Just One Look Forum Archives

Dear friends,

Here is my experience with The Looking.

By the time I first stumbled upon John on the web, a three and a half years from now, I was feeling that I had lived the whole of my life in endless and fruitless attempts to be satisfying to my ideas of how I and my life should be. I was really tired of this, without understanding why. And I was quite desperate because my inner state of dissatisfaction and restlessness never seized for more than short periods. I felt very alone and ashamed about my situation.

I found John on Youtube one dark and desperate night, and what immediately struck me was this message: "YOU ARE NOT YOUR LIFE. Everything in the life comes and goes, BUT YOU REMAIN THE SAME. You are permanent, you are always here, look for what is always here, IT IS YOU! The consequence of the belief that you are your life, will forever make you afraid and dissatisfied, and you are doomed to days and nights of never-ending attempts to reform yourself and this life! The body-mind-apparatus you have, is a programmed mechanism that is very hard to understand and get under control, you have had very little to say (if anything) about how it has become like it is! It is not the problem how this apparatus is, it is rather that you believe that this apparatus is YOU. It is NOT!"

I instantly felt I was put on the right track... So I tried to change my focus from all that comes and goes within me, to that which in it comes and goes: IN ME. By this meeting with John's message, I experienced the biggest relief in my whole life. I recall myself walking around for two days, speaking to myself: wow, could it really be that simple? Yes, it IS that simple, But can it really be THAT simple? YESSS; it IS that simple! I realized that I finally had found something substantially helpful, so I just kept trying, mostly without having a clear experience of success or failure. I understood that it was the TRYING that would do the whole job, not my mind's idea whether I really did see myself or not. After a couple of years of looking (and listening to John and exchanging experiences with friends) I was starting to have a distinct feeling of what I am, a taste of my true identity. I do not have anything to say about my true identity, only that it feels good to place my attention there, briefly, from time to time.

The only difficulty I have had during this period, is the never-ending question in my head: AM I DOING IT RIGHT? My program was not willing to accept that the looking was enough by itself, that the looking in itself was the medicine. What helped me in that situation was John's reminding: "That which is permanent, YOU, have no qualities, you cannot rest in your true nature, it is natural and obvious that your attention will always move and focus on life, all that is coming and going in your mind." So I just continued the best that I could, despite my mind's endless discussions about right or wrong, success or failure.

I experience that after some time, maybe two years, the looking at MYSELF happens simultaneously with my looking at life. It feels like seeing life and all that is constantly shifting also makes me see the permanent. This is in itself a change in the life. It has become easier, simpler, to take part in life without being reactive to it, without old patterns of reactive behavior taking over, creating repeated dramas. Sometimes they do take over, though, and sometimes they don't. It is not that these patterns, so far, are gone, they have just lost much of their power, their automatic control over me.

By now, I feel so much more compassion with my own imperfections and shortcomings! The insight that these qualities that my mind keeps judging "imperfections and shortcomings" are not created by me, that I have had very little say about the development of them, is so liberating! My search for peace is now over, sometimes I feel peaceful, sometimes I am in distress, I can more accept the endless movement of states that come and go through me, without preferring one for another. But not always, you know, sometimes I just want my life to be eternal sunshine. It's a simple and human program. It just looks like my ability to contain my life's or mind's many ups and downs have really improved, it is not such a big drama any more.

And it feels like my general state of alertness, constant inner tension, which I have felt as a part of me throughout my entire life, over time has been slowly decreasing. I just feel more relaxed in my daily life. That is a gift.

With love from Caspar,

Oslo, Norway