The Presence Project Archives - Page 6 of 7

2020-09-112020-09-17

Presence 13: I am working with {Not this… This Instead!}

I did get pretty quiet yesterday. You know, excluding carbs is a way of sensing my emotional charge. I have tended to use them as a sedating/controlling self-medication. While simultaneously sensing my interior messaging, my meta-sense, I felt pretty emotional. I also slowed down.

The writing of Glennon Doyle that I read yesterday has really stayed with me. Two aspects in particular

Belief in The Unseen Order of Things (as basically being that which is heaven on Earth, vs the Seen Order of Things, which would have us believe that we’re all up the Creek). [Untamed . p64 – see beautiful extract, below] I so agree. As a new definition of faith this is just perfect. And if I can add my own interpretation, I think GD is alluding to the fact that women are attuned more naturally to this Unseen order. Which is why our masc governments, urgently wrestling with the ‘Seen’, do more harm than good… Womens’ meta-sense has been pooh-poohed for millenia, by men who have not the faculty to understand. More the shame. But the world is evolving, as our the new generation of young men, beautifully equipped with connection to their meta-sense…
The sense of ‘Not this…’ and ‘This instead’ as being our guiding beacons, in discerning our ‘truest and most beautiful story of our lives’: ‘Discontent is evidence that your imagination has not given up on you. It is still pressing, swelling, trying to get your attention by whispering: “Not this.” “Not this” is a very important stage. But knowing what we do not want is not the same as knowing what we do want. So how can we get from Not this to This instead? How can we move from feeling discontent to creating new lives and new worlds? In other words: How can we begin to live from our imagination instead of our indoctrination?’ Untamed p67.

Please, dear heavens, let me remember this.

Let’s read The Presence Process…

TRADING RESULTS FOR CONSEQUENCES (End of Part 1 – attuning to the PP)

Extracts:

The invitation placed before us by The Presence Process is to learn through firsthand experience not to fear and resist the inevitable discomfort that arises from emotional processing, and not to react to emotional processing by behaving like “the world is ending.” Instead, we are invited to embrace the discomfort of emotional processing as a sign that we are having an authentic impact on the cause of our discomfort. The invitation is to willingly ride our inner dragon…
The Presence Process is the battleground of emotional warriors
When we use the mental body as a means of gauging the consequences of our attempts to make an authentic change in the quality of our experience, we enter another Catch 22: We ask for change. We are given the opportunity to change. We embrace the opportunity. We start feeling different. Then the mental body tells us that this strange feeling is “wrong.” We subsequently mentally interpret this strange feeling, which is actually the surfacing of our emotional signature, as a “gut feeling” or a “red flag” telling us we are headed in the wrong direction. By listening to these stories, we turn against that which is changing our experience, returning to what’s familiar and safe. Nothing is accomplished. We feel more frustrated and disillusioned than before. The mental body grows stronger, and we become disheartened. This is why it’s recommended we commit to completing The Presence Process no matter what. Take stock only upon completion of your journey through the process, not in the midst of it. Finish this process no matter what experience arises.

Thank you.

***15minMed*** [Next day]

I am deeply moved by {Not this… This Instead!}.

It is a door-opener for you, and for all, is it not?

It certainly is. I wonder how best I can incorporate it into my days…

The starting point is self-compassion. When you receive the Not this… message with tender self-compassion, it is easy to root around for the This Instead! message that is the natural counterpart and companion to the Not this... As Doyle says, ‘Discontent is evidence that your imagination has not given up on you. It is still pressing, swelling, trying to get your attention by whispering: “Not this.” Reaching This Instead! is the natural result of tuning into your meta-sense, which is your Knowing. Again, tenderness is key. In the PP extract above, Michael Brown recommends being aware of the ‘mental body’ which is very cagey about change, constantly firing ‘warning signals’. If you can discern between your mental body and your meta-sense, and follow your meta-sense (imagination, speaking to you of your turest and most beauitful version of your life) even when your mental body is firing off warning signals, you are on your way to your This Instead!.

This is such good stuff. Ok, a specific question, I am seeking to determine whether to do the Holden Qigong TCP. Can you help me use {Not this… This Instead!} to discern whether this is the right next step for me?

By all means. Tell us your {Not this…}

Ah. Well. The {Not this…} would be…

Let’s just work with it instead. <3

Exactly. Yes!

I am working with {Not this… This Instead!}

*******************************

Untamed (p64) – GD on faith as a belief in the Unseen Order of Things:

‘I have learned to live by faith, which does not mean that I live by a set of unwavering beliefs or dogma that men laid down ages ago to keep their power by controlling others. My faith has nothing to do with religion anymore. To me, living by faith is allowing the swelling and pressing inside me to direct my outward words and decisions. Because to me, God is not a being outside of me: God is the fire, the nudge, the warm liquid gold swelling and pressing inside me.

In fact, my favorite idea of faith is a belief in the unseen order of things.

There are two orders of things:

There is the seen order unfolding in front of us every day on our streets and in the news. In this visible order, violence reigns and children are shot in their schools and warmongers prosper and 1 percent of the world hoards half of all we have. We call this order of things reality. This is “the way things are.” It’s all we can see because it’s all we’ve ever seen. Yet something inside us rejects it. We know instinctively: This is not the intended order of things. This is not how things are meant to be. We know that there is a better, truer, wilder way.

That better way is the unseen order inside us. It is the vision we carry in our imagination about a truer, more beautiful world—one in which all children have enough to eat and we no longer kill each other and mothers do not have to cross deserts with their babies on their backs. This better idea is what Jews call shalom, Buddhists call nirvana, Christians call heaven, Muslims call salaam, and many agnostics call peace. It is not a place out there—not yet; it’s the hopeful swelling in here, pressing through our skin, insisting that it was all meant to be more beautiful than this. And it can be, if we refuse to wait T to die and “go to heaven” and instead find heaven inside us and give birth to it here and now. If we work to make the vision of the unseen order swelling inside us visible in our lives, homes, and nations, we will make reality more beautiful. On Earth as it is in heaven. In our material world as it is in our imagination.’

