The Book of Secrets - Deepak Chopra [11]
Perception is the world; the world is perception.
In that key idea, the drama of us-versus-them collapses. We are all included in the only project that makes any difference: reality-making. To defend any outside thing—money, property, possessions, or status—makes sense only if those things are essential. But the material world is an aftereffect. Nothing in it is essential. The only personal stake worth having is the ability to create freely, with full awareness of how reality-making works.
I feel sympathetic to those who have examined the ego and found it so repugnant that they want to be without ego. But in the end, attacking the ego is just a subtle disguise for attacking yourself. Destroying the ego would serve no purpose even if it could be achieved. It is vital to keep our entire creative machinery intact. When you strip away its ugly, insecure, violent dreams, the ego is no longer ugly, insecure, and violent. It takes its natural place as part of the mystery.
The one reality has already revealed a deep secret: Being a creator is more important than the whole world. It’s worth pausing for a moment to take that in. In fact, it is the world. Of all the liberating ideas that could change a person’s life, this one is perhaps the most freeing. Yet to truly live it, to be a true creator, a great deal of conditioning needs to be broken down. No one remembers being told to believe in the material world. Yet somehow we’ve learned to accept ourselves as limited beings. The outside world must be far more powerful. It dictates the storyline, not you. The world comes first; you come a distant second.
The outside world will never produce any spiritual answers until you take on a new role as the manufacturer of reality. That feels strange at first, yet we can already see how a new set of beliefs is falling into place:
Everything I am experiencing reflects myself: Therefore I don’t have to try and escape. There is nowhere to escape to, and as long as I see myself as the creator of my reality, I wouldn’t want to escape even if I could.
My life is part of every other life: My connection to all living things makes it impossible that I have enemies. I feel no need to oppose, resist, conquer, or destroy.
I have no need to control anyone or anything: I can affect change by transforming the only thing that I ever had control of in the first place, which is myself.
CHANGING YOUR REALITY TO ACCOMMODATE THE SECOND SECRET
To truly possess the second secret, begin to see yourself as a co-creator in everything that happens to you. One simple exercise is to sit wherever you are and look around. As your gaze falls on a chair, a picture, the color of the walls in your room, say to yourself, “This stands for me. This, too, stands for me.” Let your awareness take in everything, and now ask yourself:
Do I see order or disorder?
Do I see my uniqueness?
Do I see how I really feel?
Do I see what I really want?
Some things in your environment will speak instantly to these questions while others won’t. A bright, cheerfully painted apartment open to the light stands for a very different state of mind than a dark basement efficiency. Yet a cluttered desk piled high with papers could stand for quite a few things: inner disorder, fear of meeting one’s obligations, accepting too much responsibility, ignoring mundane details, and so on. This inconsistency is valid because we each express and at the same time hide who we are. Some of the time you express who you are, while at other times you detach from your real feelings, deny them, or find outlets that feel socially acceptable. If that sofa was bought just because it was cheap and you decided to make do, if the wall color is white because you didn’t care what color you looked at, if you’re afraid to throw out a picture because your in-laws gave it to you as a present, you are still seeing symbols of how you feel. Without dwelling on details, it’s possible to scan someone’s personal space and fairly accurately discern if that person is satisfied or dissatisfied with