Tag: freedom

Izlaz│Exit

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Java u snu

San prosle noci.

Um je zamrljan, tezak, opijen. Ne mogu se probuditi. Ne mogu se sjetiti.

Zaboravljam.

Borim se. Odupirem se tezini, obmani, gustoci, mulju.

Ne uspjevam. Iznova me povlaci prema dolje.

Znam da spavam ali ne mogu se probuditi.

San u javi

Um je odsutan, nemiran, opsesivan, povrsan. Program radi sto na sat: U pogonu sam. Doing, doing, doing. Sto je sljedece? Jos, jos, jos. Brzo, nema vremena za gubljenje.

Sjeti se sebe.

Ego zavarava, obmanjuje dobru namjeru. Progres je nezamjetan, dok mislim da radim, samo trosim, igram njegovu igru.

Vrag mi se smije. Dok mislis da se budis, sve dublje tones u san.

Dobra namjera se vazi.

Odustajem. Ne propitkujem. Uzimam zdravo za gotovo. Jednostavno je tako.

Obiteljsko prokletstvo je force majeure negativnog naboja i kruznog usmjerenja s teznjom prema dolje.

Sve imas vec u sebi.

Tko ce, ako ne ja?

Kad gle – u pozadini – to sam opet ja.

Opet ego nesto hoce, zeli, trazi, dobiva. Jos, jos, jos. Druga strana istog novcica, vrti me u krug.

Vrag se vise ne smije. Izlaz je sada.

Izadi iz vrtuljka (ne)srece. Pusti sve za sobom. Neka bude bilo sta. Neka bude nista.

Silovita rijeka tece kroz nas, a mi ne mozemo nista.

Disi.

A wakeful dream

My dream last night.

Mind is heavy, blackened, intoxicated. I cannot wake up. I cannot remember.

Forgetfulness.

I am fighting, resisting the heaviness, deceit, density, sludge.

I have failed. I am being pulled down back again.

I know I am asleep but I cannot awaken.

A dream of the wakefulness

Mind is absent, restless, obsessives, superficial. Program is on full capacity: I am in operation. Doing, doing, doing. What next? More, more, more. Fast, there is no time to waste.

Remember thyself.

Ego is deceiving, misguiding the good intention. Progress is imperceptible, I think I am advancing, but I am just wasting, playing its game.

Devil is laughing. You believe you are awaking, but you are falling deeper asleep.

Good intention counts.

I give up. Not questioning, taking everything for granted. It’s just how it is.

Family curse is force majeure of negative charge and circular direction with a downward pull.

Everything you need you have in you.

Who will do it, if not me?

When all of the sudden – in the background – it is me again.

Again the ego wants, desires, asks, gets. More, more more. The other side of the same coin, spinning me in circles.

Devil is not laughing. The exit is now.

Exit the wheel of (un)fortune. Let everything go. Let it be as it is and as it is not.

The force of the river flows through us, and there is nothing we can do.

Breathe.

Chapters of Freedom: Embracing uncertainty

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Lately I have been experiencing anxiety. It arises from uncertainty about the future, stays with me for a while and then subdues into the abyss of unconsciousness. Despite unchanged external events, anxiety comes and goes, teaching me how the cause and the cure are not to be found outside, but are only to be addressed through fine-tuning of the inside.

To provide a bit of context – I have been standing on the verge of quite a change. I have been working for corporates for almost 10 years and have build a great career in one of the most demanding, impactful and prestige business environments, clinging on to certainty of such predetermined path to success. However, the more I unravel myself, the more I understand walking a predetermined path is not for me – I need to make it my own. I am yearning for freedom, independency and an adventure of building something limitless in its potential.

However, the anxiety I am experiencing is sometimes paralyzing. It craves for the known, for the promises of system’s security. It opposes to the nature of things, withholding me from jumping into the abyss of the unknown. It whispers: “You are not good enough. You will never succeed doing what you like. You have to compromise.” Coming from a post-war, post-communist Yugoslavia, such conditioning is embedded in my family and cultural heritage. I grew up believing money is bad and reserved to war criminals and thieves, success only happens if you come from a wealthy family, there is general scarcity of resources and we are built to work for and not to own.

