kNew eyes
In a posting entitled; reaming with Eyes Open">Dreaming With Eyes Open, I shared a recurrent dream that I have been having recently. One where I am stuck inside of a dream... yet conscious and aware of my sleeping state. Wide awake in my subconscious, yet my eyes locked shut to the world around me. I struggle to open my eyes, and they will not obey. I have to wait in the darkness until they say it's time. Upon reflecting on this dream, I have waited to know what it is that I have my eyes closed to. What reality am I not willing to see?

My eyes are finally opening to the light.

You see, this weekend, I experienced a death. Not a death of the literal sense, but a death to a belief, a way of seeing, and a subsequent reality. There was a moment when life delivered me a message that shook me... quite literally. An aspect of my existence that I had begun to take for granted dissolved before my eyes in only a moment. And everything was seen to through knew eyes.

When I received the revelation of a knew and unexpected truth, I became immediately aware that I was experiencing something that conflicted with everything that I had constructed as true in my body and mind. I witnessed as my mental and emotional grids began to break down, and my body shook with a cellular fever. I was asked in a moment to accept something that led to the immediate deconstruction of a set of beliefs, and subsequent reality. And as such, my body (my molecular reality) was experiencing a quickening. It had to catch up. As my body assimilated the news it shook uncontrollably. And my mind immediately began to do its job... rebuilding structures to support this knewness... and, due to the sheer scope of the job, it became awkwardly stuck in its inability to restore balance so quickly. As a result, the wisdom of my being took over and shock kicked in... protecting me from processing, and leaving my energy body free to work in its own time.

The details of the drama that led to this transmutation within are unimportant. It is the lesson of any healing crisis is to experience a reality devastated. If the knew reality is sickness... health is the reality that has been devastated. If the knew reality is divorce... the reality of companionship is dissolving. Whatever the case, the body-mind is challenged in all that it holds true.

What fascinates me is the ease that emerges in the face of trauma when a reality is allowed to dissolve, without the added stress to the body and mind to reinvent itself in that instance. In short, destruction is allowed, unfettered by the need to create anew in that moment. The only reality that is known is that in the moment. I have found in the past week when I allow the moment to be the only foundation of my knowing... my being can recreate itself again and again, gracefully in each moment. And the ego attachment to the dramas of devastation no longer rein over the situation.

The Spider Mind
What also comes up for me is the vulnerability of what the mind learns to lean one. Belief is a series of thoughts that create a mental grid... a web that the mind can stick things to. But what happens when a knew reality emerges. One that busts through and deconstructs the grid - much like inadvertantly walking through the tedious artfulness of the spider's web. The grid that was once strong enough to hold on (conveniently bridging the past to the present)... is suddenly revealed in its vulnerability with forcefulness. Like the spider's web, our mental grids (or realities) have the strength to brave a swift and easy breeze. Yet when a strong wind sweeps through, the web is deconstructed immediately. And yet what do our spider-minds typically do? Their job. They learn to weave again. The mind does anything in its power to gather up new thoughts and beliefs that fit together well enough to recreate an equally vulnerable reality.

And that spider-mind creation... a knew reality... it reverberates to bring things into being. When a spider weaves its web, it waits for prey to attach to it. This attachment (or catch) creates a vibration that the spider learns to recognize. Each catch feeds the spider to generate more web space in the future. The mind is similar in some regards. When a thought resonates with a reality that we have already constructed, it sticks in our mind and creates a vibration. Each vibration feeds that grid of belief... and, as a result, a reality is trusted as it is confirmed through experience. The trouble is, the mind preys on that which will cause the grid to vibrate, affirming itself.

Thoughts such as "I am not enough."... "No one will love me"... or "I don't believe I can do it" work together to create the grid of not being worthy. The mind seeks to feed that grid, preying on perspectives that will stick to the construct. Thus, experiences, people, and circumstances that support thinking in such a way are attracted. And - more often than not - an otherwise neutral reality is tainted by the lens of the mental grids already in place.

So how do we see more clearly?
We make peace with the mind by becoming clear about its unique brilliance as well as where it falls short. Let us be clear that peace of mind is not defined as passive acceptance, inaction, or inertia. Peace is a dynamic process. Peace, as Mahatma Gandhi taught us, is proactive and diligent in its integrity. Peace of mind is a non-violent way of bearing witness, one where we neither accept the status quo passively nor aggressively fight against it.

Letting kNew Light In
Oftentimes, when a way of thinking and being in our world needs to shift, we miss the subtle cues. We get stuck dancing frantically with our shadows, ignoring the light at our backs. In such cases, unhealthy grids are functioning in our lives, but in our unawareness we don't see them until they are destroyed by the sheer force of sudden change, forcing us to turn around (aka: turn within) and take notice. At that moment we can see the grid with brilliance and clarity. That is, if we are willing.

