Returning to Innocence Is Optionality

After getting caught up, chewed up, and spit out, though we may look bad, we always have the choice of turning back to innocence.

— We can do this simply by not going along with, or even engaging with, the pile-on of negative thoughts about ourselves that tempt our interest. —

This is done by lifting the attention from the thought. Here are the simple directions: To get back to innocence, go into the body. Go into the heart. We enjoy life right where we are instead of making it wrong or not enough or that it has to be enjoyed later or elsewhere or under other conditions not yet achieved.

Present Enjoyment

Part of enjoying right where we are is we begin to notice the things around us and let them move us and feel us. The tumescent mind will tell us we need to go or get somewhere instead of enjoying right where we are. But we can lift the attention from those thoughts as well. We remember it’s all a game, introducing levity and letting ourselves go in the direction the game is going.

Challenge of Negativity  

Before we make it back inside our bodies, hearts, and ultimately our optionality, we may get tossed around a bit by lingering negative thought patterns. When we’re pulled into their density, we’re pulled out of the present moment into the future.

— And in futuring, there’s anxiety, because the future is where we project our not-enoughness. —

The only way to come back to being enough is to come back to the moment, by coming back to the play available in the life right in front of us.

Finding the Good  

We ask ourselves, What in this moment happening right now is good? Even in the presence of the good, we acknowledge the concentration; the density will still have this pull to it. It will pull the attention like a magnet, but we have the option of lifting it instead. If we have familiarity with the place of optionality, we can return it to its home. Inside of optionality, the negative charge we could not seem to shake, dissipates.

Restoration of Spaciousness  

It’s as if the mind can empty, the experience of contracting ends, and spaciousness is restored. If we do not peak and shift our attention successfully, we will likely take action in some unconscious way, most likely along the familiar grooves we’ve established with prior actions. We can change these habits, but it is challenging. The pull is strong. Changing our movement here, though—in the here and now—is a triumph and a lot of fun.

Optionality and Old Grooves

It can even generate a new, small pocket of optionality where a sense of freshness can occur. It’s important to note that

— if we merely allow ourselves to be carried along the old grooves, the tumescent mind has dominion and it becomes incredibly challenging to act with any choice. —

The pursuits we carry out will be based on perceived survival, and the return to optionality, more often than not, will happen inside a chamber of “heavy pressure” or pain.

Challenge of Consciousness

In this difficult field, charged material again begins to accrete, re-forming the density. Consciousness (the optionality mind) is difficult to access; in order to get it, more pressure must be applied to cut through the density. Here, where we live in the results of having gone with the pull, we inhabit our reactions: We are anger, we are sadness, and the actions then take place of their own accord. It’s the inverse relationship to optionality.

Fun of Optionality  

Here’s the trick with optionality: In the beginning is where the most fun exists—we don’t feel at the mercy of anything.

— But as we advance, it becomes interesting to get dragged further and further out of optionality to see if we can make it back. —

Each time we go out and make it back we become more resilient and informed and are no longer in danger in that domain. It’s like building Erotic immunity—provided we make it back. When we let ourselves be swept out to sea, there is always the danger of getting stuck in a riptide, of getting stuck for life in a density.