Thread: "How do we practice presence around difficult parents?"

This guy Eckhart Tolle is a genius. This video might help some people, I didn't know what was the solution to dealing with Neurotic parents until I seen this video.



So is he basically saying for example when interacting with parent(s), if their complaining or nagging about something, you just listen to them?

It always seems like when I pay attention to people who are complaining ( specifically my mother ), it drains my energy, leaves me feeling like s**t. Is he saying your supposed to just listen to them talk your head off for 20 minutes straight, feel like s**t, and move on...I don't get the part on how to create that "space" he is talking about.

The being immersed in the present moment is easy...it's doing it around neurotic parents that hard

Won't that vent all that negative energy into you when your hearing someone complain

Difficulties can actually be a good tool for bringing you into the moment. I realized this after meditating for about 10 hours a day for a week. The pain in my knees was really bad, but if I didn't resist it and tell myself a story about it the actual sensation of it brought me deeper into the moment. Look at everything with curiosity and wonder. See it for what it is and stop getting absorbed in the story of what should be.

Stay optimistic, and don't be attached to results. I'd guess you feel like shit because you want something other than what is. Look at it with curiosity rather than with a desire for it to be a certain way. Try to help, ease their suffering in any way you can, and if you can't do anything, accept that. Notice any suffering, any shitty feeling that you feel in yourself and feel it deeply. Go into it, be it, see why it is there. If you need to take action, take action, but usually in these sorts of situations it's just a mental resistance. When you see the story for what it is and see the feeling for what it is it will usually dissipate.

Originally Posted by StonedApe

Difficulties can actually be a good tool for bringing you into the moment. I realized this after meditating for about 10 hours a day for a week. The pain in my knees was really bad, but if I didn't resist it and tell myself a story about it the actual sensation of it brought me deeper into the moment. Look at everything with curiosity and wonder. See it for what it is and stop getting absorbed in the story of what should be.

Stay optimistic, and don't be attached to results. I'd guess you feel like shit because you want something other than what is. Look at it with curiosity rather than with a desire for it to be a certain way. Try to help, ease their suffering in any way you can, and if you can't do anything, accept that. Notice any suffering, any shitty feeling that you feel in yourself and feel it deeply. Go into it, be it, see why it is there. If you need to take action, take action, but usually in these sorts of situations it's just a mental resistance. When you see the story for what it is and see the feeling for what it is it will usually dissipate.

Meditating for 10 hours a day for a week?! Are you a monk? What possible good did that bring you?

One thing that may help you as well is the Celestine Prophecy and the Four Agreements. I don't know, it took a lot of work for me to figure out how to handle parasites/pain-bodies.

In the Celestine Prophecy James Redfield describes energy and attention as the same thing. The more attention we give, the more energy we feed. Because we are not aware of energy or its properties in society, we are ignorant to the war we wage in order to gain attention and thus feed off people's energy. We learn our own method by defending ourselves against our parents method, then we carry this conflict into every relationship we have with people because we've become conditioned.

Eckhart Tolle describes awareness like a flashlight and pain like shadow. The very act of turning your attention on yourself dissolves your pain. Of course we become so identified with our pain it takes courage to look it in the face, and even then it hides the moment you do. The point is awareness is the transforming agent here. One must treat drama invitations with alertness. Take nothing they say personally but recognize it as an attempt to start something, calmly disarm them by forcing them to question their own actions. You have to remember when someone starts a drama with you, they want you to fight back. The conflict feeds the pain. Practice non-reaction, ride your emotions and act carefully.

Originally Posted by Omnis Dei

One thing that may help you as well is the Celestine Prophecy and the Four Agreements. I don't know, it took a lot of work for me to figure out how to handle parasites/pain-bodies.

In the Celestine Prophecy James Redfield describes energy and attention as the same thing. The more attention we give, the more energy we feed. Because we are not aware of energy or its properties in society, we are ignorant to the war we wage in order to gain attention and thus feed off people's energy. We learn our own method by defending ourselves against our parents method, then we carry this conflict into every relationship we have with people because we've become conditioned.

Eckhart Tolle describes awareness like a flashlight and pain like shadow. The very act of turning your attention on yourself dissolves your pain. Of course we become so identified with our pain it takes courage to look it in the face, and even then it hides the moment you do. The point is awareness is the transforming agent here. One must treat drama invitations with alertness. Take nothing they say personally but recognize it as an attempt to start something, calmly disarm them by forcing them to question their own actions. You have to remember when someone starts a drama with you, they want you to fight back. The conflict feeds the pain. Practice non-reaction, ride your emotions and act carefully.

Yea I read the Celestine Prophecy and understood it. It makes perfect sense, but how do you get energy of your own without developing a control drama, it's seems like a control drama is the only way to get energy for yourself......