Overcoming these limiting beliefs is an evolving process, and sometimes it seems never ending. Remember the path is that of a spiral – through dedicated practice, we keep on thinning our limiting beliefs by iterating lessons again and again, until the samskara (seed mental impression) itself dissolves. The victory is embedded in the process as growth is embedded in hardships. I made this blog about cracking the code on how to unravel – and for this particular code I found there are two main formulas to remember.

Uncertainty = Freedom = Creativity

First is to understand the mechanism behind the security/uncertainty coin. Security is nothing more then attachment to the known, to our past. There is no evolution in that, no creation, no expansion – just stagnation through stale repetition of outworn memories. Our tormentor today is our self left over from yesterday. On the other hand, uncertainty is the only place where something new can happen. If we have a clear idea of what is to happen, we shut down a whole range of possibilities. But if we step into the unknown, we open ourselves to limitless possibilities of creation. It is in our willingness to step into the unknown that we find freedom.

To be willing to step into the unknown, we need to accept and detach. To accept starts with accepting ourselves (our humanity) and to detach starts with understanding who we truly are (being). From detachment comes the freedom to create – as we let go of our past and tap into the limitless potential of our being. If we can experience the being, then we can experience detachment with ease – as detachment is embedded in the very nature of our being.

Confidence + Faith = Embracing uncertainty

Second is to practice our willingness to step into the unknown. This is done by cultivating two essential qualities: confidence (in ourselves) and faith (in universe). The first element – confidence – in my native language translates as self-reliance. In other words, to be confident for me means to be assured I can rely on myself in any situation. It is a combination of deep, peaceful feeling in my body and a clear intellectual understanding of the reason why. The feeling is of integrity, smoothness, lava like density and melted gold. The feeling supports intellectual understanding in a way it integrates it into our psychology by forming a new, positive belief and changing our responsive habits. There is a difference between mere intellectual processing of reason why I should be confident and integration of that reasoning into a new belief – and the difference lies in the feeling. The reason why (for example, my virtues, past achievements and skills) serve as a raw input, as the feeling then transforms it into a clarity of insight and finally forges it into a new belief. (To get a guidance on how to find the feeling, check the end of the post.)

The second element to embracing uncertainty is to have faith. To cultivate faith is to cultivate ishvara pranidana, our connection and surrender to the Source. For me, this happens two-folds. Firstly, I am re-discovering my faith through playful connection with different deities. All these deities for me represent an embodiment of a certain quality, certain sublime energy which is so pure and divine in its essence, that by finding and cultivating it in myself I remember my own divinity. Now the second layer comes in, because, guess what – the Divine IS the Source IS the Being IS You. So the next time when you practice resting in the being, try looking for that underlying connection to everything that is. When we experience awareness, we realize awareness is all-pervasive and all that exists in it is one and the same thing – is awareness itself. This insight happens when we overcome the illusion of ahamkara, the I-ness, or the primary concept of separation (I exist as an individual that is different from you). If there is no concept of I, then what is left is pure awareness without separation of the things that exist in that awareness. I do not exist as separate from you, as we both exist in our awareness. (To play a bit with the concept of separation, check the “You are the Sofa” meditation.)

By combining confidence and faith, we create a bulletproof tactic that strengthens our will to overcome whatever conditioning or negative feeling holds us back and to embrace the unknown. We become more assured that everything is gonna be alright, actually much better then alright – we understand that what awaits us is the next step in our evolution, an experience that is beyond our current capacity to imagine.

I will conclude by one of my favorite guidelines: Don’t overthink and just go into the fear. This is the very definition of courage and the only way to overcome whatever you are afraid of. Godspeed.

To cultivate confidence or any other virtue or positive belief, one first has to experience what it feels like in your body. This can be done through simple meditation.

  • Close your eyes and take some time to get yourself in a meditative state, either through pranayama or 10-min of breath focus meditation. It is important to get our minds a bit quieter and to be able to keep our focus steady for an extended period of time, as this skill will allow us to sink deeper into the feeling and gain insight.
  • Once your mind feels present and calm, focus on how your body feels, especially in the area of your first, second and third chakra. Then start repeating “I am confident”. The key is to keep your attention focused on your body, and your attitude in the position of the observer, while repeating the phrase.
  • Once you notice a subtle feeling in your body arising, go for it. It is as if you allow yourself – your attention – to sink deeper into that feeling, deeper into your flesh. Keep your focus on the feeling and allow it to grow until it overwhelms your attention. You will notice it has always been there, strong and present, and you just unraveled layers of noise in order to experience it more clearly.
  • Rest in that feeling for how long you need to get truly familiar in it and allow your process to unravel in a way that is specific to your system in order to integrate it. Whatever comes, embrace it and act on it – be it an insight, a self healing process, a continuation to different realizations or an urge to move. Finish in 10 minute savasana, releasing the experience.
  • You will find that it will become much easier to access this feeling on demand, even in our daily, busy monkey-mind consciousness. As a follow-up, sit and write down all the reasons why you can be self reliant (e.g. list of your skills, achievement, unique qualities, talents, education, etc.). Your intellectual understanding of the rationale behind will serve as a complementary piece to embedding your new belief and finally acting on it. Congratulations!

