One of the biggest pitfalls I spend my time helping clients out of, is trying to bend the laws of physics.
They’re trying really hard to somehow deconstruct, or un-see the illusion of thought.
Their mind hears me say that the entirety of our experience is perception — that we’re all walking around in these little bubbles of thought that we call ‘reality’ but are, in actual fact, an illusion — and it goes:
“Ok, right, enough of this faffing around with my thoughts and feelings and things not being as they seem - JUST SHOW ME ACTUAL GODDAMN REALITY ALREADY, WILL YOU?!”
Ha ha, minds! 🙄
It’s like we think we have to wake up from the dream, in order to enjoy the dream more.
Or we want to know what to do about it, in order to feel better:
“So, I have to tell myself it’s not real, yeah? Is that what you’re saying?”
No.
Neither of these are true.
Firstly, our minds would explode if they ever saw actual reality. As Alan Watts once said,
“The ordinary everyday consciousness that we have, leaves out more than it takes in”
… and for good reason!
(Cue Jack Nicholson screaming at you, “YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH!!” 😂)
Secondly, where’s the fun in being able to see through an illusion?
Wouldn’t that remove every shred of interest from it? It wouldn’t be an illusion then, would it?
🤔
No, we just marvel at it.
Have fun with it (did you know, the etymology of the word illusion is ‘to play’)?
When we know that our experience isn’t the truth, we know that it can’t harm us in the way that it looks like it can. We can play (like kids do).
Have a look at this picture. It’s one that I took on a visit to Swansea, for my mother-in-law’s birthday. Some work was being done on the sea-front promenade, and this little pit is half full of very concentrated salty water, which is doing wonders with the light.
Look at how comprehensive the illusion of distortion is:
I can tell you that three generations of the family stood there leaning on that railing, having an involved, fun discussion about that pool of water for about 15 minutes - it was brilliant! (Boy, do we know how to party?! 😆)
The discussion went something like this:
- Look how bent the ladder looks! Wow!!
- Look at how much smaller the little ‘t’ shapes on the edge of the ladder appear to be! Wow!!
- Look at the crazy hand-railing, are we sure it’s not bending?! Wow!!
- Look at the piece of wood, it’s so refracted it looks like it’s snapped! Wow!!
(At one point, the bafflement became so comprehensive, I offered to climb into the pit and walk down the ladder, but I was stopped, for obvious reasons 😂)
Now, apply that to the illusion of your experience:
- Look at how nervous the mind is making me! Wow!!
- Look at how overwhelmed this all makes me feel! Wow!!
- Look at how much it appears that thing or that person annoys me! Wow!!
- Look at how utterly, intractably terrible the mind is making this situation out to be! Wow!!
We can’t see through it. We can’t wake up from the dream.
But we can see it for what it is. We can wake up to the dream.
And marvel and have fun and play in this thing we call life, safe from psychological harm.
I love you!
😘
Giles
Related
Giles P Croft
More helpful visual metaphors
Book recommendation
Leo Hartong
One of the more accessible books on non-duality that I have read. He's quite funny!