Total Being

Total Being-Being Total

I have been asked numerous times what holistic health means to me. It is a concept that has been around for a long time, and its popularity seems to be growing steadily. Many people living a holistic life style see it as a panacea, a means of improving their quality of life, emotionally, physically and spiritually. They contend that if you follow this life style, you will feel more relaxed, have more energy and increase your productivity.

This may all be true. What may also be true is so what. I am not into fads or life styles. I am into total freedom. I am into your being yourself regardless of society, theories or philosophies. If you enjoy a certain life style, great, but to live your life because you believe that something is good for you keeps you a slave to your belief. If you enjoy, do, but if you do to enjoy, stop.

The term holistic health has a variety of meanings, a number of approaches and a variety of philosophies. Even those involved in the movement often argue about which theory is right, which approach is more beneficial, and place a better than attitude to their position versus positions espoused by others. An “I am right and you are wrong,” attitude is often fostered. Is there such a thing as better than or less than, right or wrong? What an absurdity! What an ego trip! What an outlandish belief system!

Better than or less than, rightness and wrongness are creations of your mind. These are concepts developed and nurtured by your ego. You want to believe that what you are doing is the right thing. If someone else is right, then you must be wrong, and this is not something you want or can tolerate. Look at how many arguments, fights and wars have been engaged in because one person believed that he was right and the other was wrong.

Nature knows no right or wrong. Nature knows only this moment. Right and wrong, better than or less than is not of this moment, but of the past and the future. Of course, if you enjoy living in the past then do so. If you enjoy living in a world of tomorrows and make believe, then do so. Remember, that living in either the past or the future prevents you from recognizing and enjoy NOW.

Sadly, if you live for tomorrow, when tomorrow gets here, you may no longer want it, but since you made such a commitment yesterday, you are so invested that you must follow through with your objective today. This reminds me of the days when I used to date. I would make a date on Monday, and by Friday, I would not want to go. I would have a desire to do something totally different. Yet, because I made the date, I believed that I had to stick to it. I had made a commitment. I had to fulfill my obligation. It would not be right if I called the girl at the last minute and cancelled. Making the date was not the problem. I did that in the moment. What became a problem was believing that I had a commitment to uphold, and that I was obligated to fulfill my end of the bargain. Look at how many people get married and believe that they must remain married. They will cheat, lie, argue and despise each other, yet because they made a commitment to what they believed was right, by god, they are going to uphold their commitment regardless of how unhappy and miserable they are.

Some people are so fixed in their belief that their holistic approach is right that they never change. Others are constantly switching from one theory to another looking for the right approach. These people get really excited about a new way, jump into it, and then quickly tire of it or find something that does not agree with them. Then, they must switch to a new path.

This is very similar to switching from one master or from one spiritual path to another. The switching occurs for two reasons. First, and foremost, you have not picked the way based on your heart, but based on what your head tells you. Your head has chosen this or that because it made sense to you and it fits with your ideas of what is. Even those who pick a path and stick with it, typically do so because of what their head tells them. They stay with it because of their commitment, their belief that this is the right way or that this is what they need. This is still a choice made from the head. How many Christians, Jews, Muslims and so on are that faith because of their families’ teachings, and not out of personal experience? Even those who have experienced something special following a certain path remain because of their memory of that specialness and not because they still experience that something special. As such, they close off to other possibilities.

When you pick from your heart, it no longer matters what your head says. It does not even matter what you do. A choice made from your heart does not even allow you to select. Instead, the path selection just happens. You have allowed the process to move you, to take you on its own journey. Philosophy, concepts and beliefs are of no consequence. Whether you live a holistic life style is not the question. The question is, “Are you living your life in total freedom?” When you are, you are not concerned with theories. Your only concern is this moment, the NOW. Then, whatever you are doing, you are doing because you simply enjoy the doing. Remember, love, joy and knowing are never of the head. They are always of the heart, your very essence and your being.