2020-09-06

Presence 12: I am acutely curious about the messages of my meta-sense

I caught an impulse to self-medicate early in the day. It was a spot of ‘screen distraction’ sedation before the working day began. I asked, ‘What do you really want to say, Voice?’, and ‘heard’:

“Everyone get out of my way!”

Which surprised me! And encouraged me. It is the very opposite to the passive ‘tending’ to the barriers arising. I liked the feisty spirit of it.

Let’s read.

***The Presence Process by Michael Brown p56-59***

Extracts:

The allopathic profession is magnificent for containing, controlling, and sedating physical, symptomatic trauma. For example, if we are in a car accident and physically injured, or if the symptoms of a diseased condition or addiction escalate to a point where living becomes unbearable, going to a medical specialist is necessary. They know how to mend bones and suture wounds. They know how to sedate and control physical, mental, and emotional symptoms to stabilize our situation. However, if we intend to integrate the causal charged emotion that unconsciously drives us to manifest experiences that physically, mentally, and emotionally debilitate us, a medical practitioner isn’t the person we approach. This is because their training instructs them to seek physical explanations for all states of disease. Their expertise is in treating effects, not in causality.
Journeying through The Presence Process for the first time instructs us in the art of responding to our charged emotion. We become our own self-sufficient support group.
The consequence of decreasing or halting our self-medicating behavior is that the charged emotion related to this behavior automatically arises into our awareness. We then consciously engage these felt-predicaments through breathing, use of the perceptual tools, and insights offered throughout this text. When we become aware of these emotional signatures, we develop the capacity to be with these uncomfortable felt-resonances without condition.

So my question to Self is:

What emotional charge am I self-medicating, and how can I best use my Voice to meet the feelings and needs of that emotional charge?

In short: Self-Medication meets Voice?

Self-Medication meets Voice

Voice, meet your ‘Truest and Most Beautiful Story about your Life’.

Ah, as indicated by Glennon Doyle in Untamed..

Ok. Shoot, Toots.

In we go first…

***Med***

If you knew what you were capable of, you would be surprised. But that’s not the point. The point is this. There is scope for a role for you, in the story of your own life, which will give you joy and satisfaction. Not the kind of ‘Phew! I did it by the seat of my pants!’ relief you sometimes call joy and satisfaction, but something different. Something unique to you. Do you remember how creative you became in the height of your breakdown, when you’d bowed out of work, and were hanging on a hook above the perilous vacuum of your financial abyss? Well, while those conditions sure did illuminate your creativity, you don’t need such extreme difficulty anymore, to get into that level of connectedness.

I was connected, wasn’t I?

You always are. This is a dictation, right? Word by word. But you have to be in the right frame of mind. You have to have bored yourself into the ‘default’ mode of your brain. Abraham calls it ‘quietening your mind’. For you, it’s tolerating boredom and brain twitch… in order to access The Good Stuff. And then you have to just sit there like a bored stenographer and write. Well good, because it’s worth it. Especially when you listen for long enough, with full open curiosity. What we are going to tell you now, you’ll like. It’s this. You can be consciously connected all day long, if. you. choose. to. be. In other words, there are two streams of thought, and you can choose to sit in one groove or the other, all day long.

Streams of Thought:

Level 1 =

- The Seen Order of Things (Glennon Doyle, Untamed p64ff)
- Disconnected from Source / Inner Being (Abraham, passim)
- Mind / Logic / Reason / Yang as sovereign ruler and ‘boss’
- The world is violent, unfair, polarised and defined by suffering

Level 2 =

- The Unseen Order of Things (Glennon Doyle, ibid)
- Connected to Source / Inner Being (Abraham, passim)
- Heart / Intuition / Wisdom / Yin as constant companion, mentor and guide
- The world is defined by peace, unity, love and light: ‘On Earth as it is in heaven’

Your Level 2 state doesn’t need to be kept aside for morning Quiet Time and ‘Sunday prayers’. Level 2 can be your constant, default ‘default mode’. Can you see how this pandemic has allowed you to slide into a new modus operandi? You’ve only touched the surface of this so far.

There is so much more for you to discover. And as you discover, you will need to let certain (un/comfortable) things go – to make space for the coherent, and to honour the incoherence of the incoherent.

Does that make sense to you? If it does make ‘sense’, then you haven’t learnt the lesson yet! Because this is what we call ‘meta-sense’! Do you like that term? We thought you would.

Yes! What is meta-sense, then?

Meta-sense is that which is sensed ‘above and beyond’ (aka meta) the physical senses; ‘above and beyond’ that which can be seen, felt and heard, and is deemed ‘common sense’. Meta-sense is that which is sensed by the intuition, the heart’s palpitations, the inner Knowing, the gut’s Voice.

So consider these phrases: “Common sense tells us…” compared with “My Meta-sense tells me….”

The question is this. As a person who hears her Meta-sense loud and clear, will you be prepared to allow your Voice to express aloud what your Meta-sense tells it?

To be fair to me, I think I already do to a certain extent. It’s just I am ‘wise’ about shaping my words to adapt to the ears upon which my words are falling. There is no point in alienating someone just for lack of linguistic artistry.

… Silence… Come back. Tell me more.

The challenge is Truth. If your truth marks your marching orders (Doyle, p71, see below), are you marching to the orders of your Truth?

I happily will!! Or unhappily, if it’s hard..! Tell me more.

