Transformation versus fix-it mentality.
By Samantha Keen
Many people come to self development work or personal growth work with an attitude of needing to “fix” something about themselves. This is so different to an approach of stepping into something different, something bigger, that is imbued with the light of the higher self.
Transformation that really makes a difference is about stepping into and identifying with the light of the higher self throughout your whole life. Fixing a problem is a much smaller lens. You could even describe it as blinkered.
When you are trying to fix an immediate problem, you are focusing in on what is wrong. When you are looking at stepping into a different and higher part of yourself, for sure you do need to zero in on why you might not be stepping up but the bigger picture is the overall goal. This is real transformation in the work that I do with clients.
Transformation in the context of Inner Space Techniques (IST) is about bringing the light of the higher self, and self awareness into your other subtle vehicles of consciousness. The life force and the thoughts and emotions becoming imbued with the light of your own solar knowing.
This is not something that happens in one session, or even a few sessions. It is a way of being that involves continuing to dive into the places where there is darkness, or sleep, or vagueness or blockages and in those places finding this higher light inside of yourself.
The higher self could also be called the immortal flame, the essence of yourself, your own divine nature. And essentially it is an experience of stillness and silence of being that permeates everything.
I hold this bigger standpoint for my clients, directing their process to unlock the pieces which will really make a difference over their whole life from the bigger picture.
How can you step closer to your Higher Self in your Life?
My teacher, Samuel Sagan told me not long before he died in 2016 that the work is not only about “practice, practice, practice”, as he had previously said. The work is about being creative, smart, refined, and a little touch of genius. Yes you need to persist, and keep coming back to the practice. But that is not enough. On top of that stubborn persistence, you need something extra that is this artistic genius that brings the victory.
Tenzin Palmo a western Tibetan Buddhist nun uses the analogy of a mirror. If the mirror is covered in dust, you may wipe off a little bit of dust and see something of yourself. This can involve a huge flash of self realization or inner knowing. A spiritual experience.
(Reference: Straight Talk About #Enlightenment: Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo (#Buddhism)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzkK3wiBWRs )
Watch that video and look into her eyes when she looks straight at the camera while deconstructing the word “enlightenment”. She points to the truth that still even after any big opening, a majority of the mirror is still covered with dust, there is still work to be done.
“When you get a realization it’s like you make a hole in that dust and you can see the nature of mirror. And that’s a huge, big step forward. But there’s all the rest of the dust. And until you’ve completely removed every single spec of dust from that mirror, your mind, and there’s absolutely no more dust left you’re still in delusion. When there’s absolutely no more dust left and it’s never going to fall back, then you’re a Buddha. That takes a long time,” Tenzin Palmo says in the video.
I like the way that the Tibetans see this practice as something that happens over lifetimes. I relate to this from my own practice. I have found parts of myself that practiced in the past and I know that I will practice in the future. This is not a one-life endeavor. And therefore, it is definitely not a one-session endeavor! I am not a Buddhist. I am not religious at all. But I respect those that really practice, whatever path they are on. I consider them my fellows in some way, along the path to peace and truth.
Transformation involves accessing deep wells of Inner Stillness and Being
In my own path of transformation, I have had huge shifts when in silent meditation at times. But not always.
The shifts come when there are big states of sustained silence and Being in the meditation or practice, because this is where the higher self can really come forward. In the noise of the ordinary mind, there really is no room for that higher part.
Palmo also talks about the mind as a wild animal and asks in another youtube video , “how do we tame this wild animal?” (Reference: Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo: On Meditation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEW6jEjVXVk )
“It’s only when we actually sit and try to quieten the mind and keep it focused on one point then we recognize that we are not in control of our own mind, and this is serious because we are never separate from our ordinary conceptual mind. I mean on a relative level we live in our mind,” Palmo says.
IST is an interactive practice based on a meditation approach of sourcing consciousness where the client dives into their consciousness to find the essence of their own being. This essence is inside, behind, underneath the blockages and samskaras. Samskaras being the Sanskrit term for emotional scar.
Therefore in this practice, it is not about making things nice, and better. It is about getting to the source of things, which does take you to Being and in that Being there is great states of Peace. Peace that can be fiery or soft. Those states are full of presence and connection.
Many Clients come to sessions because they Want to Feel Better
I have done this myself in the past too, tried to use IST to get better, to fix a problem, to solve something that I think is wrong.
When I first came to the work I had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, CFS which involved many many uncomfortable symptoms. And without realizing it, I was in a great existential dilemma. I wanted to find peace inside of myself. Including in my physical body.
I started to meditate and in that practice saw that a lot of my dis-ease came from something energetic. This led me to find Clairvision School of meditation because I was searching for a meditation approach that took into account the “energy” in my body. Although at that time I had not studied this type of thing, I just knew it was what I needed to do in order to get better. It did work. I was cured from CFS using the Clairvision techniques including IST.
But the big thing was not really about getting physically better. It was finding the source of my dis-ease which was this great existential yearning for some inner meaning and a spiritual path. I did not know that is what I needed because I came from a background where spirituality did not exist really. A very science, rational, materialist background. I had no context for this thing that yearned so deeply and intensely to find.
When I started IST with a practitioner, I was surprised how much I really clicked with the approach of transformation. It really made sense to me to use these techniques of IST to go deeper and deeper into the self, finding anything and everything in the way and moving through them, systematically to enhance my own ability to connect to states of inner being.
When I started to study IST I had already done many weeks of silent meditation in groups with other schools and knew that I needed help to shift something. Yet I was kind of like the blind person, knowing but not knowing what I knew. I just felt an internal click and I went with it.
Now, after 23 years of intensive practice – including many retreats every single year practicing in groups, completing over 5 thousand of sessions for clients around the world, over the years, many silent meditation retreats of 2 or 3 weeks, or even 4 weeks at a time, teaching people how to practice IST, helping communities to set up and be effective together to support regular meditation practice – I can only say that it has become more simple.
I understand now that the techniques for the purpose of transformation are really part of a whole approach towards becoming this core which is filled with potential and inner knowing. This is a pathway to be able to connect to the real light of the higher self throughout at any time. This means accessing stillness, silence, inner knowing, light and being through choice.
In order to do this it takes persistent practice, and sometimes in that practice it is great to have someone to support and guide you. Really great. That is what seeing an IST practitioner is about, for me.
IST can be used to resolve minor problems, punctual health issues at times, punctual neurosis. You can come with the idea of fixing something. Often it helps in some way.
But this approach of fixing the problem of the day is not the best way to engage this practice. This practice is best used from a bigger standpoint of wanting to shift into something much bigger of ourselves, that is not caught in the waves of every little fluctuation inside and outside of ourselves.Yes this does quieten the mind, and bring peace. And more than that, it gives an entirely different perspective on life.
If you are curious to know how this would impact your life, I have 5 spots available in the coming two weeks for a 30-minute discovery call.
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