by Caroline Reineke, The Netherlands
When I look back at my life, I see myself as a ‘human doing’ – quick whether in thought, speech or action. I was often rushing, as if I was running through (or away) from life, for whatever reason. In a way, I wanted to be in control. Truly feeling myself or having genuine contact with my body was under-developed territory for me. From an early age I had taught myself to be tough, to not show my vulnerability to anybody. It was just too scary for me, as I was afraid to be exposed – that I was not so tough, but just a girl with feelings as well, and I could feel hurt too. This control or ‘doing-ness’ was, in a way, my shield of protection. It took me a while to realise that this doing-ness was keeping me away from me: this was a painful realisation some years ago. Who am I, if I am not this shield, I wondered?
Since I started to attend the workshops of Serge Benhayon two years ago, I got a glimpse of the feelings and words I had been wondering about. It’s not about doing – what I do or need to do, like being quick in my responses or actions; it’s about who I am, just being me. It sounds so simple, but it was a turn-around for me. I learnt to turn to and connect gently with my body and my breath and just feel. Gradually, I became aware of the fact that ‘I am enough’, and learnt to embrace that. Just being still with me, feeling what there is to feel. That’s enough. Wow!
I can now enjoy myself more. I still experience the doing-ness and the need to control, and can feel when it ‘takes over’. As I am more connected to my body, I can see I have a choice. And this brings me to another big insight: the power of choice. Every day – actually every moment – I can choose; is this (thought, word, action) harming or healing for me/my body? So when I speed up or start to speak quickly and feel I am losing myself, I can feel it’s harming: it just requires a ‘stop it and feel’. But also when I realise, e.g. my body feels stressed, I can choose instantly: what is supportive for me now?
I have taken more responsibility for my body and my choices, including habits and patterns like the doing-ness. I have become more observing and accepting of myself, which is a whole new way from what I used to… do! And last but not least, I am showing more of me now, expressing my feelings, showing my vulnerability in moments. At times I even share with others what I feel, when I don’t know why these feelings are there. I just dare to be open… just being me at that moment. It all adds up to: there is more of ME in each of my relationships now. And as we are all ‘forever students’, it even becomes fun to see what each day brings to be with.
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
‘Showing my vulnerability in moments’ has been a working progress for me. From being a ‘tough’ person from an early age too, and being vulnerable in front of others has also been confronting for them too.
If we really observe life, many people don’t like another crying and all it is, is a form of releasement. At the end of the day its either that or we bury it in our bodies for it to manifest into an illness or disease.
Being open is not a bad thing and if anything it allows another to be able to express from there too. More and more of us need to be who we truly are, and then we will get to know each other from this state, then the false / pretending selves that we walk around with.
It has been said previously, and I am saying it here again because of how powerful the reminder is for me and for us all: “We are human ‘beings’ and not human ‘doings’ and in that we bring so much more of who we truly are when we stop to bring the quality first into the being so that when we are doing it expands this quality.
When we pause and reflect on that word, ‘human being’, it is exactly that. The ‘human’ is the flesh and bone. The ‘being’ is the an intelligence that is not only worldly, but universal. This innately is in and known to us and not proven by some experiment or research. If we spend the time getting to know ourselves, we all will eventually return to that place…
In this world we are not taught to allow our fragility for it is seen as a weakness. And yet when we allow ourselves to feel and to express all we are feeling it is the most amazing healing that then gives us enormous amounts of strength. Fragility is then a strength and not a weakness…
I feel this is one of the foundational keys to enjoy ourselves more. I don’t mean by distracting ourselves and checking out. I mean by actually committing to explore ourselves deeply so that the joy that is within can at last be released. It’s as though from young we have been taught to put a cap on joy. How can a child be in joy when the parents are stressing over life, it’s just not allowed and so we swallow, push down what is a natural part of who we are.
Lovely to read this again Caroline, a woman returning to her true self and living that in the world – very precious. “Every day – actually every moment – I can choose; is this (thought, word, action) harming or healing for me/my body?” This is great to read today as I early read some supportive quotes about moments by Serge Benhayon, and what I am learning is that each moment is there for us to be our love.
“I was afraid to be exposed – that I was not so tough, but just a girl with feelings as well, and I could feel hurt too.” Your comment led me to reflect on this ideal of toughness and how it can impact on society. When we are able to express our vulnerability and what we feel in relationships it offers the other person an awareness and an opportunity to become more caring and sensitive to others. With the ideal of toughness we miss out on this vital part of communication and the growth that can come when we openly show and discuss how we feel.
