E160: The Path to Integration—Releasing the Fragmented Self

hmm jagger div dry master from the quotes we took from shakespeare in the beginning of untethered soul this is above all to their own self be true and shall follow the night the day thou shalt not then be false to any man that i don't know how deep he meant it to be but that's extremely deep why because you haven't noticed there's a lot of you in there moody ever, happy ever, sad ever, jealous ever, secure ever? Every one of you said yes, I was shaking your head. There's just layers of your being. And at any given moment, one layer shows up. Then something happens, another layer shows up. True or not? Okay, would you like to know more about that? Okay. what a normal human does, and you don't want to be a normal human, is that you do notice this. It's not that witness consciousness is some new thing to you. You've always been back there, and you see what's going on. It's just how you deal with it that changes. And the way we normally deal with these fluctuations, moods, thought patterns, et cetera, et cetera, is to think not why are they happening, but what I do about it. That's the normal human reaction. What do I do about this? What do I do about my depression? What do I do about the fact that I just fall in love so easy and can't keep a relationship straight? What do I do about these myriad changes that take place that at the time seem real? Well, that's my real me. But to that own self be true which? And some people try to pick. That, I think, is the most hilarious thing in the world. Once you understand what's going on, that's the dumbest thing to do, to try and pick which one of these is me and then devote yourself to it and think that it's going to stay because it's not going to stay. That's like a complete misunderstanding what's going on. So what a normal human does about these shifts is they don't ask why. They ask, what do I do about it? What do I do with the fact that I'm sad? What do I do with the fact that I used to be happy in this relationship, but now I'm not? What do I do with the fact that I was enthused to go to my job, but I'm not enthused anymore should I change jobs? What do I do about it? Every single thing that goes on in that mind, what do I do about it? How do I make it be the way it used to be? How do I make it be the way I want it to be? And what that involves is choosing. You have to choose one of you. I'm the person who wants to go to Europe and my gap year and just, but my parents really want me to buckle down and I want to make sure I do good in my career. Which do you do? Which is you? And of course, people say to you, well, just pick what you really want. How the hell do you know? Because it keeps changing, doesn't it? And it changes as your age changes. That what you wanted when you were younger, and younger could be three days ago, by the way, is not what you think you want now. it just keeps changing. It's going to keep doing that until you change the question. So the question you're now asking is, what do I do about it? Instead of why is it happening? The root is why it's happening. What I do about it is a band-aid because it's going to keep changing. I'm not happy in the relationship. Why? Well, I don't know. They're not loving enough. They're too loving and they want too much of my time. They don't know enough of my time. what the heck it is. So now go out and find somebody who's the opposite. I guarantee you, it is not going to work. There's no way in the world it's going to work. Do you understand why? The reason there are these layers is because you stored stuff down there. Everything I teach you is that it's all about the stuff you store down there. And if you store the stuff down there, it's going to mix and match down there and do all kinds of weird stuff. Okay, you know that. And so when you try to pick one, there's these others. And they say, no, I don't want to be like that. I don't like that part of my being. I love that one. I don't want to be like that, right? I want to be like this in a relationship or this with a person or this and so on. That's how I want to be. Why are you saying that? Because there's a part of your being that doesn't agree. And so what you do is during a time where part number two comes up, you feel, this is what I've been looking for. This feels like me. Of course it does because the rest settled down lower because this took precedent at that time. And it did. It did. Absolutely did. And sometimes it goes on for a long time, but it will not last. You will see. What happens if you take your energy and your external interactions and devote them to that, that grows. And that starts to be the picture you're hanging on the wall and who you have in your wallet and what's on your dashboard and what kind of car you're driving. It all becomes the expression of that. The reason that was suppressed down there is it didn't have the right to express itself. And so now all of a sudden somebody came up and it says, oh boy, this is me. That feels so good. Finally, that kind of thing, whatever it is you choose, I'm telling you, it doesn't matter. And you just basically put yourself into it. And now it's getting the energy it wants to express itself and you feel it expressing itself and it creates passion and excitement and inspiration. And oh boy, I got a new relationship. Oh boy, I got a new job. Oh boy, I got a facelift. Oh boy, I lost some weight. Whatever it is, I'm not judging anything. But do you understand that happens at different points in your life and sometimes very short points, right? Why? Because you gave that part, the shakti, the energy, the devotion, the