Be still and let life do its thing

 Life happens and a thought-feeling energy gets released within us, or alternatively, a thought-feeling energy gets released and life happens. We can’t have one without the other. Body, mind and world are one. Everything and everyone on the blue planet arises and vanishes in Oneness.

The opportunity is to live body, mind and our perception of the world in its entirety. Maybe it discharges and leaves our system. Maybe it remains latent in the system but at that moment it stops in its tracks, or maybe it keeps running but we stand beside it. Either way, stillness prevails.

Complete honesty is required along a spiritual quest. We may repress ugly thought-feeling energies only to find that life keeps bringing the disowned to our attention. Maybe we are stoic in the name of spirituality trying to harden our will to stand next to what deep down inside bothers us. 

The silent witness is a tricky phenomenon. It can be a cleverly designed superego that creates a distance between our assumed spiritual perspective and what is. Needless to say, we will only fool ourselves with this approach and life will keep reminding us that we are out of balance within. 

Mindfulness is an acceptance of what is, the “negative” feelings just as the excited feelings. We look at it just as we would study a painting, a tree or a person we meet for the first time. Now or never is in the learning. As we look at the thing “me,” onlooker and “me” energy both transform.

The eternal now is in a layer beneath the thought-feeling energy. It’s quiet there. The opportunity is to penetrate this depth here and now. Life is our ally. The opportunity is to align body, mind and world moment by moment. The thought-feeling energy may be present but we stand next to it.

Being occurs in the here and now. We may confront what is, heal and learn, transcend, or we may get caught in the body, mind, world manifestation once again. The portal is always open. Let go of concepts, will-power and good intentions. It’s now or never. Be still and let life do its thing.

A lost mind

 Most people are not aware of how they are in the present moment. This lack of awareness is the root of our suffering—it is what we call a lost mind.

 

Imagine seeing a curved yellow object. How do we identify it? First, our eyes perceive its shape. That information is sent to the brain, which searches through memory for something similar. Then we reach the conclusion: this is a banana. This is how perception, cognition, and the senses work together.

 

Our mind becomes lost when it is occupied by things that carry strong impressions. For example, some people struggle to attract attention, while others easily resonate with many. We are drawn to certain words, images, or people because they match our own frequency. What we see with our eyes and hear with our ears enters our memory and triggers unresolved energy. When the same frequency—or karma—is activated, we are pulled away from the present moment, and the mind becomes lost.

 

Why do we keep experiencing suffering? Sometimes we believe we have not hurt anyone, so why do we keep falling into the same hole? If we do not understand the cause, how can we clear it? And if we cannot clear it, how can we be free from suffering? We all want freedom and liberation, but without practice, these remain only words.

 

So what captures our attention? It is the frequency that attracts us and keeps us lost. When we understand this, we see that our issues are not truly about other people or external events. Then what is the real issue? It is the mind itself—a mind that is lost.

 

How does a lost mind return to its source, to its original silence? We must observe ourselves and stay in contact with our deep consciousness and then take action. Practice means applying what we have learned in daily life. If we only “know” we are lost, know that we must observe, know that we should reconnect with deep consciousness—but never act—then nothing changes. Everything remains at the starting point. Practice is action.

By Suzhen Liu

If you enjoy Suzhen Liu’s writings, please check out her new book, “Discover Love Within—Release Your Suffering” available on Amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/Discover-Love-Within-Release-Suffering/dp/0999251732

Life takes the “you” away

 George Strait almost got it right

when he concluded in “The Breath You Take,”

“Life is not the breaths you take but

the moments that take your breath away.”

Almost, but not quite, because lived properly,

life’s moments take the “you” away.

Learning from Our Issues

 When I was young, someone once gave me a refrigerator as a gift. My first thought was, Wow, this costs USD 4,000. How long would I need to work to afford something like this? Then fear immediately arose: What if it breaks? I don’t have the capacity to buy another one. I can’t afford this kind of life. People are being too nice to me.

 

I noticed something important—my reaction was fear. On the surface, it looked like the refrigerator caused my pain. But was the pain truly caused by the refrigerator? Should I blame the person who gave the gift, or the refrigerator itself?

 

The refrigerator actually brought convenience into my life. The pain came from how I looked at it. Because I was trapped in the belief that I cannot repay this; the refrigerator became a burden. In the same way, how others treat us can make us miserable, and we easily believe they are the cause. But in truth, the situation is like the refrigerator.

 

If someone says something that upsets or hurts you, the problem is not what they said—just as the problem was not the refrigerator. The real issue is that their words triggered an old wound. Past memories rise up, and we react from injury rather than from the present moment. It is not that the person or their words trap us; it is that our unresolved obstacles are still there, waiting to be seen.

 

The refrigerator revealed my fear—my fear of not being able to return kindness, my fear of inadequacy. When we learn to observe our reactions closely, we stop responding to the present with the attitudes of the past. When clarity arises, strength arises naturally. Strength does not come from fixing the issue, but from understanding it.

 

The soul grows in the same way. It does not ascend because we “deal with” our problems, but because we understand them. Only then can love appear; where pain dominates, love cannot fully exist.

 

When you truly look at your pain, a new perspective opens. There was nothing wrong with the refrigerator, and there is often no right or wrong in what happened. What happened is only the trigger—not the cause. With this understanding, we gain the strength to address our issues at their root.