Proving to one self that we can be and play tough is such a lie that we have fallen for. Because it completely takes us all away from the truth which is we are all incredibly sensitive. We do know this because we were all children once and we felt everything we soon discovered that to be sensitive meant there would be a clash with our family member’s and so we dulled ourselves down to fit into a world that doesn’t want to feel. When we desensitize ourselves it is then very easy to abuse ourselves and everyone else because we have lost our marker of sensitivity that lives innately within us all.
I love to read about the new foundations you are building for your body, ‘I have taken more responsibility for my body and my choices, including habits and patterns like the doing-ness. I have become more observing and accepting of myself’.
I can totally relate to what you are saying Caroline
With the support of Universal Medicine I dared to be open too, to express the truth I feel in my body which is something I have not done since a child when I was discouraged from saying what I felt to be true and turned these feelings into conversations I would have in my head but dare not express. Without realising I turned my body into a prison trapped in my mind as I thought my mind was the safest place to be … wrong! I have discovered our minds can keep us locked away from the truth for life times.
All those doings, it’s so deeply ingrained in us. They seem to be working in getting us situated in the world, and because it can look like that way as long as we keep at it, we would not dare even consider stopping the momentum. After all, everyone else seems to be at it anyway. Knowing there is another way of being really changes the way we think what life is all about.
When we let go enough to feel that ‘we are enough’, and accept this. That there is nothing more enjoyable to feel a stillness within our bodies then life takes on a new meaning it becomes enjoyable to wake up to the day to know that it is before us in all it’s glory and that we are part of that glory, it’s like being a child all over again.
If only we all dared to choose to be ourselves with all its responsibilities – the world would be another place.
So simple Esther what you have shared and I like to imagine the world where we are all ourselves and choosing to claim our responsibilities in a way that knows that they grow us.
Carolien I can relate to your discovery of yourself and allowing more of the real you to express and be there in relationships. It seems simple but just being ourselves again in a world that asks us to become something takes dedication and patience, but it is a joy and a constant learning to see what each day brings.
I am That, I Am! Hmm! We are all that connection in essence. And it developed from our re-connection to Our-Essences and being that in all we ‘do’ with-out reservation as best we can! No perfection. So we are already enough in the Being-ness-that-is our divine connection or being returned to-our-esences.
If we dare to stop and make an honest calculation of the percentage of the energy we use daily to protect ourselves against the world, to avoid being attacked, compared to the percentage we spend being ourselves with no reservations, we will be seriously concerned.
Is this why we run away from life Eduardo because we do not want to be attacked, judged or compared, so we run away as a form of protecting ourselves? When we stand up and speak our truth we are immediately open to attack from the people who do not want their form of living to be dismantled as it eventually will by the truth of who we are. I don’t believe we are ready yet to fully understand just how manipulated and controlled we are; however the time will come when all our choices will be staring us in the face and there will be no one to blame and nowhere to hide.
Great point Eduardo – and if we put even half the effort that we put into distracting ourselves, into actually loving ourselves, so many of the world’s problems would shift….Certainly food for thought.
I can so relate to being a ‘human doing’ and ‘doing’ very quickly, most of the time. As a result, there was very little just being me as all the doing created a dis-connection to my beautiful self. I used to think this was the normal way to live but discovering, in truth, that it is far from normal has turned my life and my relationship with me right around, in many wonderful ways.
And it’s something I am constantly learning, those old patterns of ‘doing’ come in so easily at times and feel so familiar but the truly awful thing I realise now is how it extinguishes my connection to myself. The ‘doing’ or achieving seems oh so important but it’s so punishing on the body because of the drive to get things done, and usually anxiousness or nervousness in the mix, and the disconnection from my precious self.
Small moments of connection with our bodies build to be great foundations to build on.
Carolien thank you so much for sharing so open hearted about your journey to be more yourself again. You wrote: “This control or ‘doing-ness’ was, in a way, my shield of protection.” What if this is not only a shield of protection for yourself alone – what if more people live like this? Then your awesome blog is also an invitation to ponder why most of us need so much protection.
I had not considered that my own drive to get things done may also be a form of protection, I know for sure I’m not being my essence in those moments, so it is something to look into.
There is a far richer and truer quality that is lived when we move in connection to our essence, to who we are, to our Soul, that which is beyond compared to a way of living that is driven by a need to fit into a picture of what we think we should be ‘doing’ to receive recognition, acceptance or identification. As you have beautifully shared, we already are everything we simply need only connect to it and allow this love to be what moves and guides us.
Life is about quality, and the more we make the quality of our movements our focus, above the ‘doing’ and needing to get things done, life slowly starts to also take on this quality of care and attention, and the expansion on offer when we allow ourselves space instead of the smallness and contraction we feel when we’re always on the run.
