Press ON — the Present is a choice.
Spreading faith in a world of my own
An array of options are presented in my life; and my conscious decision explored faith and spirituality in connection with nature. For joy, and access to short happinesses, I chose to see this world, life and community in a different way than the one inscribed by our culture. Here, I strive in removing the filters and veils of adopted mental constructs. After years of systematic negative and artificial integrations, I find perspective in a rawer vision.
Read now for a navigation through fields of appreciation, gratitude, & moments of Light and more impromptu, sometimes quite unpractical ways of seeing the world.
Life is a series of frequencies we tune in.
It’s as easy as changing my perspective and adopting a loving stream of consciousness.
(Did you read Virginia Woolf’s meandering characters? Remember their ups and downs, the routes which their mind took them on? That’s the streams of consciousness.)
I let my heart and my intuition drive my every moment. I catch my breath in the present and chose with awareness what follows with abundance.
I create my own recipe for warmth.
When I am stuck in my go-to storylines of being a victim to others’ negative outputs, I can’t possibly progress. I act from the ego, and it usually follows the river of self-sabotage.
Our common potential in this life is to follow our soul’s empowerment, towards greatness, and serenity. But nothing has been drawn to help us to the destination.
Somehow, it’s been commonly assumed we were victims of our own paths. With the realisation that I am the creator of every effect, I hold part of the responsibility for everything that happens to me now.
How I see the world NOW is in my power, how I see my past, and my future is in my hands.
So why not manifest the positive?
I relentlessly study my self and I get real:
I do have a little addiction to the attention I get when negative things happen to me.
Alas, attention is love, and love can be manifested around positive things happening to me. And so I declutter the way — and I find a balance between my need (attention, love) and my want (my growth).
I am not scared to banish the negativity. I stand on my grounds, and sure, it’s a battle between the ego’s old system and my heart’s desire. But somehow, with more and more awareness, I’m able to win the war, and practice acceptance when I lose a battle.
Priorities have been set: my time and my mental space are dedicated for my personal pursuit of joy.
The first steps had to be: detoxifying my days and my thoughts from the negative perspectives I held about the world.
My set of beliefs wasn’t all too objective. It’s been tough on the ego, to discover my truths weren’t always the Truth. My beliefs were clouded with past hurts and traumas which made me repeat on end the same assumptions and mistakes again and again.
Every emotion is valid, but every act has a motive.
Truth is a fluid energy, not a set concept
Finding honesty within to declutter the walls and access the real motive.
Every choice I forced unto my routine is now held with responsibility. What I engage in (drinking, going out, finding a job, relationships) reflects my true calling — and so, the clearing has been done, and continues daily as the impulses rise up. Practice makes perfect. It’s not so hurtful anymore.
The conversation between my present and my ego’s near future desire is one we keep tight. Together we listen, together we choose. I’m not trying to smash my ego, but I drop into its patterns, analyse the streams of my outburst and see the probable end-result if I followed it: it always comes back to self-sabotage.
I am reaching for stability, and the many oscillations occupying my mind’s space are circling around the same desire for love. Except I found a path that leads to it now, and not a proxy version of it through attention.
There’s a Highbrow course (series of 5-minutes-long emails) called Positive Thinking for a Serious Person by Mitch Horowitz, recommend and a punch in the face — a manifesto piece by the man himself.
“Here is a man with a headache. When I ask him how he is curing himself, he replies, ‘I’m repairing the leak in my roof.’ I reply, ‘But how can that cure your headache? You must work on yourself.’ So it is with anxiety. Nothing is more pointless than trying to cure our restlessness by involving ourselves in exterior projects. The cure is found in the same place as the problem and that is within the man.” Vernon Howard
And until the switch is found, until you press ON — it’s hard to find oneself being attracted to a new way of reacting to situations. It is not something foreseeable, the message has to resonate with you — struck a chord, be blatantly obvious, respond to your canon of values, be accepted by most of the voices within you.
I’ve skimmed pages upon pages, words upon words — yet it didn’t improve life until I dug very deep within self, inside my nature which responded to the simplicity of our world. I never connected with all the shimmering charades built upon our world.
My ego was in love with brooding and cynicism. Even more so enthralled with the romantic idea of Fatality. Destiny was taking me away and I was the one who had handcuffed my feet and hands.
In my search for identity, I focused around, which didn’t help. No, it had to be through life experiences, through multiple let-downs, through ultimate suffering that all the tears could come out and leave a space for light. The answer was within, it needed some spring cleaning. Once the space was made for light, it quickly set in. The start was being honest, truly honest with myself — listening to the voice of my intuition. I let it guide my hours despite it bruising my ego and my belief system here and there.
It felt different — wise, in the sense Ilhan Berk shared: egoistic (not in the selfish sense): supplying to my needs before others, putting my oxygen mask on until I can help my surroundings.
Now every week comes with fluid moments of self-doubts and empowerment. Time spent on despair and navel-gazing has been banished. Now there is times for gratitude, stillness, and reflections. It is healthier as I am freer and striving towards my goals with strong intentions which I allow to change.
In the reception of teachings and communion of ideas, in opening new realms of conversation around what makes us human — the acceptance of our totality is made easier. In Turkey, it isn’t exceptional to open such subjects, building bridges for future explorations.
In accepting within the walls of shared culture more spirituality (and less religions), the texture of our conversations are rawer. Together we open the doors around the psyche, our fortunes, and dreams interpretations — touching on our subconscious brings closer and multicoloured ties between hearts. It encourages to go after an individual’s deeper questioning of being human. It lets my soul speak more often, and this is how I am here. Accomplishing one of my life’s purposes.
Find yours.
Originally published as part of Copious Copy — A series of letters between the Earth and you: a weekly cosmos of words about metaphysics and enlightenment, through science and spirituality, consider joining the conversation.