***bored stenographer…***

Your wish is our command. Be it to the left or to the right of your current path, there is always a fraction more authenticity to be had. Reaching authenticity requires two phases: 1) dismantling the ’emotional charge’ as per the Presence Process and 2) developing acute curiosity towards what your gut tells you. As you dismantle emotional charge, you’ll reveal your gut-centred intuition, your meta-sense, at pace. As you peer in there, with acute curiosity, you’ll attune to it faster. Your dietary changes [low carb/low cal] are helpful, as you reduce inflammation and sluggishness. Your mission today is: acute curiosity towards the messages of your meta-sense.

Got it. Ty.

I am acutely curious about the messages of my meta-sense

PS. The work of Glennon Doyle in Untamed is exceptional:

2020-09-04

Presence 11: I am attending to my impulses to self-medicate

I certainly have a twin-track response. However, my Aspieness means that tbh I’m masking much of the time, so it’s hard to discern between Pretence and Masking, and they have different foundations or causes. Whenever I checked in on “Authenticity?”, I often noted I was acting up, a little bit hyper with others. I guess it’s a form of Appeasement, but it’s emerging from a childlike aspect of me, so maybe it’s fuelled by unintegrated emotional charge.

I can definitely tell that if I cut out saying yes to anything that made my heart sink, I would have a great deal more energy.

Onwards…

Reading.

***The Presence Process by Michael Brown p51-55***

BEYOND ADDICTION AND AFFLICTION – Extracts:

In the context of The Presence Process, addictions and afflictions (chronic illness and disease) are the same. Both are outer manifestations of an unintegrated charge within the emotional body. Although we don’t discuss allergies specifically, they are considered in the same light as addictions and afflictions. An allergy is the polar opposite of an addiction. When we are addicted, we pull a specific experience toward us. When we are allergic, we repel a specific experience. The causes of both are an unintegrated charge.
The Presence Process demonstrates that addiction, whether to illegal drugs, alcohol, food, sex, gambling, or legal prescription medications, is self-medicating behavior that we manifest to sedate and control the charge within our emotional body. Without self-medicating, an addict inevitably manifests an affliction. When an affliction is successfully suppressed by ongoing prescription medication, the same condition manifests as addiction. Both conditions are manifestations of an unintegrated emotional charge.
Recovery – a way of living designed to constantly cover up charged emotion – leads to living in quiet desperation. Discovery – consciously embracing our charged emotional content through felt-perception, using it as raw material for emotional growth – leads to present moment awareness and Presence. As happens with medication, the need to attend endless support group meetings diminishes in proportion to the integration of charged emotion, until it ultimately ceases. Addiction isn’t a life-sentence. It’s an experience, and experiences change.

QUESTION: What can I learn about my addictions and afflictions?

***Med10mins with Insight Timer***

INSIGHTS ARISING:

I self-medicate – with food, weekend alcohol or screen distractions…

In order to cover up, sedate and control the acute-to-mild feelings of hate, anger, frustration or boredom that arise when…

I don’t use my Voice to communicate, negotiate or set boundaries

Well that saved me a few thousand pounds of therapy…

Your capacity to self-reflect is powerful! That is the power of Presence, and entering the parasympathetic state, within which your Inner Being can speak to you.

So what’s the next step?

The next step today is to watch and track and lovingly observe the subtle signs associated with the impulse to self-medicate. If you can catch the impulse to self-medicate, then you have the opportunity to observe into the emotional charge beneath the impulse.

So itching for a packet of crisps today will not just indicate ‘bad/greedy Me’ or ‘such hunger I may keel over’… but a clue to underlying emotional charge.

Exactly. So welcome the impulses to self-medicate! They are important clues as to your underlying weather system. Bring compassion and curiosity to those impulses.

Ok, so today I am going to try to ‘catch’ the impulses to self-medicate, and not just tut them away, or give into them, or shame them… but listen to what emotional charge is beneath them. I could even practice using my Voice to address the feelings arising. I am on Day 3 of the Fast 800 diet (low carb/low cal diet of Michael Mosley; and yes, I’m still doing Noom – I’ve lost almost a stone and a half since Mid-March) – so the impulses to eat may be confused with those to self-medicate, but I think I can handle that.

I am catching and studying my impulses to self-medicate.

You could say you are ‘attending’ to them. You are interested in the feelings (emotional charge of ‘hate, anger, frustration and boredom’) and needs (to use your Voice to communicate, negotiate and set boundaries) associated with those felt impulses to sedation and control of the feelings.

I am attending to my impulses to self-medicate

Note to self: Use the Voice instead of self-meds!!

2020-09-032020-09-27

Presence 10: I am spotting my twin-track available responses: Pretence and Authenticity

Laying sandbags before the rain comes is such a brilliant image.

Keep practising this skill! It will bring you such peace. Keep practising.

Ok. Ty. Shall we read?

