Reacting or Responding?
What’s the difference? (Bubble Blabber #5)
Bubble Blabber: Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4 , Part 5
The egoic mind reacts. The observer self responds.
Reacting is not bad or wrong, in fact it is essential in navigating our physical reality. A great example is driving an automobile. Our noggins take in all manner of sensory data and we react accordingly. Our reactions are what keep us from wrecking the car. If we have been driving for several years we are probably not very aware of our reactions. They are automatic, conditioned reactions. If we see a red light we do not really have to think about it. We automatically come to a stop. Our reactions to traffic are so conditioned and automatic that we do not have to think about it.
Our noggins are capable of adding additional layers of thinking while still being able to react to traffic. As we drive we can be thinking about last night’s dinner party or next week’s family reunion at the cabin or what will happen when we arrive at the destination we are driving to and we are still able to simultaneously drive through traffic. We can also add layers of emotions, which are reactions to our thoughts. As we drive we could be thinking about the rampant greed of Wall Street while anger courses through our body or we could be thinking about an ex-lover who jilted us with all the emotions of unworthiness that brings up. And we can still drive just fine.
Most of us have thought pattern loops that we play over and over and over in our noggins. These loops are always accompanied by corresponding emotional loops. We can drive a car or do our work at our jobs or do housework and do all those things efficiently all the while those mental/emotional loops are playing over and over in our noggins. This is because our noggins have been conditioned to react in certain ways. Our noggins can be easily trained to react in certain ways and that is why the tasks we take on throughout our days can become boring. Our noggins are on auto-pilot doing their conditioned reacting. We do not get much energetic charge out of that.
Our mental/emotional loops, on the other hand, provide us with that desired energetic charge because they are so filled with emotion. When we fill our bubbles with emotion there is a chemical reaction in the cells and this chemical reaction produces an energetic charge. This energetic charge gives us a false sense of aliveness. So we become addicted to our emotions and to get that energetic charge we replay the thought pattern loops in our noggins that are accompanied by the emotions that produce that charge. So we continually fill our bubbles with the same mental/emotional thought pattern consciousness and our cells continually react to that.
Now let us get back in the car as we are driving down the freeway. Our noggin is reacting to traffic. It may be a little boring but it is safe. Now, instead of allowing a mental/emotional loop to begin playing, keep the mind blank — not totally blank, of course, because you still must drive the car but that is easy and automatic so your mind can be mostly blank. You might find that one of your mental/emotional loops begins to play. Stop it. Another one may begin to play. Stop it. As you keep all the loops from playing you are able to get into the observer mode. You can actually step back from yourself and observe yourself driving!
At this point your noggin is still reacting to stimuli and is able to handle the function of driving but you are not involved in any mental/emotional loops of thinking. You are simply observing yourself driving. It is from this observer mode that you are able to respond to non-mental and non-emotional stimuli. Instead of reacting to emotions you are able to respond to feeling. (Feeling and emotion are two different things.) As you drive you suddenly get this strange feeling to get off the freeway at the next exit. It is not your exit and there is no logical reason to get off at this exit but, because you are in the observer mode you are aware of that strange feeling so you follow it and get off the freeway at that next exit.
You then notice that you are low on gas so you decide to stop at a convenience store to fill your tank. It is not where you normally gas up but, being in the observer mode, you are aware of your intuition telling you to get gas. As you stand there pumping gas into your car you stay in the observer mode. Looking around you realize what a nice part of town this is. You have never been to this part of town and you feel that the energy is very different here. Then you go inside to pay for your gas and, still in the observer mode, you get this crazy urge to buy a scratch ticket…..so you do. And you win a hundred bucks — which more than pays for your gas.
You are still in the observer mode when you get back in the car. Because of this, you become aware of feelings (as opposed to emotions). You have a sudden feeling that you should not get back on the freeway but rather take the scenic country route to where you are going…. so you do. Driving the back-country road in the observer mode you notice how relaxing the drive is and you also notice the trees and pastures and farmhouses. Then you see a gorgeous country home with a ‘for sale’ sign in front of it. You get a strong feeling to stop…. and so you do. As you look at the house from the car you get a very strong feeling of familiarity and joy so you write down the phone number on the sign. Six weeks later you are moving into that house.