The second reason for the switching beliefs, life styles or masters is connected with the first. You have chosen the path because of your head, your beliefs and your logic. Since your head made your choice, a more logical system can always be found that can sway you and ultimately change your choice, or you find something that is said or done to be in conflict with your beliefs. I remember when Osho had 94 Rolls Royce automobiles. Many of his disciples became angry and condemned him for his automobile collection. If he were supposed to be a man of god, why would he need that many luxury cars? Many of these disciples left Osho because of his acquisitions. His actions simply did not agree with their beliefs. What a powerful opportunity he gave his disciples to learn about themselves and their belief systems!

Remember, it is not the holistic approach, the life style, the belief system or the master that is the problem. It is simply that you disagree with what is being said, what is being asked of you or with what is being done. You do not want to comply. Fault must be found with the system or the individual, in order for you to not comply. You soon begin discounting the process and begin the search again. You believe that the next approach, the next guru, the next system, the next master will be the right one. Is it the right one, based on your ego, or based on what is happening now in this moment? Will your next choice be one of the head or of the heart?

How do you know if it is the head or the heart that is doing the directing? The answer is very simple and at the same time very confusing. First, you, your mind, cannot know. If there is a you doing the knowing, then that is of your mind and not of your heart. It you make a conscious decision, then it is your mind making the choice. When you look at the sky and it is blue, do you have to ask if it is blue? When you look at your child, and you feel your love within, do you have to ask if you love her? When it is coming from your heart, you just know. If you have to ask, then it is coming from your head. The heart lives in trust. The head lives in doubt.

When you allow yourself to relax and flow, you begin to trust, and this trust is unique. Trust means that your mind is not involved in the process. It allows the real answer to shine through like never before. You will know. Along with this knowing, you will flow and change. What is unique about this flow and change is that it happens exactly the way it should, because it does not come from your mind, but from your very core. When you are functioning from this space, you will know that the flow you are experiencing and any changes that move with it are right for you in this moment. There simply is no doubt, only trust.

Reaching this core is the key to yourself and knowing. This core can be reached only when you are total in whatever you are doing. This means that you must be total in whatever philosophy, theory, approach or master you have selected. Do whatever is being asked of you. Just do it. Do not question it, do not argue with it, do nothing to impede it. In fact, do not even think about it. Only when you have been total, for at least 30 days and you are not flowing with it, if you are not moving freely with it, you are not finding joy in it, leave it. Immediately, go out and find a new theory, a new approach to jump into totally. Remember, do this only after following the current approach for 30 days of totality.

Your being total does not mean you have to say yes to the theories. It means you say yes to the process of the theories. It you dive into Zen, then do Zen totally. You do not need to know or agree with all that Zen stands for. If you jump into Osho, then make the jump totally and do not concern yourself with agreeing or disagreeing with him. If you leap into I AM NOW™ , play out all the little games totally. Do not worry if they are right or wrong. Let your experiences be your director. In fact, it is often better for you to know less than more about the theory. The less you read or are taught, the more you can allow your experiences to decide and direct you, rather than your beliefs and expectations about what should or should not be. A paradox exists. How can you jump into a path without first reading or being taught that path? You cannot. So what to do? You read and listen, but accept nothing as truth. Do the exercises without expectations. Allow your own experiences to show you your path of truth rather than following a path of truth developed by someone else.

What is critical to remember is that simply because you have moved onto a path with your total heart and being does not mean that you have stay on that path. Should your heart, not your head, find a new joyous path, do not stay stuck on the old out of fear or obligation. Be free to move as the heart directs. It is not important which path you follow. The only important factor is how total you are in the path you are currently following. Once you are total, you are coming from you heart. You are free. You are you!