To experience a subtle insight on the illusion of separation, try this “You are Sofa” meditation:

  • Sit comfortably and take some time to quiet down your mind and enter the space, or in other words, to cultivate meta-awareness. Meta awareness is presence and awareness of everything: yourself and everything that exists outside of you. Keep you eyes opened and just notice what is around you.
  • Now choose one object to focus on, for example a sofa. Focus on the sofa and notice how it just exists there. Notice how your mind process the visual input of this object into a cognitive understanding how this object is what we call “a sofa” and what are its functions in relation to you.
  • Now notice a peculiar thing – existence of an external object in a relation to you. Notice the concept of I. Notice how it is nothing more but a concept, a thought. This concept is one of the primal components of your mind that allows us to experience and relate to the reality in the way we do, that defines us as humans. Will that sofa still be here if we remove the I? Most probably so. But it will cease to be a sofa, a concept whose functionality serves you, it will just be an unnamed object, unnamed thing that exists in the space and that you are able to perceive due to your senses.
  • Now notice how you can be aware of both the concept of a sofa and the concept of I. Play with the idea that, if you remove the concept of I, you remove the concept of sofa, you remove your cognitive understanding, processing and the storyline you have created about reality and all that is left is just awareness. Notice how everything just exists in awareness equally. In other words, the matter is the same, it just manifests in different forms. In other words, you are the awareness, are the sofa, are you.

Chapters of Freedom: How to manifest

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Manifestation is a recent “hot topic” that I stumble upon almost everywhere I look. From articles and books to online courses and one-on-one coaching on “how to manifest your reality” – it seems like more and more people are cracking the code of human mechanism. However, it also seems like a pretty good industry, preying on the basic human desire to get what we want and avoid what we don’t want. No one can teach you how to manifest – as you are already doing that just by being human. It is one of the ground rule of the Game – our reality is a product of our mind. How you perceive your reality is directly linked to what is in your mind. The more disconnected and identified we are, the more pain and misery we experience. On the other hand, the more we unravel and connect – the more we begin to live in synchronicity and with ease.

This should not scare you – it is just how it is and sooner we accept it and take responsibility over our minds, the better lives we will lead. Human nature is based on the principle of duality – hence the “negativity” is inevitable. Hardships are great – they exist so that we can learn and grow. They burn the impurities, identifications and conditionings. They unravel you towards your true self, towards the being. You might also perceive it like this: whenever a difficult situation presents itself in your life – that is just a part of your mind expressing itself so that you can let go, heal and expand. Don’t try to avoid the negativities and difficulties – it is impossible, as this is what makes us human. Embrace the challenge and next time try to approach it from a different angle – as you know that with each new hardship, you are setting yourself free.

However, we don’t need to only go through hardships to grow and expand – we have the power to unravel our minds in a more gentle way. That can be done through deliberate self-work and practice, in whatever form serves you the best. The path of yoga is my tool of choice, however, there are so many different tools today, both formal and informal, which serve towards unraveling. The only thing you need to check from time to time is the direction – is whatever you are doing to “work on yourself” leading to less, to the being, to simplification of your life; or does it add more complexity and identification to it? For example, if I am using yoga to dismantle my belief of not being good enough, but at the same time add on this “beautiful, spiritual yoga person” to my identity – it didn’t really do much.