will that was needed for it to express itself. Of course, that feels good. And there's nothing wrong with that. Don't ever think I'm telling you something's wrong. I just want you to understand what's going on and you figure out what to do about it. I can help guide you. But nobody's judging. Everybody's different. There's not that one way is right and one way is not. But you know you have those parts down there. They've come up at different times and pretty much they screwed your life up, didn't they? okay? So if when it comes up, it's inspiring and it is, it wants your energy. You feel like, I haven't felt this real for years. I feel like when I was young and I first did this and I first did that, that's because that was down there. It now has found the precedent to come up and you have fed it. You devoted, you put your will, your Shakti, your energy, your life headed in that direction. It will absolutely turn you on. That's the new relationship, the new job, the new clothes, whatever it is. Some people do entire makeovers. They used to dress real pristine and now they were ripped parents and they like it. Oh my God, I'm free. I don't have to do that junk anymore that everybody told me to do. I don't care if they like me or not until something happens. Come down the road and all of a sudden you see somebody else getting the attention that you thought you wanted. Okay, let's go slowly. So now you have expressed it, and it does feel good, and it does feel real, and it does feel what Shakespeare's talking about. This of all to their own self be true. Which self? No one will talk about that. That one, the one I'm feeling inspired by, the one that's dragging me through life, the one I'm putting my energy into. What happens? Listen to me. Because it's getting your energy, it doesn't need it anymore. It's now satisfying. The minute you say, I had all these different relationships and they just didn't feel right. And this one feels, I'm picking on relationships, believe me, I love them. All right? But this one feels so right, I finally met the right person. Then it's almost like you put your guard down. You accept that. You feel that's taken care of. Well, what about the rest of the stuff that's down there? You kind of push it away for a while because it doesn't fit. Doesn't fit. Come on, come on, talk to me. you don't tell me you don't push that stuff away. Okay. And you push it away and it works for a while. Except it is now the one that's starving. Because you devoted your energy to something else. And that grows down there. It can grow down there. And some people are afraid to make a change the second time or the third time or fourth time, whatever it is. And so they let people, psychologists cope with it, live with it. Nothing's perfect. You have to live with it. In other words, I have to live with the fact there's a part of my being that is starving just as much as the other part was starving before I decided to devote my life to it. Can you relate? Do you understand? Good. Let's have a nice discussion. That's real. That's normal. Ah, no, it's not normal. It is. Why? Because you shoved all this stuff down there. Mostly the experiences that disturbed you, you shoved down there. And now you're having to live with it down there. All of a sudden, somebody shows up or a job shows up or something shows up that feels like I can release this now. This doesn't have to be down there like a rock inside of me, affecting my emotions and so on. I trust you. I don't know how to say it. I don't want to say it because it can be 80,000 different things, can't it? Because you put your energy into that part of your being, it doesn't need it anymore. The rest of it's being starved. It's bound to come up. And you sit there and say no and you push it back down. It's the same game. What's it, whack-a-mole? What's it called? whack-a-mole. Anybody play whack-a-mole in there? But you think you're supposed to be committed. Be committed to relationship. Be committed to your job. Be committed to religion. Committed to your beliefs. You hear me? All you're trying to do is be okay in there, but you're trying by changing the outside to match what you're feeling at that time. There are people who change their religions every time they date somebody different. And they really believe it. I was into Christianity now with Zen Buddhism. It's so neat. I see it. Okay. That is a course through life that's extremely difficult to understand that. What's not good is you don't understand what's going on in there. So instead of asking, what do I do about it? You eventually, and this is your inner work, You catch on to say, if I go outside to make it okay, it may be okay for a short period of time, but the part of me that hadn't come up yet or that took second fiddle to what came up that strong with my new relationship or my new job or my new look or whatever the heck it is, it's still down there and it's being starved. And eventually it will become what wants to come up. They're in there, I say fighting with each other, of it is silly. There's only one of you in there. There's only one self. There's only one consciousness. But when something came into that consciousness that I wasn't comfortable with, it pushed that thing away. It didn't want to deal with it. It didn't want to experience it. Each time you do that, you're building another part of your being. You're fragmenting your psyche to where, well, that was the part where somebody treated me wrong. That was the part where I didn't get what I wanted. That was the part. And all of a sudden, they all... It doesn't have to be like that. It doesn need to be like that You one integrated