Beyond trying to 'fix' Suffering: Freedom is The Door That Has Always Been Open

Most of us are taught, from the time we are children, that suffering is something we will simply “have to live with.” We learn coping mechanisms and strategies.We are told to manage stress, to reframe our thoughts, to build resilience. "Life is tough".

All of this has its place, but while we believe we are separate, isolated organisms it quietly rests on a devastating assumption:that suffering is permanent and part of life. That the best we can hope for is to soften its edges and function better inside it.

But what if this isn’t true? What if suffering isn’t something to be managed at all, but something that can dissolve at its very root? What if the root of all suffering is the erroneous belief that my thoughts, my memories, my past, my fears, my perceptions, my pain or discomfort defines what 'I' am.

What if the 'I' that we all are is God (creative source potential (whatever word suits)) itself, clear, open, free and always looking through your eyes?

What if the silent clarity is always what you've been and the thoughts, feelings and the narrator are just passing weather?

The Endless Project of Fixing

Anxiety, loneliness, the ache of a relationship that no longer brings joy, the pain of feeling unseen by those closest to us — whatever form it takes, suffering always seems to whisper the same message:“Something is wrong with me, with my life, with the world. If I could only fix it, then I would be at peace.”

And so begins the endless project of fixing. We chase self-improvement, we chase validation, we chase escape, we chase 'better'. Yet no matter how hard we try, how far we run, the sense of 'me' with 'its' issues is always here :), the sense of lack always returns, because its source was never “out there” to begin with.

The Radical Possibility

The deepest, radical truth is almost impossible for the mind to grasp at first: Suffering doesn't have to be a permanent feature of existence. It is the byproduct of a fundamental misperception that most humans live — the belief that what 'I ' am is a separate self, isolated, unworthy, incomplete. That can even show itself as a subtle sense of just something missing or off. The belief is erroneous that the consciousness that 'I' am is limited only to this separate little body (and its conditioned program) its thoughts, its perceptions, its mental re run.

That misperception or belief gives rise to the natural attachment to distorted thoughts, every emotional storm, every obsessive attempt to repair what was never broken.

And yet, when the illusion of separation is seen through — even for a moment — something extraordinary is revealed:peace was NEVER missing. Wholeness was NEVER absent. The door to eternal freedom has been unlocked all along. I love this line from Rumi - (don't quote me, I've written from memory :))

“I was knocking on the door of the Beloved. it opened, I realised I had always been knocking from the inside.”

So poignantly beautiful.

You've ALWAYS been the sun that remains behind the passing clouds of weather, just a shift in perception. You are the same pristine , stillness that looked out of your eyes at 2, 22, 32 and 42 years of age. What you really are doesn't keep hold of a 'story' of your past events 'in time'. Perceived history is just a series of apparently linear thoughts strung together in what we call memory. Science now proves that memory is not reliable as it is constructed fresh with each dip in to it! We only ever access the last construct of memory, how crazy is that!!

Holding Space for the End of Suffering

Most approaches aim to help you manage your pain. They teach you to cope, to soothe, to survive inside the illusion of a separate, psychological 'me' (which of course has its place). We can even change how we store memory with a few little psychological tricks and strategies. The mind is infinitely malleable.

But my true passion and what I am here to share and remind you of is something entirely different...far deeper....(y)our authentic Being: You don’t have to remain in the prison of 'personhood' and separation at all. The identity that suffers is not your true, original Self. It is a psychological phantom. The anxiety, the loneliness, the sense of failure, the depression — these are passing weather systems, not the sky of your Being.

What you really are is not broken. It has never felt trapped or unworthy. It is beyond any definition or comparison, and you experienced it consciously as a child - natural, causeless joy. You experienced it before you began to collect and carry the beliefs and limitations of the human world. Before you were told what you are, what everything means and what you should be and do to stay safe and loveable and free.

You are in Truth the vast, radiant Presence in which all of this play of reality appears — and in that recognition, suffering loses its power, because the “one” it tormented is seen to be only a shadow, a conditioned program or identity, designed meticulously to keep you safe and loved, just another passing weather pattern.

A Gentle Invitation

This is not about bypassing your pain. It is about meeting it so tenderly, so fully, that its root is revealed as nothing more than a thought believed in. When you stop trying to 'get rid of' or 'avoid' or 'numb' suffering and instead allow yourself to see what it truly is, and what its foundation is, you find it doesn't actually have one :), the illusion begins to dissolve.

And what remains? .........The simple, unshakable reality of Being without definition. The peace that has always been here, waiting patiently beneath the noise.

🌿You don’t have to wait for you or your life to get 'better' in order to feel free.You don’t have to wait until you are 'permanently' fixed or 'feel' that you and your life is 'enough', to feel whole and complete. Because it never will be continuously 'enough' :)...the play of life is subject to ups and downs, ebbs and flows, the play of opposites, the play of duality. YOU are beyond the dualistic play of mind. YOU are infinite presence itself. Freedom is not on the other side of your suffering — it is the very ground of Being that is holding your pain even now. It is the eternal Being reading these words.

The invitation is simple: Look gently, and see for yourself. The door is open. It always has been.