Beyond Feelings

For most people, feelings represent the epitome of creative expression and are an intrinsic way in which the experience of life is communicated. And this is true until the spiritual process disabuses an individual of their personal feelings, but in a way that introduces a finer appreciation of life. In the first instance where life arises in matter, there is feeling. We exist as feeling creatures and this imbues us with the sense of being alive. A natural feeling is hunger arising from the body as a desire for food. Feelings that interpret the lack of food as any kind of deprivation are false and will actually exacerbate the hunger pangs.

Love is not a feeling, nor is the joy of being connected to the wellbeing in the body. These are natural and unalterable states of reality that are present in everybody. Love doesn’t consider the feelings of others but cares beyond all knowing as service to the good of the whole; for love always gravitates to where it’s needed. Love knows when it’s right to give or when not to give, which often entails going against the expectations of those who would obstruct the steps of love’s unseen path. For example, love will not tolerate the emotional demands of another, especially to assuage feelings of guilt or insecurity within oneself. Nor will love hold back from taking right action for fear of emotional reprisals.

People make some of their most important choices and decisions based on their feelings and wonder why things rarely turn out as planned. This is because feelings fluctuate according to whether someone’s either up or down, excited or depressed. People are often shocked when someone leaves them or they discover their business partner has run off with the firm’s money. Shock is the culmination of previous choices and decisions based on the fluctuating feelings. The shock that is registered when an event or happening shatters the continuity of living is the truth’s way of waking us up to the fact that this is an impersonal life. In the moment of shock there is no emotional reaction; it’s only afterwards that feelings come rushing in to overwhelm the body and mind.

To transcend feelings it’s important to be grounded in the sensation within the body. This halts emotion in its track and prevents the mind from interpreting the energy as a feeling through memory impressions of the past. When someone sees how effective this is in their own experience, they are that much closer to self-mastery. There may be some inner turbulence as the emotional negativity is transformed back to love; but it’s to know that life never subjects anyone to any pain or suffering they cannot endure. As the perception passes through the body of the feeling self, the confusion of emotion is aligned with the power of the spirit. What is revealed in this clarified space is the knowledge of what has been consciously faced. From the spiritual perspective this is self-knowledge – the most authentic source of truth in existence.

When this level of reality can be accessed at will, an individual is indeed in a privileged state in which to perceive the sensory world. Having passed through the band of feelings, there is no longer the attachment to them as before. The feelings can still be registered; but unlike someone who hasn’t detached from their feeling self, it will now be possible to simply withdraw from the pull of the emotions and rest in the state of knowledge as an absence of force in the world.

Lance Kelly