[0:00]The new version of ourselves is never going to be found in our old ideas of who we were. I think many times when we're trying to change, we often reference the past as if we have to build from what we were instead of what we are. And what I mean by that is often times we feel as if we have some past previous version of ourselves to overcome before we can become who we currently are. We have to overcome some sort of stigma in the past in order to emerge as something new, but that's never truly been the case. I think that's something we've convinced ourselves of. I think that in many ways change is established the second we establish it. The second we give it to ourselves, the second we allow ourselves this space, the presence in order to do that. And that's why I think the present is is one of the most important things especially when trying to change and trying to develop yourself for the better. Because that's the only opportunity we get to not reference ourselves to an idea. The present in and of itself is an idea that we exist in. The present is what it is. Everything else is as we are, you know? It's when we allow ourselves to sort of be within the hands of outside of our own mind, basically. Um, that we actually get an opportunity to start building things in proportion to what we actually want. That we start actually just recognizing that a lot of the things that we experience on a regular basis are things that we attract into our lives, or things that we develop, or things that we manifest into our regular lives. And many times, especially in my own experience, it's sort of hard to recognize that a lot of the things that you experience are sort of in reference to you or brought about by your own mental thoughts, brought about by your own actions and things that you put into your mind and never really pay attention to. And that's why I think we should pay attention to what we're putting in our minds because that ultimately becomes our reality, becomes what we experience. You know, they call it a seed of doubt because at first it's small, then it grows into something bigger, and we don't notice the planting. But the thing about us in our consciousness and our awareness and ourselves is we're constantly planting. We're constantly investing into who we are and to what we are. And the longer we sort of stay negligent to that idea, the more we're going to grow things that aren't in proportion to what we actually want. And then we'll look at everything that's brought and we won't have appreciation for it, and therefore we won't have appreciation for ourselves, because all we're ever doing is experiencing ourselves. So the objective isn't necessarily to not feel anything, but to feel things fully, to feel things as you are, to be the one that's feeling it, not to be the feeling. You know, and I think a lot of us get lost in it. It's like we're trying to escape from ourselves. It's like we're trying to run from ourselves, running from our own feeling, running from our own ideas. And, you know, present establishment, I think is one of the most beautiful things. You know, so deferring to your imagination to define who you are in reference to what you wish to achieve in the future rather than keeping it tied to a past that you're trying to overcome. In limiting ourselves to the ideas of the past, we perpetuate them. We give them a new wings to to really fly into our our own idea. And we sort of allow those things to sit at the center of our being. And we stay on the outsert. And then we come to the center and recognize how big this thing in the center has gotten, and all of a sudden it's too big and it's overpowering us. And I think it's in those times that we actually embrace present. To recognize that our center is everywhere we are. Our center is wherever we establish it because everything is a center because the center is everything. The second we allow ourselves to be content where we are is the second we're content where we are. The second we allow ourselves to feel abundant where we are is the second we're abundant where we are. Because those type of types of truths when it comes to ourselves are only established by the present feeling that we're able to have. So if we're able to reach the present, at least in a subtle sense, at least in a real sense, then we give ourselves pretty much everything we need, the second we need it. The second we wish it, and the second we actually believe in the first wish. And when I say the first wish, I mean this. The first wish is never for anything. The first wish is that the wishes actually come true. And it's us who have to be that that sort of belief system for ourselves. We have to be the ones to believe in our own narrative, our own story, our own progression as people. In the same way that we believe if we don't do anything then we'll fail or we'll end up in a negative place. That's believing in ourselves in a different way. So why not believe in ourselves if we actually do put in even a little bit of effort to get the things that we actually desire in this world? And, you know, that's another thing I've been thinking about too. There's a whole onslaught of desire. You know, I don't know, I can speak for myself, living in America, living in a system that's very centered around being a consumer, consuming