Heaven is Here, Now! Are You?
by Nicholas de
Castella
Heaven is here, now. If
you do not agree with this it may be because you are not
fully 'here' to experience it.
Many religions teach
that after we die we will have the opportunity to
experience an imaginary place of happiness and bliss
called heaven, that is if we've been good enough in this
life. But what if this assumption is not true? What if
heaven is available to us now? If it is, then how do we
find it?
Our lives usually fall
far short of experiences we would call 'heavenly'. We
live in a culture that suffers from gross amounts of
stress, anxiety and unhappiness. If we could raise our
level of enjoyment and experience a little more
lightheartedness, then is it fair to say that this is a
step closer to heaven? I think so. Furthermore, if we
continue to lift our level of happiness, peace and love
we would continue to move towards an authentic 'heavenly'
experience here on earth.
Believing that heaven is
something elsewhere is one of the major reasons why we
don't experience it here and now.
Looking for something
better, somewhere else, means that we do not experience
life as it actually is. Instead we engage the thinking
mind which seeks, searches, analyses, compares and
evaluates. The thinking mind is always one step removed
from life. An experience rises in response to stimuli
received through our senses. The thinking mind performs
its tasks by interpreting this information. It basis this
interpretation on comparisons to memories of past similar
experiences. The interpretation is not the experience.
The impression generated is now abstracted: filtered,
distorted and removed from the actual experience.
The over active thinking
mind is a product of avoiding deeper connection to
feelings associated with our actual experience. We live
in a culture that encourages us to suppress our emotions
and disconnect from our feelings. Consequently we have
over emphasised the thinking mind and neglected the
feeling mind. Whilst our great technological advances are
largely thanks to the power of the thinking mind, it is
our lack of feeling connection that has led to the
situation where human desolation poses the greatest
threat to the survival of the planet. It appears that
there is a desperate need for each of us to develop
balance between our thinking minds and our feelings.
The more we live in the
thinking mind the more distant we become from the actual,
earthly experience of being alive. We lose touch with
what is real and what is not. As we become more firmly
entrenched in the thinking mind we lose touch with
reality as it is. We create and live in worlds that are
predominately mind generated fantasies. Feelings that are
not acknowledged generate rogue thoughts that are based
not on reality but on our assumptions, interpretations
and other illusionary scenarios. These rogue thoughts
give rise to emotions that have no currency in reality.
We spend an inordinate amount of time and energy lost in
a sea of mind generated emotions and consumed in drama
generated by thoughts that are not real, not related to
the present experience. The drama forms a smoke screen to
the genuine feelings that lie within. The more distant we
are from the experience of being alive the less we are
connected to the depth of beauty and wonder that is
available to us in each and every moment.
Heaven is here now, but
we are not. We miss the experience of what is actually
happening here and now because we are looking for
'something else'. We reject this experience because our
attitude is that this can't be 'it' (the ultimate,
heavenly experience). We reject the experience by
invalidating it, wishing it were different and by trying
to get away from it. The resistance to what is happening
and the struggle to free ourselves from whatever is
rising within us causes us to get more tightly tangled in
the net of suffering. Resisting the natural unfolding of
life creates pain. This is the root cause of suffering.
The full experience of
the truth of this current moment is only available to
those who are fully present. Being fully present means
being intimately aware of the thoughts we are thinking,
the emotions we are feeling and the sensations that are
arising in our bodies moment to moment.
But how many of us can
honestly say that we are that in touch with our feelings
and our bodies? We spend a lot of time and energy
disconnecting from our feelings and avoiding going deeper
into the experience that is available to us in this
moment. We keep our attention focused on the things
outside of us, on our 'problems' (very few of which are
actually happening in this moment). We keep busy so that
we don't have to stop and feel what is happening inside
us. We sedate and numb our bodies out of full aliveness
by the food we eat and the drugs we take: fats, sugars,
tea, coffee, alcohol... We avoid being intimate with
ourselves by chatting with others about issues that
reveal nothing about our experience in the moment.
Serving only as distractions from going deeper into
relationship with ourselves and each
other.
What feelings lie
dormant under our frenzied search for something
else?
We live on the run from
what we imagine lies within us. We are afraid of what
would happen if we exposed what lies within. Our anger
may raise its head and lead to our being seen and
rejected as a cold perpetrator. Our fear could leave us
looking weak, pathetic and inadequate. Our depth of grief
threatens to consume us should we drop into its abyss. We
fear the embarrassment and vulnerability of exposing the
emptiness, loneliness and confusion about who we are and
where we are going. The thinking mind was once our
saviour but now has become our cage. To attempt to think
our way out of the cage only reinforces the
bars.
All our fears, until
actually experienced, are no more than imagination! So
powerful is this illusion that every day I meet people
who use these horrific ideas to convince themselves to
stay in suffering, still hoping their intellect will save
them and settling for what they've got (or rather what
they haven't got). They would rather endure the suffering
deep inside in some dull and distant place, than risking
exposing themselves to the truth.
Alternatively our
suffering can provide the motivation to challenge our
tendency to flee and instead to turn and face the
contracted self that lies within. Freedom lies in the
exact opposite of what our fear tells us. Release from
our contracted state of being lies in the acceptance,
validation and open embrace of each experience as it is.
