Tag Archives: relativity

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Once

Everything happens once. You will read these words only once. You will think about this very idea once. You breathe once. You see the people you love in your life once. You have every thought and feeling once. You only exist once.

But we don’t see it, it’s as if we do everything we can to hide from this fact. We are blessed and cursed with this ego, the keeper of our story, the one that needs to hang on to as much information as possible to make the idea of ‘me’ possible and life known and predictable. We form habitual thought patterns that give the illusion of things happening over and over again, with some variations, but at the end of the day, we think ‘here we go again’ a lot.

And as we do this, we lose our ability to see, to be present and experience the uniqueness of each moment as it occurs, because it gets hidden and muddled in that cloud of our thinking. Our lives turn into predictable and planned patterns, no matter if they are positive or negative, they are still patterns. Funny thing is, every single time I have a similar thought and repeat it, it is yet happening only once each time. Through all the repetition they stop feeling unique, but we have every thought and feeling once. Again and again. Stepping outside of the pattern thrusts us into the moment, and with that comes an instant ‘Vu Ja De,’ that feeling we get when we are sure that this has never happened before … and the realization that it will never happen again because it happens only once, right here and right now. Everything in existence exists only once. Every moment, every occurrence, every wisp of life in and out of form. Nothing and no thing repeats itself, ever. Literally.

At first this notion made me very sad and bummed me out, because this meant to me that life was utterly fleeting. If all happens only once, then there is nothing to hold on to after all, it happens once, never to happen again. Kinda depressing actually. But as these musings go in my life, once they show up, they don’t leave me alone until I pay attention and look a little further into it. This one was uncomfortable because it touches that last border, that veil in my life that I will never be able to fully understand and frankly stay away from: The fact of my own eventual departure from this plane of existence. Much like the character in my book, I struggle with this. And thinking about everything only existing once makes this much more real.

If everything only occurs once, then how can it exist? How can there be continuity in anything? How does anything grow? How can I exist? That doesn’t make sense to me, and yet I know somehow that this whole ‘once’ thing is true. Being in time is the answer. We live in a concept and state of time, though this is fluid at best, and it provides the succession of singular events, the whole ‘one thing happens after another’ idea. Cause and effect. Physics. It all builds on one another, and all of this is possible because we live within the concept of time. Without it, it all goes out the window. Stepping outside of time for a moment makes the moment unique, showing us that it is happening only now, once, never to return. Only through our ability to step back into time by remembering it, can it ‘return.’

Do you do or have anything in your life that makes you feel great? Maybe a favorite meal, drink, activity, person, any kind of circumstance? One of those things you love to do? We love that feeling and long for it, and thus we repeat the activity, but all we are doing is recreating the feeling, repeating the behavior to reproduce it again and again. In fact we are simply doing a lot of re-ing, and thus are simply giving ourselves a carbon copy. We are missing out on the onceness of it all. Nothing wrong with this, except it puts us in a state of varying degrees of blindness to the moment.

This has been with me for the past few weeks, and by allowing it into my awareness, I have noticed more around me. It started by thinking about everything happening once, which led to some anxiety at first because it also meant that it may be the last time I got to experience whatever I was experiencing at the moment, but slowly it has transformed into more of a wonder about life. I find myself being struck by the onceness of a taste, a thought, a feeling, and I see that nothing repeats itself, except my thought about it. My mind has become a little quieter so that I can pay better attention. It is sad and awe inspiring at the same time. It all happens only once.

Play with this yourself and try it on for size. What if this is true and everything happens only once? Hold this idea in your mind during your next meal, conversation, bike ride, interaction with anyone, ‘this is only happening once, never again.’ You may just be so glad that you got to be around while it was happening.

Cheers,

Ralf

 

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Memories

We have them. We make them. Without them what would there be?

I often wonder about memories and how important they are to our lives, or not. With my father’s passing this year, the notion of memories and particularly his memory have been on my mind. We are spending Christmas at my mother’s house (still odd to say that) and it has been the first time for me to be back in the place I grew up in since I was here this summer as my dad was getting ready to die. I had been wondering what it would be like to come here and not have him be in this space, but to have only my memories of him. Would it make me sad again, would I miss him, would it be strange to be here without him, my last memory of him sitting in his favorite chair which now sits empty? I honestly had no idea and went into it with an open heart and mind. Well, I am experiencing something I least expected and am frankly a bit unsure with yet, and have a hard time saying on here, because I still have some judgment about it, what are other people going to think? I figure since that usually doesn’t stop me, it shouldn’t now.

I don’t miss him.

As I am reading this, I am still a little bit taken aback by the statement, but that other part in me I like to talk about so much is letting me know reassuringly that this is a very accurate statement about the way things are for me. Ever since I arrived and had this realization, I have been asking myself how this can be. How could I not miss him? How is it possible? Am I a heartless being that has no feelings? Seriously, I was shocked at first. I tried to make myself miss him. I literally walked into his office, sat at his desk and tried to make myself miss him and feel sad. I thought that maybe I was denying myself feeling those feelings because I want to be evolved or something like that. As I muddled with this for the first couple of days it began to occur to me that I may want to leave this alone, simply be with this feeling and see what happens. Interestingly enough, a whole slew of ideas around memories started to show up, and they explained to me what was happening and why it was perfectly natural.