products, finding the things that you want at your convenience and being able to get them. Um, and I think that makes us desire short term. It makes us very in a way centered about where we are, but never using what we have to get things that we actually desire. But things to just feel in little moments of entertainment, little brief bits of our awareness. And I don't necessarily see a lot of luster in that anymore, or at least I'm trying not to. Like, today is the where I'm making this is the first day of of Ramadan. If you're practicing, Ramadan Mubarak to you guys. Um, if not, just a great opportunity for introspection, spiritual development, etc, etc. That said, I haven't really been consuming anything, like media-wise, um, music-wise, food and water-wise. And it's given me a lot of space to just think even in the just this morning on day one. It's given me a lot more space to actually think and recognize that what I am is not really the thought at all. You know, we sort of get caught in our thoughts. It's like we start thinking and all of a sudden our our physical actions stop actually moving. And until we learn how to integrate those two, and until we learn how to use them both in conjunction, then one always feels like it's going to hinder the other, but that's never really the case. It's always a matter of our perspective of it. A matter of our ability to listen to ourselves and discern. You know, not every thought that we hear in our head is stuff that we should listen to, and I've also been trying to only speak positively. And not something that's difficult, because even in our jokes, even in our sarcasm, our irony, we're constantly saying words and saying things that aren't necessarily characteristic, or meaningful towards our actual experience, things that we actually want. And if we can just work with the premise and accept the idea, at least for the sake of the argument that words are powerful, that we are actually creating our our reality, our world via the words that we're using around it, then we should be intentional with the words we use too. Not to say we shouldn't be able to talk about the negative light of certain things. But to say many times when we are talking about the negative light of certain things, we become overcome with the feeling of negativity. And once again, we're plunged into our thoughts rather than actually being in the world where the thoughts are taking place. And I don't know, that's sort of the movement I'm getting into. It's trying to understand myself better, not by, you know, sitting down trying to rattle every introspective thing about myself, but recognizing the only true way to figure out myself is to be present enough to see it. It's to not let myself live in the ideas in my mind, plaging my my past, and etc., etc. But to be present enough to recognize what is presently established, and take part in that present establishment by saying to yourself, where you are, what you are, because that's all that is. You know, we have to recognize that each moment truly is a new life. Every moment makes us new. Every moment we're reborn. Every moment we die. Every moment we come back. You know, and it's truly about letting that previous version of yourself go so the current self can actually live in its fullness. You know, we're always living in reference and we aren't really the subject. Then we're being, if we're being a reference point to the past, then the past is the subject of our experience, not where we are. And of course, there are certain things that I think a lot of us want to overcome when it comes to the past, and things that maybe we didn't get as kids, things that, you know, we just want to see a a change in when it comes to the world, or it comes to ourselves. And I think those are best established where we are. You know, I think it's one thing to have volition, drive and desire, and I think it's another thing to tie it. You know, you can have a desire for something without it being tied to a lack in something else. Like I can want to be a professional basketball player without feeling like I'm terrible at basketball.
[9:52]You know, it's sometimes how we allow our goals to feel so out of reach that makes them out of reach. It's almost as if the very reaching that we do towards our goals, towards our aspirations, is what makes them feel distant, is what makes them feel like things are sort of difficult for us to obtain. When I don't think that's really the case. I think it's more so us being open enough to the moment. Us being open enough to ourselves to actually feel what it is to be you, to see what it is to be you, to experience what it is to be you. And recognize that everything that you need to learn is sort of via that experience. What questions do we have that aren't answered in the drops of rain which take care of our idea? You know, it's almost like sometimes in our very questions we find the answers. Why do I feel this way? Because you feel that way. Like it's there's a lot of I think jargon. A lot of word usage in our head that sort of keeps us wrapped up in the idea of ourselves. It makes us feel like the idea of ourselves is something that we have no part in establishing. That if we are thinking about ourselves in introspection, that if we are trying to decide what parts of ourselves to work on, that if we are trying to decide what parts of ourselves are present, then it's something we have to argue and coourse ourselves about. Yes, who we are is somewhat tied to our actions. True. But if we want something new to be established, then all it takes us being present enough to act in a way that's befitting of that new version.