***The Presence Process by Michael Brown p46+***

EMOTIONAL CHARGE – Extracts:

The main characteristic of charged emotion is that we perceive it as uncomfortable. This is because it’s trapped, blocked, sedated, and controlled energy. p46
1. DRAMA: The first consequence of charged emotion is drama. Drama is reactive projection – whether physical, mental, or emotional – which we use to gain the attention from others that we don’t yet have the capacity to give ourselves.
The reshaping of spontaneous behavior is usually accomplished by parental use of words such as “stop” and “no.” [I mentioned the role of the word “No” in my childhood/adulthood just yesterday!] What isn’t apparent is that the energetic activity underlying spontaneous behavior never stops when interrupted by enforced discipline. It merely transforms into something else, becoming energetic resistance that manifests as calculated drama. Calculated drama is successful in that it makes us acceptable to the adult world, while in the same breath it renders our own authenticity unacceptable to us. This rejection of our inner being triggers energetic conflict, and this conflict is projected and reflected outwardly in the many acts we conjure up to gain attention and acceptance. [YES!!]
2. SELF-MEDICATION – sedation and control: The second consequence of charged emotion is also a type of dramatic behavior that arises out of a reaction to inner discomfort.
SEDATION is a dysfunction of the feminine side and an attempt to numb our awareness of our emotional charge. For example, the habitual need and use of alcohol is intended to sedate discomfort. We are drowning out our authentic emotional state. The expression popularly used is “drowning our sorrows.”
CONTROL is a dysfunction of the masculine side and an attempt to gain power over discomfort – to overpower it. The habitual need and use of cigarettes is intended to control our emotional charge.
By not entertaining habitual or addictive behavior, we instantly discover the felt-identity of the charged emotion that lies beneath our habits and addictions. The felt-state that erupts from abstinence [YES!] reveals the nature and intensity of the charged emotion that’s driving our selfmedication.

It is now clear to me that the ‘automatons’ I described yesterday are the results of emotional charge. Equally I am and have been deeply prone to addictive behaviours. Let’s bring on the next stage of safely meeting the emotional charge in me.

It involves authenticity and self-attention and self-acceptance.

You’re on. I’m interested to see more of my emotional charge. Let’s go in.

***15minMed with Insight Timer***

Emotional Charge Arising: “The Original Heartbreak and Humiliation”

Dad, who had always loved me powerfully as an baby/infant, seemingly ‘turning’ on me (= heartbreak, from age 5/6/7??) and telling me off in front of my mother and siblings (= humiliation, ditto). I felt the feelings so acutely. He had no idea. He was just unleashing his own childhood and emotional charge on me. But, heavens, talk about a fall from grace – from perfection to wretch in one fell swoop, repeatedly. Talk about the heartbreak of the first broken love relationship.

He turned on you.

Yes, or so it appeared to me…

He turned on you, having previously loved you and made you feel accepted and lovable. And so you felt…

Questionable, unlovable, unacceptable…?

From an early age.

The sense of acute shame I felt being told off in front of my family, every time. And no one intervened…

You felt shameful.

Yes. Shameful. Ashamed.

What do you say to this little girl now?

“It was his shit not yours. He didn’t know how to parent with kindness. That was not your fault. He used rage and shame as a parenting tool. Poor show.”

How does saying that make you feel?

Relieved. He did use rage and shame as a parenting tool, compensated for by adventures and story-telling. He appeared narcissistic at times… This was the core ‘wound’….

Why would someone act with narcissism?

Because they are deeply afraid they are ‘questionable, unlovable, unacceptable, shameful’…?

And so what is the cure to break the intergenerational cycle of non-acceptance of self?

Total, radical self-acceptance and authenticity.

I feel I can ‘self-accept’ but not yet be fully authentic… I do note how, when I stopped using nicotine to ‘CONTROL’ my emotional charge, the plumptons and self-harm automatons went wild. Similarly, when I stopped SEDATING myself, and drowning my sorrows, with alcohol.

You did a courageous thing in ceasing to use those drugs, and feeling the feelings. Are you able to see how strong you were and are?

Somewhat.

You are a strong, courageous woman, to feel your feelings in an unmedicated format.

Thank you. May I use the strength and courage to dismantle ye olde emotional charge in full.

A good intention!

May The Original Heartbreak and Humiliation (The OHAH! 🙂 ) dissolve into the Renewed Whole-Hearted Authenticity.

Excellent work. Today, you can play with this: spot your twin-track responses available to you at any moment – Pretence and Authenticity.

You don’t need to act or present the Authentic response yet. Just note down, on paper if you can, your twin-track responses. Become aware. Bring Love and Compassion to your Pretences as they are serving a protective purpose as long as you believe your Authentic response to be unacceptable… which will change in time as you work through the Presence Process. Amen to all this. You are playing with responsiveness. Wonderful!

Brilliant. I will do this. Ty.

I am spotting my twin-track available responses: Pretence and Authenticity

2020-09-02

Presence 9: I am laying sandbags at my boundaries – before it rains

Well I certainly gave myself opportunity to see my old emotional patterning at play. The tendency to ‘run away’ or ‘put up and shut up’ made itself apparent. I sat and chuntered with a difficult situation, until at last I remembered the ‘flipside’ of my emotional patterning:

I can use my Voice to communicate, negotiate and set boundaries.

And I did. And it was fine.

I guess I could see others’ patterns at play too. (My lovely cousins were there for lunch with my parents too.) We do all repeat recurring messaging about ourselves, over time. The content may change, but the ultimate message about ourselves is oft repeated. You could call it our personality, but I could start to see which aspects of us are inspired by our Universe and which by our Puny-verse. Interesting.

I guess the idea of evolving into emotional maturity is to see to it that the Universal inspirations outweigh the Puny-versal. We have to keep remembering to shift from the default emotional patterning (Puny-verse), to the flipside (Universe!).

Let’s read.

