What Is RESISTANCE?
I/we, through practice, offer up a constant selection of possibilities egocentric karmic conditioning/self-hate really has no interest in. That’s the point of spiritual practice, to choose what ego doesn’t choose—so it’s important to have lots of choices!
What I hear constantly (not too strong a word) is “I just have such strong resistance to that!” This is always said as if it’s unusual, unique to the person saying it. “I just really don’t want to do that.” This means, “I’ve thought a lot about it, really considered it deeply, and have decided it’s just not for me.” That means, “I’ve spent a lot of time going over and over this in conditioned mind and been made miserable by what the voices are saying.”
Here’s what all serious students of awareness practice must get: That reaction is the most common reaction egos have to anything that threatens ego.
The “I” says “I don’t want to,” and the human being is meant to say “Okay, you don’t have to.”
For anyone wishing to wake up and end suffering, that “I don’t want to” strong resistance must come to mean “That is what this awareness practitioner is going to do!”
Is it comfortable to go up against ego’s resistance? Definitely not… at first. Will it always be awful? Absolutely not. In fact, way sooner than the voices of ego would ever want anyone to know, the process becomes interesting, fascinating. And shortly thereafter it starts being fun.
I just got an email from someone who has been doing for about a year and a half one of my “designed to put an end to ego’s reign of terror” projects. She reported: “I’ve taken a job that in the past would have rendered me a quivering mass of fear. I am fearless! I ask for what I need; if someone says no to a request, that’s fine. I’m not taking anything personally. And I can tell people have more respect for me than I’ve ever had in my professional career. All because I’ve learned how NOT to let the voices of egocentric karmic conditioning/self-hate run the show!”
Bottom line: If we want freedom, ego’s “no” has to be our “yes.”
In gasshō
Cheri