Experience Is Effect

I had an experience several years ago that literally turned my mental and spiritual life around. I was taking part in a transformational training (that grew out of the EST model of training). Through the interaction I was having with other participants and the trainer, I was experiencing tremendous rage at some things that had occurred in my earlier life. I was seeing how those circumstances had informed all of my emotions and thinking since. As I allowed this howling rage to move, there was a moment that it all suddenly stopped. I collapsed onto the floor. I was very awake, conscious of my surroundings and the people about me. But I was on the floor, curled up, covering my face.

Deep peace came over me; the consuming rage was simply gone. I opened my eyes, but instead of seeing my hands over my face, I saw a great dark expanse of the universe. Slowly a line of light stretched across that darkness. On this line I could see distinctly every event of my life from my moment of birth to this moment on the floor. Then a thought came into my mind. It was very prominent, like when a person speaks, but there was no sound. I just knew that this thought was what I needed to give attention to. The thought was, "It is all perfect."

From that moment, I knew that there has never been a moment in my life that "shouldn't have happened," or that was "wrong." It has taken me a long time since then to understand what I was given in that training room. A lot of that time was spent looking for a way to justify what I had always believed: that I have been at the mercy of my circumstances all my life, a victim of unfortunate events and relationships that should never have happened

This thought, "It is all perfect," just flew in the face of that paradigm. But this is exactly what turned me about. I would like to share what I have come to know.

I have come to know that all my experience is the effect of where I choose to focus the attention of my consciousness.

 The idea that every event in my life was just right, that is was "perfect," was not congruent with what I had held as true. So, if what I held as true was not really true, what was it? It was just a way of seeing what happened. Neither of these ways of looking at my life changed what actually happened, but how I chose to look at what actually happened changed my experience. In other words my experience is the effect of how I choose to see my circumstances.

"The Work" of Byron Katie has been a powerful tool for me in learning this. I refer you to: Katie doing The Work with a woman and Byron Katie Website

In my next post, I will share with you the most powerful practice I know for moving forward on the path of personal and spiritual growth: forgiveness. This is very different from what we have been taught forgiveness is. It is even beyond the current teaching of "Radical Forgiveness." (See About Radical Forgiveness.)

Remember that you are loved, you are loving and you are lovable forever.