Walking along the Palma Beach promenade today, observing people sitting out in the intermittent sun, walking their dog or jogging by, it struck me how the “weather” is almost entirely dependent on our inner sky. Being in a beautiful place does not guarantee joy and happiness. This becomes most obvious when being in incredibly beautiful places and finding one’s own inner demons have come along to join the party, as well as looking around and seeing the reality of what is true in people’s faces. Sun or no sun, beach or no beach.
Yes, it may let us forget our worries for a moment, or alleviate the weight on our shoulders by some inches, but does our outer circumstance truly influence our inner state? I don’t believe so. Not for the long run anyways. Even if we can fool ourselves sufficiently to repeatedly bet on the horse of outer satisfaction, the truth of the matter is that in the greater scheme of things, that horse tends to fail us. In fact, more often than not, miserably so.
Betting on relief and contentment coming from the outside makes us both uncomfortably dependent and easily disappointed. It rarely comes as our hopes and expectations lay it out.
A sunny spring day like today can be the long-awaited heaven or, punctured by big clouds, a thwarted afternoon out, rendering the moment cold and windy. Only the truth of one’s inner sky can guarantee a beautiful or miserable day, as far as the deeper reality of the moment is concerned. Wouldn’t you agree?
I assume that most people in the chosen business of consciousness would concur with that premise, and yet, I find myself still betting on those external horses for the sun to shine on the inside. Knowing better doesn’t stop me from momentarily forgetting that wonderful finding. The finding that no stormy day can sway my inner peace if it is anchored in myself. Even the news then is a current that may sadden my heart, but is not detrimental to the core of my, and our shared, reality.
It seems like an unattainable and ambitious goal to hope for such an unidentified observer consciousness when speaking about it from the mind’s perspective, in these terms. And while that may be so, I believe that most of us have had glimpses of stillness within a storm that, surprising or cultivated as they may have been, seemed profoundly natural on some level. And how good to know, even if frequently forgotten, that that possibility is available to us at all times. The option of turning away from any potential fulfilment on the outside and remembering that everything we believe to be missing or longing for, is in the mere reach of our conscious perception, ready to be re-discovered, independent of clouds or sunshine. A clear and endlessly soothing sky at the very centre of our being. It seems just our orientation has gone astray, that is ceaselessly looking everywhere out there, instead of simply turning around and in to find just what we were looking for. Right here.
May we continue to come back to that knowing, keep on turning around and in, undeterred by our mind’s seduction of the promising gratification in any- and everything external to ourselves. May we remember that the weather depends on our inner sky entirely, that there can be nothing more delightful than a grey and windy day when one’s inner sky is clear.
Kanika Frings
Co-Founder DIMA Mallorca
Holistic Counsellor & Enneagram to Essence Coach
www.dimamallorca.com
