The Rich Vegetarian

Simply Being | Simple Being

Tag: introspection (page 2 of 10)

July 6, 2022 / 0 Comments

And that’s why

Recently I found myself saying, “…and that’s why I Ieft that class.” Next instant I wondered, is that true? Is that truly why I left? Could I ever say with complete certainty that THAT is the reason?

No, not really. All I can say with certainty is that I stopped going to the class. As for the reason why (assuming there is one), I cannot really say what that is.

I will be the first to admit that I am not what you’d call a reasonable person. Not that I am unreasonable but I hardly ever use reason to decide on a course of action. Perhaps I employ reason to plan a course of action but even that’s largely suspect, truth be told. And I know that this kind of “unreasonable” behavior is sometimes aggravating to my loved ones. (Not my parents, I think… I suspect they are of similar orientation.)

I found this scrawled in an old notebook. “What is ‘too soon’ or ‘too late?’ Who is to know? Our perspective of time is so limited—we can never comment on whether an event happened before or after time. All we can be sure of is that happened when it had to.”

Now, the rumination above pertains to the timing of events but I can see that it applies to their cause, too. Truly, we can never know the why. Yes, we are highly skilled at constructing the why, and we have elevated that skill to a science. Yet I wonder if we may be better served by dumping all construction and reconstruction efforts, by being “unreasonable,” by being with what is, sans reason or explanation or justification… not to anyone else, not to our own self.

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August 11, 2021 / 2 Comments

All me, All You

Every once in a while, I get the feeling that I may be a bit of a misfit, as far as being a woman is concerned.

For one, I don’t have a strong connection with my physical body. Not that I have a problematic relationship with it; au contraire, I share a warm, friendly bond with my body. But it has never been a defining aspect of my identity, neither has it taken up much space in my mind/life. Then there is the total lack of interest in female rituals and kinships and sisterhoods. Add to the fact that I have always seen myself as “girl,” not “woman…” you get my drift?

I have been long following the work and writing of women who talk of reclaiming the body and its fullness, women who talk about their manifest experience as being inextricably tied to their femininity/femaleness, women who are owning more and more of their physical space with their female bodies and feeling pride and joy in all that that endeavor entails.

I wear my female identity v-e-r-y l-o-o-s-e-l-y, and I have (kinda) strived to make it a “tighter” experience. It’s rather funny, honestly… and my husband has guffawed plenty at my half-hearted attempts to “be more female.” I suppose there is a part of me that envies the wholeness of these women (or the conviction of their projections, maybe?) because I have NEVER been this convinced about anything, least of all my gender identity. And you know, all that passion is powerful and compelling. I imagine it must be awesome to feel such passionate, clear knowing course through your veins and vessels and channels.

That has never been my experience, no matter how hard I have tried to understand and/or imagine it.

Ahh, well.

And then I had a teeny tiny glimmer of insight last week.

All that I have read and heard from these women is contextualized entirely by who they are. Meaning, there is nothing objective about any of it. It’s fully held and circumscribed within the boundaries of their ego identities. Small wonder that it means nothing to me! Because that experience is wholly their own… For me to expect that I must “strive” to gain a similar realization or experience is so foolish! One cannot work towards gaining these experiences. My identity is entirely separate, and it has conjured its unique set of experiences. Yes, there may be a few (or more) similarities or there may be none. But there is very little I can do about lack of resonance.

Phew, such a relief.

What this means is, I do not need to try and understand their experiences, much less recreate or imagine it for myself. I can simply regard them as personal stories.

Because if there isn’t a trace of those ideas in me, I couldn’t have had them experiences anyway.

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July 29, 2021 / 1 Comment

Notes to Self

Don’t try to understand your thoughts or your experience. Be one with it.

Don’t act on your thoughts or experience. Fuse with it.

Experience is arising, and all is experience. Even emptiness is an experience, no different than any other.

Experience arises in you, as you. You are intimately attached to the shape, form, color, etc. of the experience. Indeed, it derives fully from you. Imagine a balloon emerging from you, inflating, deflating, disappearing. This balloon is the shape and form of your experience, and it includes the physical world, the mental and emotional stuff, all of that… Everything constitutes the balloon, and it goes away when you fall asleep.

Because each one of us experiences the world in an entirely unique way, it follows that the world is our unique creation. Just because it seems like many of us have similar experiences of the world, it doesn’t validate the existence of the world as a separate entity. It simply means that we have internalized similar ideas, hence conjuring up “similar worlds.”

Not to believe or disbelieve experience but to simply see it, hold it in the hollow of your palm. And that requires no believing or disbelieving.

SO, fear is an experience, too, as changing and changeable as any other. Now, if you swing to either side (belief, disbelief), it gets sticky. If you simply watch, it moves through.

Similar to the experience of energy (high, middling, low, stagnant) that does not stick. It is the same phenomenon, or the rhythm/flow pattern.

What of action? That also emerges, either from past ideas, or from fresh, new space… Simply watch?

Swim into the discomfort!

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July 9, 2021 / 0 Comments

Habits

It’s an interesting phenomenon when a habit dissolves, and there is not another one to take its place. For instance, dinner used to be a habit, and now it’s poof… gone! A wide expanse of time has opened up in the evenings. No dinner, no cleanup… all this time, what is a person to do?

I love this quote by novelist Susan Ertz. “Millions long for immortality who don’t know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.”

“I can’t function without my morning chai,” “I cannot end a meal without yogurt and rice,” “I cannot wear leather,” and so on. All habits, I think? And as I realized during recent travels, yes, I can function without morning chai, and yes, I just bought a leather purse!

I wonder if we define ourselves by these habits, and when they dissolve, we think we are dissolving, too. And prolly that’s why we hasten to find new ones. (Or perhaps, we are frightened of empty space and time.)

(I, for one, have a hard time developing new habits. No sooner do I make a resolution than I am plotting to break free of it!)

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