If your constantly giving attention and energy away, where are you going to get your own energy, you'll be drained and depressed, people in this day and age aren't trying to give attention away let alone focus on anything other than themselves...we need love and attention too...I think we might have to just keep meditating to get energy? that has to be the only way.

I know the Celestine prophecy works....i recognize the different control dramas people use, and giving them energy DOES help them, this I know cause I've seen it in action with one of the most aggressive control dramas, but what will make other people give away attention more? Everybody is so stuck on themselves listening to them is exhausting..especially the poor me's who constantly complain all the time.

Originally Posted by Majestic

Yea I read the Celestine Prophecy and understood it. It makes perfect sense, but how do you get energy of your own without developing a control drama, it's seems like a control drama is the only way to get energy for yourself......

If your constantly giving attention and energy away, where are you going to get your own energy, you'll be drained and depressed, people in this day and age aren't trying to give attention away let alone focus on anything other than themselves...we need love and attention too...I think we might have to just keep meditating to get energy? that has to be the only way.

I know the Celestine prophecy works....i recognize the different control dramas people use, and giving them energy DOES help them, this I know cause I've seen it in action with one of the most aggressive control dramas, but what will make other people give away attention more? Everybody is so stuck on themselves listening to them is exhausting..especially the poor me's who constantly complain all the time.

I am not at all referring to giving people energy if they're starting a drama with you. Energy should be given in mutual conversations to ensure the person you're talking to can iterate their thoughts correctly. However when someone starts a drama, use your awareness to refrain from participating in the drama. Don't feed them at all. Be calm, collected and act rather than react to surface all the unconscious thoughts that are running the drama.

And as far as getting energy for yourself, you don't need it from people. It's all around you. Expect to be happy. Expect it. Expect to be full of energy. Your expectations work instantly (or instantly begin their process). In the Now you'll see energy filling you. The only reason people think they need energy from each other is because they don't even know it exists. Or they think it only exists as an abstract term in physics and don't realize how much it effects them.

Originally Posted by Omnis Dei

The only reason people think they need energy from each other is because they don't even know it exists. Or they think it only exists as an abstract term in physics and don't realize how much it effects them.

"Energy" is just as much an abstract notion when taken in the spiritual sense as in the sense of physics.

I have to wonder. Why do new agers insist on using the term that was defined by and for science? It would make sense except that there are already terms for what new agers are talking about that predate the scientific word and definition by at least a thousand years, e.g. Kundalini and Ki. Is it because the whole new age movement is a shallow impersonation of any real understanding and, deep down, new agers understand this and hence draw vocabulary from science to fraudulantly give themselves credibility? That hypothesis would explain why new agers always say "the ancients said that" whenever science discovers something as well. Two phenomena explained with one hypothesis. I might be onto something...

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

"Energy" is just as much an abstract notion when taken in the spiritual sense as in the sense of physics.

I have to wonder. Why do new agers insist on using the term that was defined by and for science? It would make sense except that there are already terms for what new agers are talking about that predate the scientific word and definition by at least a thousand years, e.g. Kundalini and Ki. Is it because the whole new age movement is a shallow impersonation of any real understanding and, deep down, new agers understand this and hence draw vocabulary from science to fraudulantly give themselves credibility? That hypothesis would explain why new agers always say "the ancients said that" whenever science discovers something as well. Two phenomena explained with one hypothesis. I might be onto something...

It is because we are from western society and it is all the same thing. The energy I am referring to is the same thing as energy in physics.

Originally Posted by StonedApe

Difficulties can actually be a good tool for bringing you into the moment. I realized this after meditating for about 10 hours a day for a week. The pain in my knees was really bad, but if I didn't resist it and tell myself a story about it the actual sensation of it brought me deeper into the moment. Look at everything with curiosity and wonder. See it for what it is and stop getting absorbed in the story of what should be.

Stay optimistic, and don't be attached to results. I'd guess you feel like shit because you want something other than what is. Look at it with curiosity rather than with a desire for it to be a certain way. Try to help, ease their suffering in any way you can, and if you can't do anything, accept that. Notice any suffering, any shitty feeling that you feel in yourself and feel it deeply. Go into it, be it, see why it is there. If you need to take action, take action, but usually in these sorts of situations it's just a mental resistance. When you see the story for what it is and see the feeling for what it is it will usually dissipate.

Very well said. I usually have a hard time finding the words to describe this. The mistake people often make when going through this process of choosing to become aware, is that when they become aware of how negatively they feel about something, they beat themselves up over it. "Damnit, I can't believe I'm feeling so angry... Shit, I should be happy!" Which, of course is also lack of awareness.

Where I work, I am frequently verbally abused. And like you might expect, I get upset when it happens. And then, at some point, I acknowledge to myself that I am angry. I think about why, and then I think about the moment in which something occurred to make me angry. It is then that I realize, "but... that's not right now.

