How to Have a Life of Intoxicating Joy
The secret is what you “don’t think.”
Most people are miserable.
Blaming the world for their unhappiness. Living hell on earth.
We’re not humans having a spiritual experience.
We’re humans trapped in our minds. Feeling like we’re skimming the surface. In a constant state of dissatisfaction. Grasping for the world to fill us up and make us feel whole.
We’re supposed to be a spirit having a human experience. But we’re so disconnected from our true core Essence. Dangerously trapped in the world of our mind. We’re not even aware of being trapped.
We have spend millinia giving our mind free rein like a parentless kid in a candy shop. The mind is a machine that has taken over.
The way out of being trapped and retraining our focus feels slow and boring and uneventful and pointless and useless.
Because our mind tells us the process is all these things to keep us trapped there.
Bored to tears
The mind feeds us familiar stories about lack all day. Stories about how we need that next outside treasure to make us happy. The nicer house. The beach vacation. The obedient kids. The empty schedule. The better body. The smarter brain. More money.
It’s like when we go to have a bowl of cheddar popcorn and we end up eating the whole family size bag.
It’s so tasty and satisfying. And very temporary. The satisfaction of eating something that brings us pleasure lasts until the thing is all consumed. Disappearing with the final swallow.
Our mind’s stories are familiar. Tasty tales that make us feel crappy. But it’s comforting because we know the dismal outcome. The high followed by the discontent.
The early stages of retraining the mind to not take over gives a big feeling of “So what!? Big deal! This isn’t worth all the effort.”
There are hours between realizations that you have become completely disconnected from yourself again.
It feels like you have to battle a duel focus. A focus on the physical or mental task you’re trying to accomplish in your day and also trying to have a clear mind so you can feel some sort of connection with something greater.
The unbreakable belief that there is so much more to life is our lifeline to keep going.
Fantasy land
I’ve been practicing mindfulness and decided it was time to level up.
We took the kids to Dollywood.
I had dragged my feet for years thinking I didn’t want to be hanging out in the cheesiness and glitze and crowds.
I hadn’t been to an amusement park in decades. The memory makes my stomach churn. Pounding hot pavement to stand in a line for over an hour for a 2 minute rush on a roller coaster.
The mix of greasy food and dumpster fumes filling the air. Stepping in spilled nuclear blue sugar water at the overflowing trash cans being attacked by crows and tamed squirrels staked out to snatch some junk food.
This time was different.
Get back in line
Dollywood is nuzzled up against the beautiful old growth forests of The Great Smokey Mountains in Tennessee USA. The rides twist you through the trees and thrust you through the canopy top.
Instead of standing in line for 45 minutes with our daughter for her first roller coaster experience with my Ego Mind judging the crowd for their obvious poor eating and fashion choices, I practiced mindfulness. I tapped into the Essence that surrounds us all and channels down through each of us.
And this shift helped me notice things. My complaining, disgruntled head voices took back seat.
I noticed the park has a real mountain creek that snakes along the path. The bald eagle and birds of prey habitat is magnificent. It’s the largest collection of bald eagles that are unable to be released back into the wild. Apparently, Dolly Parton loves eagles. And butterflies.
And hospitality. And generosity. You can feel her delightful and powerful energy wrapped around every detail of the park.
It was the most enriching amusement park experience I’ve ever had.
Final thoughts
The Ego Mind has made it almost impossible for us to realize and use our free will to choose our true Essence over the mind stories. We’re trapped. The worry, anxiety, constant stress feel like they are the fabric we’re made of.
It's like when you clean up your eating habits and are surprised at how sluggish you've been feeling and didn't even realize it because it was your normal.
We want to stay in the familiar even though it feels like sh!t.
Because it’s no picnic to disengage and let go of the old worn stories our mind has on constant replay.
We have to get to the point that the pain of staying in the familiar stories about being a victim of life is greater than the discomfort of quieting our mind telling us these lies.
We don’t have to completely clear the mind all the time. But we have to stop believing the tales it tells us. The doom and gloom. The victimhood. The smallness. When we stop believing the thoughts they will move along on their own.
Getting the Ego Mind out of the way is the secret to igniting a life of intoxicating Joy.
I would love to hear what resonated with you in the comments. Waking up to life is hard to do. It’s a team sport.
It really is quite the conundrum. This thing, this beast, keeps us alive and engaged in this 3rd density experience, but for many, becomes more of an adversary than an ally.
It's so concerned with survival that it overrides any trace of luminosity and joy and creativity that exists, solely in its own service.
Keeping it in check so it knows its place is the greatest challenge we face.