LETTING GO OF WHAT YOU KNOW

Every time you label something - a tree, a grocery store clerk, a “good” idea - you’ve created an image, an abstracted representation, of what that thing is rather than experiencing it directly. You stop seeing the unique expression of this tree of that individual person. Whenever you classify something as “good” or “bad,” you stop looking at it with an open mind.

This type of thinking can cause you to see and treat people as objects or ideas rather than living, breathing human beings, and you subtly judge them accordingly. This is how knowledge, in the form of your own labels and filters, keeps you from seeing reality as it is now.

Practice

Imagine you are visiting the Earth from another planet. Look through the eyes of someone seeing this world for the first time. Let go of everything you know and everything you think for today, and see with new eyes.

Living a Life of Awareness

~ Don Miguel Ruiz Jr.