The Sea of Unconsciousness

Sometimes I feel like I’m swimming in the Sea of Unconsciousness. Being so engaged with my sister over the last 6 weeks, after her “accident,” has been an eye-opener you might say. It’s given me a fly-on-the-wall view of the play of the unconscious with its drama, and what happens when we are unwilling to “wake up” and not continue to sleep-walk through life. It has given me a clearer perspective of how we are “victimized” by our unwillingness to “wake up” – “victimized” (I hate this word) by our own unconscious behaviors – and how this sleepwalking keeps us from making the appropriate choices - like acting on our own behalf. Choices that I don’t think we abdicate when we “wake up” and become more conscious of who we really are. We still have to make life choices. And sometimes that requires a “fierce presence” with the way things are – the way things “go down” you might say.

In this Sea of Unconsciousness, where we don’t *recognize* the Inner Being, the True Self, the Knowing Awareness that we are, we allow others and “the system” (whatever system you want to refer to, including the ego-system) to determine our lives, and the outcomes. We pay the consequences of our unconscious behavior – and that of others as well. In this Ocean of Unawareness we ignore the “wake-up calls” – or at least try to sidestep them and return to our comfort zone. I’ve seen my sister do this on a number of occasions – pretending that “the system” will take care of everything and this (experience) will all go away. Then feeling victimized by “the system” when “the system” doesn’t work on her behalf, because it actually requires that she *do* something on her own behalf – like asking pertinent questions, finding out what is required of her, answering important phone calls, returning voice messages, and submitting applications that will help her pay her hospital and doctor bills….

Not acting on one's own behalf creates incredible drama and a victim story that goes something like: this shouldn’t be happening to me and I shouldn’t *have* to deal with this or *do* anything about it because “*he* did this to me!” - not recognizing our own unconscious behaviors that got us into this situation in the first place.

Being present with life as it is seems very different than allowing the unconscious to drive our decisions…

BEING with life as it is – consciously - is different than just “going with the flow” of the drama of life – with the usual maneuvers of avoidance, resistance and denial when life doesn’t flow the way we want and we don’t want to face what we need to face – further perpetuating the unconscious sleep walk – falling back into familiar patterns.

I have always thought that significant emotional events, traumatic events, change people – wake us up. Sometimes this has been my personal experience. But what I’ve also observed is that initially, when one is feeling wounded, traumatized and vulnerable, there seems to be this inner urge to live life differently, to make necessary changes. People seem to soften, become more open and receptive. But over time, as healing happens, as one begins to “recover” from the wounds of trauma – whether physical or emotional, or both - the personality mechanism takes over again and there is a slow sinking back into the Sea of Unconsciousness - the habitual unconscious behavior patterns that have created the drama to begin with.

We were also the” experiencers” (I refuse to use the word “victim”) of others’ unconscious behavior this week. My husband’s car was broken into Sunday night and a lot of his video equipment for his business was stolen. Another wake up call you might say – to become conscious – to be more aware, to not be so careless with what is left exposed in the car - the practical stuff of life; the no-brainer stuff. But also a “wake-up call” for my husband to move through life differently – with more awareness, to pay attention to his direction in life, to what he really values in life, to not leaving himself vulnerable and exposed, to not being taken advantage of, to not letting the unconsciousness of others determine his direction. (All the things I’ve been learning with my sister as well.) The freaky part – they took our garage door opener. They know where we live. That triggered my unconscious stuff about feeling vulnerable, unsafe and needing to be vigilant – which is not a bad thing really, as long as I don’t take it into hyper-vigilance and allow the anxiety to create more drama and trigger the unconscious need to control. (Although I have to admit – my pattern is that when there is a crisis I usually go into control mode.) Both these experiences have certainly given me an opportunity, an invitation really, to practice awareness, to be present and to *live* from a place of Presence - not fear; to not let the unconscious – mine and others - determine how I move through life. And, to act on my own behalf when needed.

In this Sea of Unconsciousness experience I’ve been noticing where I am still sleepwalking through life, where I don’t want to look, to wake up. Through this experience it has become clear that I want to accept the invitation to see those places within myself that want to stay asleep, that want to hide in the shadows of my psyche. I want to accept the challenge to not engage in the drama of the unconscious – mine or others. Not an easy task. There are many undertows and riptides to pull me back in. The gravitational pull of the unconscious is very strong…

But so is this urge to “be fully awake” - to *live* fully awake…