Why Walk When You Can Fly:

Soar Beyond Your Fears and Love Yourself and Others

Unconditionally

In this world of duality, we all feel different from each other. We meet thousands of people, from so many races, with varying physical conditions, of different ages and contrasting religions. Opposing political beliefs, philosophies, convictions and ideals jostle constantly for our attention. The complex diversity of the world we live in is seemingly endless. From our intellectual opinions to the size of our bank accounts, from our physical appearance to our cultural traditions, we perceive separation everywhere, in a world of extreme contrast and variance, a world of untold possibilities.

Within this experience of separation, we search endlessly for union. We strive to try and heal the planet, we create programs for conflict resolution, we march for peace, trying desperately to get humanity to see beyond its differences and live in harmony.

We do this in our personal lives too, putting all of our energy into trying to create balance in our surroundings. We search for the perfect partner, but when we think we have finally found our soul mate, we try to change and control them so they will fit into our ideal. We search for groups of people who will make us feel accepted, by supporting us in our convictions, our opinions, our beliefs. We join a church, a political party, a self-help group, a corporation, in our search to heal the separation in our surroundings, to find the place where we belong.

But in this search, we are vainly trying to accommodate the limiting beliefs and opinions we have adopted throughout our lives. When someone disagrees with how we perceive the world, we avoid them. We try to surround ourselves with people who confirm our convictions, who support us in our ideas, however negative or fear based they may be. Like butterflies, we flit from one experience to another, the mind never fully satisfied on its endless quest to find what feels like home.

The mind will never feel satisfied. Wherever it goes, it will find disagreement. Even within groups that appear to be united, there is separation—religions branch off into countless factions, political parties disagree amongst themselves, football teams argue about tactics, even the Beatles split up. Everywhere we look, there is separation, diversity, duality.

So we continue on our search, rejecting another group as wrong. Or we fanaticize about the particular perspective of our chosen organization, in our desperate need to convince ourselves and the world that we are right. In our quest for union, in reality we are creating more separation, as our prejudices and opinions distance us more from the rest of humanity, instead of bringing us together in love.

The irony is, we are all exactly the same. It is only our perception that is different. It doesn’t matter where you go in the world, everyone is looking for love. It could be the guerrilla in the jungles of Colombia torturing someone, or a missionary preaching in India, helping the poor. We are all looking for love. We are all looking to come back home.

Whether we are in Buckingham palace playing the role of a princess, or a crack junkie in Harlem holding a knife to someone’s throat, we have all suffered abandonment of self. We have all suffered self-abuse and we all perceive ourselves as unworthy of love, a multitude of masks covering the things we consider sins.

Everyone is playing their part in this grand opera called life, like the actors on a stage–each with a different role, each with their own part to play. Some are knights in shining armor, others mysterious villains, but the truth–our essence, our greatness–is infinitely the love. Everyone, everywhere, can choose to be that.

The only way to experience world peace is to elevate consciousness. Until we realize that we are all one, the violence will continue. Until we realize that there is no scarcity, that there is nothing to protect - no fanaticism, no religion, or belief systems - until we realize that we are not our ideas, and that ultimately we are all unconditional love, this cycle will continue, eternally. It might appear a little more civilized, it might be better masked, but until we heal the separation we experience within ourselves, we will continue to witness destruction and conflict, in a society based in fear.

You are what you choose. Instead of choosing for fear, choose for love. As we elevate consciousness, our fear based perception of the world starts to fall away. We increasingly focus on the inherent unity of everything. We embrace the beauty of this moment. We fall in love with life. In the wake of full acceptance come all the changes that are needed, because only love can birth our dreams.

As I embrace every aspect of myself, the judgments I have made about myself dissolve. The more I am at home with myself, the more I become at home in the world. My external world becomes a reflection of how I perceive myself. I stop noticing all of its divisions, separations, inadequacies. Instead, I see its glory. I no longer see good and bad or right and wrong, but see everything as just how it is meant to be.

*Excerpted from Why Walk When You Can Fly: Soar Beyond Your Fears and Love Yourself and Others Unconditionally © 2008 by Isha. Printed with permission of New World Library, Novato, CA. Isha is the founder of the Isha Foundation Education for Peace, which is headquartered in Uruguay. You can visit her online at http://www.isha.com.

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