Insight
Every now and then I get the urge to click on the Facebook icon on my phone. It doesn't happen often. Yesterday, I clicked it. I came across a quote from actor Jim Carrey. What he had to say struck me as an example of a deep insight leading to transformative change. I'd heard years ago that he'd had some sort of awakening or change in his life but I didn't really pay much attention.
Here is a bit about his experience.
"After knowing Eckhart Tolle for a while and studying the books, I woke up and suddenly got it. I understood suddenly how thought is just illusory, and that thought is responsible for most, if not all of the suffering we experience. And then I suddenly felt like I was looking at thoughts from another perspective, and I wondered, who is it that is aware that 'I' am thinking? And suddenly I was thrown into this expansive amazing feeling of freedom - from myself, from my problems. I saw that I am bigger than what I do, bigger than my body. I am everything and everyone. I am no longer a fragment of the universe. I am the universe." - Jim Carrey
This is insight. This is transformation.
When he says "I understood suddenly how thought is just illusory", this is what I call an insight. He all of a sudden saw more clearly the nature of how humans work or saw into the nature of life. This type of insight is what creates effortless change for people. We don't have to motivate ourselves to think positively or try to constantly change our mindset to a more positive one. We begin to naturally flow with life. We see that we are life itself. It gets easy.
We can operate as we were designed to. You can live the life you were born to live.
Other approaches look at your thinking and attempt to replace less useful thinking with more useful thinking. This is not transformative. Nothing changes in how a person sees themselves or the world around them. Specific areas in a person’s life might improve; however, there's no real paradigm shift. No real illumination into the nature of life.
Real insight creates massive change in all areas of life effortlessly. Life becomes a joy.
Our quote of the week this week is from Anita Moorjani "When you realize your own magnificence, you will only attract magnificence into your life." She had a near death experience, spontaneously healed from stage 4 cancer, and came back to life. Her book is called "Dying to Be Me."
It sounds to me that Jim Carrey saw his own magnificence in its fullest sense and then all life became magnificent. Or in different words, he came back to himself.
His quote above is a more dramatic example of insight. However, we all come back to ourselves all the time all day long. A more mundane type of insight is when you are lost in thought and all of a sudden you come to and wonder "Oh, where was I?" You were in thought. Now you are not.
The only reason people have trouble leaving their habitual thoughts behind is they don't know what the feeling of coming back to yourself feels like. It's a bit of blankness at first, as if I forgot my place in a book. I used to try to go back, to figure out where I was, where I had read up to. "Gimme a minute, I'll pick it right back up." Without knowing that my brain, my body, my self is trying to wake me up. Being lost in thought isn’t doing me any good. It's what's creating tension or unwanted feelings.
When you realize and come back to yourself, in that moment, you are fully present. The moment of becoming present is literally the moment of "Oh, where was I?"
That's what people are looking for and miss.
We're designed to have insights and come back to ourselves. To come back to our magnificence. We do it over and over all day long. In recognizing the process, we can leave our unhelpful books of habitual thought on the shelf. We open ourselves up to fresh in-the-moment inspiration. We fall into ourselves. After the blankness there is a rising nice feeling. Often an expansive feeling of freedom.
We are free.
In what I call my transformative work, we sit in conversation and I point people to how we are designed. What is our inherent nature. I point clients to their magnificence. When a client has an insight into the nature of the human experience (just like Jim Carrey) their whole life changes. Over time life just keeps getting better and better.
You can't unsee an insight. It's yours for life.
What Are We Up To?
Anywhere in the world one-on-one coaching Intensives to start living a life you are excited to wake up to each day, filled with delight and enjoyment. Intensives can be structured for Individuals, Couples, and Teams. Ask Nancy for a complimentary consultation call with Dr. Sara.
We Go Deep with Kat and Sara: A mostly weekly podcast with Dr. Kathleen Perry and Dr. Sara O'Neill where we go deeper with the understanding that life happens from the inside out. This is a raw and unedited podcast in a conversational style.
Recent Titles Include:
Yes, But Who Are You Before The Thoughts?
God’s Rollercoaster
The Feeling of Urgency
Available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Pocket Casts, and Amazon Music
Wildspire Podcast with Stephanie Benedetto - Bliss & the Bigness of Who You Really Are With Dr. Sara Joy O’Neill https://open.spotify.com/episode/5SgFdNP8x5Oagt6AjxYhC0?si=88bc6551037c449a
Other Fun Stuff:
Always Wear A Helmet
https://www.reddit.com/r/Eyebleach/comments/1fy5wdl/pineapple_cap/?_hsenc=p2ANqtz--t6aQHF0RZ91ekUZH_vXckLqCG3V10xf2sjoQqj6rPkxxaH7visZYnbtcKQ8wV-QVdc0glirBmICvHGSIk6yusyNiRzA&_hsmi=328258527
Chill Murmuration
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2AOsRS1jmk
With Love,
Sara Joy