Why I Stopped Fighting

IMAGE OF THE WEEK

We are grateful to Rupali Bhuva for offering this hand-made painting for this reading.

When I was a teenage girl, I had a fight with an older boy who had at least fifty pounds on me. It was a pre-announced fight, so many other students had gathered around to watch. I recall having the upper hand for much of the fight, hitting him dozens of times for every one blow he landed on me. I knocked him to the ground over and over again, using his own weight against him.

At one point, I noticed an elderly woman watching from a window. I saw her looking at me with fear in her eyes. But why me? I was the good guy in this fight! The discrepancy shook me. I had never seen myself as someone to be feared. And there a gap was created in who I knew myself to be.

Suddenly, I looked at the boy I was fighting and saw Jesus the Christ looking back at me. I looked around and the Christ Consciousness appeared in everyone standing there. I also understood that he had no idea he was the Christ.

No, he was very convinced that he was a boy who meant me harm. But I knew the truth, so I couldn’t hit him again.

I could still block though. Once I stopped fighting, he managed to knock me to the ground for the first time, climbed upon my chest, and started punching my shoulders and arms as I protected my head. Through it all I was not the least afraid or angry. All my anger had dissipated and I knew that I would be fine. Eventually, I heard police sirens, which prompted him to get off me and run.

That was but one in a number of satori experiences I’ve had in my lifetime. Thankfully, the rest involved no violence! Each time, I did not need to seek the Truth; I simply knew what was true to be true and what was false to be false. There was no manipulation. Awareness emerged from Grace. [...]

Viewed with an understanding that all arises within the Self, that all is Awareness, we do not stop caring. We do not stop helping. We simply do it with a natural equilibrium, like water flowing from areas of higher pressure to areas of lower pressure. No one needs to tell water where it ought to go; its nature is to simply flow.

Through immersing our attention in love of Awareness, this same type of spaciousness can be cultivated in daily life. Worship Awareness. Give yourself completely over to love in as many moments as you can. Live on your knees, kissing the ground of true nature.

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Excerpted from here.