Know Thyself is not enough...

I realize that Socrates, Know Thyself is but only the first step.  That being aware of one’s thoughts, one’s emotion and where it springs from, and that which forms the basis for our actions and behavior is only a prelude.

We are informed about ourselves, as we bring alertness and reflection to our behavior, recognize that these action modalities spring from attitudes and beliefs, consciously and unconsciously coded over time, but mostly during our primary family system – the early years, that enabled wiring in our brains, that played itself out thereafter, causing repeated  ‘déjà vu’ moments’ and patterned responses that moved us closer to success or doomed us to failure. A vicious and repeated able circle of inference and action, that spiraled our lives towards and inevitable consequence.  That Karma which comes from our ‘doing’, even if that meant not doing.

However, knowing thyself, is a continuous process, forever evolving, and the self evolves and unfolds, a journey in which the journey itself is richer than the destination. Truth is, that when the self is realized, the destination itself is reached. Truth is that when one recognizes for instance that the pursuit for perfection is but an ‘illness’, when one is already perfect (in our current imperfections), that there is every imperfection that is both necessary and relevant to our growth, that very 'amness' that allows for our growth: this realization enables the destination. We drop the search for ‘perfect’ and accept our own very special uniqueness.

Then we do what is the critical: Be Ourselves! We take responsibility for who we are. 

Swami Vivekananda says: “Never say any man is hopeless, because he only represents a character, a bundle of habits, which can be checked by new and better ones.”

Our Greatest Regrets

Our greatest regrets is not what we did do in our lives, but more the opportunities we missed. Conversation we did not have, vacations we did not take with loved ones, work opportunities and challenges missed. Work we did offer, but which could have been great.

Great work is anything you do with full mindedness, when you are in full flow, when you are in complete play, when every pore of your being is connected - when the dancer becomes the dance! It is perfect. Let no one lead you to believe otherwise.

We realise that every adventure we took into the unknown when realised took us to new heights of success, even the failures enriched and grew us, and enabled new potential. 

That the only real and meaningful purpose of our lives is to realise our own potential for excellence, and in accepting our own uniqueness. Not to be someone else, but to accept fully, who we are, and realise the 'self'.That self that endures beyond both our bodymind.

related blog, you may wish to read

Check this out:

40 Ways to Live Life Without Regrets

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/40-ways-live-life-without-regrets-suhas-palekar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jarRoP3Ai6M

Right to anger or sadness

There are other choices besides being angry or sad. It seems like a legitimate right, under extreme circumstances to go to a regular default emotion.

Click here for the rest of the message.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZ56ISrnmUc

Towards Executive Coaching

Power Tool:
http://archive.coachcampus.com/steve-correa-power-tool/


Coaching Model:
http://archive.coachcampus.com/steve-correa-addressing-development-opportunities/


Coaching Research:
http://coachcampus.com/coach-portfolios/research-papers/steve-correa-research-paper-research-design-and-questionnaire/

Mind is Buddha; No Mind no Buddha

Basso, zen master. 

When a child cries, he would share, 'mind is Buddha. However, when a child stops crying, he would say' no mind, no Buddha'. Everything is transient: everything is evolving. That which is, will change its form. That includes the earth. 

Everything is impermanent, and changes. That's is the nature of form.

For one who requires medicine, Buddha is offered. However, when one is settled within: there is no Buddha. No Buddha, no Sangha no Dharma. No mind, no soul.  

The No implies the bottomless, no beginning no end. The eternal. That which is all permanence. Tathagata is all that is.

Give three fourths of any picture, says Basso. Offer the completion to the other. One because it is not possible and also because you wish for the other to inquire into the rest, by searching one's own depth.  For there is the known, the unknown and then finally the unknownable.

Is the first quote, 'mind is Buddha' is like a Dragon without horns and the other 'no mind, no Buddha is like snake with horns. In this, nothing needs to be done or undone. No need for any doing. No where to go, nothing to do. Just 'now here'.

Our past life, towards the end

This lovely parable is from "Your Sacred Self" by Dr. Wayne Dyer. 

In a mother’s womb were two babies. One asked the other: “Do you believe in life after delivery?” The other replied, “Why, of course. There has to be something after delivery. Maybe we are here to prepare ourselves for what we will be later.”

“Nonsense” said the first. “There is no life after delivery. What kind of life would that be?”

