Updating our map of reality
What makes pain be pain?
Usually: judgement.
We judge the experience according to a false belief within our mind.
This is what creates the experience of pain. Something within us knows that the belief we hold is incongruent with how reality actually is.
The gap between what is and what we believe it is, creates a soul current which we call pain.
Meaning, the difference between reality and the story we believe about reality creates a friction. The territory (what is) is different from the map (what we believe it is). Hence, the difference between the territory and the map, the reality and the story, creates a friction which we translate as pain.
This is when, if we continue to pump energy into the false story rather than into reality (aka: what is) we can start spiralling in feelings of pain over even a small event.
Our feelings and emotions are there to signal when we hold true judgements and when not.
When the story we tell ourselves about the reality around and about ourselves matches what is true, or not.
When the map faithfully describes the territory, or not.
Hence, when we find ourselves spiralling in painful or stressful situations, even when we can’t name the feelings or emotions we are feeling,
we need to look back at our beliefs and judgements. We need to review our map of reality. We need to review what we think about that situation.
We can use journaling and writing down our thoughts and emotions.
We can use counselling or talking to a friend.
We can talk to ourselves and ask questions and bring answers.
The idea is to manage to bring the subconscious judgements and beliefs into consciousness, by expressing them out.
And whenever one find itself arriving at a certain belief or judgement that it can detect a strong emotion attached to it,
either positive or negative, we can immediately get the signal that that judgement or belief is outdated or false. The map doesn’t match the territory, in that particular case.
We still don’t know what is false about that portion of our map, yet the strong feelings and emotions are the signal that tell us we are dealing with a false presumption, a false belief or a false judgement.
Knowing this we can lessen the energy and credibility we give to that particular belief or to that portion of the map.
We can think “I don’t know what is false about this presumption or belief I hold, yet I can feel it is false”
Slowly then, after we rationally understand our mind is holding a false judgement or belief – a false map of reality – our subconscious will start to initiate the correction of this map.
Through dreams, intuitions, ideas and even events that happen in our daily life we can, in the days or weeks that follow, start to understand the answer to our situation. We can all of the sudden understand the bigger picture. Sometimes the change can feel so natural or normal that we might not even perceive it. At a closer inspection, though, we might realise the situation we were experiencing previously has changed, and now we feel different about it. It was enough to get our subconscious to ask itself if that painful belief was indeed true.
The subconscious is in direct contact with our unconscious, the unconscious is the part of our mind that is in permanent contact with the true version of reality and of ourselves. The unconscious is the part of our mind that never lies and remembers everything in the way it actually happened. Meaning: the unconscious mind doesn’t work with maps or stories, rather the unconscious mind sees the territory for what it is. Hence, by questioning the validity of our painful beliefs our subconscious mind finally makes room within itself to ask the unconscious for help. Hence, when we make room to question our subconscious mind, the subconscious mind opens up and ask the unconscious “what is the real truth about this situation”, “what is actually happening in the territory”? And this is when the unconscious shows to the subconscious the direct answer, and then the subconscious then goes on to integrate that answer into its map of reality, and then formulate it in a way our conscious rational mind can understand.
We might then get a sudden flow of inspiration, a sudden idea or intuition, or after a nights sleep we might find our mind different and sometimes even our body different.
Hence, when we experience a stressful or painful emotional situation, be it about ourselves or about something that has happened in our life, we first need to understand that our subconscious mind holds a belief that is miss-aligned with what reality actually is. There is a gap between the subconscious and the unconscious. And we need to open up to change our mind. Hence, the first step is to realise a belief I hold is false and is creating pain within my soul. “The map I store in my subconscious mind has stopped matching the territory of what is actually real”. The second step is to open up and ask “What is the truth about this situation?”, and then let our subconscious work this out in the days and weeks that follow.
Just by realising a certain belief we hold within is false, we are already taking a distance – sort to speak – from the identification with that belief. We are already starting the process of adjustment. Just by realising that the painful emotions we feel signal an outdated or incorrect mental map, an incorrect belief or incorrect self image, we are ready to take a step back and question our assumptions. We are ceasing to give full credit and attention to a certain belief. We still don’t know what to replace it with, yet our energy has already taken a step back from it. In this space or distance our subconscious mind can have room and air to find another belief or another truth that can better fit the actuality of what is going on. Instead of over-working our conscious rational mind to constantly patch the broken or incorrect map of reality that is stored within our subconscious mind, we allow ourselves to question that map and to let our subconscious work with our unconscious to fix it.
Hence, we are updating our map of reality each time we allow ourselves to question our beliefs. And the first signal of when we need to start questioning our beliefs is when we feel a feeling or emotion of stress or pain about something.
Examples of stressful or painful emotions: fear, shame, guilt, anger, anxiety, hate, repulsion, rejection.
And many times a strong positive emotion can be just as much an indicator that something needs corrected within our subconscious map of reality. Remember: emotions are the signals that tell us the map does not match the territory. When the map matches the territory there is no gap between “what is” and “what I believe it is”, and hence: there is little friction within our soul, hence: little feelings or emotions. A permeating feeling of naturality, understanding and what we could call: peace.
Many times our lives are running fast, like a movie that plays automatically. We can easily get caught up in the stories, and the stories unfold and develop fast, changing from one sequence to another, that in the midst of this fascinating and enticing movie we tend to forget we are the watcher on the couch and that we have a remote control in our hand. And that we can slow down the movie, we can look closer at some scenes, or we can even change the channel. Hence, our emotions and feelings are the signals through which we can gain control over our movie: our life.
By paying attention to how we feel, we automatically understand where our map of reality needs updated.
Where a certain belief no longer serves, where another one has to be updated or improved, or when our soul strives to enlarge our entire map, bringing new details and understandings.
Listening to our soul, meaning: to our feelings and emotions, can help us keep our map of reality updated, and with an updated map we have a better chance at truly exploring the territory.
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DN, March 17, 2022