#being thought

I’m not sure I can describe the intensity of increasing discomfort I experienced from simply sitting and allowing myself to be thought. I didn’t think that’s what I was doing and in fact, I was startled at my level of unawareness with regard to the volume of thought I process each day; each hour! Day 1 of 3 was miserable as thought hit me like a firehose.

It was as if I turned off a television and could hear an unceasing jack hammer that got louder and louder and louder until it was no longer new to me...and then it dropped off.

The desire to look away from it was intense. I wanted to walk around, meditate so as to focus my mind, I wanted to read, I wanted to cancel my time in solitude, leave the desert and go to Big Sur and go into the Esalen Institute (which is free to go into after midnight). I wanted to do anything but face my own intensely, oppressively massive weight of non-stop thinking! 

I used to have a story that if I did The Work each day on whatever was causing me stress, that I’d be free from suffering within a year....maybe 2 years, 3 or 4 on the outside. Peace and contentment were only a matter of dedication and perseverance. Like paying down a debt.

I no longer have this story.  I have an equally untrue story that waking up will be or is on the other side of a traumatic break with the psyche. It doesn’t feel like it can be reached gradually by degrees. It also doesn’t feel (in this moment) like anything that is necessary.