My blogs are usually short. But this time I have something personal and important to share. All during this launch of Edging Out the Ego, I had been intensively nursing Fluffy, the cat who adopted me.
You might know Fluffy from previous videos, or from my first book, Alchemy.
Years ago, he interrupted me in the middle of my suffering, dramatically teaching me the difference between the story (or movie in the mind), and reality–and how to wake up out of it.
Last Sunday, his blood tests showed kidney failure, which meant a painful death, so the humane thing was to help in this transition. It was very gentle, peaceful… even beautiful.
Painful thoughts like, “He’s gone” I immediately abandoned by seeking him. This is what first happened to me in 2009, which stopped my suffering. The option to fall into these thoughts and suffer was there, but I preferred not to.
And once again, every time I looked for what I *did* want, it was here. That is Alchemy. A genuine, embodied attention and state shift, from which all kinds of wisdom can be known…
Wisdom like: This sense of him is exactly the same as when the body was here–and it is still here. I can have and enjoy it anytime.
In the past, I’d been out on many walks without him, and did not suffer for the lack of his bodily presence! You might say, “Well, but he wasn’t dead,” but out in the woods, I could not in truth say that, because I couldn’t know that.
Had I said and believed he was dead, I would have suffered it. You see, reality, or what is, does not make us suffer. It’s painful thoughts, believed, like, “He’s gone” that hurt–and not the presence or absence of a body.
Each moment is purely as it is, and left that way, each moment is perfect. Imagined to be something else, we suffer.
Suffering is your signal and safety net–it can wake you up.
It’s weird when you live with a pet for 15 years, and suddenly they are gone. You still often about think of them at first.
There are many triggers. Having a shower, he’d always be there to catch the “rain” when I opened the shower door, and I had to watch out for him. Or I’d hear a “thunk,” and look to see where he had jumped.
The clock would show eight, and the thought, “time for his meds” would arise.
Returning home, he’d be waiting right in front of the door for me, so I’d have to gingerly step in and around him.
He was always around, an integral part of everyday life.
Yes, something has changed.
But something has also not changed.
Certainly the body is absent, but what Alchemy taught me in 2009, is that “he” never was his body.
The sense of “him” was in fact my very self–and that has not changed, and so is still present and available.
In divine timing, I came across a quote that says exactly this, from my favourite sage, Ramana Maharshi.
“Mourning is not the index of true love.
It betrays love of the object, of its shape only.
That is not love. True love is shown by the
certainty that the object of love is in the Self
and that it can never cease.” ~ Ramana Maharshi
Not suffering does not mean you didn’t love, it means you still love; you just haven’t swapped love for the idea of loss.
(And it doesn’t mean that I still didn’t love and appreciate the care and concern of family and friends who showed up to care for me–thank-you :).
Alchemy can stop any kind of suffering, from personal anger to hurt, loss, and even so-called “death.”
So yes, you have not lost anyone you thought you did. What a glorious discovery to make! I hope to share more on this with you in the new program we are launching, so you can access the truth of your own unshakable inner peace, no matter what’s going on around you.
Meanwhile, this is a tribute to and celebration of Fluffy, who we could say was a reason this possibility was available to me, and you.
With a heart full of gratitude,
I wish you infinite, eternal, Love,
Cindy
“I fell in love with Love itself.
The rest, is history.” – C. Teevens
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