I really like that StonedApe mentioned that we get upset about things because they do not reflect what we want or expect out of a moment. It doesn't match the story in our mind, and therefore the resulting experience is stress, and that is what takes our energy. I've gotten to the point now, where during the moment, I ask myself why I am upset, and I immediately am released from the stress. And when I cannot break free of the stress, I accept the emotion as part of this present moment, and often, just the act of doing that, is enough to remind me to return my full awareness to the moment.

Dan Millman put it really well-

Pain is a relatively objective, physical phenomenon; suffering is our psychological resistance to what happens. Events may create physical pain, but they do not in themselves create suffering. Resistance creates suffering. Stress happens when your mind resists what is...The only problem in your life is your mind's resistance to life as it unfolds.

I share your concerns with the lack of scientific basis newagers like to describe their theories with, but I really think Echart Tolle was on to something with this works, even if he did have to approximate with his newagey terms.

You can listen to your parents without believing in their drama. Meditate it for them. You be in the moment, and all their stories and complaining are not about you, they are about them. It is their stories. You see them as individual human beings with their own problems and issues and feel compassion for them, without believing in their stories. Or you can move out. Jim Morrison says to kill your parents. He doesn't mean literally, but be your own person where they cannot drag you down.

As for the word energy. It is a word, and not everybody knows what it means when referring to spiritual matters. It is more correctly a kind of matter that is very fluid and contains a lot of energy. But since most modern people are raised in materialistic societies and are not raised in the temple or monastery that is 3,000 years old, they adopt the language of their day. Kundalini and Qi are foreign words from another culture while here in the west we could use the words Aether, orgone, etc. which has since it has been proposed to be a kind of 'energy'. But it is more like plasma. Be that as it may, it is nitpicking and arguing over semantics when we could just say "OK, I know what you mean by energy" unless of course you have no personal experience with what is being discussed.

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

"Energy" is just as much an abstract notion when taken in the spiritual sense as in the sense of physics.

I have to wonder. Why do new agers insist on using the term that was defined by and for science? It would make sense except that there are already terms for what new agers are talking about that predate the scientific word and definition by at least a thousand years, e.g. Kundalini and Ki. Is it because the whole new age movement is a shallow impersonation of any real understanding and, deep down, new agers understand this and hence draw vocabulary from science to fraudulantly give themselves credibility? That hypothesis would explain why new agers always say "the ancients said that" whenever science discovers something as well. Two phenomena explained with one hypothesis. I might be onto something...

I don't think that in this particular context that the word "energy" was used to describe something "new agey." I think it was used in the context in which people say,

Bob: "Hey, want to go to the ball game today?"
NotBob: "Nah, I don't have the energy for it."

Would you also assume that to mean something new agey? I could be mistaken, but I think focusing on the use of the word "energy" in this thread is irrelevant, and completely bypasses the overall point of the thread, which is otherwise quite valid. Though I agree with you, that people tend to toss around the term "energy" to give the sense of some sort of qualification or validity to unverifiable claims. Then again, no one really understands energy in it's entirety.

In any case, the thread is more about practicing awareness of a moment, and awareness of one's own thoughts, and feelings, and their origins, and how they can dictate one's actions and mood if one is not aware of them, and that awareness reduces those problems. To allow the "mind," or "ego," or "pain body," or whatever one might like to call it to focus on something negative, is to allow that thing to grow. I am content at this moment. I know that when I feel content, without me even realizing it, my thoughts wander, until they land on something painful. I can at that point give it "energy" (which really is just a way to describe the ability for it to grow, i think,) by continuing to dwell on those negative thoughts and feelings, or I can make a choice to return to this moment. The past anymore is nothing more than electrical signals in one's brain. To dwell on it will often bring about pain.

On a side note, PhilosopherStoned, I understand that you dislike the people whose existence you've decided to simplify into the extraordinarily general, disappointingly narrow-minded label of "new agers," but it is not always necessary to express your detest for their opinions at every opportunity, which I've noticed that lately it seems like you do. Particularly in this case, you've managed to take something that [I don't believe} wasn't intended to imply a "new-ager" concept, and turn it into an accusation for "new-agers" twisting science around. And it is so very saddening to see someone so amazingly brilliant take a very very large group of people, and write them off in such a way because they believe in something that is outside of the bounds of what you believe. Forgetting that there are an infinite number of amazing things that you don't know about each individual one of them. This is true of all people. If I've misinterpreted your attitude behind your condemnation of people into the overly-simplistic term of "new-agers," than I do sincerely apologize. I'm truly not trying to be offensive or condescending to you, at all. I just think that this isn't the place. I'm sorry for going off on another tangent for a moment. Please continue normal discussion.