Stories Of Suffering

In order to be free, we need to be very honest if we are not.

Are we hearing and attending to stories of suffering we tell ourselves as if they defined us, or are we free of such stories of suffering, attending to what is true about the nature of our experience?

Stories of suffering about the body-mind itself that indicate its imperfection and mortality will mean we cannot be whole, safe, and free.

Stories of suffering about the relationships the body-mind has or doesn’t have with the world and other body-minds, that indicate wholeness, safety, and freedom depend on circumstances and that we allow our freedom to be restricted by these.

Stories of suffering about the separation of the self that we imagine is identified with the body-mind that tell us we are an inadequate person separate from the Universe, that we have to try and manipulate and control to make us happy in some way, and that is not on our side.

What we find is that as we attend to what is true about the nature of our experience, which our mind cannot know as a limited reality, we free ourselves from these stories of suffering, which are all stories of the mind claiming it knows and can define the self as a separate object.

Then, our innate life force of courageous, loving wisdom flows freely.

So, each moment, the free choice is ours.

Do we attend to the stories of suffering, or do we attend to what is true about the nature of our experience and break free of the stories of suffering?

First, we must desire freedom no matter what, to be free of the stories of suffering that have a powerful gravitational force, drawing our attention to fear-inducing thoughts and feelings, which means genuinely recognising our wholeness lies within and not in the world.

Secondly, based on our uncompromising desire for freedom from suffering, we must courageously be what we find through detailed inner examination to be true about the nature of our experience when we glimpse it. For it is in this truth that we have found freedom, which means genuinely recognising we are in an impersonal 'no-thing' reality, which is everything in the various forms of something, and there is no evidence this is a personal separate reality, and there is a person at all and therefore we can be open this true nature being the impersonal source of all that exists.

Thirdly, we must utterly honestly and, without any shame or guilt from identifying as a person, face the legacy of the stories of suffering and the fear they create that we inevitably continue to experience. This is so we avoid falling into the trap of believing we have attained complete freedom when we have not and prevent ourselves from falling under their influence.

As we live like this, we can transform the story of suffering into an experience of courageous, loving freedom for our lives.

Love,

Freyja

😊