Pure Potential, Your Freedom From Fear, Part II

Openness

Have you ever faced an upcoming event or personal challenge, where you thought through every possibility carefully and seemingly  planned every scenario?  Then, during the actual event, your plans failed because you could not predict certain circumstances or situations. Due to this failure, after all your effort and planning, you may find yourself frustrated, or even upset.  Why, when there’s no possible way you could predict the future or all potential circumstances? More importantly, why did you feel the need to plan in the first place? It was likely a deeply seated need to be in control and the need to be in control is caused in part by fear.

Think back carefully through your life’s history to a moment when you had no expectations.  No preconceived notion or plan for your upcoming event or situation.  What happened that time when you told yourself ” I’ll take it as it comes” or “I’ll cross that bridge when I get there” . What happened during that time, how did it turn out for you?  Did it seem as chaotic as the scenario in which you did all of your planning?  Or did you find that because you lacked expectations of any kind, open to every moment, you accepted every small event and circumstance as it came? This is what it means to be open.

In part one of this post I left off discussing the difference between seeking and finding.  What does this really mean? In short, it means that you need to be open in order to find what’s available to you, and typically right front of you (arms length). If you are truly open then you are not limited and allow for anything or any circumstance.  Some may refer to this as “thinking outside of the box” but what they likely mean is, to be open to all possibility and ideas, to be creative. I would describe openness as having no expectations whatsoever, no predetermined outcome which will free your mind from false constraints.

Patience

I often times burn things when grilling outdoors or just cooking in general. Yes, you might want to pass on an invitation to Barbeque at my house. Turn the heat on high, and hope that the food will be done soon so that everyone will be able to eat early. Ultimately, for me, the food ends up either burnt or undercooked. My constant burning of food items is due primarily to a lack of patience. In the end, I would’ve been better off just setting the flame to the medium and allowing it to cook in due time (do it right the first time).

In our fast-paced time driven world it can be challenging to maintain the state of openness, because when we are open we are often waiting.  This is because, in a state of openness,  we are also need to be aware that things may not happen at our pace, but at the pace in which they happen (their own pace). In order to be patient, we must detach ourselves from the desired outcome.  Eliminate all our expectations timelines and personal desires and allow the events to unfold in front of us as if we are watching a movie. This is not to say that we cannot interact but avoid forcing or attempting to control a particular outcome.

Tomorrow, in Part III, I will cover how I have implemented these concepts and my personal experiences with these concepts in practice.