The Flow of Being and the creation of suffering from Steven Kaufman's blog

I am through living as a slave to external circumstances.  Feeling good when good things happen, feeling bad when bad things happen. I do not control when good things happen, nor do I control when bad things happen.  Things just happen. 

I may create the illusion that I control when things happen, as I am able to pick up an object and move it from here to there, but even this is only an illusion.  For when things happen, good or bad, the cooperation of the entire universe is needed, since everything is connected, and surely even I, with my enormous ego, cannot be so deluded as to think that I control the entire universe.

And so if I do not really control when things happen, then what is the point of being happy when good things happen, as if my team has won, and being unhappy when bad things happen, as if my team has lost? Things just happen. What-Is is as it is.

There is no team me and team them, no me versus the universe, or me versus them, or me versus whoever, to win or lose. There is only Team Universe, Team Being, and everything and everyone is on that team, whether it seems so or not, whether they seem to be with me or against me in a given moment, helping me to score, helping me to get what I want, or preventing me from scoring, preventing me from getting what I want.

Both wanted and unwanted are going to happen. That is just the way it is. That is just what is. But suffering does not have to happen.

Suffering only happens when I see the universe as a contest of me versus it, where, according to the rules of that game, that contest, I must then oppose whatever happens that is unwanted, in order to make room for the wanted, and cling to whatever happens that is wanted, in order to not make room for the unwanted.

For in opposing whatever happens that is unwanted, and clinging to whatever happens that is wanted, I am in a state of almost perpetual reaction to and opposition to What Is, which state of opposition to What Is, by its nature, is a state of suffering. 

In opposing What Is I pinch myself off from the flow of what I truly Am. It is not coincidence that the words suffering and suffocation are similar. Suffocation occurs when the flow of air is cut off or decreased significantly to the organism. Suffering occurs when the flow of Being is decreased to the Being.

But how can the flow of Being be decreased to the Being? How is the flow of water decreased when the source of that flow remains full? Through some sort of resistance to the flow that is coming from the source.

Only Being can resist the flow of Being. And Being that resists the flow of Being, and thereby decreases the flow of Being to Itself, suffers, as the flow of Is-ness, the flow of Beingness to Itself, to its Being, is reduced.

Consider a river, and from that river flow outward many tributaries, many smaller rivers. The flow of those smaller rivers is dependent on the flow of the larger river, for the flow of those smaller rivers is but an extension of the flow of the larger river.

Now consider that one of the smaller rivers, for some reason, is able to turn its flow back upon its source, so that its direction of flow is now in opposition to the direction of flow coming from its own source.  In opposing the flow of its own source, in resisting the flow coming from its own source, the smaller river, without meaning to, reduces its own flow.  In a smaller river we would see this self-induced reduction of flow as the smaller river beginning to dry up.  

As Consciousness, we feel such a self-induced reduction of Flow as suffering, as the feeling of being more or less cut off from our true or larger Self.

Our own Flow of Consciousness, directed in opposition to what is also our own Flow of Consciousness, thereby providing resistance to that Flow of Consciousness, thereby reducing that Flow of Consciousness, which reduction in Flow of Consciousness is apprehended by the Consciousness that is reducing its own Flow as suffering, or the self-induced suffocation of its own Being.

Amazing. Why would I ever undertake such folly?

Because I think I am me, a me, a form, and so in conflict and competition with other forms for the acquisition of still other forms to add to and protect the me, the form, I think I am.

Knowing myself as the River the idea to oppose myself does not arise.

Knowing myself as me, as a form, I feel obligated to oppose what is, when what is appears as something unwanted.. Knowing myself as me, I do not realize that opposing what is actually places me in opposition to what I actually Am. Knowing myself as me, I do not realize that I am creating the deep suffering, the suffocation of Being, that accompanies the unwantedness that I feel obligated to oppose. Knowing myself as me, and so not realizing that I am creating the suffering I feel,  that suffering then seems to come from and be a part of the unwantedness I am opposing, causing me to then redouble my efforts at opposing what is, thereby increasing my suffering and the seeming need to oppose what is in order to reduce the suffering that I am myself, through my opposition to what is, unknowingly creating.

This is the insanity that is, for the ego, for the form-identity, for me, normal behavior. In its own way it is a beautiful thing when observed from a position of detachment, beyond the ego. But while cloaked in the ego, where the process remains hidden, there seems to be only the suffering and the continued obligation to oppose what is.

Thus, it is not circumstances that create the deep unwantedness of suffering; rather, it is opposition and attachment to circumstances that actually creates suffering.  And what creates opposition and attachment to circumstances is the identification of Consciousness with form, or more specifically, with the collection of thought-forms collectively referred to as the ego.

Ultimately then, what creates suffering is the misidentification of Consciousness with something that It has created within Itself, which misidentification sets into motion a self-perpetuating chain of conditioning that seems to obligate me to oppose what is, and which opposition to what is then perpetuates the delusion of form-identity that creates that apparent obligation, by hiding from me my true nature as formless Consciousness as long as I, cloaked in the ego, continue to flow my Being in unknowing and inadvertent opposition to what is ultimately Itself. 

It is a very sticky wicket indeed.

However, all that is required is the sight adjustment of ceasing to oppose what is, and a kink arises in the chain of conditioning that provides an opening for Consciousness to reveal Itself to Itself, not as a concept, not as a form, but directly as That within which all form arises and by which all form is apprehended.