Even if you move from one belief system to another, from one life style to another or from one master to another, you will retain those parts that hold true for you, that are real. Here is where you must be careful. You must know that what you retain is coming from your heart and not your belief systems. What comes from the heart is based in NOW and not the past or the future. If you hang on to something because it fits your theories, then it is of the head. Get rid of it as fast as you can, or at least recognize that it is coming from your head and not your heart. Those that are based in your core, and not in your head, will ring true in this moment and this moment only. If in the next moment it does not ring true, toss it and stay with what is true NOW. Your trust will create a center around you that is working from this moment, from this experience, from your being of NOW.

The more you experience NOW, the more your very being changes. As your being changes, and if you are attuned to those changes, your path will also change. The direction of that change is unpredictable. You may find a different path, you may dive more deeply into the current path, you may move between paths. It does not matter. Of course, if you become locked into the process and theory of your path or without being aware of your being, then you will again be lost in your beliefs. What I am saying is that the approach is not important. What is important is your totality. You are not questioning, arguing about what is right or wrong or judging any aspect of the approach. You are simply doing!

Of course, fear begins to arise when you are told to jump totally into something. You begin to think about all the bad things that may happen to you. Your mind conjures up images of Jonestown, the Branch Davidians, the Nazi party and so on. You do not want to be taken in. This is where trust takes over. You must trust you! You must trust that you will do nothing that is harmful to yourself or others. You must trust that you have selected a path that is life affirmative. If you choose from the mind, then death and destruction can very easily be a part of your life style. When you choose from your heart, such things simply cannot happen!

Putting your total self into the process does not mean that you give up you. On the contrary, it will be one of the few times that you will truly be you. Being total simply means that you allow the flow to take hold and you move with it. Your being is always free and always able to change course. Being total simply means that you remove your thinking from the process and move from your heart. The heart knows no power tripping. It knows no ego. It only knows NOW. When this happens, you cannot go wrong. Moreover, when thinking does occur, it occurs because you want to think. How beautiful that is. You use your mind when you want to. Your mind is not on automatic and running 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Now, when you think, you are doing the thinking rather than being controlled by what you are thinking.

I received a call from my mother-in-law, Mimi, this morning, and she told me that her sister had died at 6:00 A.M. I did not know her sister very well, but I could hear Mimi crying. As I listened to her, I felt my own tears rising. I felt her sadness. I felt my sadness. Yet, I was totally joyous in the moment. What a beautiful moment it was. To share such feelings with my mother-in-law was powerful. More powerful was that fact that I simply jumped into what I was and was able to say thank you. The love, joy, fun and happiness that I experienced was perfect. I was experiencing the NOW without my mind and with out my ego. I was simply being total in the NOW.

Totality, joyousness and having fun are synonymous. Of course, your being joyous or having fun does not mean that you will only experience love and happiness. On the contrary, you will feel sadness, anger and even fear. However, with totality comes awareness, and with awareness you know that your feelings are being created by your mind, not by reality. You know that all emotions, fear, love, anger, sadness and happiness are all part of the great illusion of power and control that the mind creates. But, because you know that these feelings are a part of a game, you relax and enjoy them. You become one with them. You can actually see yourself as an actor playing out your part of the play. So remember that in totality, you are experiencing joy and having fun regardless of the emotion you are experiencing.

One part of your total being is your body. It is [BJN1] a miraculous, marvelous and wonderful piece of equipment. It is both a feat of engineering and a piece of art that needs to be cared for. Yet, like any fine machinery or art, the caring can be taken to a point of obsession. If your total energy is in caring for the artwork, then you no longer are enjoying the art, but are worrying about it. You focus is on protecting, rather than enjoying. Of course, if the fun is in the protecting, then you protect and do not worry about the body. Let protecting be the game of enjoyment.

I once heard of a very wealthy man who had a beautiful home which was filled with priceless art objects. He loved his art. In order to protect it, he had the best security system installed. He had guards on duty 24 hours a day. He seldom left his home because he was afraid that his art collection might be stolen. This life style went on for years. Then, one day, his house burned to the ground. Everything was destroyed. He lost all the art he so cherished. His friends expected to find him devastated by his loss. What they found was just the opposite. They found him sitting by the side of the road laughing. They could not understand his laughing in the face of such devastation.

