Enlightenment is Just Another Distraction
In much of the yoga philosophy that I have studied there has been the aim or goal to rid ourselves of desires because this is where we are told suffering is multiplied. I have miserably failed at every attempt to do so, which has inevitably lead to me feeling like I suck at the whole yoga deal. So what if we decided to freely desire? What if we decided to desire consciously versus compulsively?
It seems to me that desire has been outcasted, but refuses to actually be casted out, resulting in feelings of shame and guilt of which then get all warped, contorting the OG desire into some 90’s punk ass version of the real deal. I’m not saying some covers aren’t legit, but let’s be real, more times than not, the original is the beat that I want to bump and belt out as the soundtrack of my life.
If we are to free our desires from the chains of dirty and place them onto the thrown of the divine, then step number one is to get clear about what it is that we truly desire. At the end of the day, what is it that we all, really want?
Recently a question/statement was posed to me that if I wore socks, would have blown them off. The question/statement was: if you don’t know how to be happy right here, right now, what business do you have wasting your breath, time, and mind speaking of enlightenment?
When I look within, when I remove all the lofty goals, life purposes, beliefs, and supposed to’s, I find my desire to be very simple. I want to be happy. I want to feel at peace. I want to walk this earth in joy. I have heard myself claim that my purpose is to evolve my consciousness, that my earthly mission is to spread love, to sprinkle it on everything and everyone and while this seems to be truth at face value, it is still a cover band. It is still a belief posing as the truth because I have been sold, from the spiritual world, that this is what a “real” yogi would aspire to.
When in truth, I really just want to be happy, as me, not for you, not for evolution, not for my Instagram or for the moon or for my ancestors. I simply want to wake up and exist with myself, as myself, in peace with my body, with my mind, and with my emotions. I want to frolic and play and laugh and love with absolutely no other agenda. If I can be honest about this, then I can debunk any dysfunctional desire that has lead me to behaviors and habits that are not actually in service to my truest of true desires. Now I can remove all of the icky sticky that has been gunked upon even having a desire in the first place.
I have a hunch that if we all sincerely devoted ourselves to our own happiness, this world would begin to feel like the paradise it is. The confusion lies in what we have deemed makes us happy like the career, the money, the fame, the sex, the relationship, or the size diamond on our finger. As long as we continue to place our happiness in the hands of other people, places, gods, religions, and things, that is exactly where it will remain, in their hands. The place where I feel the happy is never outside of me, the place I feel it, is always within me, because that is always where I am. Yet we spend most of our lives trying to organize and control what is on the outside versus allowing our inside to simply experience the outside with curiosity.
Let us take hold of our own microphone and start directing our own band. If the emotion is off pitch and whining like a five year old, then that is where we start. If the thoughts are like a runaway train headed the wrong way on a one way track, then, we must sit our ass down in the drivers seat and pull the brakes.
We will no longer be cover bands. Today and every day we get to step onto and into the stage of our life and rock out as the OG of our own epic playlist.
My sincerest gratitude for your attention. I don’t take it lightly that you have chosen to receive my contemplations and gift me your time. May my words and thoughts offer you whatever it is that you need to continue uncovering your own clarity. May your mind and heart be at ease. May you be nothing short of happy, happy, happy.
Namaste,
Andrea Dawn