As I say in the intro, we make memories. Let’s think about this sentence for a second. We make them. As in we create them and make them up. Literally. Every moment of our life experience is only the actual experience at that moment and then immediately turns into a memory. Every-single-moment. No exceptions. This is a humdinger, at least to me. Everything in my life outside of the present moment is a memory. In a way, even thoughts about the future are a memory, they’re just a memory about something that may or may not happen. So memories are what create me. Without them I wouldn’t be able to exist. So they are a good thing. They let me remember all the useful things in life, like walking, cooking, talking, driving, remember where home is, and to remember to actually go home, etc. What occurred to me with this insight was that this is how memories are designed  to work for us. They are not meant to limit us, by defining who or what we may be based on them. We are not supposed to be our memories, but to simply have them. Big difference. Huge difference.

This is why I do not miss my father.

I loved him dearly and we had a wonderful time together those last few weeks we spent together, and I am lucky and grateful that I got to have that time and all the times before. What I have realized in being here now is that for as long that I have lived, my father and all other people in my life are a memory whenever I am not present with them. When we are present with each other in some way, in person, over the phone, via Skype or FaceTime (wow, how times have changed), we are hopefully present enough to experience each other fully without memory getting in the way. Any other time, we are experiencing our memory of each other. Realizing this has changed my experience in this place without him. Now that my dad is not here anymore in a physical way, I am experiencing him fully in my memory when I do. It has shifted my reality. I know that he has departed from the physical plane, so I do not expect him to be here anymore, and do not miss him. I would if I expected him to be here. But I am experiencing my memories, and they show up in different ways at different times, and their quality has changed. They are no longer attached to him in the same way as they were when he was alive, they stand on their own and let me have them whenever I choose to. They have taken on another meaning. I know that I will not get to create more memories with him any longer, because he is no longer, but that is ok. It is the natural way of things. We all will depart at some point, period.

With all this I can see more clearly how memories are a wonderful thing to have, but a very limiting thing to be. When we are our memories we will go to great lengths to defend them, justify them, keep them, for if I don’t have those memories, I disappear. People go to war over their memories, because when we have a collective memory to uphold our identity, we will not allow to have them ridiculed, threatened or taken away. When I am my memories, I have to to do what is necessary to keep them, or even make others take them on as well. When I have memories, they aren’t me, so I am not at stake. Total game changer.

As we are in the holiday season, I invite all of us to enjoy our memories as something wonderful that we have. I challenge us all to remember that we aren’t our memories and in the process rediscover the moments we are in right then, so that we don’t miss them for the sake of making a memory. Give yourself and all around you the greatest gift possible, the present of presence.

Cheers,

Ralf

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Reactive reactionary

That’s a beautiful combination right there. Those two are the gatekeepers of the ego identification castle. When we are a reactive reactionary, we are fully engaged in the ego identification. In other words, we are either reacting to something or want to keep things just the way they are.

Reacting is what we do all day. We get up and react to the weather, the news, our spouse or partner, the kids, our own mood, the way we look, etc. We are reacting to the world and what it presents to us. So when I get into my car and drive to work, and someone cuts me off, I react. And boy, do I. In the interest of my G-Rating for the blog, I may not repeat the things that come out of my mouth in reaction to the … other person. Driving is one of my weak spots, well, that and watching my favorite soccer team suck. I easily slip into my ego skin and find myself reacting. When I am my ego, I am constantly and perpetually repeating the same thoughts over and over again. I do this to create permanence and predictability and therefore feel in control of my existence. A lot of repetition goes on there. So when someone cuts me off in traffic, guess what, been there, done that before, so I know how to react. Open and shut case. Depending on my state of awareness, I may entertain these thoughts for a couple of minutes or a couple of seconds. But I will fall for them most of the time. As mentioned, definite weak spot of mine.

What is fascinating to me about all this is the fact that I am doing the same damn thing every time. I re-act. I act the same way again and again. First in my thinking and then in my actions. So I am literally acting the same way I did before in light of the same ‘situation,’ which is to say in light of the same thoughts. That is a very limiting way to live to say the least. It denies us choice, to be able to see another way of being with a situation, or to act in a way that we may never have before. Instead we go with our well established and comfortable routine and even call that a good thing. I know my brother, sister, best friend, spouse, this is what they’re like, reliable like an old dog, you can count on them to react the same way every time, and it’s also hard to teach an old dog new tricks. By saying this, we simply solidify the idea of that person, and solidify the illusion that they are a permanent fixture in their ways. And what we end up with is the comfort of predictability and repetition. The ego enslaves us to the fake comfort of fake permanence.

