Lately, I’ve been sitting outside to do most of my work, watching Bella, my little 3 pound Yorkie, run around hunting squirrels. She’s never caught one, but she refuses to give up. (kind of like my peach tree) Although she’s come close, I doubt she’s ever tackle one. That’s good because she’s smaller than some of them. Once the oppressive heat of the Houston summer settles in, I won’t be able to sit out unless I get up and out there by 6:00 AM. Ain’t happening.

While outside, I love listening to the birds and trying to identify them by their calls using an iPhone app called Chirp USA. The other day, I heard one distinctly saying, “Jamie, Jamie, Jamie. Jamie, Jamie, Jamie.” Uncanny. I think it’s either an ovenbird or a magnolia warbler. Damn, I used to think birdwatching was for old people. Oh yeah. It is. Anyway, I thought that was cool. Sorry for rambling. 

As many of you know, the southeast and midwest has been hit hard with tornadic weather. Last night I saw that it was heading toward Atlanta where Jamie lives. I texted her to see how she and her family are doing but no answer yet. Y’all pray for her. 

Okay, Erik. Take it away!

Me: How can we find ourselves? It’s probably not about going to Nepal and climbing some mountain.

Erik: Open your legs and look.

Jamie laughs.

Me: Whoa. Erik, you’re so bad. I’m not surprised, though.

Erik: Look at your crotch.

Me (chuckling): What, to see if you have any balls? Is that it?

Erik: Yeah.

Me: To see if you have a pair?

Erik: If not, maybe you need to draw a pair on a piece of paper and believe you can do it.

Me: Okay. That’s weird and makes absolutely no sense at all.

Erik: No, all joking aside, how do you find yourself?

(Pause)

Jamie: “The point it poses the problem” What?

Erik: No, the question poses the problem.

(Pause)

Me: Okay. I’m confused.

Erik: Well, if we look at these words like, “yourself”, that implies that you are away from the whole, that you’re not part of the unity, the collective. So, how do find yourself? First I would figure out what’s the greater thing that you’re connected to? I think, in our culture as humans, we’re trained a lot to slice and dice, and analyze and get small. So, I believe our natural instinct is to tear it apart so we can find out how it works. I don’t think this is doing us any good anymore. Not only are we tearing ourselves apart internally with our inner voice, we’re externally tearing apart relationships, the Earth and stuff like that. We get deeper, get smaller, find answers.

Me: So, we’re basically bypassing the heart.

Erik: Yeah. You’re right, because the heart is the expansive part. So, I say, if you’re looking for yourself, see what you’re attached to first because the best definition of who you are—and I’m serious—is to know how you feel or to know your emotions. I’m not talking about how does your elbow feel or how’s your back doing but how are you emotionally feeling. If you can just start describing that or writing that down or acknowledging it, then you’ll see what kind of source you’re connected to. Then, if you want to (air quotes) know yourself, only associate with those emotions that bring you to a place where you want to be. That will work with anyone because, if you’re an angry person and you really like being angry, then go for it. You can have it. But if you’re on kind of an enlightened path, and you want to rise above it and stay grounded, then associate with those emotions.

Me: So, if you’re an angry person, you’re going to find out, “That’s me. I’m angry.” Is that what you mean?

Hmm. Sounds fishy to me.

Erik: Yeah, cuz why are we here to help, and then we go, “Oh, you can’t be that way. It’s got to be this way.” That’s a bunch of bullshit.

Me: That’s not being emotionally honest.

Erik: Right! That’s part of the whole, “numbing yourself” to fit into society and feel accepted. The whole game is not to come to Earth to be accepted. It’s coming to Earth to know who you are.

Very, very profound. My little Deepak.

Me: So, being an angry person might be part of your spiritual contract to teach or learn something. Is that what you’re saying?

Erik: Yeah.

Me: And you don’t want society to say, “Well, it’s wrong to be angry, so you have to be somebody else.”

Erik: Correct. You’re roped into surrendering things you don’t need to surrender.

Me: Oh, okay. Can you give us a fictitious person and take us through this?

Erik: Fictitious.

Me: Yeah, like say a person who, I don’t know…

Erik: John. Let’s talk about John.

Jamie: What about John?

Me: Yeah, out with it!

Erik: Let’s say John is a corporate businessperson who was abused by his parents and doesn’t know how to accept love. He’s just kind of instinctually an angry person. And let’s say John was made angry by the environment because he was too young. He didn’t know how to embrace the abuse and, you know, love on it, and therapy hasn’t worked. Let’s say that he’s tried a bunch of shit, and he’s just always coming up angry.

Me: Yeah.

Erik: So, once John can accept his anger and realize that might be his tool, through accepting however you feel about yourself and whatever your natural instinct is, you’ll find your true self. You’ll know your true self. If you’re fighting it and trying to control it, that takes so much more focus and energy that you really can’t spend extra time or peripheral vision looking at other possible truths about yourself. You’ve become narrow-minded, narrowly focused. You’re spending all of this extra energy wrestling with this anger, but when you begin to accept it, then, let’s say in John’s case, he uses his anger to be a better businessman. He sets better boundaries. He uses it as a leader does. Not in a physically or verbally violent way, but as a sharp definitive way. He may not have many friends, but he’s getting a job done that is extremely useful for the environment like his business. Let’s just use that. Then, once John is accepting of his anger, all of a sudden, he embraces it. He can see why it was there in the first place because he was never taught to feel anything deeper than anger, and when he has that understanding, then the anger gets really thin. He’ll see that he doesn’t need it in the way that he did before, and he turns it into confidence. It’s more of an emotion or a character aspect that he can use in his business career. Then, he shifts the confidence and can see the strength in other people. He didn’t have to get angry to get them to do what he needed. He needed to trust in them. Then he works on this other layer of the onion of learning how to trust others around him without the use of anger. He could never trust his parents because they would always come back with a fist.

Me: Great example, Erik. My hat’s off to you.

Jamie: He stands up and does a very girlie—

Me: A curtsy?

Jamie: Yeah, totally. He’s laughing.

Me (chuckling): Maybe you should check between your legs, Erik!

Jamie (laughing and clapping): Oh, that’s awesome.