Caroline it’s a good point about running or rushing through life and possibly running from life. We are such sensitive beings and aware of so much, however we are rarely supported to understand this nor what we feel, so the running from life makes so much sense because we may be running from what we feel.
Being in the doing is different to doing in the being.
There is usually so much asking us not to be ourselves… that to stand up and say yes this is me is really stepping out and forward into one’s own evolution.
It is so true Chris. The world currently is totally geared up to take us away from our connection to who we are, and the only antidote to this is to begin developing an honest and honouring relationship with our bodies, in which we will discover the truest guide for knowing how to live from who we truly are.
Exactly Carola… The thing is, to be able to actually unravel everything inside us so we can actually start to be honest
‘it even becomes fun to see what each day brings to be with’, this sounds like a great approach to life, as opposed to how serious we can make life only focused on surviving and paying the bills each month. There is so much more to life and we are so much grander than we could ever imagine and to reconnect with our natural divine essence, is to live in a way that is true to yourself, to share and express your truth and not hold it back.
Being ourselves and expressing with total openness can feel uncomfortable because we have spent so long hold ourselves back in protection in order not to get hurt, yet the more open we are the more we start to feel the freedom of being ourselves.
Is it not wonderful to be more who we truly are – it is so simple, easy – joyful and never exhausting. Thank you Caroline for sharing so honestly about your vulnerability and how you have changed your way of living – that is inspiring!
This is such a great point to highlight…it is FAR less exhausting to be ourselves than to run the whole gamut of characters we can be for the satisfaction of those around us.
Thank you Caroline, it’s so important to have regular stop moments when we transition from those momentums and patterns of being in busyness, rushing and pushing ourselves. By nature these things will make us feel we just need to keep going, but stop moments placed regularly into the day mean we can support ourselves to keep coming back to our being. We can then begin to introduce gentleness into our day, and as we reconnect back to and live from our being or soul we can gradually learn to move through each day connected to our inner stillness. and let the pressure of rushing or pushing go.
It is very daring Isn’t it, to be ourselves in a world where this is an absolute rarity. And yet the more of us who choose to do this, the more reflections of clarity and truth their are for people to align to
This is when the daredevil becomes the dareangel!
When we are both open to being ourselves and a forever student, life will always bless us with ongoing opportunities to grow and develop no matter what experience is at hand be it smooth or challenging.
When we allow ourselves to surrender to this beingness we then come alive as we are not controlling our every movement in the pursuit of recognition and identification but rather are open and vulnerable to what is being presented in the moment.
Daring to be open, letting ourselves be who we truly are, transparent to the world, and to ourselves… This itself will bring so much healing.
The human doing is quite effective in blocking the human being. The other day I had some big stuff come up for me to feel and review. I noticed I wanted to go into doing and get lots done. I’m not against doing as there is a lot to be done but this time I knew it was to avoid what was there for me to feel and that I was using it as a distraction. I decided to take it easy and not do. I rested, and took it easy and I allowed myself to feel what was there. It was beautiful and it passed in quite a gently way.
We often feel as though just being ourselves is not enough and become good at doing. But really, if we are hiding who we truly are, what is there to be loved? We are not even giving the world a chance to appreciate and love who we are while craving love and thinking we are not enough.
When we are identified with what we are doing or the doingness we don´t yet know who we are just being; it even can appear to be strange and uncomfortable although it is so much easier and natural. This is very revealing of how we as a society work or function and hence raise our children.
Thank you Caroline, I can relate to being busy intentionally to avoid what I feel, but as we make it about the being and reacquaint ourselves with all we are life can become very rich, and the quality of who we are in all we do becomes what’s important. Learning to let ourselves feel what hurts us and all we are aware of is a big part of returning to living from our being, because that can be what we are running from in the “doing”. As we return to being, simply being ourselves, there can be many beautiful moments in life just like this one “Just being still with me, feeling what there is to feeL”
There is always so much to be done, but the quality with which we do that doing is all important. That quality is developed through stillness within as a daily development.
I remember the feeling I use to get no matter what I did or what I achieved. It was like you were ok while you were doing it but the moment it finished or you stopped there was this uncomfortable feeling that left you wondering about the world. I had no real understanding of what that feeling was but I knew it appeared not to exist when you were on the run or doing things and so you would just keep doing things. Then was the realisation that you couldn’t do this forever and so what was going on. The more questions I openly asked the more simpler things become, life is about a quality and not an achievement and so with respect you can do anything you choose if your dedication comes home to quality. I am sure we all remember the “quality not quantity” line and here is possibly where it rings truest.