Observe instead of Judge :)

Happy Friday Everyone!!

I hope you are all having a SUPER end to your week so far 🙂 I read a passage from my book this morning and wanted to share it with you all because it really spoke to me 🙂 Let me know your thoughts! Love you!

” – If one knows what the particular disease is there is the possibility of curing it. To know that particular limitation, bondage or hindrance of the mind, and to understand it, one must not condemn it, one must not say it is right or wrong. One must observe it without having an opinion, a prejudice about it – which is extraordinarily difficult, because we are brought up to condemn. – J Krishnamurti

Alcoholics Anonymous has arguably one of the most remarkable track records ever complied in the difficult struggle to alter the course of a human life for the better. By the millions, people have gone to AA, let go of their addictions, found God and meaning in their lives, and moved on. It is an awesome reality. The first step in the process of turning your life around in AA is the admission of powerlessness over your addiction. This admission of powerlessness has been the wellspring from which millions have drawn their strength , and it is also the source of endless controversy. Fortunately, we don’t have to debate this issue here. Rather, we can reflect from the sidelines on how AA’s first step sheds light on our discussion of a more ancient path. If we were to follow Krishnamurti’s advice, and observe without condemnation, what would that feel like?

By and large, most of us observe our own transgressions – whether they are in the bedroom or in the boardroom – as though we know better, could do better, should do better, will do better next time. As we observe other individuals, companies, political parties, and nations, we tend to bring the same kinds of judgments to bear, expecting different results. In college I wrote a paper about a Central American country in which the north and the south have taken turns oppressing each other for generations. Most of us are all too familiar with such scenarios; it appears to be part of human nature to allow ourselves to stay stuck indefinitely. Caught up in a cycle no less destructive than this small embattled country’s, many of us stay stuck by being angry over our anger, sad over our sadness, lying to ourselves about our dishonesty. What would it mean to simply acknowledge our behavior without judgment, without denial, without hedging? Right now, in this moment, can you control your habitual responses to experience? Can any of us not be afraid? Can any of us not know desire? What would be a reasonable first step in forming a healthy relationship to something as fundamentally out of our control as our own deepest desires and aversions? Does an admission of powerlessness appear entirely unwarranted? Could a letting go at that level free us from the fruitless and endless struggle to control the uncontrollable? Could that kind of letting go deliver us to the place where we can begin to work honestly with what is?”

Passage from ‘Meditations from the Mat‘, by Rolf Gates and Katrina Kenison

Own it!!

HI Everyone!!

Hope your week is off to a great start! I know mine is – I am starting to feel better and am taking full ownership and responsibility for my own health and well-being. Please feel free to join me! It’s easier for us to want to blame our poor health (or the way we feel emotionally, or our jobs, or our relationships, etc.) on external circumstances. But when we do that, we are giving our power away to other things, other people. Let’s take our power back! Let’s OWN our state of being. I challenge you to CHOOSE to feel good, to feel happy for 24 hours, no matter what – starting now! Make a conscious decision, that regardless of what is happening around you, or happening to you – you will still be happy!! Once you begin to understand that happiness is in and of itself a state of being, and NOT dependent on external happenings, then, and ONLY then, will you be TRULY happy. The same goes for our health. Placing your health into the hands of others causes you to subconsciously sabotage yourself. If you’re always placing blame on something else, someone else, other than yourself – then you won’t be taking the steps necessary to make a change because it is out of your control. Take BACK your control – you CAN take control of your health! But it MUST come from within! Now I realize that this is not an easy thing to do. It’s actually very challenging. But taking the easy way out, isn’t always gonna get us where we want to go. Let’s learn to EMBRACE change. To EMBRACE challenge. And to know that every bump on the road of life is there to help us learn and grow!

Love you all!

Master Yah