Why Rude Awakening?

                          Why Rude Awakening?

 

                                          

When I try to formulate and encapsulate my life's work/calling what comes to my mind in this moment is that i've tried to understand and practice what it is to be a human being, and to model and facilitate that for others.

In large part this has been a process of awakening from a trance, hypnotisim, and conditioning of self negative, default data that is part and parcel to our process of socialization. This data basically tells us that we are not ok. These self-negating messages come in 1000's of forms; from our parents, teachers, preachers, therapists, Madison Ave, on and on...

This 'awakening' is the goal of all spiritual traditions, and in my view, it should be the goal of all forms of therapeutic interventions, whether those therapies are physical, mental, emotional, social, or spiritual.

In order to begin to awaken one must first recognize and own their sleep-fullness. In order to escape from prison one must first realize that one is in prison, enslaved, oppressed, etc. We live in a world culture that has the most cunning ways to enslave people, which is to create the illusion that we are free. This is the crux of materialism and capitalism. In old circuses all one had to do with an elephant is put a chain around them that was staked in the ground for a while. Then you could simply have the chain on them without it being staked, because the elephant had “given up” on the idea that they were free.

The process of awakening is always a shock to the system. Like Neo in the Matrix when he takes the red pill and finds out how deep the rabbit hole goes. This is a Rude Awakening that we are living an illusion, this is only the beginning, but every awakening leads a little more out of Plato's cave into the light of consciousness. It is much easier to stay ignorant, asleep, complacent, and comfortable than it is to take steps toward your own awakening. Once you do there is no turning back (unless you really work hard to go back to sleep), but there will always be a remnant of enlightening experience that is the hall mark of living fully as a human being.