Stillness

Stillness

Who are we? Well, I guess I mean, who am I? And, right off the top, I think of the person who owns the hands and mind that is writing to you write now, but that’s not really what I mean at all.

I’m going deep, fellow philosophers, so grab your oxygen tanks and let’s dive in!

I talk a lot about our natural life, and the perfect self. I don’t talk about the perfect self in the abstract. I have experienced it, the first time way back in the day, when I was sitting around, alone, fantasizing ways to commit suicide (oh, yeah, I was a barrel of laughs.)

A feeling came upon me, and there I was, at the heart, at the core, of perfect self. Perfectly calm, perfectly happy, no worries, no anxiety, no pain. Inhaling joy, exhaling joy. I felt infinite, and connected, and whole, completely a part of everything. Perfect self.

I have no idea how long the experience lasted, but it totally changed my life. Because, whenever I remembered to think of it, there it was, at my core, my perfect self, my point of stillness in the chaos, misery, and suffering that was my life.

I saw all the crud I had accreted around it, like a pearl covered in nasty, crusty crap. All I had to do was get rid of the crap. And there you have my philosophy in a nutshell.

Who I am is my perfect self. What I do is chip away at the crusty gunk around it. Perhaps my perfect self, and yours, are one and  the same. Perhaps Perfect Self is the core of the universal mind. That would be cool.

Meanwhile, at my core is that stillness of Perfect Self. Because I’ve been practicing for awhile, I can get there pretty easily, From that place of stillness is born our natural life. It’s easy. It’s fun. It’s creative; it sounds like a great toy from Whammo! Like a Frisbee or a Slip ‘n’ Slide.

That stillness is like the tank that holds my baby snails. The space within the tank is seething with life; the snails, their celery trees and romaine bridges, the food in their picnic area. The water in the tank is teaming with life. But all around it is the stillness of the tank.

We are like that, only our stillness is inside, at our core, fundamental to our Perfect Self. It’s not about silence, or absence, or darkness, or non-sensation, rather it is the defining point, the core, the center of our universe around which everything turns.

When I am aware of that stillness, I lose a little of my attachment to the stuff of my life. I see the movement, the ebbs and flows, the waxings and wanings.

I use Creative Questions to make the path clearer, easier to follow back to my core. Why is it so easy?

I use Creative Questions to chip crud off the pearl of my Perfect Self. How do I know I’m good enough?

I use Creative Questions to live my natural life. Why am I peaceful?

Why do I choose to experience stillness?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2013 all rights reserved 09172013