psyche even the psyche not just the self There just one integrated being in there You whole and complete within yourself There is no stuff coming up that distracting you from who you are, who you were, or anything like that. But what about the parts before I grew that much? They melt away. Why? Because they're not being blocked anymore. That which happened when you were young that caused you so much disturbance, now that you're fine, you're open from inside, it doesn't stay down there. What does it do? It comes back up. But doesn't it hurt? Yes, it hurts. But you love it. It's the pain that ends all pain because you've caught on. You don't want that stuff fragmented down there, do you? How much fun is it to live in there with so many weird stuff going on? You hear me? I could use some real good examples, but I won't. Okay? You have many different aspects of your being. And the second chakras are very strong one that people have a lot of trouble with. And they suppress it or they express it. And you think, that's the solution. There is no solution except the great solution, which I will never teach you, right? It can go up, not down, not out, up. And that's a phenomenal shift. You don't have to do anything. There's no suppressing. There's no expressing. It doesn't mean there can't be, but that's not what's going on. What's going on, there's no blockage down there anymore. So it's not being pushed down. See, I won't talk about it, see? You know, it's not being pushed down, either suppression or expression. It's just, you've cleared the channel enough. This is yoga. You've cleared the channel enough to where all that, imagine all that energy goes up, feeds the higher centers, and it never goes down again. Doesn't mean you can't express it. Doesn't mean you can't participate in things, human things, but not like people do. Not because it built up down there and they don't know what to do with it, so they suppress it more, or not because it built up down there and it's so strong they cannot deal with it, so it wants to express itself. Anybody willing to listen? It has a way to go up, and when it goes up, it goes to the highest centers. It's like, all right, well, why doesn't it go there? Because you're blocked. It's all about you being blocked. How did I get blocked? Because you blocked yourself. I don't remember. Of course you don't remember. You were young or this happened or you were in a bad situation or relationship and it was fighting. You don't remember. You're just trying to make it through. You're just trying to survive. One thing I've noticed living out here, because I've lived here a very long time, there are lots of critters out here. There's armadillos. There's raccoons. There's possums. There's deer. And the other day we saw a red fox. There's lots of critters. I'm going to leave you something common about these critters. They run. We're not going to hurt the deer. We love the deer. They run. You get too close, they run. So do you. The difference is they're running because the physiological aspect of their being feels challenged. Normal evolutionary thing. You're running because the psychological aspect of your being feels challenged. They run away, you push it down. So you can be a normal person in society and not carry all this stuff around and show it to everybody and be moody and all that kind of stuff, right? Get your stuff together. No, wrong. Let your stuff go, not get yourself together. When your parents told you you're misbehaving, go to your room and get your act together. In other words, suppress it. I don't want to see the behavior anymore. Does it come back up? Of course it does. Why? It's energy. Every aspect of your being that you're dealing with is Shakti. It's not like Shakti is some great light thing. No, it's energy. And if the energy comes up and you're a child and you're misbehaving and doing that kind of stuff, I'm not telling parents that I have the answer. I'll tell you the answer I generally give. But if somebody's, you know, a kid's misbehaving and causing all kinds of trouble, you have to deal with it. But the answer is not get your act together. The ending answer is, can you let it go? Can you, even a young child, right? Can you let it go? Can you work with it instead of having to express it or suppress it? That's the answer. Can they? I don't know. What I teach when they ask me about their children, I will never give answers on that. I'm not a child psychologist at all. I'm not any kind of psychologist, right? What I say is you get your act together as a parent to where you can handle them misbehaving. You can handle them throwing tantrums. You're not freaking out because they're causing a scene. You know, terrible twos. They're doing a thing. You're calm inside. You understand what's going on. That's as far as I'll go. You be clear and make sure that every word you're saying and everything you're doing is for the benefit of the child, not for the benefit of you, because you can't handle what's going on. You're embarrassed, you're ashamed. What am I going to do with the neighbors say? You understand that? You do that, and somehow things work out. You hear me? It all has the same answer. It's not, what do I do about this? It's, why is it happening? And what you will see every single time, if you look down there, it's scary, is that you blocked yourself. You took parts of your being during different stages of your life, okay, and even different days, and you couldn't handle them. Either you couldn't handle them because they disturbed you, so you pushed them away, or you couldn't handle them because you didn't get what you wanted. I wanted this to happen. It