If You Could Think Just One Thought

Here’s a question that can teach us a lot about ourselves.

If you could think just one thought for the rest of your life, what thought would you choose? 

I’m immediately reminded of a story I heard somewhere about a cloister in which the monks kept complete silence except when they met one another in passing.  Then they spoke, but only to say, “Remember, you’re going to die.”

Talk about an idea that helps keep perspective.

Among the most transformative ideas to shape my life has been: How we define our world actually creates our world.  Few gifts have been more liberating and humbling because, so far as I can tell, it touches the core of all life’s hardship, the most pernicious human addiction: the belief that events (including the behavior of others) are responsible for how we feel. 

My joy, disappointment, satisfaction, anger, blame, every opinion and value judgment—all are entirely self-created, based on just one thing: how I define my world.  Events may trigger such reactions, but they don’t cause them.  The cause is always us.  The only thing we are ever victims of is our own definition of reality.

• • A pie in the face is not responsible for how we feel about it.  
  • No one has ever pissed us off.  Or made us happy. 
  • Nothing is unforgivable or unacceptable; there are only things we choose not to forgive or accept.
  • There has never been a bad day, or a good one.  There are only experiences we find particularly challenging or heartbreaking––or particularly fulfilling. 
  • A truly healthy relationship with another is prevented by holding them responsible for our feelings, or them hold us responsible for theirs.

So when I encounter the common refrain that we live in tumultuous times, I say not so fast.  Sure, fear, uncertainty and doubt may arise in response to the self-destructive choices we humans make in our ignorance.  But those feelings are not imposed on us.  They are, rather, a conclusion we come to solely as a result of how we have defined our world.  

The point here is not to deny our feelings, but to realize where they come from––and celebrate that fact.  

The more we experience that our every judgment is all about us and what we’ve determined is real, the more we awaken our inherent power to make ever more healthy choices, leading to an ever more peaceful heart––no matter how painful events are. 

How does this awakening take place?  By growing our passion to learn from our experience––basically paying attention.

What choices am I making, why am I making them, and what’s the impact of these choices on myself and others?  Building ultimately to life’s two most important questions: What’s going on, and what’s the healthiest action I can take in this moment?

The active, never-ending practice of uncovering the truth that resides within each of us adds light and space and understanding to whatever comes our way.

That I’ve spent years working to align my consciousness with How we define our world actually creates our world, may reveal more than just how dense I am.  Namely, that it takes much repetition for good ideas to become an active, living presence in our cells.  

It’s why those monks continually remind one another of the inevitable.

Some number of incarnations down the evolutionary highway, we will be more open to the notion that each moment is a mirror, showing us ourself.  And as a mirror, the gift of any moment is its revelation of what is calling to be embraced so that we may become more of who we truly are: beings with an infinite capacity to love.  

P.S.

At the moment, my choice for the single thought I’d hold for the rest of this incarnation is: Everything is God.  

I can’t say I understand it, but it reflects my best sense of how the universe works.

We’re all manifestations of the One Essential Everything (often known as God) growing our inevitable conscious awareness of that reality over all the incarnations it takes to do so.  And, every speck of experience is a servant to that end.  Even the most bone-headed choices we might ever make.

That we may find that idea tough to get behind is part of the universe’s playful nature.  

Someday we will howl with laughter at all the misery we have caused ourself over countless incarnations simply because we were asleep, unaware, immature––and not for even a second because we were less than divine.