The second said, “I don’t know, but there will be more light than here. Maybe we will walk with our legs and eat from our mouths. Maybe we will have other senses that we can’t understand now.”

The first replied, “That is absurd. Walking is impossible. And what about eating with our mouths? Ridiculous! The umbilical cord supplies nutrition and everything we need. But the umbilical cord is so short. Life after delivery is to be logically excluded.”

The second insisted, “Well I think there is something and maybe it’s different than it is here. Maybe we won’t need this physical cord anymore.”

The first replied, “Nonsense. And moreover if there is life, then why has no one ever come back from there? Delivery is the end of life, and in the after-delivery there is nothing but darkness and silence and oblivion. It takes us nowhere.”

“Well, I don’t know,” said the second, “but certainly we will meet Mother and she will take care of us.”

The first replied “Mother? You actually believe in Mother? That’s laughable. If Mother exists then where is She now?”

The second said, “She is all around us. We are always surrounded by her. We are of Her. It is in Her that we live. Without Her this world would not and could not exist.”

Said the first: “Well I don’t see Her, so it is only logical that She doesn’t exist.”

To which the second replied, “Sometimes, when you’re in silence and you focus and you really listen, you can perceive Her presence, and you can hear Her loving voice, calling down from above.”

Isn't this something similar to what we perceive in our lives as well ?? Just think about it.

* * *

We humans are a potential: we are always in a state of departing, never arriving. Our lives are a journey to perpetual unfolding of the being. Being and becoming is the ‘amness’ we experience throughout the living saga. We are a seed of infinite potential. Every moment is a death to our past, and a re-birth to a new beginning. We are the mustard seed, with the potential to be the mustard tree. The alpha and the omega is one: time creates the phenomena. Unless we surrender to each moment completely we will be caught with the vicissitudes of the present: the past will cling to us, the future will create new evocations.

The caterpillar must die to the process of the unfolding of the butterfly, the seed must die to the earth to emerge as a sapling.

 Life and death are one: they exist together. The dawn gives way to dusk, day to night and vice versa. Life is cyclical, not sequential. The phenomena around us reveals just that.

Where the beginning is eternal and the end is eternal, and one just lives in the ‘in-between’ truth be said, that that is but transient.
As Buddha said, ‘all that is created, must die’.

Or when Lord Tennyson wrote,

"The old order changeth, yielding place to new, And God fulfils Himself in many ways,

Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.

Perceptual Canvas

Our Perceptual filter within

We view the world through our own perceptual filters. We need to be aware of this in order for us to constantly have an inner dialogue with ourselves in order to create an appropriate reflective interpretation and in managing boundaries.

We view our world through the five senses, but perceive it through a mix of judgment and perception, that informs our decision making (read more on MBTI). Decision making oft gets made at a subterranean level. Unconscious processing leads to meaning making, choice taking, role taking, and action modalities that go beyond conscious choices. Spaces, unknown get filled automatically, and unconsciously, leading to mixed messaging. We fill in the gaps, even when no data is available.(read Gestalt Projection).

Truth be said, our communication is an unending Projection and Introjection and further re projection. As I speak to you, I project through words, tone, and body language, that which is my perceptual canvas, which the other receives (introjection) through his filters, understands it ‘his way’ and then adds an interpretation and re projects it back, and so on and so forth.

In the cyclical nature, one forgets, the ever escalating vortex that escalates, who did what to whom.The origin for this phenomenon comes from infantile relatedness – a child wishing to connect with mother (read Eric Erikson, stages of man).

This mutual bonding supports containment ensuring regulation with empathetic resonance, that feelings do not go out of control. Bewilderment and disbelief follows if the containment is not effective. Women in this regard are better advantaged with this skill over men, which they bring to the workplace. These infantile and interactive scripts are reviewed in future instances, re lived and re –experienced. The ‘terrible two’ years are reenacted, destructive to ourselves and to others. This reenactment must be accompanied with a twist, to enable change. If you put the same input, process it all the same all the time, are you surprised if you end up with the same output? Things that fire together, they wire together. How you think, feel and act determines your personal reality and the outcomes which you get out of your life. Developing new insights, helps you to rewire. 

We need to be aware at all times: that which comes from our past, and throws a shadow over the future. If we forget history, we would be condemned to repeat it. While truth is eternal, this obfuscation of our perceptual canvas, could well beg the question, "whose truth is it anyways?'.