[11:37]And that's only if we want to tie it to action, because who we are is more so something that is than something that is acted upon. You know, and I think even in doing nothing, we're still being ourselves, we're still expressing ourselves because that's a choice that we're making. And there's beauty in that too, and I think we shouldn't really dampen our own idea, dampen our own life in proportion to that. I think there's nothing to truly gain in it, nothing to truly gain in us thinking that who we are is found in laborious thought about who we are. Who we are is already here. Who we are is always just something that we're becoming more aware of. And I think that sort of presence allows you to open yourself up to what you're already aware of. So like taking a step back from social media, I think in this time is important. As many of you know, like yesterday was a big day for like pretty much every every culture, every person, you know, Chinese New Year, uh, started Ramadan, Uh, Saturn enter Aries, something else entered Aquarius, um, Lent, and like maybe two other things, and a solar eclipse. Not to say that everything has some sort of grand significance, but if anything does then I think it this time is is important to recognize who we are beyond what we told, what we're told about ourselves, what we feed ourselves constantly via our social media, etc, etc. And actually trying to establish ourselves in a light of positivity and a light of future thinking that's actually going to move us towards everything. You know, there's a lot of things currently going on within our system, within the world around us. So much stuff to consume, so much negativity to to sort of funnel our attention into to become. And I think that's what they want is us to become negative along with these things that they're feeding us. Not to say that we shouldn't feel some type of way about what's going on, not to say that we shouldn't actually act upon it, but to say acting upon it takes us being present. If we only act in ways that are that are vindictive of of our anger, then they know how to how to deal with that. Anger is something that that the system that the world knows that they use, you know, and I think it's important that we sort of use ourselves to sort of see through the the nonsense that's out there most of the time. To actually recognize what it is we want to do beyond our emotions, beyond our thoughts about this specific situation, because it's about the whole of it. It's about how it applies to every single thing. Not necessarily how it looks in this specific light. You know, and I think sometimes we get so tunnel vision and focusing on leaves that we forget to acknowledge the trees that are present around them. That we forget to acknowledge the entire forest of ideas that we've found ourselves trapped in by allowing ourselves to look at one single leaf only. And not allow ourselves to recognize that we're the ones doing the looking. You know, and when I say that, I basically mean that sometimes we don't do our actions with enough presence. And I recognize this with myself a lot that times where I feel most free to do the things that I want, times where I feel most free in my expression and whatever I'm doing, or times where I'm actually present in the doing. Where I'm not just allowing myself to just be on some sort of autopilot. When I'm actually making the decision on how I want to feel in any given moment, because I can. And I think that's what Carl Young was talking about with making the unconscious conscious. There are so many points in our day where we feel as if we have to let our minds be unconscious. As if we have to sort of do things to make it so we're we'd stop thinking. Do things to make it feel like we're relaxing, but our relaxation has never been necessarily just an absence of thought, but good feeling. But the presence of good feeling, the presence of you giving to yourself enough to actually be. And that's all it really takes. It's us not identifying solely with the ideas we have. Solely with the ideas we have about ourselves, the ideas we have about everything, because they're really just ideas. And more than anything, I'm recognizing that, you know, many of the things we claim to like know about ourselves, about the world, about anything, have been fed to us. They have, and that doesn't necessarily mean I'm saying everything we know is false. But to say, if you know anything, you know, you know nothing, because there's actually so much vastness to what actually can be known for a person, for an individual, even about yourself. There's always a new situation that's going to bring about a part of you. You had no idea truly existed. Not to say that part didn't exist, but to say we weren't currently aware of it. And I think there's so much stuff out here that we're just not currently aware of because one, we're not giving ourselves the presence enough to see it. And two, one. You know, I think