Seeing Beyond Dualistic Emotions

A negative emotion is an alarm bell revealing that there is attachment to some story in time happening. If resentment, sadness, guilt, or shame arises, notice that a story of past is happening. If anxiety or fear arises, notice that thought is telling a story of future. When anger or frustration arises, notice that there is a story of resistance to now happening (e.g., the driver in front of you is not doing what you want her to do).

Awakening presents the opportunity to see that these stories are arising now. You aren’t actually visiting the past or future. There is simply thinking arising in timelessness. Suffering is an illusion of thought.

Liberation is not about removing emotions or thoughts. It is not about destroying the ego. Only ego would seek to destroy ego. Liberation is about seeing how attachment to these stories in time creates suffering.

In seeing that this thought life is keeping a dualistic, time-bound, self-centered story alive, the possibility of liberation from suffering arises. In that seeing, attachment to these stories and their accompanying emotions dissolves on its own.

Liberation is not about replacing the negative stories and emotions with positive ones. It is about seeing what is actually happening in ‘your’ mental and emotional world. Peace, love, and joy arise in that seeing. These attributes of peace, love, and joy exist beyond dualistic emotions.

~ From: ‘Reflections of the One Life’, by Scott Kiloby