The Seed of Injury Energy

 Being hurt and hurting others are essentially the same movement. When we are hurt, we carry the wound within us, and sooner or later we treat others through that wound. This is the natural response of unprocessed energy. It is not that we intentionally want to hurt others, but when we are hurt and do not know how to process the energy, it becomes stuck. And when energy is stuck, it expresses itself through reaction.

 

In this sense, once I am hurt, I will unconsciously hurt others. It feels almost beyond our control. It is not something we consciously decide. After being hurt, a conclusion quietly forms inside us:

 

“I am not worthy of love.”

But where does this thought come from?

Who is this “I” that is not worthy of love?

If we continue to inquire, we will discover it is the injured self — the part of us that was hurt and never truly seen or healed.

 

This injured self begins to create conflict. It picks fights, misunderstands others’ good intentions, and interprets situations in ways that confirm its belief. In the end, we “prove” to ourselves that we are indeed not good enough and therefore what we fear becomes reality. This is the paradox: the mind is incredibly skillful at creating suffering. Whatever belief we hold unconsciously, life seems to organize itself around it.

 

When we are caught in injury, we lose the distance needed to observe it. Without awareness, the wound becomes our identity. And from that identity, we continue the cycle.

 

All of this is created by the mind — until awareness gently steps in.

 

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

Claim the Present

 Every feeling, every thought and every event shows us our identification with body, mind and world. We cannot sit there and claim that we are not attached. If we weren’t, silence would prevail. We need to own the “me” to be able to look through the illusion.

If life is gelling, enjoy! If interferences and inner conflicts appear, look for the i behind it. There is something amazing that happens in silence. As Viktor Frankl discovered, “between stimulus and response there is a space.” This space is the power of the present. 

All of humanity’s vibrations flow there, just as much as the Source in which body, mind and world are created. Stay with these vibrations until the source of Creation shines through and ascend into this frequency. Claim the present in the present. It’s priceless!

Look at yourself!

 When we are able to look at our sadness,

we realize we are not sad,

We are simply witnessing sadness passing through us.

When we are able to look at our anger,

we realize we are not angry.

 

These feelings bring an impact,

a surge of energy we can feel;

but we are not them—not when we choose to look.

 

When we are able to look at ourselves,

we realize we are present with a human life:

a life of ups and downs,

of joy and sorrow.

When we watch our own lives,

detachment naturally arises.

We are still living,

still smiling and crying,

yet there is peace—

a peace born from the realization

that everything happening

is simply a game.

 

By Suzanne Yang

Discover the pal inside

 Romeo, save me, 

they’re trying to tell me how to feel.

Taylor Swift, Love Story 

A man has a small penis and minds until a day a woman tells him he looks sexy that way. A woman has small breasts and feels inadequate  until someone reminds her that many models are flat chested. A man loses his hair and is devastated until he realizes how manly a Bruce Willis look is.

We feel how we feel, who knows why exactly. Maybe Juliet discovers some day that Romeo isn’t quite the heartthrob she thought he was and that her parents had a point to warn her after all. Life is as it is. What we can do is to inquire into ourself until we find a true pal—peace, abundance, love.

Observe Your Interpretation

 Different people react differently to the same event. The emotions that arise in each individual depend not on the event itself, but on how the situation is interpreted. Imagine a primary school student telling his parents that he has a school outing and asking them to prepare snacks. The parents forget and do nothing. How might the child feel? He may feel angry, upset, sad, lost, or confused. He might complain, hesitate about whether he should still go, or feel embarrassed. Beneath these reactions could be deeper feelings: being neglected, undervalued, unimportant, unloved, or filled with self-pity.

 

These emotions do not simply pass—they can expand and influence future relationships. How does a person react when he feels unloved and unimportant? Even if this experience happened long ago in childhood, its influence can remain, shaping the same reaction patterns again and again. What is the issue here? The root cause lies in how the situation was interpreted.

