What is real freedom? What’s stopping us from Flowing easy!
We are not born with ideas or set way of thinking of how things should be. It’s a plain canvas where then other people – parents, siblings, grandparents, Teachers, friends start throwing varied colours which we start adapting to as ours , thereby creating a painting which is perhaps not ours. What to eat or not to eat, what career to choose, what to do with our life is not really chosen by us – but determined by our conditioned way of thinking. The idea of what life experiences we will have is then a function of our cultural exposure, our mind which has been set to a particular way of thinking ( perhaps that’s why its called “mindset”). We then continue the same pattern or chain of thinking as parents, leaders, teachers, managers –without knowing we are then intrinsically weaved into the so called societal way of thinking. As I have progressed along this journey of breaking away from the attachment to my own ideas and thoughts, I realized that till that awareness dawns in, we may be living in a free world / country but that’s simply pseudo freedom. For we are stuck in the same cycle of thought process.
When my teacher talked about the three levels of attachment, it absolutely baffled my mind. It was completely and absolutely transformational. I kinda knew of the two levels of attachment, but never really thought of the third – which I realized is actually the biggest cause of suffering.
Level 1 – attachment to material things , possessions.
He said, its is relatively easier to see this and still relatively easier to break away. I’ll call it first degree of self inflicting suffering. I experienced breaking away from this pattern when I just decided to give away most of my collectibles, books etc., as I was moving countries. Much that I thought I had overcome this attachment, there were moments when it was hard to leave all the stuff that I had collected over a decade ( it was MY time, effort, and money in collecting, organizing and maintaining all that). Hard but doable and coming from experience I can vouch that there is much freedom.
Level 2 – attachment to emotional relationships, self
My teacher said, this was still harder to see and even harder to break away from. This is the second degree of self inflicting suffering. Death of a relationship, death of a family member, pet or any form of separation is often emotionally draining, turns life upside down, often taking years for one to marginally overcome the grief. Whilst that event of pain has lapsed, we continue with our suffering by reliving those moments in the present day / moment. That’s why Buddha said, Pain is inevitable but suffering is optional. I experienced that after years of meditation and practicing mindfulness this had sunk in – the passing away of the pet, or end of a relationship was painful but the suffering was much less. At some point in time, the impermanence of all life experiences itself, helps one over come this attachment. Everything eventually passes away – including my physical existence.
Level 3 – attachment to one’s own ideas and thoughts
This one just blew my mind. My teacher said, this attachment is literally impossible to see and impossible to break away from by oneself. To be able to see this and break away from, one has to be blessed with a real authentic teacher. I was blessed to have found mine. How often we limit our lives by telling ourselves and everyone around of how life should be , how other people should behave, what others should do or should not, what we should do or not do, our definitions and ideas of whats right and wrong, or good and bad. The same thoughts go round round in circle. When things do not happen according to our expectations, it brings both pain and suffering. And yet we continue to live our lives following the same pattern. This is nothing but third degree self inflicting torture.
Our cups are full with our borrowed ideas of how life should be – which we try to justify to others or try extremely hard to convince other people to adapt the same. Arguments / disagreements, clashes, wars, the so called religious disagreements are nothing but a reflection of this very attachment. We simply love the idea of labelling everything. We can’t let go of our idea of what should be. We can’t let go of our attachment to our thought process. Emptying our cups of our conditioned ideas is a big threat to our EGO. As I continue with my journey of finding my true self, I see this as the biggest hurdle to cross. Every single day offers various opportunities where by practicing mindfulness I am able to catch those very moments when based on my ideas I judge someone or something as good or bad, right or wrong, I experience anger or irritation or gratitude, oscillating between past and future and reliving those moments, finding myself a slave of my own mind, own thinking. Honestly, its in those moments of practicing mindfulness that I realize that much that I am blessed to be born in a free country, I am not free yet. And that’s what this journey / life experiences are here for.
To attach means to cling to, to grasp. It’s so very obvious the simple act of Holding on to something for too Long is mentally, emotionally and physically draining. Reminds me of the famous “ Put the glass down story”.
As you tread along today, going through the motions of life, take some time off to remind yourself of the biggest cause of suffering – your THIRD Attachment. It’s time to put our glass down.