***The Presence Process by Michael Brown p43+***

EMOTIONAL IMPRINTING

Emotional imprinting is the term we use in The Presence Process to describe the unconscious passing on to us of our parents’ or caregivers’ unintegrated emotional condition. By the time we reach seven years of age, we are emotionally picking up where they left off. The unavoidable consequence of childhood is that we all receive this emotional baton from our parents so that we may take our part in the human race. Imprinting is an unfolding of a sacred agreement we have with each other. Imprinting is therefore not something done to us by our parents, or something we do to another when playing the role of parent. It’s an experience we enter together. p43
Our potential for our life experience is downloaded vibrationally during the last seven months of womb life, emotionally during the first seven years after birth, mentally between seven and fourteen years of age, and physically by the time we turn twenty-one. p43
Unless we are able to feel vibrations, we are unable to integrate them. By focusing our attention on integrating our emotional charge – by facilitating ourselves so we feel this energetic condition without condition – we reawaken and develop felt-perception. p44
Once we are no longer driven into compensatory experiences by charged emotion, our interaction with the emotional body is restored to its highest potential. In other words, we take charge of our experience by taking the charge out of it, which then enables us to live on purpose. p45

I’m still startled daily by the ‘automatic’ pop-up images of self-harm I experience. I’m in such a joyous, happy, safe, held and developed stage of my life, and yet still, the ‘cheese-wire’ garotting and ‘serated knife into the neck’ images still experience themselves through me. Usually on a daily basis. Similarly, the pre-intentional speech (‘plumptons’ as I call them) still occurs almost daily; and certainly daily in periods of stress. I’ve reduced stress considerably, and taken lockdown as an opportunity to rearrange life to be relatively stress-free, predictable, routinised and autism-friendly. And yet, the disturbing ‘automatic’ experiences continue. I am interested to see how and if the PP can help me integrate the emotions that are providing the impulse for these… ‘automatons‘, I shall call them.

Let’s meditate. I’m open to learning about the automatons in this meditation…

***10minMedwithInsightTimer***

In the perfect peace of pure meditation I can sense some … anger in there. Tell me more.

Anger is a sign of breached boundaries. This was a constant experience lived by your parents, and theirs, and theirs before. It has been a striking element of human life for generations that humans breach the boundaries of others. Your generation, and those following, are learning to define what it means to ‘respect the selfhood of the Other’. But your emotional imprinting is marked by ‘breached boundaries’.

I allowed my boundaries to be breached, over time.

As were you imprinted to do. Your emotional imprinting was a Catch-22: “I’m angry because my boundaries have been breached; breach my boundaries.”

Yes! Also, I was always being told No, but wasn’t permitted to say No. That arose today.

That was a feature of those times. A double bluff situation for children.

So…

So, today, the first day of September, the new school year, you are invited to go up ‘a grade’, and enter the arena of respecting your own boundaries. Practise that today, dear soul, as you start the new ‘year’. Notice when they are being breached – feel the feelings! Hear the ‘energy in motion’ and heed its protective message. Your boundaries are sacred. Respect them.

I will endeavour today and each day to respect my boundaries. If a piece of work or a request will require so much effort that it might make me unwell – or stressed or even just exhausted – then I will stand up for my own boundaries.

The sandbags laid out by the villagers simply divert the water so it flows elsewhere. They are doing no harm to the water by diverting it. Lay out your own sandbags before the predicted rains come.

Lovely image. Ty.

I am laying sandbags at my boundaries – before it rains

2020-09-012020-09-27

Presence 8: I am observing emotional patterns

I pretty much spoke only to G. and AS yesterday, but I did notice how I use my Voice to make myself amenable, and unthreatening… :/ I also noticed myself squirming out of asking for what I really wanted… And at that moment, came back to express myself clearly. I found, as I settled into the state of self-love, various lively hopes and dreams appeared in my mind for mulling over during our hike.

And today… Let’s read.

***The Presence Process by Michael Brown p34***

THE PATHWAY OF AWARENESS AND SEVEN-YEAR CYCLE

THE PATHWAY OF AWARENESS

Extracts from the chapter:

First a child cries, smiles, and coos, which is emotional. Next it learns to communicate in a variety of ways that eventually include speech, which is mental. Only then does it learn to walk, which is of course physical. The pathway of awareness is therefore from the emotional, through the mental, to the physical. p35
Part of entering into human experience is to be equipped with the perceptual capacity to “make everything matter.” We then become addicted to this capacity to the point that we are no longer aware of what our experience was like before everything “mattered” to us. This addiction is what enables us to perceptually enter into and have solid physical encounters with circumstances that are in reality pure vibration. We “stop the world” so we can move about in it. p36
Emotionally, each seven years we repeat the same cycle that was imprinted in our emotional body during our first seven-year experience. p38
Moving through The Presence Process also reveals that we died an emotional death when we were approaching seven years of age. [***See below!] This is the causal energetic death point from which we are invited to reawaken. Our repetitive emotional patterns are the dream that, on the surface of things, appears to be reality. As we learn to see beneath the surface of this dream state, we discover something startling: adults living in a mentally driven, physically transfixed, time-based paradigm are “dead children.” p39
On this journey, we consciously travel seemingly backwards along the pathway of awareness, deactivating the charged emotional impact the seven-year cycle has on our present experiences. p41
Unless we return along the pathway of awareness and bring peace to our child self, we remain unintegrated as adults. p41
By putting ourselves through The Presence Process, we gradually integrate the emotionally charged impact our first seven-year cycle has on the quality of our present experience. p42

[***AT: Woah!! Didn’t I mention yesterday the Drama Generator in me was the ‘young runaway’ aged about 7?!!! And I pinned it on the experience of trying to run away from home and realising… I couldn’t… and that my efforts to leave were teased. I (mis)learnt that I had to put up and shut up. In truth I was being in vited to learn to communicate, negotiate and set boundaries, but I had no role models of these behaviours at the time. ]

I’m going to meditate briefly. We’re off to see my father today. My question for today’s mediation is:

“How can I use today’s visit to my father to learn about my early self?”

***10minMed***

Answer: Observe the emotional patterns arising when I am with my father. Welcome them in the knowledge that they are ‘energy in motion’ and I am willing to let go of them, or integrate them. Right?