They asked him why he was laughing. His reply was prophetic. He said that he had not experienced such freedom in years. Yes, he loved his art collection, but it had become an obsession. He was always fearful that someone would steal it. He was so worried about theft that he seldom took the time to enjoy. Now that there was a fire, and he no longer had his art collection to worry about, he was free. He was laughing with joy. To be free after so long was just marvelous.

Care for the body, but do not become obsessed with it. Caring for the body has two purposes, to prolong life, and to make that life as free from pain as possible. Yet, are these really the reasons for caring for the body?

I went to a conference on HIV/AIDS. One of the guest speakers, a physician, was talking about the marvelous drugs that are being developed to help prolong life. He showed charts and graphs that indicated how certain drugs, in combination with other drugs increased the individual's longevity. Not once did he speak about the quality of that individual’s life. Not once did he speak about the quality of the AIDS person’s existence during that extended period of life. He only spoke of the success in extending life. Extending life was his only criterion of success.

Existence is not the goal. Being pain free is not the goal. Yes, it is nice if you have both. However, they are not the goal. The only goal worth living for is being total, being here in this moment, having total awareness of NOW. When you live your life in the moment, longevity and pain are not issues. Being here, in the NOW, is the only goal worth having, if here-now can even be considered a goal. To experience the joys of this moment, and let go of the past and future is the true goal. It is the goal of living in the NOW. However, your having a goal to live in the NOW will only prevent you from being in the NOW. Quite a predicament, is it not? The very desire and goal to live in the NOW can only mean that you are not living in the NOW. Instead, you are looking at your past and saying that it is not right. You are looking at the future and saying it can be better. Having NOW as a goal only means that you are not letting go and experiencing the NOW, but having some judgment about some future NOW against your current NOW.

What must be understood is that NOW and totality are, in actuality, verbs. They are the doing. This means they are the process and thus, the process is the only thing worthy of totality; because only in totality does the process exist. In fact, the process, totality and experiencing are always happening, always now, always in this moment. You cannot avoid the process. You cannot avoid totality. You cannot avoid the moment. You can only ignore, compare and judge it. The fact is that you are in the process and you will always be. Only your mind prevents you from seeing and experiencing this process, this totality, this moment of NOW.

Totality includes caring for your body, but does not place your body into a hierarchical chain above all other things. Do what you do because it is right for you, because you feel happy doing it and because you enjoy. Taking care of your body because of what it might bring you is doing for tomorrow and that eliminates today. Plan for tomorrow, but do not allow tomorrow’s plans to dictate today, this moment, NOW.

I once heard Osho say that he was against any fad, whether it be this program or some other program. A fad means of the mind; it means following the procedures of another person; it requires placing limits on existence through a system. Yes, regardless of which holistic approach, life style or master adopted, you must jump into it, not with your mind, your ego or for an outcome. You must jump into it out of having fun, enjoyment, excitement. Put your mind away and enjoy. If you do it simply out of ideology, you will eventually fail.

It is not important the direction you choose to follow. Should you choose standard medical practices, colonic therapy, herbology, vitamin therapy, massage therapy, some form of psychotherapy, or some combination of therapies, is not important. What is important is your totality. You are to be total in whatever you are doing.

A healthy body, a healthy lifestyle or a spiritual journey is not free of pain, aches or sickness. Instead, you are healthy in spite of any pain, aches or sickness that you encounter. When you are truly a healthy being, you enjoy life in spite of what is happening to the body. Yes, do what you can to preserve and protect your body, your lifestyle and your spirituality. Do it as naturally as possible, but above all, do it for the moment and with total enjoyment and fun. Remember, it is a game to be played and if you know the rules of the game, you can play it at your peak.