of complaint and its consequences, begins to emerge into the foreground and there is relief. What flows into your life, into your ordinary day-to-day experience, then seems to flow more easily, and matches the state of "no complaint."

It is this process itself that is the goal... not some finished state of supposed awakening in the future. This place and time, this one, right here.

Comments

[Leslie]

Thank you Marian. You must've been hired by God. I will give this my best shot. The support for this must be built-in and all around. Lord knows I need it.
With love,
-Leslie