Today will be a valuable day. Not only will it be a precious time with your father, but it will be an educative time. Remember the phrase, ‘put up and shut up’ which your inner Drama Generator, your beloved inner child, offered up for you today. See how often you ‘put up and shut up’ instead of ‘communicate, negotiate or set boundaries’. See how being in the presence of your father triggers some of that early patterning. Welcome this! Welcome it all!

Is there anything else I should consider?

Be open to suggestions.

From them? From you?

From the Universe. And also, from the Puny-verse.

What the heck is the Puny-verse?

It’s the tiny world captured by your old emotions. It paints itself as very large and all encompassing.

So the suggestions from my Puny-verse – I should be open to them?

Be aware of all ‘suggestions’ that seem to underpin and validate reactive emotions. That is all.

So, observe my emotional patterns and the seeming suggestions which stimulate them?

Yes.

One last thing. How best can I bring love to my father today, and healing to all?

By bearing witness to his emotional patterns too. See which are stimulated by the Universe, and which are propelled from his Puny-verse. That will give compassion to you both, and help you understand the ’emotional imprinting’ we will be looking at next in the PP.

Ok. So, observe his emotional patterns and mine, and see which are stimulated by the Universe and which by the Puny-verse (or frozen emotions?).

You can apply this to everyone today. It will be good learning. Focus simply on observing emotional patterns. This will be enough. Enjoy the practice, and bring your loving compassion with you too.

Amen.

I am observing emotional patterns

2020-08-312020-08-31

Presence 7: I am holding myself in a state of self-love as I speak

Play? I did. We did a 9 mile walk across rolling landscapes. Amazingly beautiful and joyous. What fortune to have the health in our limbs to do such an epic hike.

I’m back for today’s bucket from the well of wisdom. I’ll start with some reading.

***Reading The Presence Process by Michael Brown***

Sub-chapter of ‘Attuning to the Process’ chapter:

Movement Beyond Motion p29

Oh wow. It’s so good. Extract:

Though we can’t change ourselves, we can change the quality of our experience. As we enter The Presence Process, we are asked to adjust our perception of what we think of as “movement.” Generally, when we speak of movement, we are referring to a physical event, as in movement from one physical location to another. As far as the physical world is concerned, there’s no possibility of a journey without physical movement. The Presence Process involves a different kind of movement that doesn’t result from physical activity – movement that isn’t simply motion, but that results in a shift in the quality of our life experience, a shift that’s always in the direction of increased authenticity. To illustrate the difference, consider what we usually do if we are dissatisfied with the quality of our experience. We may change our circumstances by changing the person with whom we are partnered, changing our job, or moving to another town, city, or even country. These kinds of changes require a lot of physical motion. Running around and getting nowhere is the movement endorsed by the world as a means to rectify the dissatisfaction we feel with the quality of our day-to-day experience. The trouble is, once we are settled in our new location, we invariably discover that despite our altered physical circumstances, our dissatisfaction resurfaces. This is because, despite rearranging our situation, we haven’t initiated authentic movement within ourselves. As has been said, “Wherever we go, there we are.” We’ve all gone through this frustrating experience in one form or another. This type of rearranging of our day-to-day experience is nothing but pointless commotion – a better word for which is perhaps “drama,” the word used throughout this text to describe this type of pointless movement. Drama is physical, mental, and emotional activity that focuses on and fiddles with effects without impacting causality. The Presence Process leads us out of drama by activating authentic movement in our experience. Much of our unconscious approach to life arises from a Catch 22, which is that until we activate authentic movement in our experience, we reactively resort to drama. But as long as we reactively resort to drama, we don’t attempt to activate authentic movement. The Presence Process shows us how to release ourselves from this Catch 22 by instructing us how to integrate blocked emotions. Once these blocked emotions are liberated, the effect is reflected automatically in our physical, mental, and emotional experience. By raising our capacity for causal adjustment – also referred to as “alchemy” – we activate authentic movement throughout our experience without resorting to drama. Only when we realize the effectiveness of this alchemical approach are we prepared to drop drama. Through authentic alchemy, the pointlessness of all drama becomes self-evident. Once we realize this, the dharma of all drama is accessed. When we enter The Presence Process, we begin moving from “doing” to being, looking to seeing, hearing to listening, discomfort to balance, separation to being unified, reacting to responding, inauthenticity to authenticity, fragmentation to integration, seeking happiness to allowing joy, revenge and blame to forgiveness, incorrect perception to correct perception, complaint and competition to compassion, behaving unconsciously to behaving consciously, and “living in time” to experiencing present moment awareness. All the above movements are variations of the same shift—from pretence to Presence. This shift is achieved solely by using our attention and intent to adjust our felt-perception.

We are invited not to make ‘drastic’ or ‘impulsive’ changes in our lives before or during the process. This is ‘drama’ which may arise as a reaction to our resistance to the emotions arising for integration, and generally denotes self-sabotage, by ‘taking too much on’… If I’d known some of this stuff as a young adult, I’d have done things differently.

We’d beg to differ. When your children were young, you put aside a great deal (of drama) to focus on them. You sensed that they needed your Presence. And you knew how precious the time was with them.

Ok. I hear that. I have learnt about the impulsive/drastic bent in me. It arises strongly when I have PMDD too.

This time of your cycle is an invaluable opportunity for integrating some powerful emotions. You are ever more accomplished at achieving this. The PP will help you.

Ty. Good. Time for some meditation. Shall I set a question?

By all means.

Question: “What aspect of me would generate most drama? And why?”

***15minMed with Insight Timer***

Answer: ‘The young runaway’ – she who (aged 7?) decided to pack her little suitcase and go. It was clear, to her, that she should go. Yet she was teased by those who ‘offered to help her pack’… rather than listen to the pain behind the declaration to leave. She felt trapped and helpless to change her circumstances. It was an early experience of ‘powerlessness’ and ‘voicelessness’.