didn't happen. So I pushed that away. Yes or no? How often do we do that all the time? You're just fragmenting the self. That's all the self. It can't be the self. It's all terrible thoughts. That's because the energy came up, it hit your garbage, and it tried to express itself. And what you looked at, it was embarrassing. I ask everybody, let's say there was this, and there is, by the way, on Times Square, there's a giant screen. And what we're going to do is plug in your ears, a place back in your ear, that every thought you have goes up on that screen. Which one of you are volunteering? You hear me? There's stuff down there. and the way it expresses itself, the answer is so simple, but so complicated for people. There's energy down there. You are a being of great energy. You're God's energy pouring through, cycling through. All right? That's who you are. God descended, expressing, experiencing, but not expressing the sick, messed up psyche that you built down there, right? You just be here now. You're totally here in the moment, experiencing what's going on. So it makes it through. When you start resisting it or clinging to it because you wanted it or you didn't want it, you store rocks in there. They get stored. Every single thing you push down is still there. Every single thing, even the slightest little thing. It rained yesterday and I had to deliver something. Now look at the weather forecast for the next two weeks. Is it going to rain or not? Because I don't want that to happen again. even our natural acts that seem so obvious and meaningful are suppression. What's wrong that it rained? What's wrong that you got wet when you had to go deliver something? It should not affect your attitude about the rain. It should not affect your likes and dislikes. I don't like when it's cold. I don't like when it's cloudy. I don't like when people don't say hello to me. I don't like when I feel rejected. What do you do when you don't like it? You push it away. Where's it going? when you push it away. Freud called it subconscious. I don't need a name. It goes out of your normal conscious mind. I don't want it being there and I don't want it to happen again. I'm like the deer. I'm protecting myself from the fact that it rained. They don't. They stand in the rain, but they won't let you walk up to them. That's where that stuff came from. You did it. you didn't consciously and willfully do it but you did use your will the power of your shakti the power of your consciousness to push that shakti back down otherwise an event takes place it comes in you experience it and it passes through be here now that's what that means you're washing the dishes meantime your mind is saying i did it yesterday i can't believe she made me do it again why should i have to do this again she's supposed to do that's really nice i hope you're enjoying washing the dishes because you're not being here now. You're being there then of what happened yesterday. But it's so prevalent that we can't talk about it. Why? It's happening all the time. A fish doesn't know they're in water. I was a flying fish and they jump out for a minute. That's like meditation. Somebody told me it was a place up there I never saw before. Okay? So that's what you do. You protect yourself from yourself. And then what happens when you shove one rock down there, then you shove something down there. It's not innocent. If you take energy and you resist it, it's like, okay, take a ball in a bathtub or take a lake. Take a ball in a lake, all right? It's floating on top of the lake. It's a little kid's ball, right? Push it down. Will it stay down? What do you need to do to make it stay down? Keep holding it down. That's what happened to every single thing that you push down there. You're still holding it down. That's where your likes and dislikes come from. You stored them down there. And now you're trying to make things happen or not happen based on that. So what happens if it's down there? The Shakti is always trying to flow. You're a very great being. There's nothing you ever did that will ever not make you a great being. You are a great being. You're God descended. You were made in the image of God. You are a great being. I don't care what you did. You don't understand. It doesn't matter. You are a great being. That's what you are, a great being. You have Shakti. You have energy. You're not like this little rock that's just sitting over on the side of the road. Okay? What happens is when you shove something down there, then when the Shakti comes up and tries to flow, not express. It's not trying to express it. It's trying to flow through. The experience is the, they say when the experiencer and the experience become one. Ever heard that? Right then. Let's talk about that. When the experiencer and the experience become one, then there's not an experiencer looking at the experience and judging it. There's not an experience that's independent and lost to the experiencer. They come together. They're one. The experience comes up. The experience experiences it. It passes straight through. It's whole, gestalt, whatever you want. It makes it through. That's what's meant to be happening. It's not that you don't have the experience. Every single experience you ever had made you wholer. Even the most terrible experience you ever had taught you something, didn't it? But you're not willing to learn. You're afraid of having it again. You're afraid of getting hurt. Every experience, I don't know here, you learn to play tennis, never played before. Pick up a racket, pick up a ball. I'm telling you, it's going to the net. Every single time you swing that racket and hit