There is so much happening in my life, all the time, but I don’t often reflect it in the articles on this blog partly because the bulk of my readership are passers-by who drop in and leave again, most never to return. For those who return here, I would love to give you more regular updates on what I’m learning and discovering and how that might be useful to you.

What comes to me today, is that it’s so easy to look at other people’s lives and situations and imagine that they have it much easier than you do personally. Everyone else has happier marriages, better-behaved children, faster cars and looks smarter than you do (not to forget “is having better sex more often than you are!”)

Of course at another level, we live in the idea that we’re way better off than the next guy.

Both these states of mind are an illusion and a waste of time. I say that because we’ll never really know what is true for the next guy. What we see on the outside, is just appearances. We judge or envy others but we don’t really have much insight into what goes on behind his closed doors (including behind the look on his face.)

What we don’t spend much time doing is consciously reflecting on our own inner state of being. Yes, we certainly think thoughts about ourselves and we judge and criticise ourselves for not “making the grade.” We learn to hide this very well by acting cool and putting on all the accessories we need to seem fine, but for most people the conversation in our head with ourselves about ourselves, is pretty bad news.

So what to do!? What I’m finding as a way out of this state of mind, is that instead of thinking more about it, I go deeper inside, into that place I teach about in sessions where you feel your being from deep inside yourself. There is no thought there – only silent reflection. There’s a subtle difference between the analysis of the mind and inner awareness of being. The mind is thought. Awareness is something like a feeling. It’s conscious and so it’s very close to what thought looks like, but it doesn’t have much content. One way of expressing it, is in the ancient words “I am.”

So my reflection today on what has been happening lately in my life, is that I have times where I am so tired of what i think about myself and others that I HAVE to stop and go within and just feel my own heart. It’s incredibly peaceful to do this. I’ve learnt to find and cultivate a warm and positive attitude in there, that is not thought-based but is felt as bliss. It’s the real truth and it’s not based on comparison to others. It’s deeply rooted in the simple realisation that I am. And that’s good enough.