Sometimes, when pursuing the Truth, the best thing we can do is: rest. This may sound strange when we are intensely determined to stay on track. Are we on track or are we driven? Though we say we know the goal, we may be just driven to be driven. We may have “forgotten” the goal of Home, Truth, God, the Self. Our new goal is “driven”. When this occurs, self-effort has hijacked the practice and become the goal. We may believe we are working, but our small self is working, making decisions, and directing our course, which will be anywhere but near the Self.
Rest is exactly what is needed in this case. It goes against our idea of sādhana, spiritual practice, and therefore stymies the small self. Confusion will come to our small self because rest stops it in its tracks. So “sure” of action and direction, the small self would never lose control by resting. And yet if we really are pursuing the Truth, rest is definitely required. Rest can help us detach from our concepts.
We tend to be identified with our concepts, and with this identification comes a rigidity or tightness. Rest loosens the bounds enough for us to free ourselves. The very act of holding on quiets when we rest. Rest can be defined as relaxing, letting go, refreshing ourselves, and recovering strength. There are times when this is totally appropriate, not lazy. We are not running from “productive” or maybe even “workaholic”; it is just appropriate to rest.
We have been pushing very hard these last two months. Now is the time to take a breath, rest and assess how and where we are. Some of us feel we have not moved at all, that we are stuck in our misery. This means we are attached to our misery. We have not been able to detach. But if we are willing to back off from the battle and rest, we may actually detach from the importance of the battle and the object we are attacking. Remember, we want not to fight, for that will keep us in a repulsion relationship and make it quite difficult to free ourselves.
At these times rest becomes the best tactic. By resting, we are saying this very vibration we are working to overcome does not run us; we can back off and we do not need to engage with it. Ah, a moment without the pressure of purification, purgatory, a quiet moment. We are quite capable of these quiet and peaceful moments, though we may have forgotten that because we have been so committed and driven to remove our impurities from our character that we believe that is all there is. This focus on purification without perspective is also wrong understanding. We are meditating on something that is not Real. We have to come back to what the goal is and is not. Pride of work does not move us in the right direction. The goal is to give up our attachment to the small self, our individuality, and return to union with our true nature, God.
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