Consciousness – United Being

The Power In Asking Questions

“Sometimes questions are more important than answers.”
– Nancy Willard

I’m sure that many of you have heard the saying, “sometimes the questions are more important than the answers,” as have I; Before I realized the extent to how true and impactful this message actually was.

I have found that asking myself questions is the easiest way to become aware of unconscious patterns.
I also made the connection that the wording I used when posing the question played a major role in what I was able to uncover within myself.

For example: Whenever I feel feelings such as fear or anxiety arising within me, I simply ask myself the question, “What am I so afraid of?“ Whenever I ask myself this question, all feelings of fear and anxiety dissipate within me.

Another example is when I catch myself having a difficult time being genuine or authentic with my words, or simply not sure which direction I want to go in. Whenever I feel this way, I pose to myself the question, “What are my true intentions?” Whenever I ask myself this question, a sense of clarity comes over me, and I am able to honestly work towards and communicate my goals and expectations.

So often we spend our time unconsciously avoiding or ignoring thoughts or emotions that we don’t like, instead of confronting them with the presence of awareness.
One way to confront these thoughts or emotions with the presence of awareness is by asking ourselves questions. Once we address this cause of suffering by asking ourselves the right questions, we create an internal shift allowing inner peace to take over.

These are just a couple of examples that I use often within my own life, but the power of questions don’t just apply when asking questions to myself, but sending a question out to the universe as well. I have found to be true that whenever I send a question out into the universe, even if the answer may not be direct, I always receive an answer in some form. Although from my own experience, I would say that the simplest and most effective way to use the power of questions to benefit one’s life is by posing them to themselves.

When posing a question to oneself, I have found that the most effective way to do so was by asking it internally, in the form of thought.
Although it is true that we are not our thoughts, as Eckhart Tolle and many others influential teachers express, our mind can still be used as a tool for good.

One does not have to verbalize the question that they are posing to themselves out loud in order for it to have a positive impact, asking the question in the form of internal thought is just as effective, if not more.

The possibilities for the questions that can be posed are endless, whether it be from something as vague as “What do I want?” to something as specific as “What am I feeling?“. At the end of the day, pose whatever question calls to you! We are all on our own individual journeys and thus are looking for our own individual answers that relate to our own individual experiences, so we will all have very different questions to ask, and that is the beauty of it.

I hope this helps. All my love and namaste.

Becoming Non-Reactive Towards Thoughts

To observe thoughts without judgement or criticism, only with the presence of love and compassion, is to become aware of the truth that thoughts have no power over the way we feel, unless we allow them to have that power through reaction and ego-identification.

Of course no one would consciously want to give their thoughts the power to cause them suffering, that is why it is unconscious behavior. When one brings their awareness to the fact that thoughts do not have the power to cause them suffering unless they react to them, they then become conscious of it, and it is then no longer an unconscious pattern.

Some get as far as becoming aware of the thoughts that arise, but then lose this awareness by falling into unconscious reactivity; such as convincing themselves of “I should not be thinking this, I am wrong for thinking this” or truly believing that the thought has something to do with who they are (ego-identification), thus inducing emotions such as sadness, anger, regret, or fear.

The thoughts that we tend to react to the most are usually linked to a negative false belief system that we have recurrently convinced ourselves to be true (even if it is far from what is true), which then becomes ingrained within our mental structure. This false belief then influences unconscious cyclical patterns of thinking that we assume we have no control over, but we do.

When we begin to sit with these thoughts and look into why they arise, instead of fighting against, resisting, and trying to avoid them, we can then bring our awareness to the root cause of why these thoughts make us feel the way they do, and make the shift from unconsciousness to consciousness.

From the Words of Dr. Dyer: Awareness of Perception

“When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” – Dr. Wayne Dyer

It is our choice whether we interpret our personal experiences to be positive or negative. In other words, we all have the power to choose to reflect a state of higher awareness, or to remain rooted in patterns of egoistic perception.

One thing I came to realize is that when the ego is in control, it will always manage to find another problem, another thing to complain about, another thing to oppose. Even if there is no problem present, the ego will find a way to create one just so it can continue to survive.

One way I learned how reflect a state of inner peace and higher awareness, instead of allowing myself to fall into negative ways of thinking and reactivity, is to live in a constant state of gratitude.

If I am resting in a hot room, there are two ways in which I can perceive the situation:

“I can’t take this heat, this is so unpleasant. If I just had another fan to cool me off I would feel much better.” And so on…

“I’m grateful that I am inside with some air flowing. If I were stuck outside, I would be much hotter than I am now. Thank you.”

This is just one small example, but this applies to all the experiences we perceive and encounter throughout each of our journeys. As one continues to practice and become aware of the ways in which they perceive interactions and situations, the ego’s tendencies to seek out negativity will diminish (as the ego itself will begin to diminish due to the presence of awareness), and all that is positive will start to become apparent.