The Rip and Tear of Leaving a Way of Being

I have found myself with less energy to work on my business (it's there, but measured, has to be more fun...less driven or efforting, cant'do that), and even stuff like flying an airplane (don't want the hassle of bi-annual training, keeping current with flight time and reading, paperwork...if I flew often it would be "flowing" "natural" and worth it...otherwise, no), and remodling the house (I've done this for years, work all day then work on the house for hours. The house was a metaphor for "Me"...I can't fix "me" by fixing the house...but when I'm relaxed my creativity and work results in my(our) house and gardens to be an expression of my(our) inner life and that's good.)


After reading a bunch of writing of Almaas, I write the following:
So identified with "not enough support forthcoming from the mother or father (in childhood), this sense of smallness and dependency is experienced as helplessness, deficiency and inadequacy." I can see that, although I have also enjoyed "achieving" in life, so much of the way of being I'm "abandoning" or letting go of has to do with achieving in order to compensate for the above sense of deficiency.

Almaas writes:
"Since one deeply believes (usually unconsciously) that the inadequacy is not a state but a fact, and this causes a deep hopelessness about the possibility of expansion, one defends against this awareness by settling for a mediocre life. If there is any expansion it is small and usually only external."
...well for me I've expanded plenty in certain areas of my life, but to be more relaxed, playful...even silly at times, creative (again, as it would be a return), dancing, joking, laying in the sun (allowed beyond a heavy judgment of "lazy" for the first time in my life)...this is the direction of expansion that I'd not previously allowed.

A case cited by Almaas:
"Jordan's case:
He cannot stop doing one thing after another, managing so many jobs and commitments and interests that he now has no time to relax. None of his activities is particularly difficult, but to be involved in all of them is very demanding and takes all his time and energy. He does not truly need to do all of them, but he somehow cannot see that. He keeps complaining about how busy and hurried he is, but he will not stop. "
...reminds me of myself...although I've been releasing this over the past 10 years or so....I think I went back into this way of being when I remarried 3 years ago, knowing I had someone to provide for, to impress?, to be competent around (yup, that's to impress)...and when moving from family, friends, and her work left her depressed for a while I just redoubled the way of being to help us/her because I wasn't beyond it yet!

"but if one goes deeply into himself, exposing the deeper layers of the ego structure, he is bound, sooner or later, to come face to face with this dreaded basic characteristic of his individuality. "
...yes, big time. And I refer to this, from Anthony DeMello, as Aloneness--that paradoxical place where as one fully embraces the aloneness and not longer "rush toward" or "cling to" another, one actually becomes free to intimately commune, even enjoy union, with another.

I totally love the affirmation within the following passage:
"Our exploration of the deeper layers of the normal personality reveals that these defenses are still present and are in fact employed extensively. They become more active, or rather more consciously active, in the deeper stages of inner realization, revealing, in the presence of every ego individuality, structures that are, or are similar to, psychotic, borderline, narcissistic and schizoid structures. "
(I added the bold)
...and...
"Basically, with this resolution, one attains a much greater measure of disidentification from the state of inadequacy. When the inadequacy manifests it is regarded as an emotional state, just like any other, that is transient and conditional on certain identifi­cations. One stops believing it is a true description of who one is. It will manifest whenever there is a major expansion, but it does not stop one's expansion."
(my underline again)