I really hate to talk about social media like that. But I think the way that it's been used, at least in the past, maybe for the majority of people now is sort of something to not directly, but indirectly suppress themselves. Not to say that we can't be on social media, not to say we can't express ourselves, but it's literally making us promote our own idea more than our being. And it's making us or allowing us to sort of be fictitious about what that idea is, what that person is. And somewhat we get wrapped up in the lies that we feed ourselves when it comes to that, and then we stop trusting ourselves. And then when we actually do have a desire and things that we want to go towards, we don't do anything because we don't believe that we can. Because we don't believe that it's possible, because we believe so much in the idea that we have fed ourselves already. And that's why I think in a lot of ways yourself is your most applied thought. It's what we think of most. It's what we allow to be so centered in us. And I think many of us just want to be centered where we are, and I think to do that, we sort of have to shake off all the words we use so we can be in the center of now. You know, being in the center of the moment, recognizing that you don't have to think, you don't have to riddle everything with words in order to find peace, because peace is not in the word about it. It's in the feeling that we have, and peace is not found, it's created, the second we'll create it, the moment, the place, the instation where we create it. And that's pretty much it. We have as much as we give ourselves nine times out of ten. And that's also something I've been trying to do for myself a lot recently is give myself at least an opportunity when it comes to thoughts that I have that aren't necessarily beneficial. Give myself at least a chance to look at what it is I'm creating for myself and make the decision to create with intention. We're already living in our own personal heaven or hell. You're already living within your own personal world. Because everything no matter what is going to be reference to you. Because you are the subject to your own experience. But that doesn't mean you're only one having an experience. I think that's an important distinction to make too. I think that in a lot of ways other people should be looked at as other versions of yourself. I think in that way we free ourselves from a lot of the biases that we might have about people and their own uh prescriptions, like we think about other people's perspective of us more than we think about our perspective of them most of the time.
[19:59]And it's already so based in our mind, so based in ideas that aren't grounded in truth. That we're not really living in in a genuine in a genuine world, or more so living in our minds. The real world has no connotation. The real world just is. And in allowing certain things to be, mainly ourselves and accepting that, we actually get a chance to move forward with whatever it is we want. The present is nothing but a blank canvas for us. And I think we've been taught to not use the present as a blank canvas, but constantly altering work that was previously done. And most of the time, not even by our own hand. It's when we pick up the brush for ourselves and we start to make certain strokes. That we actually see the the beauty of our being emerged, because it takes our awareness to become aware of us. Nobody else is going to be aware of you in the same light that you can be aware of yourself. And I don't mean that to to, you know, any bad light, any negative way, any way of of narcissism or or enforcing this idea of solitude, nothing. Nothing like that. But recognizing that one of the most beautiful parts about being an individual is being an individual. Is being able to experience your own karma, your own drama and learn from it, and learn your own lessons in your time where you need to. And taking everything as a sign of appreciation, as a sign of affection from the world around you, because that's all it can be. If we're not here to experience it, then it's not experienced. So if we are currently experiencing something and we recognize that we can give to it, why not give to it? We only have so much time on our hands to actually do the things that we want to do. This life is finite. And there's beauty in that too, because it gives us drive, it gives us motivation, it gives us more than anything, an opportunity to recognize that the space that we're taking up should be used. And it should be used for ourselves. And when I say ourselves, I don't even just mean this one person. When I say ourselves, I mean everybody, like because we are really one people, you know, and I don't really want to like really get into the the jargon of that, you know, in the current political, socio-economic, etcetera, etcetera. Because I think those are those are more things that enforce separation. You know, I think that that much is true. And I'm not saying that to say that everything is Kumbaya, everything is all peaceful, everything is all good, and in reality, because it's not how it is. Things are as they are. True. But that's a neutral position. If we actually do want to look at things through a lens of ourselves, through a lens of Ian, through a lens of my understanding, a