that ball, you're becoming a better tennis player. You get better That what going on with your experiences Life is teaching you loving you giving you what The experiences of reality And when you open to them you become better every moment that it comes in and feeds you You become wholer because you had that experience. Who would you like to go hiking with? Someone who's never seen a rattlesnake or someone who sees them all the time and knows how to deal with them? They're not a question. Well, then that's the same with you. Who would you rather get married to someone that got divorced two times and learned why that happened, what they did and so on, or stay away from those divorcees, man, they're terrible. It depends on whether they learn, whether they're willing to learn. So every experience is your teacher. So the Shakti comes up, it's trying to feed you. Every experience, it's a whole. The experience happens, it comes in, it moves up, it rushes in, you feel the experience, you learn, it dumps into the self, comes back down and just constantly feeding you. It's intoxicating. Do you understand that? You're a great being. That's what it means to live in the way. There's just total openness. Nothing closes you. Doesn't mean temporarily it doesn't feel bad, but you don't push it back down. You learn. What happens if you push it back down? It becomes like a rock in a stream. There's a beautiful stream flowing. There's no eddies, no currents, no rapids. Why? There's no blockages. What causes eddies and currents? It hits the block and it goes around it. What causes rapids? Water gets all drops down and what kind of things happen? What if it's totally clean? The stream bed is totally clean. There's no disturbances down there. It flows right through. What if you take one rock and you shove it into that flow? I'm telling you, there will be Gettys and currents and disturbances. And they won't stop right there. They spread out. That's what happens when you shove something down there. Anything. I'm daring you to listen once in your life. There's no innocence suppressing. Why? I told you. There's no innocence pushing the ball down. You don't have to look at it anymore. Yeah, but you have to hold it down there. Anything you ever push down is still draining your energy. it's like in other words you go through these experiences and they wear you down you get all the way before your time okay because you're wasted your shakti to hold down the stuff that you don't want to experience all right and what i told you norman humane does says the stuff i don't want to experience i am not going to experience it don't you dare talk to me like that and don't you ever do that in my presence and you understand there's rules around here okay and you're going to do it the way I need. That's how you solve the problem, by trying to manipulate and control everything else so that when it comes in, it doesn't hit your stuff. Can you relate to that? Do you understand that? The right way, the highway, the spiritual way, the way that actually works is to say, here's my stuff coming up. That's what it is. I'm afraid to go to work. Why? Because they didn't compliment me. I thought I should have got the compliment. He got the corner office. I'm not comfortable parking my car in that parking lot the next day. In other words, you didn't handle the experience. And I'm telling you, it's still down there. I'm telling you, every time you walk by the guy who got the, even if he's your best friend, he got the corner office. Maybe you can deal with it. But deal with it means shove it back down. Deal with it under that mature adult situation is you didn't hit him. He didn't quit. Okay, I dealt with it. You pushed it down, and it bothers you every time anything interacts, right or wrong. For how long? A real long time. Do you understand that? It can be down there for a real long time, can't it? Because you're holding it down there. I'm begging you to understand. You're wasting your Shakti to hold stuff down there that happened a long time ago that you couldn't deal with then, and when it tries to come back up, you can't deal with it now. So your idea of how do I fix it, what do I do about it, is to manipulate the outside world to make sure it doesn't hit your stuff. No one likes their stuff getting hit, do they? Except a yogi. Come and get it. Because they don't want it down there. And so basically, one way to deal with it is to not deal with it. It's to make everybody else deal with it. Don't talk like that. Don't do that. Don't dress like that. I'm going to make you handle me instead of me getting rid of me. That is what Christ meant by die to be reborn. Don't you doubt it one iota. How do you know? Because as you die in there of that self, you're reborn. The Shakti's free. The Shakti flows. Do you understand that? Okay. So you finally catch on that the reason there's so many different parts of my being is because I did that. I shoved all that stuff down there. And by the time you get, you don't have one or two rocks down there, don't you kid yourself? So you get tons of them. Then the Shakti has to find a way around it in order for you to feel high. So you only feel high if this person says that and this person does this and doesn't say to somebody else after they said it to me. And the tone is right and the look is right and everything's what I expect. It just made it through your stuff enough to where some current comes up and you think that that's neat. Yogananda once said, if you were not blocked, the amount of Shakti that would blow through you would blow you to pieces. It merged with the universe. That's where the yogis went. There's