Hooked

It’s so funny the things that distract our attention. The things that get our goat and the things that really cause our brains to stick on to it.  Something we don’t like happens and our mind starts to feed it with further  unwanted stuff to add fuel to the fire. It takes only a slightest and smallest thing for this to happen to us.

 

Think about it. Not only do the smallest things affect us like someone you don’t like sitting next to you, even a little food spilling on some precious clothes has a very disturbing effect on the human mind. When the vibrations of someone sitting next to you leads to under current inside and outside ourselves. Under currents when something falls on our precious clothes are more on the inside. Don’t we all feel these everyday things. Tightening of the fists ( and you cannot shake hands with clenched fists! ), clenching of the jaws, pursing of the lips. A feeling that we are shutting down. A feeling that suddenly all our nerves are at their highest level of alert. This happens when things do not go our way.

 

We are attached to these feelings that we feel at this superficial level. We identify ourselves with these types of feelings. The mind has accumulated these beliefs that we carry around like excess baggage. The thing about this is that we don’t think of these as excess baggage because these feelings define us. They make us who we are. So, they are extremely precious to us. We cling on to them. We get stuck to them like superglue and are unable to move out of those feelings.

 

All the things that bring us comfort are things that we have attached false importance to. So those clothes that got spoiled at the party, are so precious and now our mind rotates around getting the stain off. But that’s what it is. A piece of cloth, to be worn out of necessity not something that all your thoughts need to revolve around it. It isn’t who you are. It is a thing, that’s all. The metaphor used is a piece of clothing, but we are like this for things we eat/ consume, things we possess/ own and things that matter to any of our senses.  We like these things so much and attach so much importance to them that we get hooked to them. We become their slaves. Bonded to them.

 

As we progress and understand our unhealthy patterns, we do try to get out of our attachments. But it is extremely difficult to get out habitual actions that bring us some comfort. So, what do we do? The best way to go about it is though awareness of things happening around us and more importantly inside us. This increase in awareness in our daily life is almost impossible without meditation. When we do decide to give up certain unhealthy habits, we go through even worse tense and horrid situations inside ourselves. Feelings of insecurity, loneliness and lack of love. But when we realise it is exactly this that we need : love, kindness and love towards ourselves, will we start healing.

 

All the things we want are possible even without the hooks catching us as bait. When we start meditating on the moment, we come to levels of awareness we wish to and over come habitual patterns. Experience the full discomfort of the urges you get when you deny your self that very thing that you want the most and you will over come it and come out victorious. When the greats talk about leaving attachment to the world they in fact mean releasing attachment to the things that have hooked you. That have attached themselves to you. That is true letting go. That is freedom.

 

Learn to stay focused in each moment. Watch all your emotions every time as they flow in and out. Try not to become a sponge and keep those inside you for as long as possible. In fact, be like a strainer. Let it flow. Feel it, acknowledge it and let go. If you let yourself become a sponge, it will weigh you down just as a sponge gets heavy when it has absorbed liquid. No one wants to feel heavy and yet most times we do and don’t even realise it. The patterns have made pathways into our mind making us believe that those feelings are all valid. But just as a tree sheds leaves that are no longer required or fruit which is ripe, learn to let go.

 

Let go and be free from the hooks.