In case you wish to read more on the similar area:
http://zencaroline.blogspot.in/2009/07/projection-and-introjection_26.html
http://zencaroline.blogspot.in/2009/07/gestalt-processes-explained.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8a3-DyMUHQ
(clips from movies around Defense mechanisms)

Conversations - a route to our hearts

Unless we begin to strike a conversation, building a relationship is impossible. The very basis for relationship is to make connection, even if that conversation begins with a gesture (establishing eye contact, a moment longer than  usual), a deep acknowledgement (doffing one's cap), a touch (with a handshake).

Wisely, Buddha advised his monks: stay not in the same place more than three days except in the rainy season (for practical purpose); do not beg for food (not ask, but stand and be noticed by a householder, then move away after a while), look not beyond a few yards, avoid eye contact that lingers, avoid conversations if possible. If conversation is necessary, address using terms as 'Sister, Mother" etc to women. Avoid touch, but if that is not possible, remember your deep purpose and stay in that awareness.

A famous oft repeated story: two monks were crossing a river which was in spate. A young woman who wished to cross was experiencing difficulty. Silently, the elder monk lifted her and carried her across the river than placed her on the other side and walked on. After a couple of hours, the younger monk, enquired of the older monk, "being a monk, why did you carry her?'. He replied famously, "i dropped her on the river bank long ago; it seems you are carrying her still".

For most of us, building relationships is key to how we get the most of life. A stranger becomes a friend, through conversation. Conversations are like an investment into a bank - the more you converse, the greater is the relationship you build.

In my work in HR, I have seen the power of the spoken word. When two people simply connect and each one shares how they feel in an ongoing conflict, the conversation itself clears the air. Just sharing, what I feel, and listening to the other, helps the relationship to deepen.

Relationships that are broken, is evident with the lack of communication between the two sides.

So how does one go about it. Try this:

Ask for time of the other. Choose a pleasant venue which is quiet and relaxed and no scope for interruption. State that you want all of the 30 minutes you requested. Request the other not to interrupt you, unless you finish speaking( even if you pause for a while), ensure you get that commitment verbalised before you begin. Share your feelings about a few recent events: 2- 3 facts, the context and event, what it made you 'feel' and how it impacts your relationship with the other. Continue with other 2 examples. Then sit back and keep quiet and let the other person respond. Remember: do not accuse or defuse, state your feelings. Thats all.

Try it, it might just help towards clearing the air. Mend back that relationship badly in need for repair. 

Values

Values – a reflection.

What makes a group become a team? A drowning child (say at a beach) observed by onlookers may together spring to action to save the child. What was an assortment of people could be channelized as a shared purpose for the moment. Task accomplished they disperse. But is that enough to be called a team? I argue that for a team to really emerge, a shared value must also be agreed, as to how the team members will behave towards achieving the goals.

As is known, our behaviour springs from our attitudes, our attitudes from our beliefs, our beliefs through our Values. Values are the bedrock- our true north that guides all our Thoughts, Feelings and Actions.

Our view of the world is the lens of our values. Seeing a glass half full or half empty, seeing constraints or opportunities. What do we really mean, when we say, “it all depends on the situation”. Clearly, at first level we argue that it is not just the content of the phenomena; there is a context too that needs to be examined. But when we examine the context, we inject our values to it.

So it seems that that which changes is impermanent, for what is created must cease to exist some day. For it is argued, that if there is no clear beginning or clear end, just a deep middle: then by definition it must be transient. So are our lives: it will cease some day; our dreams: for it will break one day. This unreal believed to be real itself does not exist.

Values espoused by group members are credos by which the group will subject itself. It contains negotiability, resilience and Vision. Through this members hold themselves and each other responsible and accountable. There is mutuality of goals, and interdependence.

Values can only be believed when one ‘walks the talk’: when there is consistency in thought, feeling and action. It is only when these modalities are synchronized that members invest in the emerging Institution.

Trust comes from authentic conversations. From deep intelligence from those who have deep awareness in investing in relationships. Relationships  that support mutuality of growth, not from attachment. A relationship from self assuredness, and self sufficiency, and not from emptiness, or from a void that exist from within.  Seems to me that most of us is caught with the joys of the desiring, and not from the object of the desire. The object is just there: a spouse, a career, etc. What is attachment is the concept that comes with the possession of the object.

Drop the attachment. Stay aware