Looking back on that little girl and now knowing about her autism, does that help?

I can’t compute her autism… It doesn’t mean anything to me. I’m too engrained in the lived experience of that little girl. Maybe she was very sensitive and intuitive, like LV… (Maybe she was picking up on her parents’ pain??) And instead, she put it on herself, the blame that is… When she was trapped there, she guessed it was her fault? She was somehow lumped with this difficult circumstance because of some negative quality in her which meant that she didn’t have the power to extricate herself from a bad situation… whatever the situation was. I forget now.

‘she didn’t have the power to extricate herself from a bad situation’

What can your older you tell your younger you about the above line now?

I can tell young me that… bad situations are there to teach us our power. We don’t need to extricate ourselves (that is ‘drama’); instead we are invited to sit tight and find, within ourselves, our power to communicate, to negotiate, to set boundaries.

Bingo: ‘to sit tight and find, within ourselves, our power to communicate, to negotiate, to set boundaries’.

So the Drama Generator in me is the part which would avoid sitting tight and finding, within me, my power to communicate, to negotiate, to set boundaries. And she would avoid communicating well because…? Because when her impulse was to ‘pack her bags and go’, she MISLEARNT that this was a message to ‘put up and shut up’. In truth, the ‘pack her bags and go’ impulse was a message to use her voice.

Excellent work! You are right. The so-called (by you) Drama Generator in you is the part which says ‘put up and shut up’. Excellent! The Drama Liberator is the part which would ‘use her Voice’ to communicate, negotiate and set boundaries.

In this regard, my Voice is my greatest defender of my … sovereignty.

Absolutely. So today, just become aware of the ways you use your Voice. There is no judgement or explanation to be had. Just compare Voice and Sovereignty. Ask yourself: when do I use my Voice to uphold my sovereignty, and when do I use it to defend my sovereignty? And here, we are defining sovereignty as ‘reigning over life according to your own will.’

And to know my will is key…

Maybe it is, maybe it is not. We are not saying ‘don’t be flexible according to circumstances and suggestions’. We are saying, don’t betray yourself.

Man. Deep stuff. Ok. So with my Voice I can uphold, defend and betray my own sovereignty (self-determination). Depending on…?

Depending on your degree of self-love in any moment.

So my Voice should be a herald for the self-love I bear?

Self-love is the source point of clear Voice, which is the herald of Sovereignty.

So, if I ensure I am aligned with self-love whenever I use my Voice, I should be acting in Sovereignty?

Yes. Hold yourself in a state of self-love as you speak.

That’s quite an awesome discipline. I can work with that. Thank you for this deep and nuanced and helpful practice.

You are loved.

I am holding myself in a state of self-love as I speak

#SelfLoveSpeaks

2020-08-30

Presence 6: I am going off to play

A satisfying day was had. All my files and papers are sorted and understandable by an outside person.

And what did you learn?

Maybe that I slightly over-diversified with my training work? That I love and honour the mediation work especially. That it’s not so hard to let go of some papers…. especially those I use as ‘reminders’ or ‘prompts’ for things I’ll never do. That I still love to keep ‘archives’ of special memories. That I’ve worked really hard over the years. That I can do quite a lot with some music on, and a heater keeping the (August?!) chill at bay. That the clear and organised space frees my heart.

Excellent work. And in to Presence..!

***Reading The PP***

Holy moly. Check out this sub-chapter, ‘Consciousness of Questions’. It explains the DoDs process!! Here are some key quotes..

CONSCIOUSNESS OF QUESTIONS (Michael Brown, The Presence Process):

We place our focus on the asking of the question, not on attempting to think up answers. We allow the answer to manifest unexpectedly, organically, trusting it to arise in the moment we require the realization. This opens up our capacity for receiving. (p25)
Accessing information without the application of thought may seem foreign to us because of the mentally dominated approach of our current educational system. However, contrary to popular assumption, the thinking aspect of the mind isn’t the be-all and end-all of our capacity for insight. On the contrary, we have an ability to receive insight when we least expect it. (p26)
These types of experiences reveal that all the relevant information we seek about our past experience is available when we apply the correct method of access, which doesn’t necessarily require thought. Instead, it requires being open to receive the answer from an aspect of ourselves that knows everything. As we currently conceive of ourselves, we don’t know everything. But there is an aspect of our beingness, which we may so far be unaware of, that does. It knows everything without having to think about anything. Presence is a silent witness to each experience we go through and it remembers everything in each moment of these experiences as if they are still happening. To Presence, all the experiences we ever go through are as if they were happening in the now, because beingness resides in present moment awareness, which knows no time. Presence is a constant witness to all experience as if all experience were unfolding simultaneously. Throughout The Presence Process, we are encouraged to ask many questions about our experience. So as not to lessen the potential of our questioning, we are encouraged to approach the asking of questions without resorting to thinking about the answers. Either we know the answer to a question or we don’t. Thinking about it doesn’t alter this. (p27)
By asking a question without trying to think of the answer – by asking a question sincerely, then letting it go and allowing the answer to be given – we invite a manifestation of the required answer through physical, mental, and emotional experience. Presence oversees the manifestation of the answer as and when required. (p28)
Asking significant life questions from the point of awareness allows the energy of inspiration and insight to awaken in our daily experience. It allows us to enter the resonance of knowing without having to know why. (p29)
Throughout The Presence Process, we are invited to explore the experience of allowing ourselves to receive answers, as opposed to getting them. (p29)

So… I guess the PP is going to help us communicate better?

Much better. But the meditation and breathing is key… So…

In I go. Sinking in… Wait! Shall I go in with a question placed?

You can.

Ok. Cool.

