Monthly Archives: December 2015

PROBLEM OR SITUATION?

 

problem

 

Do not try to solve your problems; that just gives them life.

To be solving a problem means you first decided a situation was a problem.  Would you agree that two people could approach the same situation, in two different ways?

 

A magnificent white swan gliding on dark water, her folded wings protecting her grey, furry feathered chick.

 

Whoever designates a situation as a problem will be defeated by it. He will always have it. Even when it appears to be solved, it is a sleeping dragon, a dormant volcano, ever capable of coming back to life. Dormant or active, dead or alive, what you name as a problem will rule you.

 

To name a problem is to give up your free will. Free will and fear cannot co-exist.  A problem is something you potentially cannot handle.  Here is something I fear. I will spend my time learning how to deal with it and how to tame it. I will look at how others deal with the same problem.  I will study it and master it.

 

Image by Kevin Turcios on Unsplash

 

Who will be master?

 

It will not be you.  By naming anything as a problem, you have given yourself up, betrayed your true Self, admitted you do not believe you have access to that perfect creative power that sets to right each tiny gnat’s feeler, and each galaxy in each imaginable universe.

 

no problem 7

 

If you had access to that power, allied with the most exquisite intelligence, how could anything be called a problem? By admitting to a problem, you cut yourself off from this perfect Knowing,  Seeing, and Loving that brought you into being.

If God is with us, who can be against us?

Romans 8:31

 

Life is full of situations.  How could it be otherwise?  The more you pay attention to the vicissitudes, the constant changingness of life, the more you encourage that kind of energy to come. Whatever you pay attention to increases.

 

What would you increase?

 

I would increase peace in the world.  That is the first order of business. How would I do that?  All I have is my mind, my power of choice, but it is enough. I would give my mind to peace, think on it, dwell in it, imagine it. What would it feel like?  How would it sound?  This I would do for five minutes, because that is five minutes more than I am doing right now.

I will take time away from incubating whatever I have designated as “my problems”, and give that time to increasing what I would increase.  When I find myself thinking about what I have called “my problems”, let me remember it was my decision to name a situation as a problem, rather than as an occasion for light to shine.  I would now like to become part of that light.

 

A lighthouse shining out against a dark, starry sky.

Photo by Nathan Jennings on Unsplash

 

And, as often as you may find yourself giving time to a “problem”, use this occasion to remind yourself, “I choose instead to give this time to peace.” And then do so.

 

 What power in broken habits

 

 

A baby turtle breaking out of its egg.

 

PROBLEMS? DENY THEM

 

What is the difference between problems and situations?  A situation is information merely; it is what presents. It can be captured in a simple statement of fact that all parties would agree on.  “They are getting a divorce.” “You graduated high school.” “I live alone.”

A situation is information, merely. You could picture your reality as one situation after another, presenting.

 

Two large wolves, front paws on a rock, surveying the area

 

When you designate a situation as a problem, you are introducing what was not there before. You bring in the idea that any situation could warrant being taken seriously enough that you could be downcast. You experience emotions: despair, panic, anxiety, all of fear’s other names, which are legion.  You are a puppet whose strings are being pulled. You are having a knee jerk reaction.

 

Young woman sitting on a bench, downcast, alone

 

Are you consciously choosing to have these reactions ? Was it your intention to feel depressed, dispirited, powerless?

 

A reaction is never conscious. It is involuntary, the fright of your animal self, who is convinced that nothing can exist outside of his five senses.  See him.  Thank him for being here.  Let him go now.

 

A coyote in watchful pose, hunting food

 

 

Entertain no fears. Deny them space, send them away if they try to come. Instead, be still. Remember who you are, unlimited and peaceful. And then choose the response you would delight to have.

 

 

problems

 

Deny problems, and you turn yourself into a surface upon which problems cannot stick. Problems are perceptions, unlimited and relentless. To deny problems is to deny them even one receptor cell within you, and it is to rise above them until they quickly crumble away as worthless dust already shaken loose.

 

problems

 

If there is a situation to be dealt with, then let me deal with it. Show me how to address it, direct me what to do,  and make me open to all the help I need.  That is all I want in response to anything that presents. To entertain fear and anguish at the arise of any situation is an absurd overreaction. It is like having a fit of the vapors because a wave is going to break.

 

problems 3

 

Every wave is going to break. Every flower will bloom and die, as you think. It is not necessary, it is folly, to pay much attention to the happenings of this world. Ask instead to be helpful, relax, be open and let everything fall out as it may.

How may I help?

 

problems 4