13 Conditioning and Reaction
The self is conditionally arisen in every aspect.
The self can be re-conditioned, but it can never be un-conditioned.
There is nothing in the mind that is free of the conditions to which it has been exposed.
Can we remain constantly aware that all thought and action is conditioned?
Reaching out for the unconditioned serves only to perpetuate the conditioned, for it is the movement of desire.
Awareness is not a long way away, but is there in every moment that you understand yourself and how your actions and reactions arise.
We are conditioned at every level: as a species; by the environment; by both race and culture, family and friends.
Our personal history is simply our interaction within this limited world under the guidance of pleasure and pain.
We cannot escape from conditionality, but we can be free from identification with it.
We carry within us the struggle, the fear, and the violence of our history as a species on this planet, we cannot avoid it, but we can be aware of it.
We are not separate from the history of mankind, indeed we are but an expression of it.
To see and accept the reality of who we are is the first step towards freedom.
A mind that is unmoved by the past is free of its conditioning.
Conditioning is the seat of the problem, but identification is its seal.
If the fact of conditioning were the whole problem we could never be free of it.
Identifying with a system cannot free you from the self-delusion for the self is simply finding security by identifying with what is larger than itself.
The problem as such is not the past, but that it goes unexamined.
You will remain a victim of the world around you so long as you act and react unconsciously.
To react is to act mechanically.
Reaction is of the past, response is in the moment.
Reaction arises consequent upon the experience of pleasure and pain.
To respond means to give your whole being to the moment you are living.
Reaction is born of habit, response of awareness.
Habit is proportional to a lack of awareness.
Only when there is awareness can there be an action born of love.
Reaction is born of habit, response of awareness.
Habit is proportional to a lack of awareness.
Only when there is awareness can there be an action born of love.
Everyone can see that others are conditioned but they somehow fail to see that that means they are conditioned.
Never attribute independence to anyone and you will never get angry with them.
You only get angry with another when you fail to see the conditionality of their arising.
You should always ask in regard to another’s behaviour: is it possible I could have acted in the same way given the right conditions?