Written by Mathew Naismith
It’s a beautiful Sunday spring morning and yes I should be doing
something else other than writing, kayaking on such a beautiful day first came
to mind however, when I have to write I
have to write otherwise I do at times lose such inspiration. This one wasn’t worth losing; it’s about
pacifying the chaos in our lives, not through new techniques but enhancing the
techniques we are currently using by becoming more aware but aware of what?
First of all we need to become aware of chaos itself. There
are many forms of chaos from the destructive to the constructive, any
interaction and reaction will cause a form of chaos, another reaction which
might or might not cause us to react once again. Being physically attracted to someone
is a form of chaos because we are interacting and most often react to each other
time and time again, this is my mind isn’t destructive. A form of destructive
chaos is when we are in disagreement with others; we will react to their actions
thus creating a more destructive environment, this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t
disagree with anyone, it just means we should be aware while in disagreement
that we are indeed creating more chaos in our lives. Every reaction and interaction causes some form
of chaos, all we need to be aware of is what kind of chaos do we want to live
our lives by!!
Meditating, chanting, praying and even singing songs or
hymns are all to do with quietening the chaos in our lives by making us focus
on one thing not many things all at once.
You could say while we are arguing with someone we are also focused, we
are focused on the present moment which isn’t very quietening.
Let’s look at it this way,
if I was to listen to music that I am not in tune with, no matter how
focused I become, I will not become quietened, the same is with an argument, it’s
usually aggravating not quietening thus adding to the destructive side of chaos
within our lives no matter how much we focus. It’s not in the focusing itself that is
quietening but in the way we focus.
If we focus through a more constructive chaos we will create
a more pacifying experience than if we used a more destructive chaos, let’s look at mediating for example, what is
so chaotic about mediating to start with?
It’s still an interaction, a reaction to not wanting to be aggravated or
unsettled in anyway, now you might think how I could say meditation is a part
of chaos, that’s just plain negative. To become aware of a negative we must judge a
negative to be a negative, in other words we are creating a negative. I don’t
just judge chaos as being negative or bad, I don’t even judge the more destructive
side of chaos as being negative or bad, it is what it is and we must also
realise it’s we who have created such negative chaos in the first place. We have
made it what it is through our reaction and over reactions.
See what I mean about it’s all to do with how we focus not
if we focus, if I was to focus on judging this that and the other negative; I
am reacting thus creating even more destructive chaos within my life. This also
doesn’t help with mediating for example, if you are having trouble mediating
take a look at the chaos in your life, is it constructive or is it destructive,
is it pacifying or is it antagonizing? I lot
of people think it’s just to do with not being able to quieten the chatter in
their head , this isn’t the case, it’s to do with the kind of chatter in our heads not if we are chattering or
not. Why do we get so much chatter in
our heads? Interactions, we are interacting thus creating a reaction which in
turn causes more chaos, actually the less chaos we have in our heads the better
our chances are of a successful mediation. What we really want to do is pacify the chaos
in our lives altogether either it be destructive or constructive.
To do this we need to be aware of our interactions in life,
are they creating a destructive chaos or a constructive chaos, the reason for
this is we need to first live our lives in a more constructive way thus creating
a more constructive chaos in our lives
before we can totally pacify the chaos in our lives altogether. All we
really need to do is become aware of what our interactions and reactions create
and that every interaction and reaction causes a reaction and a type of chaos,
the less we react the less chaos period we will have in our lives. However we
can’t totally stop interacting and reacting but we can become more aware in how
we are reacting and what these reactions create.
Using myself as an example; for most of my life I have had
to endure a chronic injury which of course gave me chronic pain, I don’t take
pain killers. The reason for this is I try not to react and especially over
react for all I will do is create even more chaos in my life, why add to my
trauma by creating more chaos in my life!! This isn’t saying that I haven’t reacted to my
condition, every time I have, I’ve created more chaos and at times destructive chaos.
We of course learn by our experiences if we are aware of the
way we react and what this reaction will create, on the other hand, it is unlikely
that we will learn by our experience if we are unaware of our reactions and
what they create. This is because of the
type of chaos these reactions create, the more destruction our reactions create
the more chaotic our lives will be and the harder this makes it for us to learn
by our experiences. This is because we
have become unfocused by so much chaos in our lives, we have over and over
again reacted when all we had to do to bring peace within our lives is stop
reacting.
If I looked at my condition as something just negative, I
would have created a huge amount of destructive chaos in my life, I’ve seen
this time and time again while working in the welfare arena. I instead worked with my condition instead of
against it; I basically tried to experience life without allowing my condition
to affect my life by not continually reacting to my condition and creating more
chaos in my life. This wasn’t easy of
course but quite obtainable, what was the alternative, keep creating more and
more destructive chaos within my life? That of course wasn’t going to happen,
well not to any great degree, it did happen but I kept the effects down by
being aware of what I was creating, this of course help my quality of life a
great deal.
I try not to look at anything negative, even people, because
all we would be doing is creating more chaos in our lives by reacting to such judgment.
This is the main reason we shouldn’t
judge, it’s a reaction and judgment is usually negative so such actions will also
create a more destructive chaos in our lives. Yes I stay away from people because I don’t
want to interact with these people because of their destructive chaotic lives, but
it’s not because I have judged them being negative. We can easily judge their lives
as negative but it’s just another way to exist that’s all.
A real positive person can’t judge another person negative
so they won’t try to avoid these people in the first place thus in turn creating
less reaction and a far less chaotic life for themselves. The message is here, don’t’ try to avoid what
you deem as negative people or situations, try to just avoid a chaotic existence
within yourself by not reacting. Yes we
can feel more at peace within ourselves if we avoid such negatives, what we have
judged as negative people, but in reality we are still creating chaos through such
reactions.
Now by avoiding such people are we creating a more constructive
chaos for us to live by instead of a destructive chaos? By reacting and judging certain people
negative, we are indeed creating a more constructive chaotic life if we stay
away from these people who we have obviously allowed to affect us through our
own reactions with such people. It’s our
reactions that make such people seem negative, thus adding to our chaos every
time we are confronted with such people who we have judged negative, not that
they are actually negative.
You can now see why so many spiritually aware people are one
minute in pure bliss and the next quite traumatised, as soon as they react
through judgment of a situation or person, they rebound back to being in chaos
but only through their own reaction. If they didn’t react and judge, they wouldn’t
experience such extremes of bliss and trauma.
It is not complicated pacifying the chaos in our lives, all
we have got to do is be aware of our interactions and action and what they will
create. If we want a more chaotic life, keep reacting and judging, if we want a
more passive life, learn not to react through being aware through what these
reactions will create, it’s really up to us. We really do however need to be more aware in what we
are creating over all, just be at peace within yourself and all will be fine.
