What in retrospect is perceived as a Way
is a continuous stepping into a changing Flow.
If you are happily drifting downstream, enjoy!
If an interference catches “you” off-guard,
let it help spotting an illusionary interfering entity.
The Way gets its way, with or without “you.”
Pay attention to your own thinking, because you create your world through your thoughts.
Thoughts are forms of conditioning in our consciousness.
When you were born, you didn’t know what milk was. When your mother fed you, she said, “Come have some milk.” After a few repetitions, you learned what milk was. The same happened with apples, cookies, and many other things. Gradually, your understanding expanded.
In the same way, our thoughts are learned. From a young age, we are taught what we should do and what we should not do. Because these thoughts take a long time to form, we rarely question them.
Every conclusion and every thought is learned. We think this or that and seldom examine or verify it. Gradually, we become imprisoned by our thoughts and lose our sense of ease. When we look deeply, we may realize that what we believe is good for us is often just a conclusion formed through long accumulation. The mind creates thoughts one by one without questioning them, because without them, we may feel lost if we do not live this way.
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.
Letting go involves being aware of a feeling,
letting it come up, staying with it,
and letting it run its course,
without wanting to make it different
or do anything about it.
David R Hawkins
You try to be nice.
You want to be kind.
You surround yourself
with crystals and books;
hear Eckhart and Sadhguru.
You do sound healing and Yoga.
Are you ready for spirituality 2.0?
Just sit there and stare into space.
See programs running, even “good” ones.
Doing good is a good first step, but not enough.
Sit and experience self at work in all manifestations.
Know, sense, feel and see self and let God do the rest.
When we see a beautiful place, we want to visit it because it radiates attractive energy and makes us want to stay. When we meet people we like, we are drawn close to them—sometimes even wanting to possess them—because they radiate a lovely energy that attracts us.
The common quality of attractive energy is that it feels peaceful and warm. Most importantly, it does not feel harmful. When someone radiates this kind of energy, people around them do not feel threatened and do not feel the need to protect themselves. Naturally, they want to draw closer.
Similarly, when we encounter someone or something we dislike, it is often because they radiate an energy of judgment or contempt—not necessarily directed at us, but present nonetheless. Our instinct, then, is to distance ourselves or exclude them. Rejecting unpleasant energy is a natural human response. Another common situation is that two people with similar unresolved issues may attract each other.
Most people react according to the energy they perceive in others. After learning to meditate and practice mindfulness, it is important to observe whether we are still functioning in this pattern of direct reaction. When we notice such reactions, can we transform the energy? This transformation is not about changing the other person, but about transforming ourselves. It is an awakening—to see, soften, and loosen our own inner challenges. When we can do this, we rise into the energy of compassion.
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.
What we once lived and experienced as self occasionally clashes with “life as is.” Recognizing “life as is” and living in accordance with its flow is the means to getting the conditioned self out of the Way. It’s an inside job though, since body, mind and world are an item. “Life as is” manifests as
S (tillness)
E (nergy)
L (ove)
F (low).
Actually, “life as is” always gets its way, but we only enjoy the show when we join the flow.
The challenges in our lives—such as our interactions within the family—serve as mirrors, allowing us to see ourselves more clearly. When you look into a mirror and notice that the person reflected has messy hair, do you try to comb the person in the mirror, or do you comb yourself? In the same way, when external challenges reflect something back to us, it is we who need to adjust ourselves.
Through this process, we can discover how we think about and interpret situations. Our patterns of thinking and interpretation gradually form the challenges and obstacles we encounter. If we can observe ourselves at this level, we can recognize our issues immediately. This is how we address problems at their root.
Illness can also serve as a mirror. When we experience physical discomfort, we can adjust our minds accordingly. If we only try to handle problems on the surface, it is like sweeping away fallen leaves—the leaves will keep falling, and the work will never end.
As we begin to observe more deeply, we discover that issues, obstacles, pain, and discomfort arise from the mind. In other words, we create our experience through our thinking. The world we live in, the problems we face, and the pain we endure are all shaped by the mind.
Therefore, the first step is to observe, not to rush into solving the problem. These experiences become meaningful only when we explore what is happening within us and trace them back to their causes. Challenges are mirrors reflecting our reactions. If we focus on combing the hair in the mirror, nothing about our own hair will change. Without understanding how we think, there will always be endless issues waiting to be solved.
All pain, obstacles, and challenges merely reflect our patterns of thinking; they do not have independent existence. They arise because of the way we think. Our pain, our problems, and even the world we experience are created by our thoughts.
Isn’t it true that once a thought arises, a world is created—often without our awareness? Whatever we think becomes self-fulfilling. Wherever our thoughts lead, our life follows.
If you wake up thinking about hiking, your day will unfold in forests and wilderness. If you decide to go to the United States today, you will find yourself on an airplane, spending the day in transit. If you wake up wanting a meaningful date night, your evening will naturally follow that direction. Thought comes first; experience follows.
These are examples of surface-level thinking. Beneath them lie more subtle and deeper layers of thought, which are the true roots of suffering. When we look carefully at our lives, we can see that everything begins with how we think. A single thought leads to another, and then another, until we feel trapped and say, “I need to solve this problem.”
Yet the key is not to solve the problem, but to observe how the problem was created. When we pay close attention to our thinking, we can trace issues back to their source.
By exploring our challenges in this way, we gradually see that pain and difficulty arise from the mind. If we do not understand how the mind works, the same problems will repeat themselves. But when we clearly see how we think and understand our thoughts, we begin to experience the world with clarity as well.
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.
The teacher who advises “you”
to be mindful of psychological thought
cannot bring about Realization.
The teacher who tells you
to heal “your” psychological wounds
cannot bring about Realization.
The teacher who tells “you”
that you are “That”
cannot bring about Realization.
Yet, all of them provide answers
and are part of the maturing process.
The fruit falls when it is ripe.
When the I is grasped, sensed, felt, seen;
when all hurts and aspirations are
embraced, understood and let go of as they arise.
We cannot let go of self,
but we can see Consciousness at work,
and enjoy the ride—“you” are “That”!
