In this incantation I describe the enormous relief that arises when I can overcome the delusion that I have a past full of painful behaviors, events, and experiences. By accepting the obvious truth that there is only this moment then I can escape the bonds of the past I impose upon myself. I am who I am in this moment only, not who I believe I have been in the past.
I can best summarize my illness as the delusional beliefs that I am one person among many people, in one place among many places, in one time among many times, with one experience among many experiences. As long as I believe that there is “otherness” separate from me, I will experience this awakening.
In my past there are moments of embarrassment, shame, humiliation, and regret. When I let go of the idea that there is a past, then I am free from the burden of these feelings. Anger. Frustration. Resentment. Shame, and more. There is no past. I have done nothing wrong; I have wronged no one.
When I understand that I do not have a past full of regrets, I can let go of all the pain that comes with them. I am not a person who wronged other people, missed opportunities, or failed to achieve. I am the creator experiencing painful wounds in my flesh right now in my only moment. No one has wronged me. Instead, there is a thorn embedded within the flesh of my being, and the sensation of memories is akin to throbbing. When I grasp this, I realize that I am not a person defined by what I did or did not. I am the being who is actively creating these wounds in my only moment.
Everything that I consume as a distraction in my awakenings is built upon the idea of a past “we” are running away from, and a better future “we” are running toward. All the shows I mindlessly watch depend on my accepting the premise that the characters are embedded in and defined by an invisible timeline upon which their lives unfold. I have to accept that the protagonist has to overcome some challenge. He must transform something that was into something better that will be. But when I redefine the concept of time as momentary depth, the illusion shatters and the characters and their troubles no longer make sense, and thus are not entertaining. They fail to serve their purpose of distracting me from the pain of my awakening.
How do I act in my awakening? I must slowly remove time-based expression from my vocabulary. Just as I stopped using the plural first-person (“we”, “us”, etc), I must no longer use the past- and future-tenses when I speak, except in designated areas of my awakening where I am still working through the disease, such as work. My work entanglement demands time-based expression; however, my personal and familial entanglements do not. Whereas I must refer to the past performance of a particular contractor who works for me in order to achieve and overcome that area of my moment, I do not have to recall false memories in the personal area of my awakening. I can effectively treat these two areas of my awakening separate until they converge.
While this approach is uneven, so too is the surface of my awakening. Eventually I will have brought all areas of my awakening under control. Until then, the entire professional part of my moment is still inflamed and rebellious and it will take time to heal. I can focus on those painful areas where I experience regret and shame; I can look squarely at those as they are, and redefine them in my moment. I never hurt that person. I only believe that I did along with all the other self-delusions I carry around with me. I never did that thing. That never happened.
When I see a person and feel a kinship or relationship, that is because that is the story I have written for us. There is no past; we did not share experiences years before. They are characters I have written deep within the flesh of my one and only moment.
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