We all have negative qualities.
Some people are hot-tempered, others are self-critical.
What about people who seem to be one hundred percent kindness? They still have negatives, or areas that aren’t as dominant.
Negatives are not bad, they are merely voids, or areas that lack awareness. I call these negative areas blind-spots, but you could just as easily call them your darkness, your shadow, your ego or your pain body.
This entity is not real, so it cannot be considered evil, but the result of being resistant to shedding the light of awareness on your blind spots is always suffering.
Every aspect of a personality relates to a level of awareness. Introverts are more aware of their inner life, extroverts are more aware of social communication techniques.
Angry people are more aware of injustice and patient people are more aware of the valid reasons that people make mistakes.
The thing that makes you unique, is your level of awareness regarding the infinite categories of knowledge in the universe. For example, I have a high level of awareness of jazz vocalists and a low level of awareness about raising children.
Where we put our attention results in our level of expertise. I am only writing this article because I’ve thought about awareness for 15 years.
Some people have never even thought about the subject of awareness, but they could have 15 years of experience thinking about NASCAR. My NASCAR knowledge is extremely limited. So please go elsewhere for NASCAR advice!
So if one is experiencing suffering of any level in any area of life… it’s merely a result of a lack of awareness.
The level one is willing to look (shine the light of awareness) at pain and what causes it, is directly correlated to the reduction of pain.
If one is experiencing pain as a result of resentment toward one’s father, an increased awareness of one’s father will remove the pain. If one is in emotionally withholding romantic relationships, an increased awareness of how you withhold love from yourself could reduce your pain.
You can increase awareness in many ways. One of the most powerful techniques I use is inquiry.
By asking oneself the right questions, the boogeyman is released from layers of darkness to reveal an illusion. If there is a pain-causing belief such as “My parent doesn’t love me”, one can question this belief from every angle.
By asking questions such as “In what ways does my parent show love to me?” and “How do I withhold love from myself?” and other inquiries, one can reduce the pain-causing belief to the illusion it always was.
Romantic partners, family members, friends, and everyone else in the universe can see things that you cannot. By examining conflict or opening yourself to others’ perspectives and mentorship, you can reduce your blind spots.
You can also increase your awareness through old-fashioned study. Pain related to money? Learning about money and how it relates to a person’s psychology can reduce the pain.
I have found that the more I study a topic, the less it can cause me suffering.
Even though it seems like we all have an evil alter ego, we really just have areas of less knowledge and strength.
Through awareness practices such as inquiry, mindfulness, therapy, study, and relationships with others, we are able to put the key of awareness into the keyhole of our blind spot.
This unlocks the expansion of our being and releases the pain of ignorance.
After recovering from depression, Sean Morgan writes about mental health recovery and behavioral change. Check out his Mastery of Change Facebook page.
