My husband and I were discussing how we react to things that happen in our lives. We have very different approaches to what could be seen as “irritations” that occur. I tend to take what I call a more “spiritual” approach; he tend to take what I call a more “reactive” approach.
I’m not saying I don’t even get upset or angry over things that happen, but I try to switch gears quickly, problem solve and stay pretty positive and grateful. My husband, on the other hand, tends to just get angry and upset and to feel like a victim to circumstance. It becomes hard for him to see anything positive–any upside or opportunity.
So, for example, when our state tax refund showed up just in time to pay for the property taxes and my son’s summer dance program (both of which we were going to have to pay for out of our savings account), he saw that as something about which to be upset rather than happy. The money that we had just received went out the door as fast as it came in.
And when my old car died just as we were about to get our federal tax return, which we hoped to save, again this was something about which to feel angry.
I wasn’t pleased about spending the money we could have saved, but in both cases I simply accepted the fact that we had expenses–and we had been provided with the means to meet them. I felt grateful that we didn’t have to go into debt or deplete our savings. I also didn’t spend a lot of time getting upset or angry about the situation–or shaking my fist at God.
Rather I felt as if God were acting as my partner. As always, I believed in some way shape or form God’s hand was in all of this. I knew I just needed to trust that everything was okay and would be okay. I knew I just needed to feel connected.
Interestingly enough, this morning after more discussions with my husband about new cars and money, I got an email from one of my favorite rabbi–a man and teacher who has helped me with my own writing projects and who put me on the Jewish mystical (and Jewish spiritual) path. I took the time to visit Rabbi David Cooper’s website and found a post there that spoke to this point (and inspired my post today). In reading Rabbi Cooper’s words I was reminded how hard we must work every day to stay conscious and connected to Source, to not react to what we are presented with in our lives each day but instead to respond. That’s why we must stay on the spiritual path no matter how hard that feels, engaging in some sort of spiritual practice. And, and I’ve said before, it does take practice to stay conscious and connected. It doesn’t happen without effort and daily–almost hourly or minute-to-minute–sessions.
Rabbi Cooper writes:
The purpose of spiritual practice is to gently and consistently move us from our place, where we normally “hang out” in our day-to-day behavior, to a mind state of greater refinement. In this context, refinement is connected with our conditioning, our normal reflexes and responses to situations that arise every day. Through practice, we begin to reflect and react in different ways. This change in our behavior actually causes many significant results.
Spiritual practice, is this context, has a series of tiny ekstasis that arise when we behave out of place of our normal reactions. We must keep in mind that “normal” for most of us is quite different from “natural.” Normal is how we are conditioned to respond. Conditioning develops from the time we are conceived; some say that our propensities to be conditioned go back into our genetic dna. But the spiritual principal at the base of many traditions is that our natural inclinations arise when we fully recognize the basic nature of our own minds and thereby gain greater ability to resist conditioned reactions.
Through our spiritual practice we learn to respond rather than react, to stay connected and conscious. Another of my teachers, author Stuart Wilde, says this is like spiritual weight lifting. We become stronger, more able to change how we react to the irritations in our life–the situations that arise–by constantly practicing remaining conscious and connected no matter what arises–in spite of what arises–in our lives. Life becomes our training ground, our gym, our practice field.
Little by little, day by day, hour by hour we change simply by living. As Rabbi Cooper writes:
Skilled practice results from an ongoing engagement in the mystery of what everyday life presents. As we never know what life will bring, we need always to be prepared to meet this unknowable reality with our highest potential. Thus, to the best of our ability, we continuously are challenged to bring our awareness to the many opportunities that present themselves as a series of invitations for manifesting enlightened actions. Each and every time we succeed, we change the world.
I’ve still got a long way to go–a lot of practice before I become truly “awakened” or “enlightened.” I still react more than I’d like; I still get irritated by the irritations. I notice this when I angrily respond to the fact that my son forgot an essential item that prevented him from taking dance class–after I drove an hour and a half to take him there, the shelf in my living room has not been replaced by my husband after five months or the insurance agent takes two hours to ask me questions I already answered once before. So, you’ll find me in my spiritual gym on most days lifting weights in an effort to become more awakened.
As Rabbi Cooper explains:
The highest teachings are explicit in describing the idea that our most enlightened opportunities occur in the ordinary daily life we now experience. The difference is that one who is awakened recognizes the essential nature of what is happening while one who is not awakened is easily overwhelmed by an ongoing flow of “self” induced dramas.
To rid ourselves of this sense of drama, Rabbi Cooper says we must rid ourselves of the belief that we are separate. When we do so, we also lose many of the harmful actions, false beliefs, negative reactions, confusion, irritation, and suffering that go with it.
Instead of believing we are separate–something most of us have believed for a long, long time–we must remember we are connected and always have been. Connection is our normal state of being. We only think we are separate from the Source; the thought doesn’t happen to represent truth. It’s a meme, a thought given to you by someone else that you adopted. You can choose to adopt the thought that you are connected instead, but knowing and feeling this connection comes with spiritual practice.
Some people end up feeling too irritated, too angry, and they fall off the spiritual path before they can change their reactions or thoughts. They leave the spiritual gym seeing no results from their efforts. They feel alone in their work there and without a personal trainer. They don’t feel connected, so they go off alone blaming the gym and it’s Proprietor for their failure. They don’t realize that if they don’t stay in spiritual shape, bit by bit, parts of their life start feeling harder and harder. Without connection and consciousness, everything begins to feel like an irritation and a struggle.You get stuck reacting to irritations in your life in the same old way you always have.
Is that what you want? I don’t. So I look for “enlightened opportunities” as they occur in my ordinary daily life to respond in conscious and connected manner. I lift spiritual weights daily. Sometimes I’m not strong enough to do all the sets, but I keep lifting.
How do you react to the irritations in your life?
