Peace of mind

I'm so tired, I haven't slept a wink
I'm so tired, my mind is on the blink
I wonder should I get up and fix myself a drink
No,no,no
--John Lennon

When my mind is racing, it is filled with thoughts, words, pictures and song. The past week I have been on a mental hamster wheel; running over and over the same thoughts and songs. And then last night, after some purging, I got up this morning with only one song floating around in an empty head. See the above. What I actually keep hearing is the long, drawn out breath John Lennon expels: “I’m soooo tired…”

I often feel this way after an intense emotional or mental workout. Exhaustion. I am so relived when my mind has finally drained the backed up thoughts in my head. I realized that if I wrote all of those thoughts down, I would come across seriously crazy, so I mull over them until they cease. What has been dominating my thoughts is the application of some new lessons learned, but also, old patterns that die hard. I find that there is a process when integrating new information into our consciousness and pushing out the old from our subconscious. For instance, last year, I integrated new information through self-reflection into my consciousness. It was there, but I wasn’t using it. I had a very difficult time manifesting what I knew. This year, I found myself utilizing the knowledge I gained. Somehow, over the course of time, I transferred that information from a simply conscious thought, (one where you know what is right, but you just keep doing the wrong anyway) into an intrinsic part of my subconscious. As I experience more and reflect more through out my life, awareness becomes increasingly present, and sometimes I feel like my mind has split right in two.

After my New Years experience, I had a plethora of new knowledge to synthesize into my being. It felt good, exciting to have made such breakthroughs. When I was younger, my destructive patterns and attachments were at the helm, and so although I was having experiences and receiving valuable information about myself, my subconscious took over and conscious thought did not absorb these epiphanies quite so quickly. I was dominated by one or the other: logic or emotion. There was (and still is to certain degrees) an imbalance of self and spirit. Now, in light of a slow integration of lessons learned, my inner self has learned to become more agile, and I am finding that incorporation is clearer and faster.

It is a strange existence though, when one is no longer ruled by subconscious and deep rooted patterns or habits. The past week has felt like there were two people living in my head. My conscious mind has new revelations and wisdom to share, but, again, Ugghhhh…. Old patterns were wreaking havoc on my emotions. This is the interesting part though. I was fully aware that the patterns were patterns. The emotions were there, but they were hollow, not attached to a particular action or person. My mind would search to latch on to some idea, memory, person, anything… But it just couldn’t attach, so the result was feeling a range of urgency and anxiety, but without any source. My old patterns fought so hard that I found my self on the verge of obsession… but there was not a viable object to place my attention on. My conscious mind has been working quickly at rewiring my subconscious, and it would not let it attach to fallacy. It was like my body and mind were suffering from its own Couvade syndrome.

I have spent years researching and reading about self-awareness, emotion, thought, and spirituality, and for reasons unknown, now has become the time in my life where they all come together. But what I get from all of this is that the consciousness is not enough. To think, to know, to understand is not enough. This information must be experienced, it must be an integral part of our systems; mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. It is not enough to read the book, and I think, although we spend our lifetime trying to escape suffering, sometimes we must experience it to truly understand what we learn… to really feel. In my life, I have had the experiences first and then learned the information. I had been trying to learn the words and thoughts first, but even if I could recite them from memory, I still could not fully understand. Nothing undermines the experience.

And now “I’m so Tired…”

It seems that my self has learned to rewire quickly enough. All the hard work I have done in the past has built momentum, and the basis of my being no longer stands on useless habits and learned behaviors. Oh yes, some still linger, and I know I will have other battles in the future, but what I also know, is that I have in some ways, become a better human being, a stronger individual, and a whole person.

When I was searching for the clip of John Lennon’s lyrics, I stumbled on a short description about the meaning behind his words. It seems that John wrote this song during his stay at a transcendental meditation retreat. I found this interesting, how he was so tired too in his quest for self-discovery, and how appropriate, that it was the song that welcomed a hiatus from self-reflection.