Groundlessness

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Hand-drawn art by Rupali Bhuva
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आधारहीनता
--मेग व्हीटली के द्वारा


आशा ही है जो हमें कार्य करने के लिए प्रेरित करती है। हमें सिखाया गया है कि एक बेहतर दुनिया का सपना देखना उसे बनाने में आवश्यक पहला कदम है। हम अपने इच्छित भविष्य के लिए एक स्पष्ट दृष्टि बनाते हैं, फिर हम एक रणनीति निर्धारित करते हैं, एक योजना बनाते हैं और काम पर लग जाते हैं। हम रणनीतिक रूप से केवल उन चीजों को करने पर ध्यान केंद्रित करते हैं जिनकी सफलता की उच्च संभावना है। जब तक हम "आशा को जीवित रखते हैं" और कड़ी मेहनत करते हैं, तब तक हमारे प्रयास उस दुनिया का निर्माण करेंगे जो हम चाहते हैं। अगर हमें सफल होने की कोई उम्मीद नहीं थी तो हम अपना काम कैसे कर सकते हैं?

आशा से प्रेरित, लेकिन फिर असफलता का सामना करते हुए, हम उदास और निराश हो जाते हैं। जीवन अर्थहीन हो जाता है; हम चीजों को बेहतर के लिए बदलने की कोशिश करते रहने से निराश हैं। ऐसे समय में हम आशा की कीमत सीखते हैं। आशा हमें प्रेरित करने और प्रेरणा देने के बजाय, असफल होने का डर साथ लाने के कारण भारी बोझ बन गई है।

इसलिए हमें, हम सभी को, आशा को त्यागना होगा, और सीखना होगा कि "आशा और भय से परे" स्थान कैसे खोजा जाए। आशा और भय से मुक्त, हम स्पष्टता और ऊर्जा की खोज करने के लिए स्वतंत्र हैं, लेकिन वहां की यात्रा ऐसे व्यवहारों की मांग करती है जिनसे हम परिचित नहीं हैं या जिन्हे हमने टाला है। यहां इस यात्रा के कुछ निशान हैं, उन लोगों के अनुभवों से प्राप्त धन्य ज्ञान, जिन्होंने अपने प्रयासों में बहुत कम या कोई परिणाम नहीं होने पर भी दृढ़ ध्यान केंद्रित किया है और बनाए रखा है।

रूडोल्फ बहरो, एक प्रमुख जर्मन कार्यकर्ता और रूढ़िगत विचारों का विरोधी, पहले चरण का वर्णन करते हैं: "जब एक पुरानी संस्कृति के रूप मर रहे हैं, तो नई संस्कृति कुछ लोगों द्वारा बनाई गई है जो असुरक्षित होने से डरते नहीं हैं।" बहरो एक सकारात्मक विशेषता के रूप में असुरक्षा की पेशकश करता है, विशेष रूप से विघटन के समय में आवश्यक है। फिर भी क्या यह सोचना संभव है कि असुरक्षित महसूस करने से कुछ नया बनाने की हमारी क्षमता बढ़ जाएगी?

मुझे नहीं पता कि बहरो का "असुरक्षित" से क्या मतलब था; हालांकि, मैंने देखा है कि जो लोग सहन करते हैं, जिनके पास लंबी दौड़ के लिए सहनशक्ति है और समय के साथ अपने कार्यों में समझदार हो जाते हैं, वह वे लोग हैं जो परिणाम से जुड़े नहीं हैं। वे योजनाओं या उपलब्धियों में सुरक्षा नहीं चाहते हैं। वे निश्चितता की जगह जिज्ञासा, और भय की जगह उदारता का आदान-प्रदान करते हैं। वे समस्या में डूब जाते हैं, अपने प्रयासों को प्रयोग के रूप में देखते हैं, और सीखते ही जाते हैं। इस तरह की असुरक्षा स्फूर्तिदायक है; लोग सही होने की आवश्यकता या विफलता से बचने के तरीके के बारे में चिंता करने के बजाय यह पता लगाने में व्यस्त हो जाते हैं कि क्या काम करता है। जब भी वे कुछ ऐसा खोजते हैं जो काम करता है, तो ऊर्जा की एक बड़ी लहर आती है, अक्सर हंसी के साथ।

तो, असुरक्षित महसूस करने की इच्छा, आशा और भय से परे यात्रा का पहला कदम है। यह कहीं अधिक चुनौतीपूर्ण स्थिति की ओर ले जाता है: आधारहीनता। यह जानना कि कुछ भी कभी एक जैसा नहीं रहता है, परिवर्तन की सदैव निरंतरता के साथ जीना सीखना, यह महसूस करना कि अच्छी चीजें भी हमेशा के लिए नहीं रहेंगी, उस परिवर्तन को स्वीकार करना, उसी रूप में, जैसा वह है।

मनन के लिए मूल प्रश्न: आधारहीनता आपके लिए क्या मायने रखती है? क्या आप कोई व्यक्तिगत कहानी साझा कर सकते हैं जब आपने 'जिज्ञासा के लिए निश्चितता, उदारता के लिए भय' का आदान-प्रदान किया हो? परिवर्तन की निरंतरता को स्वीकार करने में क्या बात आपकी मदद करती है?
Seed Questions for Reflection

What does groundlessness mean to you? Can you share a personal story of a time you exchanged 'certainty for curiosity, fear for generosity'? What helps you accept the unrelenting constant of change?

