Bingo!

Guess I had forgotten how very personal these lessons get 

as I move further through DeMello's writings.

The length of this entry equals the depth of awareness

this chapter brings to my life, again and again.

Wow!

Tax Collectors and Sinners

The Pharisees said to his disciples, 

"Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" 

Matthew 9:11

If you wish to get in touch with the reality of a thing, the first thing 

you must understand is that every idea distorts reality 

and is a barrier to seeing reality.

The idea is not the reality, 

the idea "wine" is not wine, the idea "woman" is not this woman.

Unfortunately most people most of the time do not take the trouble 
to see things like this in their uniqueness; 

they just see the words or the ideas, 

they never look with the eyes of a child at this concrete, unique, fluffy, 
alive thing that is moving out there in front of them.

The idea therefore is (always) a barrier to the perception of reality.

(Believing is seeing.)

There is yet another barrier to the perception of reality--

the judgment. 

It is barrier enough to have the idea of Indian or woman or peasant 

when I look at this concrete individual. 

But now I add a judgment and I say, "She is good," or "She is bad," or 

"She is attractive and beautiful," or "She is unattractive and ugly."

Inasmuch as they suit my purpose 

or please my eyes, 

or help me, 

or threaten me, 

I call them good or bad.

Therefore, the proper and accurate 

response when someone calls you beautiful is to say, 

"This person given his present perception and mood sees me as beautiful, 

but that does not say anything about me. 

Someone else in his place and depending on his background 

and mood and perception will see me as ugly. 

But that again says nothing about me."

How easily we are taken in by the judgment of other people and then 

form an image of ourselves based on this judgment. 

In order to be truly liberated you need to listen to the so-called good 

and bad things that they tell you, but to feel no emotion 

at the feedback any more than a computer does when data is fed into it. 

Because what they say about you 

reveals more about them than about you.

If you look at anything through the eye of judgment or approval 

or condemnation, is that not the major barrier 

to understanding and observing things as they are in themselves?

When someone tells you how special you are, all that you can accurately say is: 

"This person given his particular taste and needs, desires, 

appetites and projections has a special desire for me, 

but that says nothing about me as a person. 

Someone else will find me quite unspecial 

and that too says nothing about me as a person."

Refuse to take anybody seriously 

when they tell you how special you are.

The words, "You are special to me" simply say something about my present mood regarding you, my taste, my present state of mind and development. 

They say nothing else. 

So accept that as a fact and do not rejoice in it. 

What you may rejoice in is my company and not my compliment.

And if you are wise, you will urge me to find many other special people so that you are never tempted to hold on to this image that I have of you. 

(Hmmm...this is HUGE!)

It is not my image of you that you enjoy because 

you are ceaselessly aware that my image of you can change so easily. 

So what you enjoy is the 

present moment, 

because if you enjoy the image that I have of you, 

I will control you and you will be afraid to be yourself lest you hurt me, 

you will be afraid to tell me the truth, to do or say anything 

that would damage the image that I have of you.

(Yikes!)

Apply this now to every image that people have of you 

and they tell you that you are a genius or wise or good or holy, 

and you enjoy that compliment and in that minute you lose your freedom, 

because now you will be constantly striving to retain that opinion. 

You will fear to make mistakes, 

to be yourself, 

to do or say anything that will spoil the image. 

You have lost the freedom to make a fool of yourself, 

to be laughed at and to be ridiculed, 

to do and say whatever feels right to you 

rather than what fits in with the image others have of you. 

(To be "unfiltered"...)

How does one break this? 

Through many patient hours of study, awareness, and

observation, of what this silly image brings you. 

It gives you a thrill combined with 

so much insecurity and unfreedom and suffering. 

If you were to see this clearly

 you would lose your appetite to be special to anyone, 

or to be highly regarded by anyone. 

(Yuck!)

You would move about with sinners or bad characters 

and do and say as you please, 

regardless of what people think of you. 

You would become like the birds and flowers 

that are so totally unselfconscious, 

too busy with the task of living 

to care one little bit about what others think of them, 

about whether they are special to others or not. 

And at last, 

you will have become 

fearless and free.

(The Kingdom of Heaven? Heaven on Earth? BINGO!)