Here's a glimpse into how my mind works sometimes...
(If you don't like profanity, please stop reading now.)
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If someone cuts me off on the road --
"Fuck you, you fucking idiot. Why don't you learn how to drive you stupid fuck?"
If my partner questions my judgment --
"Just shut the fuck up and mind your own fucking business for a change."
If a store clerk is rude --
"Learn some fucking manners you degenerate. Would it kill you to smile?"
If a friend makes a choice I think is unwise --
"Are you fucking kidding me? When are you gonna fucking learn?"
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I think you get the point. My mind can be a giant, impatient asshole. I don't say any of the above statements out loud -- except to drivers who can't hear me, and to my partner who gets a less profane restatement of "leave me alone" -- but these thoughts pass through my mind before I have a chance to think otherwise. They are unconscious.
I wish I were kidding about the extent to which my mind judges and abuses, not just others but myself. I consider myself a kind and loving person, a man who has been on a conscious spiritual path for nearly 20 years now, a man who wants, more than anything, to reflect and share love.
Still, sometimes I'm not much more than a prick. Mostly in my mind.
And that's the thing about the mind. It's thinking faster than we are, it reacts so quickly to situations. a flood of judgments and generalizations and blame can course through our minds faster than we have the time to think, "Wait, I'm a loving person. How can I respond differently to this moment?"
That's where we need to do the work, make the effort. We need to stop ourselves and say "Wait, I'm a loving person. How can I respond differently to this moment?"
I rarely stop with all the profane judgments above. I push myself to go beyond them. If you sit in the energy of "fuck you, you fucking idiot," you're not likely to come away from that moment feeling good in any way.*
I don't even know why I get so pissed off about things sometimes, why judgment and rage is a go-to in certain situations. I only know I have chosen to live my life from love -- that's what feels the best to me, by far -- and by making that choice I need to do the work. So I don't stop with my mind's "fuck you." I let it play out, then stop myself and invite my heart to enter the moment.
Then it becomes "how do I feel?" rather than "what do I think?"
"How can I accept?" rather than "what do I judge?"
"How can I love?" rather than "what do I hate?"
And man, when I take a deep breath and let my heart dictate who I am and how I respond, everything changes. Goodbye to the anger, and the generalizations, and the blame, and the "fuck yous" and all that other noise that my mind -- MY EGO -- uses to try to control who I am.
Love has no time for that. Love washes the ugliness away.
We're human. We're judgmental. We're assholes sometimes. It doesn't take much effort to go to negativity. The work is in shifting to love. And it is work. It always has been and it always will be. But the more often we ask our minds to wait, to stop, to reconsider, and invite our hearts into the scene, the easier this whole love thing becomes. And the more positive and fulfilled we become.
I write this from experience. I feel how I've changed. I know how much longer the profane tirades used to play out, how much more my ego controlled things. Don't get me wrong. My ego's still working plenty of its fucked-up wizardry. But so is my heart, my love, and it always gets the last word. Its abracadabra is way more powerful.
Please keep doing the work. Don't give up. Keep going to love. It pays off, again and again and again... and it changes everything.
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*Yes, it feels good to say "fuck you" sometimes and even great to launch into a tirade of profanity. we need to vent. But we also need to heal, which requires bringing some awareness and love into the moment too. Healing never ends with a "fuck you."