that much energy blocked because you have this junk in there. And what you're doing is living with a little trickle and saying, oh, finally found somebody. Somebody who what? He doesn't be like this and don't like that and promise me to do that. And they're like this and dresses like this and also does whatever I tell them to do. I found my mate. No, you found a way around your stuff. And how long is that going to last? Because I know you don't want to hear it. You know how you have all this stuff in there? So does he. And it's not the same stuff. Do you understand that? You shoved all your stuff down there. All through your life. He shoved all his stuff down there. Yeah, but we talked about it. It would take your whole life to understand his life. Now, you see our relationships are interesting? And so what you're trying to do is solve the problem by changing the outside, by controlling the outside, by making sure that what comes in doesn't bother you too much. It maybe even feels good. It can feel good if it makes it past your blockages. What's the solution? There's only one real solution. It's called yoga, but we can call it whatever you want. It's a spiritual path. What do you mean? I am not going to solve the problem inside of me with things outside of me. Period. I am not going to do that. I'm not going to. It will never work. Why? Because the outside's outside and the inside's inside. And the inside is full of it. And the outside is just going about its business. It doesn't know you. The outside world knows who you are, what you want, and what you like and when it should rain. So you wake up and you realize the answer is not getting what you want. There's nothing wrong with getting what you want. There's nothing wrong with not getting what you don't want. It just doesn't take you anywhere. It makes you devote yourself to the part of you that got blocked. And so that's why I am the way I am. And now I'm only okay if I get what I want. And I'm only relieved if I don't have to do what I don't want. And I'm really, really upset if I don't get what I want. And I'm really upset if I get what I don't want. Okay. Well, I have a fun in there sometimes. How often? If I work hard at it and I get what I want. And so eventually you take a step back and you say, are you in there? Yeah. Is it really nice in there? No. It's not naturally really nice in there. I have to work at it really hard. Where have you seen that disgust? Ever heard of the fall from the garden? I don't read the Bible. I don't know why I know this stuff. The fall from the garden in Genesis, it says, when you've fallen from the garden, now you must work by the sweat of your brow to be okay. Can you relate to that? Do you not work every minute of your life to try to be okay? It's just a question of how good you're doing at it. So you finally wake up. That's where I want you. You wake up, you realize, I can't really be okay. Well, there's all these different pieces of me scattered all over the place, and I'm trying to hold it all together and find out something that makes me be better. That's not being okay. That's trying to be okay. That's struggling to be okay. What does it mean to be okay? There's only one way. Get that stuff out. Get that stuff out and stop putting more in. There's your spiritual path. Get the stuff out and stop putting more in. What does it mean to stop putting more in? I always suggest is not putting more in is actually more important than getting the stuff out. How do you like that? Maybe you like that. It's easier to deal with. Why? What is the purpose of getting out what happened when you were six years old and mommy did this when you're still putting junk in there all day because of how somebody's talked to you or what you looked like or what you wore the wrong clothes at a party or whatever it is. You're just putting more on top of it. So you have to learn to not put more in. How? You practice that. You practice letting go. You practice saying, I don't want. You want more down there now that we've discussed it? You want more blockages? You want more junk that you have to work with and work around and not see this person and see that person and don't answer that phone? Don't call. No, no, don't answer it. Wait, no, don't. Okay? Until all of a sudden you do that, and all of a sudden you get a text that says, I'm so sorry what I said to you yesterday. You have no idea how much that hurt me. Answer the phone. Quick, quick, answer. You basically wake up and realize, look what I'm doing. If I can't handle what somebody said yesterday, or can't handle that it rained, or can't handle that my hair got frizzy, if I can't handle the everyday experiences of life, Not the big things that I suppressed a long time ago. If I can't handle those, how can I handle the big stuff? So it's a matter of learning how not to put more down there. Why is that the answer? Okay, I can handle the rain. I can handle the driver in front of me. People always go, they get mad at me. Every example you ever use making is the driver in front of the rain. There's much bigger things to deal with. Yeah, but if you can't deal with those, you can't deal with anything. You practice handling the things that happen today. consider them the most important work you have. You're trying to learn a piano. Teacher sends you home with the scales. I don't want to play the scales. I want to play Beethoven. That's why I took the piano. I want to play Beethoven. If you can't play the scales, you can't play Beethoven. If you can't have a coach and learn how to hit the ball right and hold your wrist and do stuff, you're not going to play tennis. You learn how