The UK’s leading Tao master on trusting the universe to create the life of your choice
The UK’s leading Tao master on trusting the universe to create the life of your choice
Whether through enlightenment or sheer desperation, more and more people are turning on to the notion that you materialise whatever you’re investing your mental energy in.
So that if you invest in a picture of you having everything you need, it’ll manifest for you all by itself. Conversely, if you invest in a picture of you not getting what you need, that’s what you’ll get instead. Here’s how to create the right future:
1. Choice
In other words, in each and every moment, you have a choice: to invest in a picture of what you want, or invest in a picture of what you don’t want. The former depends on imbuing yourself with a fundamental trust in life, in the Tao, in the Great Way, or whatever you want to call the unnameable. The latter depends entirely on being afraid and allowing the fear to run away with itself. Trust or fear.
2. Honor the fear
Now obviously in practice, it’s all about striking a workable balance between the two, with a healthy preponderance of the trust element. You can’t just go into denial about being afraid. Honor the fear. Accept that you secretly love the fear (because presumably it helps you feel more alive), even thank the fear for whatever benefits it brings you, but then remind yourself you have options. The fear and the fear-based pictures it conjures up in your head, along with the queasy, jittery sensations in your belly, is not compulsory or obligatory. Your parents may have felt obliged to indulge it, and possibly passed that on as a rule of thumb, but there’s no rule in the universe to suggest you have to too.
3. Let yourself go
The more you let go, the better you land. So while it may feel almost reckless and irrational to eschew the fear and fear-based thoughts in favor of the trust option, it doesn’t invalidate trust as a viable option.
To the contrary, assuming you do choose the trust option, what you’ll find is that life, the Tao, the Great Whatever, will respond most favourably by somehow shunting the flow of events in a direction – however ostensibly unlikely – which will deliver you to the set-up you need around you to thrive.
4. Exercise discipline
But as you’ve probably inferred, this approach requires a certain discipline. You have to discipline yourself firstly to be mindful, to be awake and cognisant of what’s actually going on in your mind and body. You have to be able to regularly spot whenever fear has built up in your belly and chest. You have to be able to spot when you’re holding your breath or breathing intermittently. You have to be willing to check for muscular tension, especially around the back of the neck, shoulders, face and chest and to use your will to release it. And you have to be aware of the thoughts running through your forebrain. You have to be able to spot whenever you’re generating fearful thoughts in your head. And you have to be willing to remind yourself you have options and that it’s a viable and safe choice to go with the trust option.
5. Talk to your Tao
You also have to be up for conversing. In the West, we’d traditionally call it praying but there’s no ‘our father’ about it; I’m referring more to the style of the Native Americans with whom I had the pleasure and privilege to live for four whole years once. They speak to the Great Spirit in everything and everyone – in the chair, the table, the mountain, the eagle, the sparrow, the mouse, the leopard, the people you meet, the train, the bus, the road, the traffic light and in fact any and every phenomenon you ever encounter. What you say doesn’t matter so much, it’s more about striking up and perpetuating a conversation, to be in dialogue, with, to be communing with. You can talk the biggest load of rubbish if you like – just keep going and, as with any conversation with a good friend, it will go deeper and more truthful of itself over time.
6. The Tao is your friend
And that’s the point. The Tao, the Great Whatever, is your friend. It’s not your judge or executioner. It’s not your lord or even your lady. It’s your friend, your beloved friend. That’s why it’s safe to trust it. That’s why it’s okay to let go and jump into the mystery even if it looks like you’re being irrational. Your friend, the Tao, the Great Whatever, will catch you, hold you, carry you and always keep you safe and sound.
Remember…
Developing this dialogue also requires discipline. That’s why spiritual disciples are called that – they’re willing to discipline themselves to remember. That’s all it takes: remembering.
So if circumstances require you to take a huge leap of faith at the moment and that leap appears to constitute the greatest folly, don’t be deterred. Do what your heart, your inner child’s heart, really wants to do. Follow your fascination, even if it makes no sense whatsoever. Even if momentarily it appears to land you in the crapper. If it does, it’ll only be to swiftly catapult you somewhere way better than you’d been previously.
The more you play the trust game, the more you score the big prizes. Hanging onto the railing, refusing to let go, lest you lose what little you have, will only cause you to lose that anyway – and you’ll still have to jump at some point. So jump now and let the Tao, the Great Whatever, catch you in its loving arms. All will be well. The work is done.
Article by
Barefoot Doctor
Tao Master
Barefoot Doctor is a leading tao master and has written numerous books including the cult classic Handbook for the Urban Warrior. His latest book is called The Man Who Drove...
Discover more
Article by
Barefoot Doctor
Tao Master
Barefoot Doctor is a leading tao master and has written numerous books including the cult classic Handbook for the Urban Warrior. His latest book is called The Man Who Drove...
Discover more
By Barefoot Doctor