The infinite SHiNE of our spirit is like a sun that is constant shedding an endless and accessible source of awareness from deep within. And I know from experience, when we are not able to connect to that light, it WILL one day connect to us. Like the Earth turning on its axis, the passage of time will operate in such a way that our grids will inevitably be revealed to us. The real question is, are we willing to allow the light to dissolve webs of what was once knew?

I am honored by my recent challenges, as I have been dared by my circumstances to discover the peace of the Unknown... and the glory of SHiNE. SHiNE is a choice to connect to brilliance no matter what... and as a sensation, it can only be found in the moment. Now that is true knowledge, if you ask me.

Tags: spider mind, Awakening, shadows, metaphysics

I am on a flight from Atlanta to Denver... on the first leg of a journey back from a family visit. My presence was requested for my gorgeous niece, and her 3rd birthday party - I did a hoop performance and playshop. It was so wonderful, as always, to be with her and my nephew. (I promised myself that I would make every effort to ensure that they would know their aunt, even though I live so far away).

It's a 3 hour flight, and I just woke from a nap. To tell you the truth, I am little spun. Only three times in my life have a had a dream state like this one (and never on a plane!). It is a quality of sleep where I am teetering cautiously at the brink of conscious and subconscious, surfing the waves of thoughts and images in search of which is what.

The Dream:
I am on this very plane, in this very seat, in these very clothes.. on my way to where I go now. I am watching the direct tv screen. A news segment. The story is on making desires a reality (dreams coming true). I am fascinated as the anchorwoman holds up letters from viewers to demonstrate to her audience just how desperate they are for what she is about to offer them... the secret to living the life of their dreams. I quickly become disinterested in the story, as it is a sensationalized take-off of The Secret... but I am awed by the inclusion of a friend's letter among the many to the station... so, I DECIDE to wake up in order to send her an email, to tell her she is on the in-flight news show. So there I am... completely aware that I am dreaming with eyes open. Suddenly, I am in my body again... sleeping. I tell my body it is time to wake-up. Everything cooperates... only I cannot open my eyes. They are unmoving to the point of painful... stuck closed. It aches to try and open them, but I do. They will not budge. Anxiety surges through me, but I coax my emotions back to a center point in order to meet my aim more calmly. Slowly and suddenly, my eyes open. Ah, what relief!

But wait... I look around... I AM in the plane... in this seat, yet I suddenly realize that I am still not yet awake. Again, dreaming with eyes open tells me that I am still sleeping with eyes shut. Replay... I try to open them... again, they will not budge. Finally, they open at the urgency of my will. Again, I look around... and I am STILL asleep... and the cycle repeats for a third time!!

On this third attempt... I finally awaken for real.

When I finally woke, that depth... that prison of eyes wide shut beckoned me to challenge it with sleep again. There was no way that I would re-enter that unrelenting dream state. As l looked around at my environment, I struggled to tell myself that I was indeed awake... I was hesitant to be caught in the illusion again. Only a trip to the bathroom and a bite of food succeeded in convincing me. And now I sit perched on the bridge between this dream and that.

I had a dream almost identical to this months ago, where I woke... and woke... and woke. Finally to awaken to find that I understood what maya is... and the teaching that we are living in a dream in each and every moment. Although in my last dream, one very particular detail was different. Rather than my EYES that would not open... it was my JAW that was locked shut. My voice was that which would free me from the dream state. And today, it was my sight.

What I wake up wondering today is...
When will I really wake up? And what resistance will I face in order to push past that edge?

It is as though my eyes have been closed all along, and I have been waking up over and over ... and over again... to find that I have been dreaming with my eyes open for my entire life. Each new fabrication of reality is a dream... until I wake up to create a new one. Perhaps each time I wake up, the Observer that I am (my spirit) is activated to see more clearly. I have long felt that I am but a witness in the dream that is this world. Certainly, I have gotten tangled in many a drama in my past experience... however, the more that I wake up the more that I see that none of it permeated to the depths of who I really am.

I am the same Observer/Witness/Eyes that I was when I lost my yellow umbrella at kindergarten... when I was spinning around a May Pole in the 4th grade... and when I lost my virginity in high school. I am those age-less eyes that watched all the drama unfold in my heart and mind. And over the course of the years, I have become more and more aware of how many layers there are to this dream of existence. I aim to live from the eyes of this Higher Self, so that retrospect need not always be that which unplugs me from the storyline. And so I know that as I type these words, I am not awake. I know that the dream still has me in it. And I look forward to waking up again and again throughout the course of my life.

Perhaps one day... I will experience the awakening that only a few ever speak of. The enlightenment of seeing through all the veils at once. Death is the awakening that slices through them simultaneously... yet, I am willing to belief that The Purest Knowing is available right here on earth. May I awaken to find it one day soon.

Blessings to you in this Great Dream that is life....

Candice

Tags: dream, Awakening