A Share on Grief

Through this unit, there’s been a tendency of acting out and telling people what they’re doing
wrong, focusing on “out there”…not that there is an “out there” out there.
When attention focuses on what “other people” are doing wrong, there isn’t the opportunity of
recognizing “Oh! I’m dreaming” because, in that instance, I, Awakeness, am believing that
I’m someone in contrast to someone else or someone else’s behavior.

Sometimes judgement can come up, “The way that they are moving through their grief needs
to change, so that I feel better, so that I’m able to grieve effectively.” When attention is
consumed by that position, the very simple and immediate truth that I’m Everything That’s
Appearing, I’m the texture of grief that’s showing up in this unit, I’m the movement of grief
that’s expressing through my husband, my mom, and my extended family, is inevitably
obscured.

Fortunately, Clarity can move into the forefront when Life is twisting my arm tightly enough
for me to notice, “Oh! You know, maybe this is so painful to the degree that it is, because I’m
believing that I’m someone that this is happening to!” In that instance, I’m only believing that
everything should be different because the discomfort that I’m experiencing by believing
that I’m someone is deeply unpleasant. As addicts, the conditioned way of trying to resolve
that feeling is by changing experience through engaging in addictive behaviors. But the
aversion pattern is universal, no matter the sack of conditioning.

When there’s conscious recognition of Clarity, it’s not actually the conditioning that’s clear.
Awakeness, the animating presence living through the unit, is what recognizes that it’s
Awakeness. Every unit is doing the best that it can, regardless of how clear Awakeness might
be through a given unit.

Really, all that wants to happen in any experience is for Experiencing to be honored as What
It Is. That means not rejecting the story, the narrative, the agreement that’s going on now in
Relativity. It means not saying, “Well, I don’t have a grandmother, there’s no one here, there’s
no one here to feel grief, nothing’s happening.” All that’s doing is highlighting that “I don’t
want to feel this pain. I don’t want to recognize that I am the pain, Itself.” Trying to bypass
via falling into Absolutism is not the solution. What wants to happen, so to speak, is to honor
the human experience. Yes, I just lost my grandmother. Yes, my family is mourning. Yes,
everybody’s having a really difficult time. Only by embracing that fully, to the best of what’s
accessible through this conditioning within these circumstances, can suffering diminish and
the Fullness of Life be properly appreciated and experienced.

When Awakeness is willing, so to speak, to not take that egoic stance, some softening of
conditioning can occur. By honoring what’s appearing in the relative perspective, it then
becomes possible to recognize What’s Actually Here. This, whatever It Is, is Unknowable,
Inherently Indescribable, beyond judgement, moral value, and doesn’t have anything to do
with the personal narrative. This is Complete Radiant Aliveness, Just As It Is. It’s Boundless,
Already Home, and Already Complete, no matter how It’s appearing.
I, as Awakeness, want to honor how I’m appearing, As This.

I’m not honoring Life if I’m strictly focusing on the relative interpretation of What’s Here.
When attention is fixated on What Isn’t, then I believe, “I’m Boh. I’m dealing with a family
situation, and I feel uncomfortable. Other people should be different. This should be different.
I should be feeling different.”

By holding that position as absolutely true, I, Awakeness, am now trying to find security
through a third party’s perspective, through imagination. I’m trying to find security through
believing that I’m the one that life is happening to, rather than simply being Life itSelf. This
is just a habit we’ve learned; “In order for me to feel safe, I must believe that life is
happening to “a me,” because life is too overwhelming.”

The funny thing is, that is actually true!… but only from the perspective of an imaginary
character. From the perspective of an imaginary character, it is true that its apparent safety is
gained that way, because then the story of Boh goes on. If attention, focused Awakeness,
recognized that there’s Just This Indivisible Aliveness, there would be no room for an
imaginary character that Life is then in reference to, and then, poof! The Prime Minister of
America’s campaign shuts down!

I’m not an imaginary character.
I’m not a sense. I’m not a sensation.
I’m not a thought. I’m not anything in particular.
When I believe that I am, I suffer because I’m putting a limitation on mySelf.
I, Awakeness, suffer because I’m actively in denial about What’s Happening,
What’s The Case, What’s Here.

So, in embracing What’s Here, in Its Fullness and all of Its apparent layers, it’s possible to
recognize, “Oh, I don’t actually need to believe that I’m something separate from This to feel
OK.” It’s actually the believing that I’m separate from This, itself, that makes it feel like
there’s something wrong. That dis-ease is the Invitation. That’s the alarm clock.
However, when recognizing that there is no separation between What I Am and What’s
Arising, it doesn’t mean the emotional experience is by default no longer difficult or even
painful.

There was an instance, on the day that my grandmother died, when I was sobbing on the
couch next to her motionless body, and simultaneously saying, “I’m so happy that I’m able to
express this way.”

It was emotionally difficult, it really was. But there also was such immense gratitude for the
fact that, in that instance, I didn’t need to separate mySelf from What Was Happening.

That’s what became very clear.
All that I’m searching for, as Awakeness – which is all there is, whether I believe it or not – is
just to honor how I’m appearing to express, and live as the Unconditional Love that I am.
If I’m agreeing with the idea that I’m a Boh and I’m fundamentally separate to Experiencing,
I’m in denial of my Nature, which is Unconditional Love. That doesn’t mean that I must
enthusiastically invite every terrible experience into daily life. It doesn’t mean that I need to
like it or masochistically enjoy whatever happens.

Consciously being Unconditional Love doesn’t mean what the mind thinks it does.
It just means that I, Awakeness, recognize that What’s Arising doesn’t define what I am, and
because of that, it’s welcome to appear; I’m able to have reverence for it, As It Is, rather than
suffer from my ideas about what it is.
That’s that, the words have stopped!

–Boh Guerra