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Your Guide to Wholesome Living

People everywhere long to feel a sense of wholeness in their life and it’s not uncommon to find one talk about how “something’s missing”, and they can’t quite figure out what. It’s evident that just possessing a lot of money or having an ideal marriage or maintaining a good health, isn’t the secret to  wholesome living, because there are many people who have one or all of these and yet maintain that they feel a sense of “lack” in their life. So is there a way to live a wholesome life or is it just a never ending search? There certainly is a way to live in a manner which makes you feel whole and fulfilled every moment of your life, it’s just that we have been looking in all the wrong places for it.

You Cannot Achieve Wholeness Externally

To feel whole is the most natural state for a human being and yet very few humans ever experience it, why is it that the most natural state is so difficult to realize? The root cause is our mental conditioning. Since our childhood, we have been programmed to “seek” happiness outside ourselves. We were told to achieve good grades, be victorious at sports and be a role model student, and in our minds we started associating these achievements as the route to fulfillment, so much so that we started disassociating with our natural guidance, or preference, in order to pursue these externally imposed goals. This was the beginning of our separation from our natural state of being.

As we grew up and became adults, our mindset stayed hooked on external achievement. We started looking at our careers, our relationships and our standing in the society, to provide a sense of fulfillment and meaning in our life. There started a never ending seeking to fill up this constant “dissatisfaction” or hollowness we felt inside. Some people realize quickly enough that money, career, relationships or status, did not provide that sense of completeness that they were seeking.

It’s not uncommon for people to blame their job, their partner or their financial situation, for the sense of “lack” that they feel within. In their search for fulfillment, they switch partners, change jobs and they seek all forms of entertainment, only to find that none of it provided the sense of wholeness they were seeking. You are lucky if you realize this truth quickly – you cannot “achieve” a wholesome life through external possessions. Neither can you achieve wholesome living by “shunning” or distancing yourself from the external world. The external world is for your enjoyment, so play with it, but that’s not where you should seek your wholeness.

You Will Only Find Your Wholeness in Your Being

The secret to wholesome living life is to live as a “being” rather than as a “self image”. The reason why you never feel whole is because you are living from a “self image” which can never be complete, because it’s just an idea and it’s always going to seek some content to be kept alive. Who you are is not an “idea” but a being.

If you look within your mind, you will notice that it has associated who you are with an “image” which has a story. This self image can be insulted or exalted depending upon the circumstance, and hence it’s always at the mercy of the external situation. A self image can never feel whole, even the best of it. This self image constantly seeks new additions to itself, and from this lack sprouts the constant feeling of emptiness.

You don’t feel whole because you are living as an idea, instead of living as a being; in your mind you are just a story character. In truth, you are not a “character” but the awareness in which the story is being played out. You are before every thought or feeling, you are the awareness of it. All you need to do to come back to your wholeness, to live a wholesome live, is to start “being” instead of living in your mind.

Let thoughts happen, let emotions move through your body, but you can simply stay as the being or the presence who is the background to all of this. The truth is that you are not a “person” (that’s just an idea) but an eternal space of awareness in which all phenomenon take place. The awareness, that you are, is not dumb, but an intelligent being, the creator of everything. Initially it’s difficult to come to terms with this truth, but if you just contemplate it within yourself, you can see the obviousness of it.

A Sense of Wholeness Within is What Creates a Wholesome Life Externally

Unless you feel whole in your being, you cannot really manifest a wholesome life externally; it’s against the law of attraction. The only way to feel whole within is to reside as a “being” instead of living through an “idea” of who you are or “self image”. Let go of all ideas, and just be. A simple pointer to residing in your being is to realize that you are the “ocean” and the thoughts, emotions and feelings are like fleeting ripples on your surface. The ocean is not affected by the ripples because of its immensity and depth.

Most of us live completely identified with the ripples (the thoughts and emotions), which by their very nature are fleeting and hence create a sense of insecurity and uncertainty in our life. When we live this way, our life cannot feel wholesome because of the insecure nature of our vibration.

When you realize that you are “ocean” or the container, and the events are just fleeting on your surface, you realize your depth and wholeness. Once you return to this place, of your being, you realize that thoughts and emotions don’t have such an impact on you, they are just surface level. As you start living this way, you will sense a feeling of fulfillment and wholeness every moment of your life. You will notice that the external circumstances in your life turn benevolent and joyful as you experience the wholeness of your being as a constant feeling. This is the secret to live a wholesome life.