Superpowered Mind with Clare Dimond

I'm in knots trying to work out what to cook for dinner. I just can't find anything suitable. Suddenly I am full of self pity because it always seems to be me who has to solve this VAST problem.  I can't do it! Then I just give up and experience peace. 

Time passes...and then it transpires that everyone is actually out this evening and its just me I have to cook for, so I'm off the hook. 

I have used this as an example of my inner wisdom, but I am not sure anymore. It is like there is two forms of wisdom...wisdom that wants to keep the identity safe and make it feel good, and wisdom that just unfolds like life itself.

**Here is the question**: is the pulling back from the stressful experience of having to choose A og B a form of false wisdom? 

I often experience a pulling back, because I know my thinking will change. But, what I have learned on this course is that going up to edge of the unpleasant feeling, to look for the ME who is experiencing this,  is a way to transcend a small program within the larger program (like transcending one record in a record shop that exist to play records). 

Is pulling back a way that ensures that the record will play again and again, until I see that it has nothing to do with who I really am?

What I'm noticing is that I often begrudge other people's successes. I have judgemental and contemptuous thoughts and fear of other people's work being better than mine.  I can see there is a desire to be special. Even being in  this conversation brings out these feelings of superiority. This feels jarring because the thing I want to do (or at least what my mind is telling me I want to do) is to support people and lift them up. I get that these are just thoughts. I don't choose them and I am able to act from a place of support regardless.  It's horrible though. I can see that the other constructed version of myself as 'nice' and supportive is fighting against this shadow side with all of these resentments and meanness. I know the whole point is that we let everything in. I know that real freedom is allowing all of this. I do wish it would go away though so I could enjoy being 'nice me' properly!! I guess I need to fully allow this to teach me what there is to see? Whenever I hear people like yourself I can't help but think, I bet she doesn't think these nasty things like me!     

In a recent podcast you encouraged us to gravitate toward our discomfort, get curious about it rather than flee from it. I tend to be a conflict avoider, spending energy protecting the non-existent “me.” For example, I avoid my husband when his weather is stormy. Although there are swells and troughs, his baseline aggravation is high. Even as I write this, I am trying to be aware of my own projections around it. His irritation is often directed at our children, and when I don’t join him in his gripes, he feels betrayed and unsupported. If I enjoy time with them that is light and unencumbered, he seems resentful or jealous. When I try to soften toward him, he hardens. I see we are both stuck in a story of “This is not how things should be.” He wants our family to be more in line with his expectations. I want him to love us and himself for who we are. Yet do I love him for who he is? I do love his essence, the loving person I sometimes glimpse behind the armor, but I don’t love the aggravation and accusation. Over the years I have become braver about trying to communicate with him. These attempts usually result in him getting defensive and me feeling sad and resigned. I have felt his verbal bullets pass through me like air, no “me” to trap them anymore. I don’t feel my happiness relies on his, but I am so sad that we can’t seem to share happiness together. Where are my blind spots here?

1) Looking at the world scale problems I often see greed as the main driver which causes the problems. Some days ago after reading your book Sane I got an insight that greed is only a symptom of our phantom self which is perceived separate, lacking, not enough etc. The end of this madness will come only by realisation- lifting awareness of who we truly are, a space where life arises and that the self which is being defended, secured is only a mirage in the desert. 

2) I have a question for your podcast :) Looking at self improvement field in my eyes look as tool to get in this endless search to be better, to get better, to feel better. But more as I look at it I see this phenomena produces more problems than solutions. It takes us to this neverending journey where goal or peak of the mountain is even not seen and defined. So I wonder when/how do we know when is enough? 

I was wondering about gender identity and sexual orientation. I guess this is a big part of the identity. We were talking a lot about identity being a learned thing, or a program. But it really doesn't seem to me that gender identity or sexual orientation is a learned program, but much more like an inner knowing. Is there a step before the identity? Like being born a certain way, and only the step of describing what is already inside makes it part of the identity?

(Sorry I think my English isn't good enough to phrase this last sentence, I'm not sure if I'm making sense..)

Thank  you so much for your guidance through the last two months. I'm so glad to have had all those wonderful, scary and liberating experiences.

And I'm sorry for not replying sooner.. I think this might have something to do with the question I've been hoping to ask..

After this stressful time it felt like I needed a break. Looking back at this break I'm quite sure that my ego felt like it needed a break from being constantly under threat. From what I understood so far, this might be a good moment to move into more discomfort, because the ego is playing its tricks.. But how can I actually just take a break without letting the ego, the fears, the wanting to hide at home take over?

Something in this question seems fishy but I can't see what it is.. 😂 

You speak often of doing the thing that scares us to show us where the 'self' is showing up.  What if I have been doing the thing for over a decade and it's led to horrific anxiety (panic attacks GAD insomnia) It's been a decade now.  I worked for two decades without any problems and then as soon as financial insecurity showed up I had one panic attack and boom, my life forever changed.  I feel like I'm in the deep end and there's not the opportunity to go in slow.  The program still seems to think this is the way I have to earn a living as everything I look into comes to a dead end.  I also know that I worked so many years without this issue, so why not again? I know that my brain has changed and this system is looping around on the same neural pathways that have now been created.  Does it take time for the systems' auto pilot of body reactions to change.  I feel like my nervous system is so revved up all the time that it's stuck in my body and this is now my life, which I want to heal, and don't know how.

The self here is still grappling with the stark notion of ruthless self criticism  as an ego trip. I see the necessity to take responsibility for that and at the same time it leads to more self criticism. Who is taking responsibility for what?

How can I be happy despite pain and fatigue? (Listener question.)

Do you think "3p" has shortcomings?

Sometimes it looks to me that the aspect of  inquiring is shut down by saying "it's just your thinking". In the end yes indeed ("direct path")but sometimes to have a better understanding of the body mind system, and where i picked up some believes (religion, work environment etcetera)  the mind is more willing to let it fall away. And ofcourse it is my personal experience. Your teaching is bit more forgiving. That is what i found refreshing in your courses.