The Hell we make Ourselves

This is a continuation of the previous post "Giving your all within going for what you want"

When you get arrogant, there are consequences. You may not be aware that your actions are having consequences, until it is 'too late'. The thing about arrogance is the inability to see consequences. You think you've 'got something', and that that 'something' is a 'sure thing'. You stop questioning yourself. And when you stop questioning yourself you become blind to what's happening around you.

You stop seeing that things are always in movement. Everything is always moving even if it doesn't seem like it. Arrogance makes you not move 'with' things. It makes you stagnate. It makes you stop breathing and stop living. It makes you also assume that, just like you came to a halt, so did the world around you. And so you don't see that in fact, life is always 'on the move'. Just cause you gave up, doesn't mean that the world stopped turning.

You sink into a 'lazy couch' inside of yourself, from where you don't see any 'urgency' to move 'with' your reality, to pay attention to your reality. Unfortunately, when consequences play out, it becomes an 'emergency'. But then there is no action that can reverse or undo those consequences. Then there is just the bottomless pit of regret for not having been more humble.

Arrogance is like shooting yourself in the leg. But by the time you realize you've shot yourself in the leg there's nothing you can do anymore. You now need to make peace with the consequences and not to mention the anger at yourself for having done it to yourself. There is nothing worse than realizing that what is happening is completely your own doing and that there is nothing you can do about it now because you should have just not been so arrogant.

The only way to 'beat' arrogance, is to just keep breathing. Breath is the pace in which life moves, which is 'in every moment', always present, always aware. Never coming to a halt. It is a constant flow and if you don't move 'with' that flow, in humbleness, you might end up in your own self-created hell.

To stay humble in every moment is a constant reminder to yourself. To constantly remind yourself that "life is moving" and, "My reality is moving, so I must be here, present and breathing."  To be moving with and as the flow of life or you'll get swept away the moment you sink into a seemingly 'sure thing' and stagnate.

Giving your all within going for what you want

This is a continuation of the previous post "To be Passionate"

One 'trap' of the ego that I fell into which I did not realize - because I did not question it - is arrogance. Thinking that I've got something. Thinking that life will come to me instead of understanding that I must go to it, because I'm 'special'.

I don't really have to put in the work. I don't have to really challenge or push myself. In a way 'I'm already there'. I'm just that special. Meanwhile thinking and believing that I'm humble.

Of course I would think that I am humble, because I am not in fact humble in reality. If I was humble in fact, there is no way that I would EVER think that I am. I would just be it. Cause I would realize that it takes HARD WORK to be anything real. It takes hard work and never assuming that you've 'reached' anything. It has to be here. Meaning it has to be evident. Not just a thought, belief or assumption. It has to be living proof.

I believed that I just deserve good things. I don't need to really work for it and prove myself worthy. I just deserve it, because I am special. That's arrogance.

To be humble is to realize and understand that I 'deserve' nothing. To not 'assume' anything. If I want something, I need to work for it. I must be PASSIONATE about it. As in state, "Yes, this is what I want! And I will do anything to make it a reality!"

Guess I'll need to revisit my definition of 'passion' which I shared in my post "To be Passionate" lol. To be passionate is to go for what you want BUT to not be 'patient'. To not expect or assume that things will come to you. To rather 'take matters into your own hands' and 'give it your all' to make it happen.

There is humbleness in that. You have to humble yourself to say "I don't have this yet" or "I don't deserve this yet" BUT I will do anything to make this happen because it's what I WANT.

How is Blame a Laziness of Self?

This is a continuation from the previous blog post "What does it really mean to care for others?"

A place where I can already see that I can start applying that self-honesty and humbleness is in relation to my thoughts and reactions to other people. I've noticed that when it comes to other people I have actually been thinking and believing myself to be 'self-honest' and 'humble' yet when I had a real honest look at my actual thoughts then I had to realize that I'm actually not at all!

There's a lot of thoughts and reactions I 'let slide'. Mostly it's reactions and thoughts of judgment where I'm judging someone for not being more like who I believe I am or should be. That means that what I judge about people is when I perceive they're not being humble. There's a reaction of annoyance or even hate that comes up in me, it's a pretty intense reaction.

So, why is there such an intense reaction to this particular point? Really it's cause I see them do what I am actually secretly doing in my own mind. I am not humble at all within my mind. I do the equivalent of boasting and attention-seeking in my mind. I react so intensely to others doing it because it's just something that I am not honest about with myself. So, my reaction is there to show me what I am not being self-honest about. I mean, as I realized in the previous post, I don't know how to really be humble because I've just never done it.

So one way I can practically start applying and living humbleness in these situations is to, whenever I find myself reacting to how I see someone else behaving, immediately look at what my reaction is showing me about what I'm not being honest about with myself. To immediately realize that this reaction is about me, not the other person. It's for me to learn from about myself.

Humbleness is thus like the reverse of blame. Where, in blame you point fingers outward, like arrows shooting out, but with humbleness all the fingers or arrows point towards self. There's very much a self-responsibility. There's also a lot more effort involved with being humble, because now I actually have to take ownership of what I used to just blame or project on others.

Blame is very much like laziness. It's laziness of self. Maybe that's why it's called 'B-lame'. It's easy to blame another person. It takes a lot more effort to actually look into "OK why am I reacting this way, what can I learn from this reaction and how can I do things differently?"

I've definitely been very lazy throughout my life. Never really put much effort into my life and was rather chasing quick energy fixes instead of working and building on something that will pay off in the long run. I'm realizing that that laziness also exists on an internal level in terms of just not being humble. But it's funny that I would then go and think of myself as 'humble' when it's actually the complete reverse.