As I sat in my little process of Somatic-Self Inquiry, exploring what I felt about my ailing automobile, I discovered that it did more than just carry me & my canine companion from place to place. I began to realize that it also held an immense amount of conditioned beliefs related to freedom.
Growing up in the Midwest during the 70's, the ability to have a car represented freedom from all kinds of imposed limitations, real & imagined. Just the image of the girl with long hair waving in a convertible cruising down the road brings up fond feelings in most of us. But underneath this I found an even deeper conditioned belief, that true freedom can be found in something like a car.
As I continued this line of exploration I also realized the deep seeded belief that "home" was equated with security. As most people explore a "spiritual path" it is not uncommon to face the fear of being "homeless" in one sense or another. We see inspirational movies like "Conversations with God" or "The Pursuit of Happiness" that address this issue point-blank of what it can be like to "hit bottom" & not even have a roof over our heads.
And suddenly I saw the deeper level of attraction to Motor Homes....for they are the American Dream of both security & freedom wrapped up into one! And perhaps it's also the reason why some many people in mid or late life pitch the "big" American Dream for the scaled down & compact one. Perhaps, whether we know it or not, what we are really seeking is a truer level of security & freedom. It's just that we are still missing the mark.
And as I ventured further into this murky terrain I really found two fundamental and conflicting beliefs about the nature of reality itself. One belief is about our need to protect ourselves from an adversarial universe. The other is about our desire for freedom from limitations. And both are about our desire to escape suffering. Of course the irony is that neither a house or a car are going to ultimately provide that. Now this doesn't mean that we need to don our monks robes & take up our begging bowls in order to be free either, although we certainly can discover this by enacting it all out if need be, and many of us do (myself not excluded!).
However, in the end it is really about realizing that security will never be found in the world or anything outside of us, no matter how diligently we adhere to any principles of positive manifestation. For it still fuels the misperception that we are something separate that needs to be protected from them & that. And the more we try to find freedom & liberation by leaving our current situation & seeking ANYTHING other than what is right here - right now, the more we will perpetuate suffering by avoiding the reality that true FREEDOM IS NOT CIRCUMSTANTIAL.
So now I know why I have been dreaming of VW Vans & tiny "Scamp" trailers........ they are clues to my Soul yearning for freedom & security beyond anything I have know before in this lifetime. But the true gift comes in realizing that they won't work either, at least not as long as I am still harboring the delusion that they are the answer to this fabricated dilemma. That doesn't mean I won't still end up with a traveling home of some kind, it just means that I won't believe that it can answer that ultimate koan of who I am & what the true nature of reality is!
Growing up in the Midwest during the 70's, the ability to have a car represented freedom from all kinds of imposed limitations, real & imagined. Just the image of the girl with long hair waving in a convertible cruising down the road brings up fond feelings in most of us. But underneath this I found an even deeper conditioned belief, that true freedom can be found in something like a car.
As I continued this line of exploration I also realized the deep seeded belief that "home" was equated with security. As most people explore a "spiritual path" it is not uncommon to face the fear of being "homeless" in one sense or another. We see inspirational movies like "Conversations with God" or "The Pursuit of Happiness" that address this issue point-blank of what it can be like to "hit bottom" & not even have a roof over our heads.
And suddenly I saw the deeper level of attraction to Motor Homes....for they are the American Dream of both security & freedom wrapped up into one! And perhaps it's also the reason why some many people in mid or late life pitch the "big" American Dream for the scaled down & compact one. Perhaps, whether we know it or not, what we are really seeking is a truer level of security & freedom. It's just that we are still missing the mark.
And as I ventured further into this murky terrain I really found two fundamental and conflicting beliefs about the nature of reality itself. One belief is about our need to protect ourselves from an adversarial universe. The other is about our desire for freedom from limitations. And both are about our desire to escape suffering. Of course the irony is that neither a house or a car are going to ultimately provide that. Now this doesn't mean that we need to don our monks robes & take up our begging bowls in order to be free either, although we certainly can discover this by enacting it all out if need be, and many of us do (myself not excluded!).
However, in the end it is really about realizing that security will never be found in the world or anything outside of us, no matter how diligently we adhere to any principles of positive manifestation. For it still fuels the misperception that we are something separate that needs to be protected from them & that. And the more we try to find freedom & liberation by leaving our current situation & seeking ANYTHING other than what is right here - right now, the more we will perpetuate suffering by avoiding the reality that true FREEDOM IS NOT CIRCUMSTANTIAL.
So now I know why I have been dreaming of VW Vans & tiny "Scamp" trailers........ they are clues to my Soul yearning for freedom & security beyond anything I have know before in this lifetime. But the true gift comes in realizing that they won't work either, at least not as long as I am still harboring the delusion that they are the answer to this fabricated dilemma. That doesn't mean I won't still end up with a traveling home of some kind, it just means that I won't believe that it can answer that ultimate koan of who I am & what the true nature of reality is!
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