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In our review of tip 328 it says. “. . .what you want is often a defense against the belief that you are bad or lacking.”
Can someone please share an example of what that looks like?
Welcome Kathy. For me, if I am seeking FOR something it means that what I have available to me is not enough. I need something else. For the past few months I seem to be receiving lessons about loss. I do a small meditation/spiritual reading/contemplation every week day which used to involve 2 or 3 other people. One by one, they have left the area or something else has come up. So now, I’m alone each morning. When it first happened, I thought it meant something...about aggie. That I had done something wrong and for awhile, I would think about how I could arrange things so that what was would be different. Behind this was a belief that I needed others for me to feel good about what I was doing. That I was not enough all by myself. And lurking behind that was the thought that those people who no longer came didn’t like me, left because of it. Over time, more lessons along the same lines arrived and it seemed clear I was being asked to stand in all of that and see that it was not the truth. Those beliefs about needing (lack) and worrying (bad) were all coming from me! There wasn’t anyone else there! LOL! Hope that might help...
I guess the word that trips me up with this is “defense”. That what I think I need or want is a defense. I guess I really hadn’t considered or seen that before.
For example, right now I need a couple table lamps (light, ironically) for a guest bedroom. While this example may seem “unthreatening,” it nevertheless would be no different than the need for money to pay last months overdue rent. Both stem from lack.
So when I buy those lamps that particular lack is filled. But I know the fulfillment of that lack doesn’t end with that purchase. Why? Because believing-attention, un-monitored, will always offer up loss, lack, unworthiness, etc. It seems obvious that investment in what I want or need is reflective of attachment to a me.
For me its like a question I ask myself, as I am watching my mind - "noticing a desire rise up". Like the desire for spiritual companionship - the lack of, and hence desire for additional daily contemplation partners, the lack of, and hence desire for more kindness, the lack of and hence the desire for, more table lamps. (By the way ironically I would like more contemplation partners, kindness, and table lamps but that's an aside) So what I do Is I LOOK and notice, and just BE with the desire as its rising up the best I can. For me some desires and attachments relating to working on this very forum have come up for me to look at and was 'with them' to what ever degree I saw it. Being with the attachment, sitting with it, letting it dissolve. These for me relate to desire to be seen a certain way, be successful, or be treated a certain way. How am I treating others ? How am I seeing others? who is the I that is seeing all this anyway...….
I've never heard of a contemplation partner. But that sounds like it would be amazing!