The movement of energy in us is continuous. It never stops. Rather it passes through phases of intense projection which we call tension, and phases of returning to oneself which we call letting go, relaxing. There cannot be continuous tension and there cannot be continuous relaxation. These two aspects are the very life of the movement of energy, the expression of our life. From its source in us, energy is projected outward through the channel of our functions toward an aim. In this movement the functions create a kind of center that we call “I”, and we believe that this projecting outward is the affirmation of our self. This “I”, around which our thoughts and emotions revolve, cannot let go. It lives in tension, is nourished by tensions.
This ordinary “I”, our ego, is always preoccupied with what pleases or displeases it what “I” like or what “I” dislike in a perpetual closing that becomes fixed. It desires, fights, defends itself, compares and judges all the time. It wants to be the first, to be admired and to make its force, its power, felt. This “I” is a center of possession in which all the experiences inscribed in our memory are accumulated. And it is from this center that I wish “to do” to change, to have more, to improve. I want to become this, to acquire that. This “I” always wants to possess more. With ambition, it always has to become something better. It has a fear of being nothing. Is not identification, at its core, based on fear?
Real security does not come by escaping from this mind or emotion. It is possible only when the mind and emotions are truly quiet, when the accumulating action of ambition and desire comes to an end.
In order to see what is, I have to recognize that my state cannot be permanent. It changes from moment to moment. This state of impermanence is my truth. I must not seek to avoid or place my hope in a rigidity that seems to help. I have to live, to experience this state of impermanence, and proceed from there. For this I have to listen to what whatever appears, and in order to really listen, I must not resist. This act of listening, of being present is a true liberation. I am aware of my reactions to everything that takes place in me. I cannot avoid reacting, but for reactions not to stop me, I must be able to go beyond them. I have to continue until I see that it is everything I know that keeps me from approaching the real, the unknown. I must feel all the conditioning of the known in order to be free of it. Then my search for silence, for tranquility, will be a quest not for security, but for freedom to receive the unknown.
When the mind is freer and truly quiet, there is a sense of insecurity, but with it there is complete security because the ordinary “I” is absent. My mind is no longer moved by the wish ³to do² on the part of my “I”, by its demands, even for my own inner growth. In this tranquility all the responses, reactions and movements of this “I” are left behind. My mind is at rest, stilled by the vision of what is.
From Reality of Being, by Jeanne de Salzmann