Greetings and Pranams. Happy Mother’s Day to the Divine feminine within the Self nature. OM 
.
Just wanted to say I am amazed at the level of synchronicity my own process has with that of the group. You said something quite poignant during your commentary on Susan’s talk. Something to the effect of “We really don’t know how much crap will come up when we start doing this work.” I wholeheartedly agree. As I continue to objectify my emotional/mental state compared to my whole and complete nature, deeper and deeper levels of childhood “reactive mind” type thinking reveal themselves. These revelations also give me keen insight into the nature of how past relationships were entangled with the Samskaras of childhood trauma. Susan said that when it comes to relationships there are really two levels happening, the conscious level and the inner child level. From this perspective I can see how the abandonment I experienced as a child, foster care, self cutting, confusing sex for love, drug abuse, attention seeking, people pleasing, greediness,dishonesty, seeking virtue, status, perfectionism, EVEN the search for spirituality, all of it falls in behind the inner child’s emotional state of feeling unloved and unwanted.
Could it be that the inner feminine quality of nurturing that I have sought externally through security, pleasure, and virtue, is only fulfilled through conscious self acceptance in the present?
As I contemplate how the failure in my heart valve is connected to my inability to receive love, I think maybe the failure to receive love is not a failure to receive from the outside but a failure to receive from the inside. An epic failure to love myself, to forgive myself, to accept myself.
As a child Jeremy’s experience was that the world was a harsh cold rough place that did not give a f@#k about him. So he developed ways of getting attention. Being charming. Being excellent at anything he did. If he couldn’t be good at it then he didn’t want to do it at all. The belief that I had to constantly placate to everyone and anyone that I felt had the ability and status to validate me. This is a type of constant stress. A never ending anxiety.
My childhood experience was that abuse and abandonment could come at any time. I became hyper aware of others emotions. I became extremely skilled at predicting others potential reactions to any given situation. Some people call this empathic. I think it is just the effects of childhood trauma. The emotional center is stuck on high alert.
Because of all this trauma, I sought a life partner who could fulfill my endless desire to seek love through her own INability to receive or return it. And by the virtue of our inner childs unmet needs we set out on a 25 year collision course. My divorce was like chutes and ladders. It sent me all the way back down to the bottom of my innermost loneliness and hurt. Back to the realization of my Mother’s abandonment, which I had long since disassociated with. Deep Deep hurt that I had forgotten for nearly 40 years still tucked away inside my emotional center. Alive and well. Running the show from behind the curtain. Informing all my life decisions. If I could just have this then I will feel whole. If those people like me I will feel good enough. On and on.
I also see how I transferred that stress to my children, always pushing them to excel so they too could be good enough. They intern resented me for being too critical.
It is very difficult to untangle all this mess. Isvara has slowly and steadily removed people and circumstances from my life ever since I learned the truth through Vedanta. There have been times of great elation and relief as one layer would fall away only to discover another. Now faced with potential death of the body, and the realization that either now or later this is a reality that will not be ignored, what can be left? I don’t know.
In the end I come to the state of mind where freedom is not what I thought it was at all. Actualization of the knowledge of Self is not an attainment, which I knew early on because you told me. But I am steadily feeling lighter and lighter. More solid in my own inner sphere of conscious experience. I get to choose now who I interact with and who I shut down. Other people’s motives and desire to manipulate me are plain as day. I have given up many friendships and said no to many offers of romantic interaction because they have that same fragrance of unresolved inner child trauma. There are a handful of relationships to clean up but they are working themselves out at a steady pace which I am not inclined to rush.
Anyway, I could go on and on. I know most of the teachings are assuming people are qualified. For those of us whose good Karma has brought us to the teaching but still have a lot of work to do to REALLY qualify, you and Sundari, and all of the Shining World folks are a bright light in the darkness. I know you are very busy. I appreciate and have so much gratitude for your endless patience and willingness to respond to me over the years. Please forgive me for being such a slow learner. After years in the spiritual world it is very hard to start at the beginning and rebuild your entire conception of reality from the ground up. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. For the Jiva, I guess the work is never done, but as for me, I am whole and complete, unconcerned, ordinary, simple, existence, consciousness, bliss. I am the Self.
Love,
Jeremy