You never would have bought a winning scratch ticket and you never would have found your dream home if you remained on the freeway completely engrossed in one of your mental/emotional loops. But by stepping back into the observer mode you were able to get out of simply reacting to things and you were instead able to respond to feelings and inner senses. Reacting is a noggin function that can be very automatic and conditioned and does not necessarily involve choice. Responding is a heart function and it always involves choice. We react from the noggin and we respond from the heart.
When we react from the noggin and from emotions that is what we fill our bubbles with and the resulting chemical reaction gives us an incomplete sense of aliveness. When we respond from the observer self and the heart this fills our bubbles with feeling (unconditional love) and this results in an electrical reaction which is life itself.
We are all mental/emotional addicts. We are junkies. Being stuck in our noggins, we play and replay the thoughts and emotions that provide us with the chemical fix that provides that fleeting sense of aliveness. We have forgotten what true aliveness is like. To overcome our addiction we must step out of the noggin and, in the observer mode of self, open up our hearts to the life flowing through them. That is when we can stop reacting to life and start responding to it.
The Gift of Excruciating Pain
Imagine waking up one morning to find that you have an excruciating pain in your gut. You also have a sharp pain in your back. The pain is almost unbearable.
How would you react to this? How would you respond to this? If you are like most people, myself included, you will react to this and not respond. Most likely, your very first reaction would be an emotional reaction of fear. Mental reactions would be quick: Oh my god, what’s wrong with my body? Am I dying? Do I have cancer? Is my youth over? These mental reactions come with more emotional reactions of fear. Mental/emotional reactions can quickly become exponential. Whenever there is a thought, there is a corresponding emotion and whenever there is an emotion, there is a corresponding thought. These are all reactions and in the case of waking up in excruciating pain they are most likely mental/emotional reactions based in fear so what you are doing by reacting in this manner is filling your bubbles with fear. And that is what your body responds to.
Over the course of our lives our reactions become very conditioned. They start being conditioned and programmed while we are small children and that conditioning is further shaped throughout our lives by our families, friends, education, work experience, social pressure and advertising. The Western medical establishment is very good at conditioning people on how to react to physical maladies. Got a cold? Buy some cold medicine. Got the flu? Buy some flu medicine. Afraid of the flu? Get a flu shot. Afraid of cancer? Get tested. Confused? See a doctor. These are all conditioned reactions.
If you are like nine out of ten people and woke up with an excruciating pain one of your first reactions would be to go to the emergency room at the closest hospital. It amazes me how quickly that reaction kicks in with many people. Don’t hesitate, just go! Seek help from outside of yourself immediately. Not me. I avoid hospitals like the plague (which is also a reaction).
You might be the kind of person who reacts to the excruciating pain by trying to identify it and figure out what is causing it. You might get the family medical book off the shelf and search through it looking for something that fits your symptoms. Or you might get online and google your problem. Once you feel that you have identified your problem you might then google remedies for it. If a remedy you find says to drink plenty of vinegar you will then drink plenty of vinegar. If that doesn’t work you will then probably search for other remedies. You might call a friend who you think had a similar experience before and ask them what they did.
These are all reactions. We all react in certain ways that are specific to how we have been conditioned. Whatever the reaction, it comes with emotion which, in the case of excruciating pain, is almost always fear-based. So while we are reacting we are feeding fear into the bubbles of our body, including the bubbles around the specific part of our body where the pain is coming from. Not surprisingly, this does not heal the pain. It can often intensify the pain.
So how does one respond to a situation like waking up with excruciating pain instead of reacting to it? Seriously, what’s the difference? Well, that is exactly what I have been trying to figure out. I had a golden opportunity to learn about it once when I awoke one morning with an excruciating pain. As per my conditioning, I reacted instead of responding. I reacted and reacted and reacted for three days and the pain did not go away. And then in a moment of crystal clear clarity I realized the difference between reacting and responding. So I shut down my thinking and got into the observer mode of the true self in order to give responding a try.
I responded. And guess what? I was almost immediately healed. It was my body that told me what to do. I was so busy reacting that I couldn’t hear my body. It was astounding, mind-blowing, amazing….. It was so amazing that I am compelled to share what I learned even though I am still essentially in the process of learning it. I used it to bring about an instant healing but I am still learning how to use it in other ways and in a more constant daily basis. Once in the observer mode we can choose what we feed into our bubbles. It is a powerful way to respond to life.
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