 

For a young child, the world is very small, and a single event can feel enormous. No matter how old he becomes, this inner child may remain frozen in that moment, reacting with the same attitude and repeating the same patterns. Every repetition reinforces the inner experience of “I am not important” and “I am not loved.” The more this pattern repeats, the harder it becomes to see clearly, because the heart becomes bruised and guarded.

 

In daily life, many situations trigger us, and we become entangled without realizing whether it is the event itself or our interpretation that is influencing our reaction. This is why clarity is essential. We need to distinguish between what actually happened and the meaning we attached to it.

 

Without this clarity, our reactions stay rooted in the past. We become unable to build real, present relationships with the people around us, continually falling back into the pattern of “not being loved” and “not being important.” Yet in reality, it is often we ourselves who are unconsciously pushing others away.

 

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

Becoming aware of conditioned mind

 We cannot fight who we are,

but we can become aware 

of who we think we are!

I went to a Gurdjieff meeting in Cambridge, MA and the organizers gave a simple challenge: be mindful of the chair you are sitting on and the sole on your foot. The meeting commenced and everyone shared their spiritual experiences and what has led them to the Gurdjieff group in particular. One person in particular loved talking and in-between the organizer shouted at him, “feet,” to which he replied, “yes, I feel them too,” which seemed to be a lie. Eventually the organizer just told him to please give someone else the opportunity to talk and the room fell quiet. 

I found this exercise quite helpful. It does not connect us to who we are deep down inside, but it makes us aware of the interference—the personal energy that fights for liberation from personhood. It may be perceived as a noble cause, but it will also lead to nowhere. Francis Lucille postulates, “You cannot become what you already are. You can only stop pretending to be what you are not.” This “via negativa” approach is really important. Each and every moment we can either spot the Light, or notice when who we think we are is blocking the Light from coming in.

To Clean is to See

 When we feel deeply lost, cleaning can help us return to a clear mind. The purpose of cleaning is not to get rid of our problem—nor to change how others treat us—the key is to see that everything happening in our lives follows a self-fulfilling pattern, and through seeing, we come back to clarity.

 

Cleaning is about seeing our obstacles, not eliminating them. When we can see our obstacles, we are no longer lost. Because once we see them, we recognize that they are our own inner issues, and we understand that the work must be done within.

 

If we cannot see this, we remain lost and keep searching outside ourselves—looking for a better teacher, a more famous master, a more powerful guru, or the highest dharma. Yet no one can transcend our obstacles for us. No one knows what we are thinking from moment to moment. Only we know, and only we can do this work for ourselves. If we do not understand this, we will continue to seek answers outside.

 

Before a clear mind can arise, there is one essential condition: we must be willing to face ourselves. Some people are not willing. Whenever they encounter their obstacles, they interpret them as proof that they are not good enough or not perfect, and they want to escape these feelings rather than face their own pain.

 

It takes great dedication and sincerity to keep diving inward, day and night, to see our obstacles. When we continuously pay attention to ourselves, clarity naturally emerges. Let me share an example from a student:

 

“I used to complain that my husband came home late after work. To make him come home earlier, I tried every possible way—even offering to pick him up. In the end, I was exhausted, and nothing changed.

 

One day, during meditation, I looked deeply into why I was so obsessed with what time he came home. To my surprise, I discovered that in my heart, I didn’t actually want him to come home early. I was afraid that if he did, he might look for trouble with me.

 

When I was seventeen, I once went out with friends. My boyfriend at the time got drunk and jealous, got into a fight, and hurt his thumb. Later in my life, my ex-husband got drunk and put a knife to my neck. On a subconscious level, I carried a fear that drunken people would hurt me, and I projected this unresolved pain onto my husband.

 

Through practicing letting go and staying present with these old injuries, the inner knots gradually loosened. After I faced them, saw them clearly, and understood their roots, my fear dissolved. I no longer worried about my husband coming home drunk. Naturally, he began coming home on time, and he also stopped drinking so much.”

 

When issues arise and we are willing to face them, harmony emerges in our lives and relationships. When relationships become harmonious, stability and wisdom naturally follow.

 

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