Your true Self has the answer is about seeing how everything is interconnected and interdependent, and using this to wake up to your Buddha mind. In fact, underneath all the confusion, your ordinary day-to-day mind is Buddha mind.
The original lojong slogan is: Seeing confusion as the four kayas is unsurpassable shunyata protection, which needs some explaining. The four kayas describe the process of awakening. Kayas means ‘bodies’ and they represent the different ways emptiness (shunyata) manifests and how we experience it.
In simple terms, this means that reality appears to manifest from emptiness but because you take that appearance to be solid you end up feeling separate from reality. This leads to confusion and suffering. But this slogan is saying that you can see your confusion as part of the same dance of shunyata and wake up to who you really are.
There’s no separate self and other, it’s all Being manifesting in different forms. Everything arises from emptiness, or awareness, and returns there. When you look at your confusion and suffering like this, there’s no need to get rid of it because it just evaporates, like mist in the sunshine.
Apply this slogan to your writing practice by exploring the possibility that when you feel stuck and can’t write, that you may not actually have a problem at all. You can cut through the confusion by asking yourself: what if I’m wrong?
This is especially important when you’re stuck in a negative loop of self-doubt and it’s stopping you from writing. What if the thought that says you’re an idiot who can’t write for toffee is wrong?
Listen to your heart for the answer. Your true Self is found in the silence and space of the heart, and if you’re right about something, the heart will know.
Your writing prompt this weekend: Whenever you feel stuck or confused, not sure what to write or how to fix a problem, turn the problem in on itself and ask: Who is stuck? Who is confused? Who can’t write? See if you can find the self who thinks it’s a writer.
Jessica Davidson 