What is the very best use I can make of this day?
(a sunny, chilly Saturday, the 28th Aug 2020)

***15min Med with Insight Timer***

I received this:

Teach ‘self-dialogue’.

Self Dialogue

Be your own therapist, counsellor and coach (OR…)

Be your own guru

So, is that something to take forward today or mull over…? I am so pleased to have received this term ‘self-dialogue’. And I love ‘be your own guru’. What do I do with this.. today?

You park it. You’ve downloaded it. Now go off and have fun. You are learning, once again, that true DoDs means coming to the well of wisdom and drawing a bucket of it. That is the work. Now go and play.

Really?

Yepski. This presencing work is meant to be, as your beloved mother knew, FUN!

One thing… I’ve got this burgoeoning desire to write, to share…

Good. Keep it cooking.

Do I need to rearrange my days…?

You will do. For now, teaching and doing case work is fine.

Will I lose the teaching?

No. But you will teach your own course.

In self-dialoguing?

Yes.

Wow. And Glennon Doyle’s book is such a boon here. And the PP. People are finally talking about these processes.

Be your own guru… It’s as you knew. You aspies are ahead of your time.

Right?!

So its time to play.

No book proposal.

Let it all cook and simmer. Go and play.

Ok. Thank you. This is such precious time. Thank you.

Come back tomorrow, with focus and fuel in your belly for more. The dial is getting turned up. You’re going to LOVE it.

Yeeps. Ok thanks.

I am going off to play

PS. It’s a ‘how-to’ do DoDs book, right?!

Adios!

PPS. There are already 3 books called ‘Be your own guru’. Just checked. But never mind.

2020-08-29

Presence 5: I am reducing and simplifying

***Reading The Presence Process [The PP] +10minMed***

The ‘Attuning’ chapter to The PP is so rich… I keep wanting to write it up, but it feels like a big project! Some notes and quotes:

Reaction = suppressing inner discomfort – triggered by unhealed trauma => ‘doing’
Response = ‘being with’ inner discomfort => non-doing, undoing
‘This response draws on the wisdom we derive from past experience, whereas reactivity is driven by the unresolved trauma that’s embedded in us.’ p17
Attention = what; Intent = why
‘Throughout the PP the word ’emotion’ is an abbreviation for ‘energy in motion” p16
“A lifeline into present moment awareness resides within us all: our breath. There’s no way to breathe in the past or in the future. We can only breathe in the present. By becoming aware of our breathing, we activate a tool that facilitates withdrawal of our attention from both the past and the future. By focusing our attention and intent on connecting our breathing, we encourage an aspect of our awareness to remain anchored in the moment”
-Michael Brown, The Presence Process p24
“The Presence Process is about showing up by growing up and growing up by showing up.” p25

I’m not quite conveying how rich this ‘Attuning’ chapter is.

I’m listening now…

What would you like to discuss?

I’d like to discuss this showing up business. What is it?

Mr Brown is referring to being present to all that is in you, without as it were ‘squirming’ away. You can link this to the Matt Kahn work around becoming ‘heart-centred’. When you can show up and be present to all the emotion in you, and ‘unravel the overstimulated nervous system’, and shower yourself with unconditional love, you will find yourself more heart-centred.

I’ve done some excellent work on non-squirming over the years, haven’t I?

Absolutely.

What can I do next, to become more present, more heart-centred?

You will enjoy the Presence Process, and find it valuable.

And today? We mentioned something constructive. We cleared some decks yesterday.

But not all of them…

It’s true, my desk…

Start there. Unresolved piles of papers are basically little emotions you have squirmed away from.

Ha! So true. It’s all very well being present to and facing my ‘self’; but it means little if I’ve got clumps of ‘stuff’ sitting about … because I can’t face them…

Clean and clear. Like a monastic. We can’t stress this enough. You will benefit from simplicity, order, observed routines. You asked earlier in the year about getting in the Aspie Zen Zone. Your first port of call is your environment. Attend to your ‘world’.

“Tidy your room” as JP says.

Yes, because that is how you become present to all that you are and represent in the world. Clean and clear. Simplify and order.

Like a monastic.

As your beloved friend E. says: “Sharpen your pencils for the new school year.” It’s going to be a busy term and you will want to get a good run up.

What about… pension week… advancing the business… all that stuff?

You have clients who need you to arrive fully ordered and prepared, truly present to them. Give them your best, and then the business will look after itself.

And the writing..?

You are not ready.

I feel relief when you say that. How do I become ready?

Clean and clear. Simplify and order. Your physical world should be so simple and ordered that someone else could step into it, and understand how it works.

So organise it all?

Clear and simplify it first. Don’t be organising the sands granules of the Sahara. Reduce, simplify…

Ok. I hear you.

I am reducing and simplifying

2020-08-282020-08-30

Presence 4: I am clearing the decks

***10minSinking…***

What is your advice for today?

Relish the peace and quiet… Really bask in it.

Why?

Because things will get busy, and you have the opportunity to anchor in Your Peace, and then take that forward to the coming days and weeks. Your Peace is your greatest offering to your clients, colleagues and companions. Clear out the old, and simplify the new as much as you can. You are doing really well with this. Really well. Now add more simplicity and clarity wherever you can. Clear the decks, so you can bask in P&Q.

I’ll take that. I have a few decks to clear. (Holiday inbox, office desk, future marketing…) I’m loving the simplicity and space I’ve attained from emptying my chest of drawers and clearing my workspace… It’s the sharpening the pencils before the new school year, isn’t it?

As your mind is clear, so will your practice be ‘true’. Simplify, clear, bask.

Thank you. I’ll let stuff go and clear stuff out, and start from zero. And tomorrow, will we do something more… constructive?

You betcha!

I am clearing the decks