RC101 – Lesson Six
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: The Validity of the Whole Human Experience
“Why do bad things happen to good people?” “Why do good things happen to bad people?” “Why do bad things happen even to conscious creators? Wouldn’t a person only want to create fun and enjoyable experiences?”
The last question touches upon a misconception that many people have when they first begin practicing conscious reality creation. The underlying assumption is that, as a reality creator, they can keep away, or avoid those experiences which they think of as “bad” in some way. Of course, trying to keep something out of your life is only re-inforcing the original belief that it was part of your life to begin with. In order to exclude something from your life, you have to specify or focus on that which you are trying to exclude, and since you get what you focus on, trying to exclude something doesn’t really work!
Creation vs. Control
When you are trying to shape your reality to the exclusion of events (“I’m NOT creating a world of environmental destruction because I only eat vegetables and I recycle and plant 12 trees every year.”), what you are really doing is reacting to and reinforcing the original, perhaps unconscious belief, which in the above case was that this person believed in a world where the environment was being destroyed. Anytime you feel the need to DO something in order to keep something else from happening, it’s a sure sign that you are not dealing with the underlying belief but rather trying to control physical reality. When you are centered in your joy, you don’t focus on what you DON’T want to happen, but what you DO, and you learn to let go of anything that doesn’t resonate with your focus, with YOU.
Many times we will try to control the events we are going to experience in the future, and when events don’t turn out the way you have been focusing it can be disappointing, disheartening, and downright infuriating. This happens rather often on our journey of awakening to the fullness of who we really are. For example: Let’s say you were focusing on meeting your ideal lover. You have a vision for this person in your head, you know what qualities you want in this person, and you are feeling great about resonating him/her into your life. Suddenly, you get the impulse to answer a personal ad, you meet this person and on the first date he/she seems to have all the qualities you are looking for, then you never hear from them again.
What happened??? This person seemed to be IT, that one special person that you have been searching for. Why did all the belief work fail? The reasons for this type of situation vary, but often are twofold in nature. First, it’s a sign to yourself that you ARE moving closer toward that desired goal. This match may have appeared perfect, but in some way(s) it wasn’t, but it is a sign to yourself that the perfect match is just over the horizon. The second is that THIS experience still had something of value for you, something you wanted to learn about, or release before reaching your intended goal. When we are moving toward an intended goal, any beliefs or expectations that are not in harmony with it will find a way of manifesting so we can see them and release them. The more you try to ignore the beliefs, or work around them, the more obvious or dramatic form they will take until you recognize them.
The bumps in the road and detours we create for ourselves are there for a reason. Trusting yourself is important during these times because those detours might seem to be taking you in the opposite direction of your original intention! Remind yourself that despite any appearances, you are keeping your sights on the goal you intend to create, tune into that sense of inner joy and the reason for the detours will show themselves.
And what about “unexpected events”? Sometimes an event will appear in physical reality that seems to have no bearing or connection to anything in your life. It will appear to be “random” in nature, and whether you judge it to be good or bad, it appeared to be taking time/energy away from your chosen goal. And yet, there are no “random” events. In the same way that any computer programmer will tell you that there are no real random numbers generated from the computer. It’s all an elaborate illusion, and you of course are the illusionist.
It seems somewhat contradictory to say that we consciously create everything but that there are also “unexpected events.” Think of it this way… As creators, trusting in ourselves and our universe, the last thing we want to do is CONTROL reality, we want to CREATE it! The difference may seem subtle at first, but it’s important. Those of you who are artists or writers probably have an understanding of this concept. When you set out to write a story, or paint a picture, you might have an overall sense of what you want, but you don’t try to control the flow of the paintbrush, or the pen in your hand. You let the vision express itself as you stay in “the flow”, and then refine it until you are happy with it. If we allowed ourselves to be reality “controllers” there would be no room for new stimulus and growth. Using the painting analogy, we wouldn’t allow for the “accident” of mixing two colors together and discovering something new. As each of us as unique beings are always in the act of becoming more than what we are, how can our creations be any different?
Most of you have probably heard the common saying, “The only constant is change.” In the world of reality creation, this is also a standard, so to speak. Even if you ordered your one favorite meal at the same restaurant every day, it would still be different than any of the others you’ve eaten. And while you may enjoy an experience and want to repeat it, you are no longer exactly that same person that created the previous experience, and so it will be different, in perhaps subtle or obvious ways. Maybe the cook will use more pepper, maybe the restaurant will be out of what you usually order. As a society, we’ve generally accepted the belief that change is BAD or at the very least, extremely annoying and a lot of work.
In many ways, we’re breaking ourselves out of the habits of thinking and being that we have become unconscious of and have been repeating over and over again. The new norm is change, and it’s time to release the fear beliefs around change and trust ourselves/All That Is and enjoy the growth and the learning. Instead of cringing about change, we’re discovering that it can be an adventure – like a computerized virtual reality game that we direct.
Judgment and Labels
We already discussed judgment in a previous lesson, but we want to apply it here as well. We define judgment as saying this is good, this is bad, this is okay, this is not, while DISCERNMENT is simply seeing the details inherent in the experience without categorizing it. Why is this important? Here’s an example. Over a year ago, our van got hit in the back by a pickup truck. If we applied judgment, we’d see that this was a supposedly “BAD” event – who wants their automobile crunched and broken? Because it was BAD, this perspective would automatically prevent us from seeing each event that was connected to this as anything more than a pain in the butt, and would basically be blind to all of the little nuances and GENUINE feelings we were having towards each part of the sequence. In this case, we released our judgment about it and simply opened to more knowing about it. In the end, the guy who hit us actually helped us get our cargo home that we were having trouble with in the first place, we got far more insurance money back than we’d actually paid for the van in the first place, the van was still quite usable, and we got to interact with some really great people as well!
When we stop labeling something as good or bad, we then have the opportunity to truly see what’s happening and truly EXPERIENCE it first hand, instead of pulling the usual emotions out of the “bad” bag and saying fundamentally, “Oh, I know how I’m supposed to feel about this.” You may know how you’re SUPPOSED to feel, but in finding out how you REALLY feel, you’ll discover another layer of WHO YOU REALLY ARE.
When we find ourselves reacting negatively to events in physical reality and then trying to control them, we are putting more attention on easing the symptoms rather than curing the disease. What you are perceiving has already been created. In the next moment, you can choose a new probability where a solution exists if you want, but not if you’re focusing on trying to make something “bad” NOT EXIST anymore.
Homework
Take a piece of paper and draw a line down the center of it. In the left column write, “What I think of as BAD things” and in the right column write, “What are some alternate interpretations of these things I had been simply considering BAD – What else could be going on here.” Brainstorm and have fun. If you can only think of ridiculous and far-fetched answers for the right column, that’s fine! The idea here is to stop ourselves from simply categorizing and reacting and start seeing the gift inherent in each creation.
End of Lesson Six