lot of stuff is going wrong, and we need to stand up, we need to wake up more than anything. But that always takes us waking up. It doesn't take us listening to people who are awake. It takes us waking up. And this is something that I had to realize quite a while ago is that your journey is always yours, and it's never going to be anyone else's. This thing might work for somebody, but it might not work for you, but that's okay, because it doesn't have to work for you in the way that it worked for them. There are a million ways to the top of the mountain, and we make the mistake of thinking that just because somebody made it up this way, that that's the best way to go. Yes, we might have obstacles that differ from other people. But there are obstacles, and if we choose to look at them as obstacles, that's as long as they'll be obstacles. But the second we allow them to be stepping stones, is the second we ascend to higher heights of who we are individually. And that doesn't mean don't learn from other people's experiences, but to say, at the very least, be present enough for your own. That's all that matters to me. At least right now, that's all I've been thinking about. I'm at a point where everyone, or it seems like everyone in my life is is is about to branch off into their own lives. And grow in ways that I probably can't even imagine. But I think what hinders us most in the idea of other people, is us thinking that we aren't subject to the same growth that other people are when it comes to time and change. The second we pour ourselves into our own life is the second that we actually begin to sprout. Begin to find ourselves beyond our previous thoughts and start to truly live in our own new ideas, lives on our new versions of ourselves, lives on in our new use. Because who you are is always new. It just takes you acknowledging the newness that's currently there. And being present enough to recognize it when it is showing itself. Like, I don't know. It's just the idea that we have to wake up and do the same thing every day when we never have to. You've never had to. You might feel obliged to, but you never had to. And that's my point too. A lot of us enforce certain regulations and conditions on ourselves without acknowledging that we are enforcing regulations and conditions on ourselves. And in that way, we call life a certain thing. You know, oh, life is treating me this way. My life is just hard. My life is just busy. My life is just this. And we allow ourselves to feel it within our core that everything about us is that stress, is that business, is that anxiety. When it's really just our perspective of specific things that we're doing. And I don't know. In my, in my worst times, like the main thing that I've been able to recognize is even the worst times are subject to perspective. Yes, they might be harder to just up and change, but that doesn't mean they can't be changed. When I say changing perspective, I don't mean not caring. Like if I broke my leg, yes, I broke my leg, but that doesn't mean that I have to you know, shed a tear every time I don't take a step in the right in the in the way that I have before. I almost said the right way, but that was a part of the problem, cuz who said that's the right way? And even if there is an established right way that other people agree to, why would I agree to that if it doesn't allow me to actually take a step? If it doesn't allow me to take a step with comfort without feeling like I'm less than everyone around me. Because the truth is, it's not about anyone else. It's not even about you really. It's about being, and recognizing that we don't live in reference to other people. We are all the subject to our own experience. If you allow your gratitude to live in reference to each other, then something good is going to be bad to something greater. And it's never really been that way. Good things and great things can exist on the same plane. Oh, that's a, that's a, that's a pretty plant. But that plant is beautiful. I'm not calling the pretty plant ugly. I'm just saying that one is beautiful. And if if you allow them to truly live outside of reference to each other, then the beauty exists fully in both. You can take as much as you can from each of those. You can find a stone in the street and decide that that's going to be your reason to be happy today. And truly mean it and truly feel it, you can. I'm not saying it's an easy thing for us to do, but saying at the very least, we have to recognize that we can use our perspective in a way that's going to allow our life to feel better lived. That's going to allow us to feel happier in our undertaking, in our realizations, in our overall progression of who we are as people. And I think we have that opportunity. I think everyone has that opportunity. I think everyone can do exactly what they want to the second they give themselves the authority to. And when I say authority, I do not mean power. I mean awareness. I mean being present enough to recognize that you can do anything you want because you've always done everything that you are. And what you are is always sufficient. What you are is always enough. We might not be able to choose how it comes to us, or how it looks. We can choose what it is, and that's something I've I've been coming to recognize.
