What Am I Feeling?

There are times that I have to stop, sit down meditatively and ask myself, "What am I feeling? I wait and listen for an answer, and when the first answer comes back, it's usually not true. In fact it's often "misdirection." When I dig more deeply down, quite often I notice or find something that seems far more authentic and honest.

"What we think about, we become" is a very popular quote from the "The Dhammapada," that I have heard people use a lot. I upgraded that expression for myself to "What we feel, we become, all day long."

What's notable for me is that when I have feelings that I don't like, find unattractive or that I'd want to stuff, I do something quite interesting. My brain allows my attention to get hooked by other things, so that I don't notice or feel what I'm feeling.

Getting so-called "Hooked," for me includes TV, going shopping, procrastination, coding, designing, listening to people gossip, focusing on people that I'm unhappy with and more. Really, it's anything leads me away from me. Hence the word "misdirection," that I mentioned earlier.

When I live by the things that hook my attention, I can acquire a psychological or spiritual kind of sickness. But the tricky thing about this sickness is that you can be ill without know it, because we become emotionally or psychologically distorted. It's kind of like gaining 10 lbs, but you didn't notice it as it was happening. One day you look in the mirror, shocked as all-get-out and ask, "How did I get to this weight (place) without knowing?"

The cure is relatively simple, but can be very difficult to swallow. The cure you ask? Sit on the zafu and meet our "True-self," there. As we come to ourselves, we have to cut through all the crap and BS. That is the really uncomfortable part. It can be a struggle, like cutting through a very think forest with a machete. It means cutting down, moving through and evaporating our illusions, so that we can get to what we *really* feeling. It can and does hurt, sometimes. Zen Buddhism is not a pain free process.

So here we are, full circle. What are You and I really, really, really feeling TODAY? Is it true or it something we made up, to cover and smooth over something else that we didn't like? Only you know. Only you can tell you what you are genuinely feeling. As for me, my focus today will be to "harmonize," with my true feelings and find a way to be my authentic self.

May Your Life Go Well,

Jaye Seiho Morris, Curator
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