Question of the Month: “Is Desire Good or Bad?”
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Welcome Members to our April Question of the Month. Kevin Schoeninger here.
Last week we talked about 3 practices for aligning us with what we desire in life. This week we step back a moment and ask, “Is desire good or bad?”
The reason this comes up is because there is a long lineage of questioning the value of desire. Don’t the great spiritual teachings tell us that enlightenment comes from the cessation of desire or that salvation comes from dying to our selfish desires? Yet here are Abraham-Hicks touting Desire as the prime positive force moving us forward. Something has to give here. Who is right?
The way that my mind works is to see how all of this can be true at once, to see how what appears to be contradictory actually fits together in the Spectrum of Consciousness (thanks to Ken Wilbur for that phrase).
Statements that appear to be contradictory may actually be saying the same thing using different words or looking from different points of view. Or they may be complementary truths each applicable within specific situations.
So what could be going on with this word “desire?”
Let’s begin by recalling from our first Weekly Message a basic distinction made by Abraham-Hicks. They distinguish between You (with a capital “Y”) meaning your essential Being or Source Energy Self and you (with a lower case “y”) meaning your physically-based self existing here on earth in space and time.
This is not a distinction in Reality, but rather a matter of perspective. These are two perspectives within which you have awareness and experience. You can know yourself as an extension of Source Energy, a part of the One Field and you can know yourself as a person born into this physical body, within a certain family, culture, and time, with these likes and dislikes, and so on. Both of these perspectives exist simultaneously–though we may be focused on one or the other.
This is analogous in the Christian tradition to the distinction between “self” and “the life of Christ within,” in Hinduism between “atman” (individual soul) and “Atman” (Universal Spirit), in Daoism you have the “10,000 things” and “the Dao,” in metaphysics you have “beings” and “Being,” in Physics you have “events” and “The Field.” These are all ways of describing our experience of ourselves as many and as One. Abraham-Hicks say “you” and “You.” It is in this context that we can understand what they mean by Desire.
We can likewise view desire as desire (lower case) and Desire (capital “D”). The lower case desire is that which comes from the egoic consciousness (to harken back to Eckhart Tolle). This type of desire is a desire to build up the ego sense of self by attaching to thoughts, feelings, roles, and things that define who I am. This is what Buddhism sees as the source of suffering and what Christianity sees as sin. This is what the wise Daoist laughs at and wanders away from.
By contrast, Desire with a capital “D” is the expansive joyful expression of Being itself, it is the
In their words: “When an idea occurs to you and you feel eagerness about it, that means that your Inner Being is a vibrational match to the idea, and your positive emotion is an indication that the vibration of your thought in this moment matches that of your Inner Being.” (APOE, P.36)
Desire then is the joyous feeling of expansion that comes from aligning with what you are here to do now. It is a felt experience of flowing with your Inner Being. In this sense, it is not an attachment to a specific result, but rather an emotional experience of being on track.
Our Inner Being is like a Stream that leads us toward the actualization of what we desire. Our emotional guidance system tells us if we are following that Stream toward what we Desire or not.
“If the thoughts you are thinking, in this moment, are in alignment with the vibration of the Broader You, you feel the harmony of that alignment in the form of positive-feeling emotions. But if the thoughts you are thinking in this moment are out of alignment with the vibration of the Broader You, you feel the disharmony of that alignment in the form of negative emotions.” (APOE, P. 33)
So, Abraham-Hicks use the analogy of a Stream for the flow of our Inner Being. Our bodies are like canoes that we put into this Stream. We have the choice each moment to either paddle upstream, against the Current, or to allow ourselves to flow downstream with the Current. We can go with the flow or resist it. Everything that we Desire is actually Downstream and that is where the Stream of our Inner Being is leading us.
Often we get the idea in our heads that we are supposed to paddle upstream. We have learned that life is about building up the ego sense of self, that life is hard work, that we must struggle to survive. All of these thoughts lead us to disregard or turn and go against the natural current of our Inner Being. In fact, that is the nature of egoic consciousness.
