JesusCarlos: Today I woke up feeling stuck in my process. When observing my feelings during the early hours of the morning, I discovered aggression. Anger. Nothing really strong, a state of subtle discomfort. Some bitterness. For some reason, this old pattern of resentment in general was reactivated. What I can detect is that it has to do with the fact that I feel threatened in my new work environment. Defence mechanisms were activated. That ancestral animal that I was able to recognize, integrate and eventually send to rest during the July PCE. At that time, that instinct was active in relation to the fear of feeling rejected by my partner. Today is this other situation, of feeling under attack in the work environment. This quote that I put above reminds me that the only way to continue, and get out of stagnation, is to recover the pure intent, lower my arms and not seek to defend myself. Instead, from a sincere intent (to use the terms more precisely), try to look at the situation anew and act harmlessly.
The only thing I will gain by acting aggressively, or defensively, is more of a perception of being under attack. I want to change perspective and learn to live in harmony with my fellow human beings even in this environment. But I’m having a hard time seeing the silliness of the situation.
Hi JesusCarlos,
Can it be that the problems you listed are related to your resentment you talked about a month ago – not getting recognition?
JesusCarlos: I recognize that what I want is recognition. I long for recognition. (link)
Here is part of my reply to you –
Vineeto: Longing “for recognition” is not something superficial, it is an inbuilt feature of the human condition. You not only “long for recognition”, ‘you’ need it for ‘your’ very existence. ‘You’, the identity’, being a contingent ‘being’, cannot exist on ‘your’ own – ‘you’ require constant confirmation to justify and confirm ‘your’ existence, else ‘your’ non-substantial nature will become apparent. (link)
Naturally you experience “the fear of feeling rejected by my partner” and “feeling under attack in the work environment”. In this modus operandi you are competing with every other feeling being for the highest amount of recognition you can get, just as they are doing, and you are naturally in battle with every person you are in contact with. A lose-lose situation.
The alternative is to get back to feeling good and recognize that you can be a friend to yourself and treat others as fellow human beings rather than competitors in a futile battle for recognition of a fake ‘identity’.
With the help of remembering your “July PCE” maybe this conversation of Richard’s can give you a hint how to proceed –
RICHARD: When one has an insight into an aspect of the Human Condition, there is action … and this action is the actualising of the experience so that one’s personality is changed, irrevocably. Otherwise, I agree, the experience, the insight, becomes knowledge … and knowledge is dead. Dead, that is, until it is activated and lived in one’s daily life. Sagacity lies in the living of a realisation … (Richard, List B, No. 20, 14 Feb 1998)
RESPONDENT: Can an insight, one moment of insight, have an effect here? Does this not call for something that is from moment to moment, ongoing.
RICHARD: Yes, indeed it can. One fundamental moment of insight can alter the entire course of one’s life wherein becoming free of the Human Condition is no longer a matter of choice – it is an irresistible pull. And, yes, then there is something that is from moment to moment, ongoing. I choose to call this something: ‘Pure Intent’. Pure intent is a palpable life-force; an actually occurring stream of benevolence and benignity that originates in the perfect and vast stillness that is the essential character of the infinitude of this physical universe. One can bring about a benediction from that perfection and purity, which is the essential character of the universe, by contacting and cultivating one’s original state of naiveté. Naiveté is that intimate aspect of oneself that is the nearest approximation that one can have of actual innocence – there is no innocence so long as there is a self – and constant awareness of naive intimacy results in a continuing benediction. This blessing allows a connection to be made between oneself and the perfection and purity. [Emphasis added]. (Richard, List B, No. 20, 17 Feb 1998)
The key to unlock naiveté is sincerity, “which is that intimate aspect of oneself that is usually kept hidden away for fear of seeming foolish (a simpleton) … it is like being a child again but with adult sensibilities (wherein one can separate out the distinction between being naïve and being gullible/ trusting).” (Richard, AF list, No. 79, 7 June 2006).
With naiveté operating in your life you can like yourself and like others … and it is a wonderful way of experiencing each moment, far more enjoyable and inducive in providing fun, appreciation and dignity in your life than any battle for recognition can ever deliver.
Cheers Vineeto