Leila's journal

[leila]

Another reminder :

@Vineeto

becoming more and more happy and increasingly harmless, i.e. considerate, in your daily life is the best thing you can do for your fellow beings right now, particular for your partner, and of course for yourself. In other words, when you emanate less and less stressful feelings and vibes and are able to neither suppress them nor acting on them, and/or eventually not having them arise in the first place, the less you contribute to stress circulating and multiplying. Start from where you are at, and with pure intent the progress of the actualism method will fall into place organically.

@Vineeto

Naturally, being stressed needs “‘good’ investigation”, as Geoffrey said in the quote below, so you can recognize and then decline what causes you stress. As ‘Vineeto’ observed early on, it’s often the ‘good’ feelings such as pride, ambition, loyalty, virtue, being ‘right’ and other feelings like this, which caused the ‘bad’ feelings such as stress to achieve the ‘good’ feeling or disappointment when not achieving it. And unless those ‘good’ feelings are recognized and acknowledged with the ‘bad’ feelings both will stay in situ.

@Vineeto

It’s essentially that “good” investigation is just seeing what’s preventing me from feeling good right now. There’s no need to get any more complex.

@Vineeto

It’s not about which aspect of ‘me’ to focus on but on whatever is happening at this moment – if it’s a belief which causes diminishment in feeling good right now, then this is what you figure out; if it’s a habit, such as resentment or castigating yourself, then you acknowledge and decline this habit by replacing it with something better; if it is a certain attitude, then you look at that and work out in what way you can exchange it for a more beneficial attitude.

As Geoffrey said, “It’s essentially that “good” investigation is just seeing what’s preventing me from feeling good right now. There’s no need to get any more complex.”

@Vineeto

“The memory that it’s possible to experience life in a totally opposite way” can strengthen your intent to be/become more happy and harmless, and perhaps allows you to take life less seriously, less sophisticated, more naïvely.

@Vineeto

Actual change happens now, only this moment is actual. The past is not happening now neither is the future happening now – that’s why you don’t want to waste this moment by feeling stressed, remembering good intentions and bad decisions or planning/ wishing something in the future.

Now is the only moment you are being alive. Realising this, again and again helps a lot to recognize that feeling bad is just silly.

@Vineeto

Because the feeling of stress continued you then found a likely cause transferring it all to work-related problems. I am not saying they don’t exist but the primary trigger was that your naivete was taken over by the desire to being praised “for my naiveté” – in other words manifested as the co-joined twins of pride and humility, swinging from one end to the other.

I suggest to get back to feeling good, or at least feeling ok, and then see if what I said makes sense to you. Perhaps it helps to understand more of this aspect of your social identity and thus can be declined so you will be able to get back to a more consistent feeling good.

It’s also useful to remember that when you fight/reject any of your feelings you add affective energy to that feeling and thus increase it.

@Vineeto

Chrono has just posted a report (link) that he was experiencing a similar fear of not being likeable and found other feelings lurking beneath that. It may give you some helpful or even applicable pointers.
Chrono: Continuing on from my reflection, the initial feeling of this ‘put others before oneself’ type of operating seems to be guilt. I experienced it first as an anxiety and a ‘scan’ of how others view me. I sometimes experience a glimpse of what’s underneath it. This fits in with harmlessness and how I want others to accept me before I will feel good continuously. My experience is that it’s actually very easy to feel good once this is out of the picture. This feeling of guilt and anxiety I experience creates a helplessness (victim). By being this victim, I am wanting the other to antidotally respond with loving or compassionate feelings. With that, I will feel accepted and thus let myself feel good. To contemplate feeling good forever without the permission of ‘others’ feels callous. Another interesting related aspect that I’ve noted is that when you’re in love, you automatically put the other before yourself. It’s the nature of love so now it makes sense why it’s advocated by the enlightened people.

@Vineeto

And instead of wondering why other people do perhaps not like you, you can find out if you like yourself and if not why not. Is there perhaps a bad feeling lurking in the dark that you want to keep hidden, hidden from yourself? Something which perhaps requires some bright light of awareness? Something you can do something about with sincere intent to be happy and harmless?

@Vineeto

AdamH: Yes I definitely have been seeing the connection between my fear of not being likeable with the knowledge that I have harmfulness hidden within me. The more I channel energy into happiness and harmlessness the less I feel like I have to fear from others, it leads to a positive reinforcement loop… whereas when I hide and ‘nurse’ harmful feelings the opposite happens.
I think this is a phenomena I’ve been aware of, but the recognition of what point in this ‘loop’ I can actually make changes is something that’s never fully sunk in. The point where I can actually make changes is in being happy and harmless …

Hi Adam,

This is excellent. Fully comprehending that you “can actually make changes” will give you the necessary interest, vitality and persistence to actually be happy and harmless.

@Vineeto

you can’t make naiveté happen, you can only allow yourself to be more naïve, in this moment – it is something outside the domain of the ‘controller’. It happens when you allow life to happen, not have it ‘your’ way. Hence a good way to start is to put everything on a preference basis, give up control a little – and don’t expect everything to happen at once (like a big leap to “the state of ‘gay abandon’”) – that again would be the opposite of being naïve.

You can experiment when doing nothing in particular for a while, and not know what is going to happen next, feeling a bit foolish perhaps, that’s ok, then a bit more of that, allow the objections and recognize the silliness, then get back to feeling good. Just explore what happens without plans how it should turn out …