39. Illusions

As one mulls over things, sometimes an ‘aha’ moment arises. After more than a decade, an exercise I had participated in, at a self-awareness seminar suddenly made sense. The host had held up a teddy bear in his right hand and said “Hello!”, then he transferred this bear to his left hand and held it up. He repeated this action a few times and asked us, “What do you see?” We were asked to whisper our answers to a waiting panel at the back of the room and were given many chances to get it right. My focus had been on trying to find the meaning behind his actions. I still did not understand the point he was making, until now!

Isn’t trying to find meaning in everything a human creation? If something does not make sense, we make up stories that help us better understand what could be going on. I know I am guilty of this – creating illusions rather than seeing something as it is.  Recently, I heard many luminaries at an online summit. Conversations were focussed on why ‘being happy’ is so illusive. A fundamental point made was that it is hidden in plain sight.  When we experience our own essential nature, it is happy and full of joy. However, because we are entangled in our stories, we don’t make the time to understand or question the true essence of who we really are.

Connecting the two, I finally understood the exercise with the teddy bear. It was to just describe his actions as it was. We needed to notice what was in plain sight, there was no deep hidden message to decipher. We tend to complicate and try to be clever…too often it is simpler than we realise. Could the same be applied to being happy? Learning to live moment to moment, allows the calm awareness to descend, as there is no space to hold a story from the past or future that could create disturbances. At last, this state of ‘being happy’, no longer has any basis in transitory illusions!