We live in very peculiar times. If in the past, we were gagged under the weight of religious morality, submerged by their dogmas that conditioned the full expression of our Self, today we are at the opposite extreme, building new dogmas. We try to show people that they can be anything they want, that through a practice, a method, a technique, they can build a new personality. On the personal development side, we are told that we can be happier, more successful, more joyful, and more passionate. On the spiritual side we are told that we should be more coherent, humbler, more loving, and more selfless, and, based on all this, we are presented with multiple techniques and methods that enable us to achieve these objectives. But I say to you, that everything that we build with effort through a technique, whatever it is, is another character that we put on the stage. Better than the previous one, that's for sure if it's well built, but one more character.
Actually, Life only asks us for one thing: to be True. May we have the courage to remove all the masks, without building new masks, living peacefully with this type of influenza that we call selfishness, inertia, unhappiness, sadness, incoherence, and so many others. And as flu, soon passes. We do not even have to take any medication. I say to you that to be true is to accept life for the experiences it presents to us, without wanting other things but those. It is to live these experiences in full acceptance - Life makes no mistake - without building any narrative on top of that. The more authentic we are, the fewer characters we have to play on the stage, and faster will this flu disappear without us even having to deal with it.
Living by those characters built through multiple personal enhancement techniques is the most perfect trap, for in the first stage we really believe that we are improving; we judge that these flu states have disappeared because the character we created does not have them, but they are all there behind the mask. And it is a trap that will ask from us a constant effort, a permanent vigil over this same character to ensure that it remains on the track that has been defined. At some point, it will become a burden that we will not be able to bear, so much will be the effort required. This effort, as a drug to have the same effect requires increasing doses, will ask us for a constant update on new techniques and methods for which there will always be someone available who, in exchange for a lot of money, will prescribe the new doses. In the end, the need for permanent monitoring to ensure that the intended objectives are achieved will be strenuous. We will be so concerned about building this character, making a tremendous effort to be happy, successful, joyful, coherent, and passionate, that Life will eventually pass us by.
I tell you that leaving the stage and removing the masks, that accepting Life through all the experiences that it provides us, without running away, is the true freedom. Let us, therefore, have the courage to let go of all the techniques and, without building anything in the perfection of whatever, live without effort, without the need to control, to lead, to direct, full of this Inner Presence that only asks from us an uncovered face, true in the traces of his own wrinkles, from which it does not hide.
From the book Spiritual Reflections for a New World
https://www.pedroelias.org/en/books