to let go. You learn how to let the day come towards you. Every day, not big things. tiniest things. Do you get upset because the driver in front of you? Have you ever talked to the driver in front of you? Come on, buddy. You pull into a long left turn lane that has a light and the light turns green The arrow turns green and nobody moves They were on their phone until about two cars go by and the light turns red again How you doing You might have a word to say about that driver Well he don hear you Okay? You couldn't handle it. It was an everyday situation. You can justify all you want to get upset. It did no good. What good did it do to get upset? He didn't hear you. He's gone. He made it through. Just at the last minute, somebody beeped and he stopped looking at his phone. One car got through. screw you up on it no it's just an everyday event are you willing to practice handling it are you willing to understand it is more important to be able to not put more down there of these everyday events than to be able to let some big thing go all at once because you're not going to be able to so you get to the point where you say no i have work to do and in order to play the piano I need to practice. Can I get an auto player piano that plays itself and looks like I'm playing? Yes. Go have fun. You did not learn how to play the piano. You made people think you did. That doesn't solve anything. So you start to understand the first step in your spiritual growth is don't put more down there. But if you come to me and say, yeah, but Sally was my friend and she didn't say hello. Why would she do that? Okay, fine. You weren't ready to not put stuff down there. You were the deer, ran away. But maybe if it wasn't Sally, but maybe if you saw that it was Sally, but she had earbuds on, just the last second you notice, oh my gosh, she didn't hear me. Thank God, I don't have to hate her. What if you didn't see the earbuds? Don't talk to me. I don't see Sally on me. Have I exaggerated? Come on, man, let's talk real. And so you start to say, it matters. These little things matter. If you learn the scales, it matters. I want to go to Beethoven. No. You learn to not put more down there. That's the greatest thing. I mean, I used to meditate six hours a day. I left all of life. And what I learned is this. I don't want to teach you. I want to teach you meditation. Good. You should meditate. I want to teach you all kinds of stuff, too. I'll teach you this because that's what I found works. You in there who's reacting and complaining and doing all the junk and then trying to make it okay by manipulating the outside. You hear me? Handle the small things that happen to you today. In Living in Tether, I define the small things. That which, if they didn't bother you, there's nothing to do about them. The fact that it rained when you were driving home and it was a little bit tense, there's nothing to do about that. Except don't get tense. Let's relax. Sally didn't say hello. is that okay with you? No, but is it okay with you? Do you really want to store it down there and have problems with Sally for the next three weeks? No. There, that's you in there. Not how do I fix it? Why is it like that? It's like that because you made it like that because you couldn't handle the realities of life. They had to be the way you wanted them to be. Otherwise, you couldn't handle them and you kept shoving them down there. and you start realizing there's a line in which, okay, I can handle the rain. I don't like it, but I can handle it. I can handle the cold. I can handle these little things. I can handle the driver in front of me. How? I don't care how you do it. That's your business. You're in there. If you want out, you need to learn how to do this. You can use affirmation. I told you, the driver in front of you, make believe it's your grandmother. As the last year she's able to drive by herself on her own. Go on, tailgate and beep her. No, you think, okay, grandma, it's okay. Enjoy your drive. That can slow down a little bit. Things like that, all right? Or catch yourself. The self's in there and notice that the tension coming up because the driver in front of you. And ask yourself, do I want that store down there? do you understand let's just get it solid there's a car driving in front of you in fact the car that didn't turn left when the light turned left you noticed that it was a 2005 mustang green or whatever heck it was and that really peeved you off if you happen to be in germany three years later and you're trying to take a left and you see that car up there you get upset it ain't the same car It doesn't matter. It left an impression, didn't it? And you have to say, I don't want those in me. It's meaningless. It has definitely no meaning. It's screwing me up. It's one of those rocks you put in a stream that cause current and rapids. And I understand, you just get to the point that you understand the teachings well enough to really say, I don't want that in me. Well, then why are you putting it in there? I'm not. Yes, you are. You're resisting the experience. You can't handle it. Have you ever used the word, I can't handle this? Here, we talked about positive thinking. How about affirmation? I can handle this. I can handle this. That's a nice mantra. Wouldn't that be nice? Instead of saying, I can't handle this? And you start practicing handling things as much as you can. There will be things that you can't handle. I understand. There'd be 10 shots that you can't the backhand, not ready yet. That's okay. Don't judge. these are the essence of what I'm teaching you it's like don't judge, fine, if you fall down get up and don't think