Let there be peace | A contemplation on personal failings and the perfect Self

If your life has been plagued by shame and guilt, remorse and self-loathing, this one is for you. Those feelings of inadequacy, imperfection, just not being good enough, they can be overcome.

Long ago, a friend told me, "You are not comfortable in your own skin."

And in the moment he said it, I knew it was so true.

It took more than a decade before I got comfortable. But it was only from shedding my skin. This skin is stifling. You've got to take it off.

The shell that's been built, you have to peck your way out of it. And we will try to do this today through the contemplation of a verse from the Upanishads, which is is called 'The Perfect Prayer'.

"That is Whole and this is Whole,

The Perfect has come out of the Perfect;

Having taken the Perfect from the Perfect only the perfect remains.

Let there be Peace, Peace, Peace."

You have been mistaken about your role in life. Your contribution to all these events passing you by.

You see, the electrons and quarks and photons are all doing their little dances perfectly. The planets are going around their stars.

The galaxies swirl majestically. And yet you feel so imperfect. Tainted. Impure. Just somehow wrong.

I will tell you something, and one of the signs that you have understood what is being communicated will be this feeling of purity.

Of being cleansed. Much like the feeling you get after indulging in a long shower. Cleansed. Like your mind has been washed clean.

So, listen.

Just as mountains do not lack the qualities of mountains, and the sun doesn't lack the qualities of the sun, you do not lack your true qualities. Once you are sure of your true quality you will know that you are perfect. You abide in ease.

Because all ideas of shame and regret and guilt, all ideas of inadequacy and imperfection, are based on a misunderstanding of your role in life.

Your true contribution to all these events.

Just as warmth is the quality of sunlight, pain and pleasure the quality of sensations, brightness and darkness the quality of sight, you too have your own indelible quality.

The quality of being aware. That is all.

Any other quality is not truly yours. It is of the phenomena being perceived. A transient quality, that depends on this more fundamental nature. Your nature of being aware.

Be firm on what is truly yours. And see the rest as nature doing its thing.

Reality doesn't allow for any imperfections. All must follow the laws of nature.

Even what are called aberrations; mutations and cancers and so on. The inquisitions and the pogroms, all the war and the hate. Still, they are following the laws of nature.

No one is in control.

No one is in charge. There's no central authority, no planning, no one to blame. The electrons do their dance, the planets go around the sun. The organic molecules replicate.

Spread their seed. You witness the heroics and the tragedies. It is all inevitable.

You are just playing your own role.

Carrying out your function perfectly. And your function is simply to be aware. You cannot do it any better or any worse. Just as a photon cannot be any brighter, or a rock cannot be any harder, and a tree cannot grow any taller than the laws dictate.

Reality does not allow for any exceptions to its laws, or any imperfections. All those regrets about choices; decisions made, some action taken or not taken, those are just a human way of interpreting certain events.

In fact, what was experienced was some networks in the brain. They were competing.

One path was chosen. A decision was made.

But by no one!

By the laws of nature.

It was not possible to reach a different decision at that point. Because all must follow the laws precisely.

Think about it. Contemplate, meditate. Don't hold back.

Use whatever means necessary to see this for yourself. Your only true quality is that of being aware. Any other quality that you claim for yourself will disappoint you by carrying out its own function as it should.

Say we add another quality quite close to you.

That of being present. You have always known yourself to be present and aware. But even this sense of being present is sometimes forgotten, isn't it? That is what's called "unconsciousness".

When you've forgotten your own presence. But you remain aware. Because when this sense of being present comes back you're right here to receive it. And you continue to carry out your function of being aware.

That is your power. Your only power.

But somehow, absurdly, this power which you have thought nothing of, have taken for granted because it's so natural, so effortlessly yours, so truly you, somehow everything else depends on this power. Without this quality of being aware, there can be no beginnings and no endings.

All begins with the awareness of it. All takes place within awareness. And all endings are witnessed by awareness.

Know this to be your true quality, accept that this is all you are, all the power you have, and you will see that you are the highest power.

The Supreme Reality. The support for this entire universe.

Nothing is your doing, but all is being made possible by You. And all of it is witnessed by You.

When you shed your skin and accept yourself as you are, then you are perfect and all is well.

So, now listen to this verse from the Upanishads and see from what standpoint it is being delivered. It is a statement of fact.

"That is Whole and this is Whole,

The Perfect has come out of the Perfect;

Having taken the Perfect from the Perfect only the Perfect remains.

Let there be Peace, Peace, Peace."