Pain

Welcoming The Buzzing Flies In Our Lives

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I am dealing with a very close family member who has metastasized cancer.  Needless to say, it is super food for the struggling self.  Fear arises, then sadness and despair, and then more fear. Recently, I woke up in the middle of the night enmeshed in fear.  But after just a few moments, I became curious and met the fear with my heart, “I see you sweetheart.  I see how scared you are.  I am here with you.  You are not alone.”  The fear dissolved like the morning fog does when it is touched by the sun.  As I was relaxing back into sleep, the image of a buzzing fly circling around my head, driving me crazy like flies often do, suddenly appeared.

FlyOnFlowerThe image of the buzzing fly represents all of the states that we don’t like and wish would leave us alone – like the fear I had in the middle of the night, or judgment, loneliness, despair.  Most of us resist this annoyance, swatting at it because we just want it to go away.  We desperately try to get away from these states through busyness, compulsions, fixing, judging, analyzing … anything that absorbs our attention and takes us away from the feelings.  But when we start becoming curious, all of a sudden the fly (i.e. whatever uncomfortable states we are experiencing in the moment) is not an irritant anymore.

Like a small child seeing a fly for the first time, this fly is something to be interested in.  The first time I did this with an actual fly, I became intensely interested in the sound of the fly.  It was like music.  Then, when it landed on my hand, it felt like its feet were little kisses on my skin.  I thought, “Wow, this is what I have been resisting my whole life?” Continue reading →

Breaking Through The Pain Of Existence

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“Confront the tightness, soften into it, lose the identification, reclaim the lost nuggets of soul-gold buried there; then feel the soul bursting through.” – Open

waterfallFlowRocksI’d say one of the biggest problems humanity is dealing with right now, is something I call “The Pain of Existence”. It’s the disconnection from the sublime feeling of unity with the divine, and therefore unconsciously seeking some kind of substitute in the outer world: distraction, entertainment, relationship, sex, drugs etc etc. It’s not that we shouldn’t enjoy life, the problem is identification with the outer mirror: we need it to be a certain way, rather than realising it as the mirror to the inner perfection of the divine.

How does that mirroring work? How can we locate the divine through all these kinds of circumstances in our lives?

False Identification

At Openhand, we consider there are basically two flows of consciousness that generate and influence every conscious and subconscious action: it is the interplay of the flow back to the Source – unity consciousness – and the generation of some physical experience – the separation consciousness. Essentially it’s the interplay of the soul through the bodymind. When you’re aligned with the soul, there’s the sense of loving connection to the divine. However if you’re identified with only the physical experience itself, then you have the sense of separation from the divine. It’s why people say reality is generated by only two expressions: love or fear.

So how do we find the aligned expression through these circumstances? Continue reading →

Treating Burns When There Is No Doctor

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burnsYou were out for a walk in the woods and while returning to your campsite you discover that your duck hunting partner has burned himself on the campfire. You find him laying on the ground crying in pain. It is just you and him out there and the nearest doctor (or phone) is miles and miles away. What are you to do? One thing is for certain, you have to do something and you better do it fast.

Head-To-Toe Assessment

Before you can start any type of burn treatment you need to evaluate the situation. Your approach and treatment method depends upon what caused the burn to begin with. Figuring out the cause is vital before you can approach the situation. For example, if it was a chemical burn you would need protective equipment. Also, you need to know if the danger is still present. Say, your partner was in your kitchen when a grease fire occurred. You would want to get him out of harms way before administrating any type of treatment. Finally, you might want to ask him (if he is conscious) when the burning ceased. Your main goal in burn treatment is to:

  1. Get the area that was burned cool.
  2. To reduce any infection (especially if you are in the woods) you want to cover the area that was burned with a sterile cloth. The idea here is to keep the germs out of the burn and to keep any fluids in.

Layers of Skin

Burns do not just occur from fires such as your campfire or matches. There are a varied of situations that can cause a burn. Burns can result from: chemicals, radiation, heat and electrical current. Severity depends upon many different factors such as: burning agents temperature, body part that got burned, how long the victim was exposed to burning agent, depth and size of burned area. Before we get into the Burn Classifications we need to discuss the layers of skin. Continue reading →

Morty Lefkoe ~ Be Careful Of The Words You Use To Describe Your Health

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LefkoeInstitute May 8 2014

Did you know that the words you use to describe your health can actually influence both your physical and mental health? In today’s post I will describe how that can happen and what to do about it.

I’ve written previously about how our language determines both what we are able to perceive and how we perceive it.  (see here)

Today I will show you how many specific words we use to describe reality, including words we use to describe our health, already contain meaning in their very definition. So when we think we are objectively describing reality we are often adding meaning that isn’t necessarily true.

Are you really in pain?

Take what seems to be a simple statement of reality: “I am in pain.” For someone uttering those words, that is a statement of fact, not an interpretation. You might give that “reality” the meaning: I have a serious illness. Or, I won’t be able to work today. Or, I’m punishing myself for not doing something I should have done. When you identify any meaning you have attributed to any event and then distinguish it from the event (e.g., I am in pain), the meaning will dissolve and you will be left with nothing but the event.

But is that statement of the event (I am in pain) really an objective, meaningless description of the event? I contend the answer is , no. The word “pain” is not merely a word describing reality; it is a word loaded with emotional connotations that already has a lot of meaning, albeit different for different people. Continue reading →

How Courageous We Are!

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sorendreier September 20 2013

Almost forty years ago, when my second son was young, I started having dreams of an atomic bomb exploding. One time it was in a playground… another time I could see it in the distance. In every dream my son would be in my arms, my precious little baby, and I would be running and searching, experiencing tremendous fear. It was not a fear that he or we would die… it was a fear that his life would be worse than death, and I could not save him from it.

Well, no atomic bombs fell nearby, he lived and experienced easy and hard times, became daddy to two beautiful children, ­­made a good life for himself and his family, and happily for me, he kept on loving his ‘spiritually minded’ mother.

I don’t know what triggered the dreams. It could have been that I was tapping into the fear of the collective mind… also could have been the arguments going on at the time regarding nuclear power. I remember asking a business executive, “What about the radioactive waste… what about future generations?” He responded, “By that time they’ll have figured out how to handle it.” I heard my inner voice say, “I could never get with this person… he’s an absolute idiot.”

Well… I was young. Idiots are not absolute… they can change.  When the threat becomes immediate even the most cold-hearted can wake up… and I imagine quite a few have. But the point is, life has sent me into fear plenty of times, so I know how overwhelming, controlling and confining it can be.  And the funny thing about it… there is no benefit to it: being aware, yes; perceiving danger, yes; avoiding danger, yes; but fear… it’s a lose/lose.

Continue reading →