Fear and Resistance

I woke up at 2am a few nights ago filled with fear.  What somebody said to me, what another person didn’t say, Corona virus, relationship stuff.  My mind was absolutely churning, reviewing the past and preparing future conversations.  This kind of fear reflex churning is a old program I run, and it has lots of momentum.  Like a kind of familiar old friend.  It keeps my perceived problems out there in front of me.  

This time, I felt the resistance in me and made the choice to let myself have the my full present experience.  I breathed slowly and deeply into my chest and let my heart center open up.  I let myself feel all that I was feeling.  In me, and not out there.  Beyond the stories and concepts and machinations.  Just the purity of my emotions.  Fear, grief.  Call it what you want.  It was beyond the labels.  

As I let myself feel, I didn’t go down a black hole and I didn’t die.  I was just breathing and feeling the trembling little boy in me.  I felt cleansed.  I fell back asleep soon after.

The next morning I was reading an email from a friend of mine who just had a truly visionary experience while on some plant medicine.  He described it as much light and love.  As an ecstatic happening.  In that moment I saw my nighttime experience as a similar kind of ecstasy.  The purity of my own feelings felt so divine.  This is what it means to me to stop resisting.  

A few days later, I was reading parts of one of my favorite books, The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer.  He has a chapter called The Spiritual Path of Nonresistance that really addresses what I’m talking about and I highly recommend.