[From Marsha:\u00a0\u00a0 I\u2019ve had a long-time habit of listening to other piano players and thinking this one is better than me or I\u2019m better than that one.\u00a0\u00a0 Always comparing.\u00a0\u00a0 It is a tenant of the teaching to drop comparing.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It\u2019s valuable when shopping, but not in the case of comparing people, talent and skills.<\/p>\n
Here is the idea of comparing expanded in a workshop.]<\/p>\n
You know we have more \u201cdreams\u201d in the daytime that we have at night because we get more involved with them; and they\u2019re experienced purely in the \u201csubjective\u201d state.<\/p>\n
Now man\u2019s dreams, of course, are based upon his desires from this first decision — always wants to gain pleasure and comfort and escape pain, needing attention and to escape being ignored or rejected; and he wants to gain approval and to escape disapproval. He wants to gain a sense of being important or special and to escape the sense of being inferior. Now all of those, of course are illusions too. They\u2019re all things that one only senses.<\/p>\n
(What\u2019s that last one?)<\/p>\n
This one here? Being important or special and escape the sense of feeling inferior or incapable.<\/p>\n
Okay, so man dreams. First off, he dreams that he will try to be superior here. He starts off feeling inferior after birth because he compares himself with his parents. As a little kid, he couldn\u2019t reach the top shelves and get things that he wanted. They hid things from him. So actually that\u2019s where you began to feel inferior.<\/p>\n
Now when one begins to feel inferior, one usually trys to adapt to it by getting some way that you can feel superior. You find yourself feeling inferior; and you try to convince yourself in some way that you are superior, is that right?<\/p>\n
(Don\u2019t you try to do something to prove that you are superior.)<\/p>\n
Well that\u2019s the next step. First off you just assume you are \u2013 you start dreaming that you\u2019re superior; and then you try to do something that says that you are; and it always seems to be that there is some obstruction to it.<\/p>\n
So then we feel we\u2019re persecuted. Somebody\u2019s picking on me. If it wasn\u2019t for her \u2013 I\u2019d get along just fine. I\u2019ve had many a man tell me, \u201cWell if it wasn\u2019t for my wife, I\u2019d\u2019a really got ahead, but she just drags me down all the time\u201d. And I\u2019ve had many a lady say, well if it wasn\u2019t for the husband and children, I could have written great books and great poems; and I could\u2019ve painted great pictures and all these good things. And so another person said, if it hadn\u2019t a been for this particular system that\u2019s in operation, meaning society, why I\u2019da been getting\u2019 along great. So the persecution sits in them and then, of course, we hate that which we feel obstructed us \u2013 is that right? We have a sense of hate for whatever — we blame..<\/p>\n
And then when I hate something, I can\u2019t dispose of it, so I begin to feel inferior; and then around and around it goes; and this is one lovely little wheel that we can get hung up on when we dream of all this; and that creates many great problems, doesn\u2019t it?\u00a0\u00a0 Do you live with it about every day in the week?<\/p>\n
(You just keep goin\u2019 around and around.)<\/p>\n
Round and around, round and round and gradually but perfectly deteriorating; and in 60 or 70 years, you usually wipe it out.<\/p>\n
(That\u2019s when you die.)<\/p>\n
Yeah, in one way or the other.<\/p>\n
Is this illusion all the way around \u2013 something you can identify with?\u00a0\u00a0 Are you inferior or superior to anybody in the world or just different.<\/p>\n
(Different.)<\/p>\n
We all stand in different places, so we\u2019re just different. And when you really look at it, isn\u2019t that a perfectly designed world? Can you imagine if everybody had the talent of math; but couldn\u2019t write books or everybody could invent machines but nobody could manage a business?<\/p>\n
So there is no price that you could conceive of because you\u2019re totally unique, right? And we could get that down to see that there is no one we need compare ourselves to.<\/p>\n
So when we are doing all this comparing, we can remember that there is no two of us alike.\u00a0\u00a0 So the exercise is to drop the idea of comparing \u2013 comparing me to you, one child to the sibling, and one friend to the other.\u00a0\u00a0 Then I can just BE myself and do what I do best.\u00a0 I can be content with me the way I am and not expect everyone else to fit some ideal I\u2019ve dreamed up for them or try to make myself into some ideal picture I have in my mind for me.\u00a0 And what is that ideal, picture and certainly an illusion based on anyway?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[From Marsha:\u00a0\u00a0 I\u2019ve had a long-time habit of listening to other piano players and thinking this one is better than me or I\u2019m better than that one.\u00a0\u00a0 Always comparing.\u00a0\u00a0 It is a tenant of the teaching to drop comparing.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It\u2019s … Continue reading