 

If we only solve surface problems, the same patterns will return again and again. When an issue is not understood, it follows us. Unresolved energy becomes entangled with our soul, drawing similar situations into our lives repeatedly.

 

In family energy workshops, we often see that the entanglement between two people is an expression of their inner energies. When the “fridge” is fully understood, that entangled energy transforms into love. In that moment, a deep and unexpected joy emerges within the soul.

 

No one can give us this joy. It has always been inside us. Understanding simply allows it to appear. This is the heart of learning.

 

By Suzhen Liu

 

If you enjoy Suzhen Liu’s writings, please check out her new book, “Discover Love Within—Release Your Suffering” available on Amazon.

Get the self out of the Way

 We all know the problem statement. We do things against our better judgment, such as craving sugar, entertainment, alcohol, porn, etc, or we avoid doing the things that are good for us, like going to the dentist, doing our taxes or dealing with difficult people even though we know that we have to. 

We can force ourselves to do the “right” thing with the help of willpower. We can inquire into the resistance with the help of self inquiry. We can be mindful while slacking or while doing what is perceived to be “right,” and we can understand that these conflicts only arise because we need to be reminded that there is no “me” who has a problem. 

The “me” is a bundle of memories and energy links that are as old as humanity itself. Drop the “me” and all activities, connections and periods of rest arise spontaneously. How to get there? See the “me” in all its interactions, understand the “me” and find the ways to cut these age-old energy links. 

Few people understand this, but the willpower is the “me.” Only mindfulness, self inquiry and letting go remain. So if inner conflicts arise today, jump on the opportunity to get the self out of the Way. Life’s energy speaks for itself.

Pause while acting

We suffer because we fall into patterns of suffering without awareness. It is like walking endlessly toward the east, toward an abyss—yet we only realize we are walking in the wrong direction when we have almost reached the end.

 

For example, if I keep borrowing money from you, I may feel happy as long as there is money to spend. I enjoy the moment and avoid thinking about how I will return it. The pleasure covers the consequence. If walking toward the east represents a suffering pattern, then learning means learning to stop when I realize I am walking east. It is like an ostrich hiding its head in the sand—avoiding what it does not want to see. When awareness suddenly arrives, that moment is pause while in action.

 

Pause does not mean stopping all thoughts or eliminating all problems. It means we stop ourselves from continuing down a path of endless suffering. To pause while in action is to recognize that this is the wrong direction. When we can truly see that, we no longer need to keep walking.

 

We all have this inner ability. But without learning and observation, it rarely emerges. Most people only recognize their suffering pattern after tragedy has already occurred.

 

The starting point of suffering is how we think. That is why we must observe how we interpret things in daily life. In each moment, our judgments, thoughts, and habitual reactions quietly shape our destiny.

 

Some may say, “I cannot see how one thought can lead to suffering.” The reason we do not see it is because the thought feels good. When we spend money, we feel happy. We seek happiness and fail to recognize self-sabotage. We believe we can handle things later, rearrange circumstances, or think our way out. In that moment, we escape seeing how this path will eventually harm us.

 

We are confined by our own limitations. For example, when we compare ourselves with others, crave recognition, or seek praise, we believe these will make us happy. We see only one side of the action. Yet every action has many dimensions. We may taste happiness for five minutes, but then we must spend a long time cleaning up the other nine dimensions.

 

When we seek recognition, we want more. When others become more praised or more popular, comparison arises again. As long as we act only to satisfy desire, we cannot see the whole picture.

Pause while in action allows that larger view to appear—and with it, the freedom to stop.

By Suzhen Liu

If you enjoy Suzhen Liu’s writings, please check out her new book, “Discover Love Within—Release Your Suffering” available on Amazon.

 

https://www.amazon.com/Discover-Love-Within-Release-Suffering/dp/0999251732

Synchronicity at the courthouse

 “I will be Juror Number 8,” I said to my wife before leaving the house. It was my first jury duty after becoming naturalized a few years ago. I tend to pick the number 8 because it’s my birth number and I knew that we address Jurors by their seating order since watching the movie “Juror #2.” The town I had to serve in is about 45 minutes north from where I live. The day was full of synchronicities. As I walked in I asked about parking validation and was told there was none. A guy sitting next to me said, “At least parking is cheap in Lowell, this isn’t Newton.” Strange, I thought to myself, with 54 towns to choose from in our district, how come he picked the city I am from?” I was given the number 15 in the jury selection process with 8 spots to fill, but several potential jurors were rejected for one reason or the other. You probably guessed it by now, I was selected Juror number 8. At night I couldn’t believe my eyes, the socks I had worn that day had the number 8 written on it. The Tao had fun with me that day as it often happens.

Body, mind and world are One in Consciousness, and I am “That.” There is nothing that falls out of synchronicity other than reminding us to step out of the plot and just enjoy the ride come rain and shine. The people on the jury pool were from all walks of life and they were nice. We had a job to do and we got it done without any quarrel. One juror even requested Suzhen Liu’s new book “Discover Love Within” when I told him that I write and publish spiritual books. Take a good look around today and spot that energy that always prevails. The Tao is within “you” and yet embedded in life. When skillfully applied, we are powerful energy surfers, but in order to live the Tao we have been willing to get our feet wet. So jump in!