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20 Past Reflections
MA
Nov 12, 2022
"Groundless": when what I was standing on has been completely swept out from under my feet! Feeling a huge unknowing that is unsettling, like being shaken by an earthquake.
It helps to think that "There is nothing from which I cannot grow and learn."
AN
May 9, 2022
My desire is to surrender to what is, to "let Thy will be my will". It requires being in the present moment and keeping my heart open.
May 8, 2022
“Your work will bear fruit in 700 years or so.” (From the longer article, quoting advice the Dalai Lama gave to Westerners.) Wow. That’s a new time scale for me - I’m only 1/10th that old.
ME
Meha
May 5, 2022
Most of our anxieties are routed from insecurity and ultimately out of fear. The moment you start manipulating outcomes you start messing with the balance in life. And there goes the HOPE in thin air. If one starts addressing the fear and let things happen without worrying of the outcomes and just concentrating on actions that one has control over, you will notice all falls in place as it should be. This is the principle that i try to follow and it brings hope and content for me.
FR
May 5, 2022
I have often reflected on Chogyan Trungpa's quote on groundlessness: "The bad news is you are falling through the air with no parachute. The good news: there is no ground." I may have paraphrased. I continue to care for my husband who has been in decline the last five years and is now on hospice. Here, there is no hope; only love (along with exhaustion and grief). I have no idea how much he will suffer or how his death will occur. I don't know if I'd call this curiosity but I am attentive. The generosity also resides in that attentiveness.
DD
David Doane May 5, 2022
Thank you for the Chogyan Trungpa quote or paraphrase which I think we are all living to some extent and with some awareness. I am moved by what you shared. Thank you. I hope what you suffer also brings you great joy.
May 3, 2022
In my youth I felt groundless more often than grounded. I strived for certainty and it turned me into an anxious and unhappy person. Then death came for a beloved one and there was no thing I could do. That was the gift of my opening to a different way of being. Embracing (sometimes just allowing) uncertainty and breathing a lot and seeing beyond certainty and uncertainty to the many names for god. Light, generosity, beauty, truth, life, joy…the list goes on!!! With deep love to all beings, May you be well.
ME
me May 3, 2022
🌱
DL
May 3, 2022
As with most pieces like this, the"how to" of going beyond hope and fear is not dealt with, and humans are hardwired to those two emotions, as well as resistance to change! Getting comfortable with groundlessness and unpredictability takes much internal work, through presumably meditation and the courage to embrace, rather than push away, the uncertainty or "undesirable" condition. Much hard work, and much time; it will not happen overnight. It's complete overhaul of one's though processes.
ME
me May 3, 2022
🦋
AD
Adi
May 3, 2022
I am not sure what Germen word was translated as "insecure", but I think he might have meant "vulnerable".

Like the Fool in the tarot deck, walking toward the brink of a precipice leaving the safety of the ground behind.
JA
May 3, 2022
To me groundlessness connotes something frightening. To be grounded even in groundlessness is what I aim towards. Groundlessness is a feeling of anxiety. What helps me confront such an existence and experience is accepting it and finding a space of steadfastness during the experience by way of deep breath, by allowing attention to be over some object for a time, by watching the world as if for the first time. I am more of a visual person. Seeing the benign nature of objects. The world is truly beautiful even in its changing and spiralling-out of control-nature. This Beauty found in practice of Suchness helps me to find roots even in chaos. It is denoted best in a Zen Story known as Tigers and the Strawberries.
DD
Apr 30, 2022
Groundlessness means lack of ground or foundation, lack of anything to count on. As I see life, the ground we have is constant change. We can count on that. No change is an illusion. Actually, I exchanged certainty for curiosity a long time ago. There is no certainty. We live in the unknown. For me those are simply facts of life. As for exchanging fear for generosity, I'm working on it -- my fears have greatly dwindled, and I practice being more generous. What helps me accept the unrelenting constant of change is not seeing it as unrelenting which for me has a negative and oppressive connotation, and seeing change as 'that's life'. It helps that I've become pretty good at being in the present (we are alive only in the present), trusting what I believe to be right action in the present, and letting go of outcome.
ME
me May 3, 2022
Amen.🌷
JP
Apr 29, 2022
In my relatively long life journey ( I am 96 years old) I have encountered many ups and downs and there were a few times I felt groundlessness, a sense of sinking down without bottom, darkness without rays of hope. In such dark times of my life I felt and saw the light of based on the ground of unvaering faith. Faith is the light that hardly gets extingwished.
I felt dense darkness and groundlessness during the second stage of my lie. I felt helplessness and hopelessness. They were dark periods of my life. Light of Faith in the higher power helped me go through dense darkness and see the light. Keeping my mind open and curious, accepting myself as imperfect, mindfully reducing the noise in my mind, and being grateful to my family and friends for holding my hands when I was falli
ng down have been very helful to me.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave
MA
Maja May 3, 2022
Thank you
VA
Apr 13, 2022
Wise and well-said. In the throes of mid-life, as I acknowledge that I’ve likely lived more than half my life, maybe much more, I’m awakening to the truth that peace and meaning now, as well as in coming to terms with death, depends on “accepting that change is just the way it is.” No easy task, but your clear and kind article helps a great deal in that process
Apr 12, 2022
I still wish that bad things won't last forever
BD
britt densford
Apr 12, 2022
When I hit this wall and experience the groundlessness, that is when I go to courage. I must dig deep and honor my willingness to experience failure and move forward anyway.
LB
Apr 12, 2022
We should be curious about what the day will bring. It's all impermanent.