a single thing about it and don't sit there and say oh my god I should have done better, no you shouldn't you weren't ready, you weren't ready for that piano piece right now, nothing wrong with that just keep practicing if you practice, you're going to find out that when something bigger comes up you can do the same thing you did in there to let go of the smaller stuff and it becomes easier, people write me from all over the world all the time saying it changed their lives. Of course it changed your life. You stopped storing garbage and then having to work around it by manipulating everybody else to fit with their garbage. Of course it's going to change your life. And then what's going to happen over time, you keep devoting yourself to that. Why? Because it works. There's less stuff down there so you can be happier. And then some big stuff will start coming up. I don't understand. I was doing so well. I was so happy. I felt Shakti. I even felt the chakras opening. It was amazing. I saw lights. and everything. And not anymore. Now I just keep thinking about the thing that happened to me 10 years ago. And they ripped me off and I can't get rid of it. I can't get out of my mind. You know what the answer to that is? Good. I am so glad to hear that. Well, I guess I love you and I don't want that stuff down there. And if it came up by itself, you don't have to do anything. If it naturally came up by itself, it means it's ripe to let go. You're ready to let it go. Maybe it'll take a few passes. So what? You want it out or you want to stand down there? You have work to do. What's the work? Let go. Accept, honor, respect. It really ties you real well with the start of the conversation about the different parts of your being. You shove different parts of your being down there. Your psyche's blocked up into tiny little splinters. Part of it's trying to come up, not because the outside world did something, because it doesn't want to be down there. It never wanted to be down there. And so all of a sudden you've opened up enough. It has room to try to come up. Welcome in. Okay. You start to say, not only is it okay that it comes up, I want it to come up. If it starts to put its head up, I don't even start to push it down. I say, thank you. Thank you. Come on, come on up. And then you apologize to it. I'm so sorry. I shoved that part of my being down because of what happened in high school or this or the other thing. I put you in a dark closet that's what the subconscious is a dark closet why don't you just take parts of your being show it in a dark closet see what happens and so you start thanking it for coming up you welcome it you tell it no matter what you have to do you're fine come out of the closet come on express yourself I know it's going to hurt there's no way it's going to feel good it was put down with pain it's coming back with pain I love it I welcome you here's my hand take it when you want and you help it up you don't even tolerate it it's not about coping it's about get that stuff out of there. Am I listening? That's how you grow spiritually and you will grow so fast. What do you see what happens? It will shock you. It will shock you to find out what you're capable of doing. What do you do? Relax. Instead of resist, relax. Relax what? Relax the hands in there that push it down. You hear me? Just relax anyways. It doesn't feel good. Of course it doesn't feel good because you shove stuff down there and that's what's coming up. Anybody understand? That's how you deal with the fragmented parts of your psyche, of why there's so many different moves and so many different things and so many different aspects of your life. Eventually, you become an integrated, that's the word they use, an integrated, a whole being. There's only one of you. And by the way, there's not one of you down there. There's one of you up here. It all becomes up here, born from above. All the Shakti ends up in the upper two centers. There is no down there anymore because you didn't shove stuff down there. I told you once, there is no subconscious. There's an area of your conscious that you don't want experiencing certain things. And so you push them away into a room. It's still the conscious mind. You're just underneath keeping it from coming up. When you're done, there is no subconscious. There doesn't need to be. You're not shoving anything down there. It's all free to come up. You don't even touch it for a minute. I told you, Ramakrishan said, it's like riding on water. If you have emotion, anger, this, that, drive, it's fine. Come on up. No impressions are left. There's no samskaras. You see how beautiful that is? To be whole and complete? To never worry about a single thing again for the rest of your life? What do you worry about? That what I don't want will happen and what I want won't happen. What if there's nothing like that? whether there's just this experience of life and you're participating in it completely. You're capable of a very high state, but not while you've separated yourself in all these pieces and then keep shoving them back down there. Okay, you are a great being. You don't have to become a great being. There's no place to go. You're already there. You just shoved all this stuff down there that keeps distracting your consciousness from experiencing the greatness of your being. All right. Jai Guraduf. You've been listening to the Michael Singer podcast, produced by Sounds True in partnership with Shanti Publications. For more information on Michael's body of work and all back episodes, please join us at michaelsingerpodcast.com. Thanks so much for listening. Sounds true. Waking up the world. Thank you.