The Story Of The Universal Family.

Life is an experience we are having right now. This experience consists of three fundamental elements: thinking, and that which is classified by thinking as a multitude of patterns of sensorial experiences grouped into the categories of body and the world surrounding the body, and finally, the awareness of thinking and sensorial experiences. Those three elements can usefully describe our experience at this moment. All minds can attest to this. We can believe whatever we want, but what we experience consists of these elements. If we are to find reliable happiness outside of belief systems it is to our experience of these three elements we must look.

You may be sitting in your home reading this with a cup of coffee. What you call your home and the cup of coffee is just a collection of sensorial experiences your mind is recognising and labelling as your home. What you are calling those warm feelings in your tummy are sensorial experiences your mind is recognising and labelling as warm feelings. Your mind may be thinking, "This is a nice cup of coffee". Your mind recognises this as a thought. But you are whatever is aware of all this. Whatever is aware of all this must be present because you would not be aware of anything if it were not.

Can anyone tell you differently? A psychologist may say to you all sorts of things about your mind and body, or another person may give you their opinions too, or a scientist may come up with the latest theory. But the only thing you can go by to be sure of what is going on is your direct experience. How can anyone else tell you about what you are directly experiencing? They cannot. Time and again, when asked to examine their direct experience of being alive, all people agree that it comes down to these fundamental elements.

Of course, we can intellectually break them down and classify them into further subgroups. We can classify sensations and physical bodily sensations, emotions, and senses of colour and form from objects around the body. We can classify thinking into negative and positive thinking, imagination and rationality. But these are all subcategories of the three fundamental categories. In all cases, our sense of psychological safety comes from some combination of these three elements of what you are experiencing right now.

You know you are feeling safe because you are not having thoughts that indicate something is wrong or missing or to be worried about. Instead, you are having thoughts that are supporting constructive activity at the moment. You are not feeling fearful or lacking or experiencing rapturous sensations in the body. Instead, the sensations are just neutral, calm, and not distracting your attention. You are aware of the activity at this moment and not attending to any thoughts that take you away from this moment. That is the simple definition of being present, psychologically calm, and safe. It's that simple.

In this place, you can function. You can enjoy the moment. You are not worried about visions of the future or analysing memories of the past. You are focused on the job of enjoying your experience of this moment. This is always the best place, the most optimal place, the happiest place, the safest place you can be. Isn't it? You are most safe when you are most present with your own experience. You are most present when you are consciously aware of your thoughts and what thinking classifies as various sensations and not getting lost in the flow of your thoughts and what they classify as multiple sensations.

If you are not consciously aware that you are what is aware and not these thoughts and feelings, then it is very easy to get lost in those thoughts and sensations. Some of those thoughts tell you, "You MUST do this to be happy," "You SHOULD do this to be happy," and "YOU will never be happy; there is something wrong with YOU." These thoughts, and many like them, inspire fear in the body. When you are lost in such thoughts and the concerns of the body and no longer being consciously aware that you are what is aware of them, how can you feel safe? Where can you go in your experience to find safety?

Remember, there are only ever three elements to your experience right now, and you can only look to one or other of these three elements to feel safe. Your thoughts are in turmoil, so they are not safe. Your sensations are in turmoil, so they are not safe. You have lost sight that you are what is aware of these thoughts and feelings, so you have lost the safety of your aware presence. In your fear, you may grip onto experiences around your body to feel safe, but will that really make you feel secure, or hide it for a while?

Soon, it becomes clear that there is never any lasting safety resting on your thoughts and what your thoughts call various sensations. They are constantly changing, never at rest, and not reliable. So, it becomes clear to you that unless you are consciously being your aware self that is aware of these other two experiences, you will never find any psychological safety.

Let us treat these three primal aspects as a family for a moment. You are the aware parent, and thinking is your teenage child, and your body is your young child. One day, you decide, as the aware parent, to leave your two children to go to the shops. You tell your teenage child they must look after their younger sibling, the body, while you are gone, and you won't be long. You go, and as soon as the door is closed, your two children start to feel unsafe as they have lost your reassuring presence.

As you leave, the younger child falls and hurts itself and starts crying. The teenage child panics, but all it can do is think its way out of trouble. So it pours out thoughts that try to stop the young child from moving so it won't damage itself even more. It starts trying to LIMIT the child's actions as this is the only thing it can think of doing. It does this by telling the child, "You are inadequate," "You will never be safe unless you stop moving," and "You must stay where you are."

All the while, the teenage thinking mind is also thinking, "I am not adequate to do this job," "Something more terrible will happen soon," "When I was young, I never learned what was necessary," and many other frantic thoughts. As the teenage mind pours out these thoughts to its younger sibling, all that happens is that the child's body gets more and more upset, feeling full of guilt, fear and shame and crunches itself into a little ball in fear. This way of staying safe is not working, but the adolescent mind doesn't know what else to do.

Eventually, both children call out for their parents to return, for they know deep down that it was only their aware parent that could make them feel safe. As their aware parent returns, they immediately relax. Because they have become upset, their aware parent may welcome their upsetness without judging it or criticising it, with infinite patient love. The parent may welcome the upset feelings of the child, and in this allowing, these feelings dissipate. As the child calms down, the teenage mind also lets go of any thoughts of limitation and panic. Then, this family of elements of experience are all present together in complete oneness and can enjoy the moment again.

Over time, the parent becomes more and more aware of its nature. It understands that, though it is not the same experience as its children, the thoughts and feelings, it is nevertheless real, and the aware parent knows it is here. It starts to understand that this reality is safe, not just because it can stand back and be the objective observer of the thoughts and feelings that were its children, but that it is much more than simply an objective observer.

It starts to understand its characteristics and become more convinced about these and gains even more confidence that it is the trustworthy source of safety for the family of experience at this moment. It understands it is a reality that has no limit, is always present everywhere and at all times, it is never changed by what it is aware of, it is always the same peaceful place, it is not separate from its children the thoughts and sensations, but these children are an expression of itself and made of the same stuff as itself. It starts to consciously experience itself as the reality of all experiences in this moment.

From here on, it thoroughly enjoys the flow of this moment, feeling utterly safe within itself, no matter what thoughts and sensations are going on. It knows that, though thoughts and sensations constantly change and come and go, even the ones that are classified as a body and the world, it is always present and never comes or goes. It knows that the whole universe, including the body and the world, is one big process that is constantly in a flow of various appearances and that the specific needs of the child's body will be met as part of this process. Thoughts and actions occur naturally to ensure this.

Now, what psychologists and scientists say about the patterns and processes of our children, the mind and body can be helpful in caring for them. Still, we know in the heart of our experience of his moment and being this aware reality, we have found our safe home that they can never achieve for us

Love,

Freyja