As we begin to allow our real feelings to surface we
often feel uncomfortable and frightened. As we get more
experience with feeling the flow of energy through our
bodies we gain confidence in allowing ourselves to let go
of control and we develop capacities that make feeling
and expressing emotion more comfortable and ultimately
pleasurable.
One of the greatest
commodities sold in our culture is the concept of
'getting ahead'. Everybody seems to be so consumed by the
idea that heaven is in the future: If I only try harder
or am a better man, women, mother, father, husband,
lover, worker.... then I'll be loved and happy. Finally I
will get the cheese at the end of the tunnel. Well
looking at the people in our nursing homes is not great
inspiration for pursuing the idea that things are
necessarily going to get better in the
future.
So how do we make a
start to freeing ourselves from the cage of our
suffering? First we must recognise and feel the cage. For
many the suffering has either become so much a part of
'normal' life that we don't question it or we have become
so detached, distracted and numbed out of life that we
can barely feel. Recognising the predicament we are in
gives us the incentive to do something about it.
Secondly, we have to
STOP. Stop running away from that which is uncomfortable,
stop running towards what we think will alleviate our
suffering and stop hoping that we can escape our body and
our life by focusing on something other than this very
present moment. Stop and be. Breathe deeply into the soft
animal of our body, giving ourselves permission to be as
we are, in this moment. Yes right now! Including any
judgements that this is bad or wrong. Recognising
comparisons to any other times or anyone else. Not trying
to improve, be stronger, more open, more loving. Simply
allowing ourselves to be as we are. When we do this we
find we peace and things start to move. Not because we
are making them change, but because life is always
changing. When we get stuck it is because we are holding
on or trying too hard to change and creating counter
resistance.
Why don't we stay in
heavenly-blissful states of awareness? Authentic ecstatic
states of being occur when we are 'fully present' (Full
Presence is when our consciousness is focused in the
present moment and our feeling awareness is focused in
our bodies). Being 'fully present' in our bodies triggers
unprocessed emotional energy to be released. Most of us
do not have the capacity to stay fully open and present
to the full range and depth of emotion. Often fear of
being out of control and our ego being annihilated
arises. We tend to split off from fully feeling the
energy and retreat into our thinking minds. Thus we lose
touch with feeling deeply, and lose our connecting to the
vibrantly alive experience that is 'Life'. This is why it
is important to do emotional process work. The clearer we
are of past emotional baggage, the more naturally and
easily we dwell in the present moment.
It is said that in Hell,
there are huge tables of delicious food. To eat you have
to use chopsticks that are a meter long. Everyone there
is starving to their bones. It is also said that in
Heaven there are huge tables of delicious food. To eat
you have to use chopsticks that are also a meter long.
Yet in Heaven everyone is full and content. The
difference is that in Heaven you feed the person on the
other side of the table.
It is our attitude to
life that affects the way an experience is felt.
Believing this to be other than heaven amounts to saying
'this isn't it', or 'its not supposed to be this way'.
This rejecting or invalidating our situation contorts our
bodies (and our relationships) and causes our experience
to become painful, thus destroying any chance of
experiencing our lives as divine bliss.
Developing an attitude
of gratitude affects our experience each moment. What we
focus our attention on expands. Resentment and criticism
focuses our attention on what we do not want and thus
tends to create more of what we don't want in our lives.
Gratitude, appreciation and praise focuses our attention
on the things that we feel happy about and leads to the
creation of enjoyable experiences and positive outcomes.
In the words of John Gray: "When you want what you've
got, you'll get what you want". When we come into the
present moment there are always plenty of things to be
grateful for. Stop now yourself and check it out. Look
inside and around you now. What have you got in this
moment that you could be grateful for? Look and see how
richly blessed this moment is.
As you practise
accepting and embracing the moment and celebrating each
blessing that is available many wonderful things will
happen for you. Firstly, you will begin to realise that
you do in fact live in a bountiful and rich world. That
there are many things in your life to be grateful for.
Secondly, as you focus on the goodness in your life, it
will expand. Things will get better and better, there
will be more and more for you to celebrate and
appreciate. Thirdly, as you begin to accept and validate
your experiences you will see the perfection in them and
in life here and now. Fourthly, you will find that within
each experience is an opportunity. An Opportunity to get
to know yourself more fully, to release suffering, to
enrich your experience of being alive and to open your
heart to the wealth of love and radiance that is your
truthful, natural state of being. Finally, you will begin
to raise the vibration of everyone else. In the words of
Marianne Williamson: "As we let our own light shine we
unconsciously give others permission to let their light
shine also".
Life on Earth can be
Heaven or Hell. Heaven being Rich, vibrant, radiant,
beautiful, coursing with love. Heaven is not so much a
place that we go to, its a place that we arrive at. A
place we awaken to. It is here and now in this present
moment. We have been in a trance. Lost in our minds, out
of touch with the bodily pulse of life. Lost in the
abstract mind, projecting into the future and replaying
the past.
I invite you to
experiment with this and see for yourself. Start
affirming to yourself: "This is as good as it gets.
Heaven is Here, Now".
Nicholas de Castella,
President of The Australian Breathwork Foundation has
12years experience as a Breathwork practitioner. Founder
of Power of Presence Seminar (formerly Passionately Alive
Seminar) and author of 'Keys to Emotional Mastery', he
conducts Breathwork practitioner trainings, facilitates
weekly support group meetings and runs a private practice
in Clifton Hill, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
Ph 613 9482 5332.
Email:ncdec@alphalink.com.au