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Sitting in Reality
There is such great comfort when your life reflects the story your mind is telling. Even if this is a comfortable illusion, the harmony between the story and the perceived reality is a type of peace of mind. It is the root of the old adage “ignorance is bliss.”
But oh the anguish when Reality arrives as truth — a truth markedly different from the story our mind has been telling. There is an intensity to the arrival of Reality. This is why most mystics call it “waking up”. It’s jarring. A cold ice bath, a bright light, a shaking. How tempting it is to tighten the blankets and drift back into the dream.
The mind will treat this abrupt change as a threat. It will become obsessed with returning to the illusion of harmony. It will fixate on creating a different condition than present reality. Why? Because the mind is wired to keep us alive. It does not know to process things like a spiritual awakening, a tragedy or even what it means to truly love. The mind is a perfectly designed survival multi-tool made up of problem-solving, righting wrongs, telling stories and pursuing goals. All of these are not inherently bad or wrong. However, to accomplish any of these, the mind will attempt to close the heart. Again, I don’t judge this. It makes sense. It sees current conditions as a threat to survival so it is just doing its job.
