Beyond Morality: Beauty in the Ugliness

The suffering self

An image of what I saw in creative visualization. This large, black blog was suffering, imprisoned in an electric fence. This “moral” guy (aka the ego) had him imprisoned, and had lots of idols on the walls, like a Buddha statue. I freed the blob and shattered all the statues.

I don’t know what to say. In fact, I’m not sure I even want to post anything. But I still have something to share today, and I’d be a fool not to. Ok, maybe not a fool. I’d just be me, but I’m going to share it anyway.

Sometimes, we get so invested in becoming good by our definition of it that we ignore our own suffering. We struggle and strive for an ideal that we forget ourselves, in all our darkness, moodiness, suffering, desires, insecurities and fears. When we desire something intensely that we don’t have instead of tending what is within us, it can be like putting ourselves in a cage. We want to become not-ourselves. We want to transform ourselves into only that which is good, rather than seeing the beauty in the real, untransformed us.

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Helping Others

Today’s discovery: When you’re trying to help someone, there are two compulsions that arise – one is positive and wants to do anything it can, and the other is negative and hates suffering and can’t stand it when anyone is suffering nearby. If the negative one tries to help, it pulls out its back of tricks and theories for what might help, dumps it on the suffering person and demands they go through every single method, now. In this way, the part of us that hates suffering can create suffering in others.
The positive part on the other hand, considers where it may be wrong and welcomes whatever the suffering person says, in an upbeat way. That positive voice may not know right away how to help, but it learns from what the suffering person says, and so can eventually get to the heart of the problem. Do you know these two sides of you in this kind of situation? Are you secure enough to not freak out when your friends are hurting? : )