Behold the power of mindfulness

 Ultimately, it is the desire, not the desired, that we love.

Friedrich Nietzsche

 

I was browsing the YouTube channel for a new spiritual video that I could share in my community. As I browsed the video selection a sexual explicit one got my attention and got aroused. It was a remarkable experience. I suddenly realized that I had looked for the video in a state of boredom and emptiness and I noticed how the brain chemicals switched from dull to excited. This was the same mindfulness that I sometimes experience when I suddenly say or think something negative, only flipped around into a pleasurable state and not a depressed one. Immediately the excitement was recognized as empty,  just as in all the negative mindset examples I snap out of them the moment I get aware that they take over.

 

When we try to live an ethical life such as “I must not lust” or “I will not bad-mouth anyone,” we play a game with ourselves since the minder arises from the same self identity as the sinner or player. It’s an endless cycling. Yet, when we are mindful of the energy states that we are in, we can in fact observe the self identity in its different manifestations at work. Behold the power of mindfulness. Everything is energy and we can be aware of the illusionary self identity rising and fading.