The ego is also the ultimate reactionary. It wants to keep the status quo. It does not like change and has to keep things as they have always been, so that it may keep up the illusion of control over its own existence. It holds on to patterns and rituals and declares them essential. The perfect reactionary holds traditions as holy and sacred. They may not be challenged or questioned, and most certainly not changed. That is tantamount to sacrilege. They may not be messed with. If you dare to, you will be met with fierce resistance. This can go as far as physical violence. The ego will stop at almost nothing to defend its status quo and that can include its own demise. It never questions the origins of its dearly held traditions it is willing to die for. It will not entertain the possibility that it was simply made up by someone at some point. Everything the reactionary is so attached to was indeed made up at some point. But the idea that it could be changed or unmade is unthinkable.

There is another level to all this repetition, which is habit. Habits are what the ego is really good at. As the keeper of memory, it is actually the best at it. When I do something a couple of times, the ego stores this experience and makes sure to automatically pull that information when needed. So I will remember not to touch a hot stove. I will know not to grab a knife by its blade. This is incredibly practical and helpful. This does not limit my life experience, it makes it safer. It does not make me fear or hate stoves or knives. I simply use the information to make sure I won’t get hurt. I will remember how to speak my language, how to do math, drive a car, get dressed, eat, walk, etc. All of this is automatic and enhances my experience as a human. It’s a beautiful design. And then we start turning these habits into us, and bingo, we are a reactive reactionary.

All because we forget that we are temporary, that the ego is nothing but the story keeper of our human existence. Because we fall so deeply asleep to forget our own impermanence and that our life is but a mere moment in the vastness of all life. Billions of people have come and gone, billions of stars have come and gone, and billions upon billions will continue to do so. To the ego this is the most frightening fact of all, because when we dare to think like that, our life loses its importance to us, it becomes something we get to enjoy and do, and is no longer who we are. Our mind gets cleared up and quiets down. We begin to get back to our original state of human beingness, not human has been or human will be. The ego goes back to doing what it is designed to do, to give us a safe trip through human land.

Next time you see yourself re-acting, stop the show and realize that you are in the (insert your name here) show and get to call the shots about how this particular episode is going. You are the writer, director, producer and star of this show called your life. And who wants nothing but re-runs all the time?

Cheers,

Ralf

P.S.: I can now talk about the nomination for my book, check out The Book page on the site if you’d like to know more.

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Eternally temporary

I went to my wife’s former middle school today to spend some time with the kids. Before I went she reminded me that she used to roam those halls a mere 21 years ago. So as I roamed the halls I was trying to imagine her running around between classes, chatting with her girlfriends, all wide eyed about her unknown future and her life ahead of her. Now in her mid-thirties, I know that most people would agree that she still has her life ahead of her, as I am sure a 100 year old might say that to a 70 year old. But what if we all had a life expectancy of 150 years? How would that change the way we looked at our lives at 65? We would ‘expect’ to barely have gone past the first third of our life. Would we still retire then? Would we maybe take a break from work for a couple of decades only to start another career? Would we wait with having kids until we’re in our fifties? Think about how everything would change with that shifted expectation in mind.

At the same time, we could always die ‘prematurely,’ just as we do now. We could sit and wonder about where time has gone by the time we’re 140 and in different ways prepare for the impending ‘end.’ So in a way nothing would change. I think that’s very human of us. We are the only beings we know about who can think about themselves in a fully conscious way and ask ourselves who we are, why we’re here and what it’s all about. With that comes our very acute sense and obsession with time. We know that time is relative – ten minutes waiting for bad news feels like an hour, while spending an hour with a loved one can feel like a second – but we never really consider how incredible that very difference is.

Nothing lasts. Absolutely nothing. Countless processes are at work in our bodies at any moment, as there are countless more on the planet. Things coming and going all the time. Any thought we have comes and goes in a flash, and unless we could remember to repeat a thought, we would remain like babies. So this is a good thing, don’t get me wrong, but it happens automatically and we don’t have to do anything to be able to function very well as a human being. Where it gets challenging is when we get lost in time and try to create a sense of permanence around what we call ‘me’ to feel more real. You know, like telling stories with old friends about the ‘good old days,’ looking at pictures from past adventures, thinking about the things we have achieved, etc. Then we add to this ideas about our future, things we want to achieve, places we want to go, things we want for ourselves and others. All of this is inherently done to make ourselves feel more real, more permanent. It’s because we live our lives solely within the time bound confines of birth-to-death. In this model that past and the future is what defines us, what makes us unique. Without the past and future we would not exist, because there would be no reference point, no ‘content’ to our lives.

But what if we lived our lives in the relativity of time? What would change? Think about that. We would be present-bound, not time-bound. We would still have memories of the past and thoughts about the future, but we wouldn’t be them. We would be here and now, period. Our ability to remember things would simply enable us to live our life, but they would not be us. Time would become as immaterial to us as it truly is. There is a lot of freedom in that. Ask any older person who is deeply content and happy, how they feel about time. I think in their own words they will tell you that nothing is permanent, and that all they enjoy is the moment. Nothing is eternal. Everything is temporary. It’s all eternally temporary.

Depending on how you live your life, that can be deeply disconcerting or deeply reassuring.

Cheers,

Ralf