In this direction, in this path between the awareness (the being) and the identification (the ego), lies embedded the principle of manifestation. The more we move towards the identification, the more out of alignment we feel with life. We may attract hardships or feel unsatisfied, as our reality is a solid projection of the content of our unconsciousness – and we have no idea what is there. Here is where the most manifestation techniques fail – as we cannot manifest just from our conscious mind (i.e. positive thinking or endless visualization of desired outcome) if we do not know what we hold in our unconsciousness. Our conscious mind is just a tip of the giant mind iceberg – and everything else under the surface is our unconsciousness. The mere size ratio between the two is a good indicator of which part of our mind holds the greatest power – and hence manifests the reality we experience. I am not saying you cannot change your reality by changing what you think – of course you can – but that takes quite some time and effort and is pretty difficult to completely dismantle your whole conditioning that is limiting to your reality in just one lifetime. It is like trying to move a big, heavy stone sculpture by pushing it – you will need to push really hard before it moves just an inch. All the progress achieved through such manifestation techniques is marginal compared to the energy invested. What I am saying is that there is a much faster way – there is a lever to lifting your stone sculpture just in changing how you think.

First of all, manifesting something from the position of wanting it is still manifesting from desire, from the ego. Did you ever experience how, as soon as you almost give up on your desires, they all of the sudden come to you? That is because you have started to move to the opposite direction – to the direction of awareness – and by doing so allowed the manifestation mechanism of the human mind to materialize the concept in your mind. Notice the difference – before you were manifesting from the desire, the grasp, the identification – which means pain (not getting what you want) – and by moving away from the desire, by releasing the gasp and deidentifying, you released the space for your natural manifestation powers to materialize the concept you had envisioned in the first place. Deidentifying and letting go is the key. This is how you allow yourself to drift to your natural state – the state of being, of pure awareness, from which all things emerge. And the more you progress towards the being, the more you can experience (not have – as possession is identification). You can experience anything you envision (not get what you want) – because the awareness is plenty – it is all there is. By doing so, you allow life to surprise you by brining you experiences your ego-self does not even have the capacity to imagine. You experience so much more then you could have ever wanted. You surrender yourself to life – you become what you are – the vessel of the limitless creation experiencing itself. Check your direction guys, that’ all there is to it.

Chapters of Freedom

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When I was a child, I dreamed of becoming an astronaut. There was nothing more exciting then the thought of being able to explore all the mysteries hidden in the vastness of space and go beyond human experience. Although my life took off in a different direction, I still believe it will happen in the next lifetime.

Another childhood dream of mine that did become my reality was dancing. I danced for as long as I could remember. This impulse to dance never came from my thoughts, but rather from my body. As it was always here with me, so effortlessly and naturally, I didn’t bother for a long time to understand why is it that I dance.

Unfortunately, I was brought up in a culture that isn’t as supportive towards arts as it is towards “real” professions. I kept on balancing between dancing and “more serious” studies (finance) for as long as I could, however, once I got a high profile job in top tier strategy management consulting, dancing fell into the background. For two years I didn’t find the time to dance as there were “more important” things on my agenda.

What I didn’t notice at the time was how I was actually molding myself into this pre-determined corporate role, at the expense of my essential self. This dominant corporate persona was not who I really am – it was just a mere avatar that fits somebody else’s expectations. However, I started to identify with the role, accumulating anxiety around the “insecure overachiever” complex. I was exposed to chronic stress and overstimulated by adrenaline and cortisol. Exhausting my adrenal glands came with a price – I was diagnosed by Hashimoto thyroids & suffered from acute migraines.

Unfortunately these alarming signs my body was sending were not enough to wake me up. It took a more severe “shock” to pull me out of the identification loop. The pregnancy, although unexpected, came as a blessing. I was alone during my pregnancy, in the middle of the pandemic lockdown, what allowed me to immerse into a deep healing process. As I reconnected to my essential nature, I finally understood why it is that I dance.

I dance because dancing means to be myself. And to be myself means to be free.

It means to roam wild through life, reshaping your reality in accordance with your own unique imprint. It means to let go of expectations and judgement. It means to break free from socially acceptable roles and how things should be. It means to redefine your path. It means to do the things your way. It means to embrace fear and to bravely face the unknown. It means to listen to your intuition no matter what. It means to stand firmly in your own truth. It means to let go of all mind-made concepts. It means to stop taking life so seriously. It means to break free from ourselves.

It is my current path to explore different concepts of freedom and how they manifest in my life. I am at the beginning of this journey and it will make me very happy to share my adventures on this blog. Hence the series called “Chapters of freedom” – to share my truth while rediscovering the meaning of freedom and maybe even inspire you to do the same.