9 - High Key versus Low Key - Part II

Of course, it means growing up.  It means being intensely alert and aware and luminous - not just aware of the "here and now", but of the "everywhere and always" (which, incidentally, must not be confused with the "nowhere and never" - often the outcome of spacing out, easily taken to be Samadhi).  Being aware does not just mean being acutely observant of what is happening around and about one, with particular regard to its relevance to one's objective, but of all that lies behind the apparent situation and the implications of this objective, and what is more, of what are the issues behind one's objective. 

To be precise - it encompasses several scores - first, setting a goal as definite as possible.  This is admittedly difficult because our human representations of our objectives are based upon our own scale of values, which we are continually reassessing (Murshid says:  "Shatter your ideals on the rock of truth"), and which fluctuate according to our attunement.  Second, as we mature we become more realistic as to how to implement these imponderable values into tangible objectives.  If we are really progressing, whatever we conceived of as our purpose is continually superseded by a further one.  "The purpose of life is like the horizon:  the further one advances, the further it recedes"  Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan.  Not only is this true, but if one is truly creative in life, one constructs the path upon which one treads not unlike an aircraft (in contrast to a car) that has to follow a prepared red road. 

Here, our own incentive will determine an azimuth upon the horizon which itself may vary, should one choose to reschedule the itinerary on the way.  Furthermore, one would prove foolhardy to pursue one's proposed objective glibly without the slightest regard for what is going on around one.  In fact, one is continually reprogramming one's objective on the strength of the wisdom that one gains by learning from the experience of one's fellow humans and from the feedback to one's ideas and actions gleaned from the life situations around one.

Having then some sense of one's purpose, it is advisable to foresee possible obstacles, although most of such are unpredictable.  Obviously, one will have to be prepared to deal with these as they arise.  However definite one is about one's purpose, one may be advised to be versatile enough to totally reprogram one's course in view of the lay of the territory encountered.

The challenge of life requires of one to be highly astute.  First, one may be able to observe how people, perhaps unwittingly, tend to draw one into their problems ("laying their trips on one" - in American).  If one is inclined towards tender-heartedness, one inevitably does get oneself inextricably inveigled, which, incidentally, is not necessarily salutary for the person one is accommodating.  In this case, the second modulation of consciousness advocated in meditation is extremely revealing:  shift one's consciousness into the consciousness of another person.  What a different perspective from one's own!    One soon discovers how people both suffer and rejoice for having made themselves dependent upon one by, in fact, making one dependent upon them.  Their fear of being unable to cope without one may be so desperate that one prefers just putting up with the pain oneself.  One likes to boast to oneself of being stronger than the persons concerned, not realizing what it does to one's morale and one's personal unfoldment.

When one gets oneself inveigled in worldly affairs and dallies in small talk, not only does one lose one's contact with one's heavenly dimension, but one starts disliking oneself, and consequently develops hardness and bitterness.  What is more, one may nurture a resentment against the people who were dragging one down, overlooking the fact that maybe they were looking to one to inspire them and give them an uplift!

As one matures, one learns how to help without being burdened, how to function like a 'sannyasin,' an initiate, in life.  It is true that one needs to be alone to do a lot of repair work upon one's psyche and to see things in perspective.  One may well understand Buddha.  Yet in our day and age, it is more challenging and wiser to awaken, become very alert and aware right in the middle of 'all of this,' standing steadfastly while lending a helpful hand by thrusting the light of one's insight upon people's problems.  This means earmarking the deeper issues behind their problems, to avoid letting oneself be trapped by or embroiled in the commonplace thinking, judgementalism and personal likes and dislikes of so many people, while keeping one's spirit in good tune.  All of this, on the assumption, of course, that one is not being judgmental of them oneself.  One is really more aware than they are of the way their interpretation of events and their dealing with events has tarnished them, and how this happens surreptitiously.  One sees clearly where each person is "at" and what they would do to one's attunement, to one's thinking, to one's values, how they would affect one in the pursuit of one's objective if one demurred.

Such clarity will undoubtedly bring one to handle life situations and all relationships wisely, harmoniously and beautifully in one's future dealings.  Obviously, the emergence of a new awareness will carry as a consequence a difficulty in continuing to adjust oneself to situations previously taken for granted and even coveted.  Of course, as people grow, they inevitably need to readjust their relationships accordingly.  They are no more the persons they used to be.  Relationships have to be re-wooed, updated, never taken for granted.  Redressing current situations and relationships after reassessing them requires even more insight, assiduity and courage than dealing with new situations, because one has to safeguard people's pride while weaning them.  One discovers that the wisest way of doing this is by strengthening them in their trust in their own resourcefulness.  This can only happen by giving them a chance of having to rely themselves upon that untapped store of resources which they can only discover by actuating them.

This requires of one to watch the process very carefully and monitor it painstakingly, rather than go about crushing people's feelings recklessly like an elephant in a glass castle.  However, sometimes a sharp change of tack is less painful than a lingering severing, leaving a person in a feeling of uncertainty as to one's true intentions.  One needs to awaken people to the views that one cherishes rather than nurture resentment for the fact that they are constraining or restricting one.  For this, it is best simply to communicate one's point of view, one's insight.  People love clarity, and are excited by new points of view, and will value these, providing one does not criticize their narrowness, of which they are themselves not aware, even as we have a blind spot in our own eyes.  On the other hand, people tend to feel threatened by a point of view that takes away the walls of the false security of their commonplace values.