“So, going back to the analogy of you in your canoe in the Stream: When you are allowing yourself to float freely in the Stream, without resistance, thus closing the gap between where you are right now and who the broader part of you has become, you feel your alignment in the form of positive emotion. But if you are still paddling upstream, holding yourself against the natural Current of your own evolution, your resistance to the Stream and to that which the larger part of you has become is evidenced in the form of negative emotion.” (APOE, P.33)
When you realize the unnecessary suffering caused by paddling upstream, you ask yourself, “How can I be sure that I am going Downstream?”
The answer to this is to pay attention to how you feel. When you are feeling positive, appreciative, expansive, and joyful you are flowing downstream. When you are feeling depressed, negative, and powerless you are turned upstream. These are two ends of a feeling continuum that we can use to chart our course.
In the book, Ask and It Is Given, Abraham-Hicks give us an Emotional Scale with 22 degrees by which we can identify where we are between expansive joy and powerlessness, so that we can gradually turn our boats in the Downstream direction. It is not always possible for humans to shift into joy from where we are. Most often, we have to make our way there by degrees.
Here is the Scale of Emotion for reference:
Scale of Emotion (taken from Ask and It Is Given, P. 114)
- Joy/Knowledge/Empowerment/Freedom/Love/Appreciation
- Passion
- Enthusiasm/Eagerness/Happiness
- Positive Expectation/Belief
- Optimism
- Hopefulness
- Contentment
- Boredom
- Pessimism
- Frustration/Irritation/Impatience
- “Overwhelment”
- Disappointment
- Doubt
- Worry
- Blame
- Discouragement
- Anger
- Revenge
- Hatred/Rage
- Jealousy
- Insecurity/Guilt/Unworthiness
- Fear/Grief/Depression/Despair/Powerlessness
According to Abraham-Hicks the main thing we need to know to navigate through this life is where we are on this scale and how to turn from that point to the downstream direction.
“The only way you will be able to personally know if your words, or focus, are upstream or downstream is by reaching for a visceral feeling of relief.” P54
“Whenever you feel relief, you have lessened your resistance, and when you lessen your resistance, you are flowing in the direction of your desire.” P.54
Say for instance that you find yourself frustrated with your current situation with money. No matter how hard you work, you still find yourself piling up debt. Your dominant thought is something like, “No matter how hard I work, I can never get ahead.” In this case, you can locate yourself at number 10 on the Scale of Emotion: frustration.
In order to find relief from frustration you simply need to reach for a thought that gives you a feeling a little higher on the scale. You could say “Well things just aren’t going my way.” This is actually a little better on the emotional scale because the possibility is open that things could go your way.
Once you’ve made that shift, you don’t want to stop there. You could go on to say, “Things aren’t so bad. I’ve been able to get what I need. It’s o.k. here and now.” You’ve moved your emotion to #9, contentment, and are feeling a little better.
Continuing on, you can take yourself a few more steps by thinking in turn,
“Maybe I can find something that I really like to do that also pays me more money.”
Now you’re getting into a better feeling place.
“You know, I used to love writing stories when I was little. People used to tell me how great they were.” Optimism has creeped in. “I’ll bet I can capitalize on that.” #4 Positive Expectation.
“I’m going to pull those stories out and work on them.” Eagerness #3.
“Yes, I love to write.” Passion #2
“This is wonderful. I am thoroughly enjoying this.” You’ve moved to #1, Joy.
Now I went through this process rather quickly, but you get the idea. With small irritations you can probably move just as quickly. With larger emotional issues and events you may take days or weeks to turn yourself completely Downstream.
According to Abraham-Hicks, no matter where we find ourselves at the moment, we can take note of our feelings and gradually move ourselves along the Scale of Emotion by reaching for better feeling thoughts. We know that a thought is better feeling if we feel even the slightest sense of relief when we think it.
If we continue this process up to #1, we will find ourselves living in alignment with our deepest Desires and living the joyous life that we are meant to live. Is desire good? If it is the kind that leads us to align with who-we-are in our innermost Being, yes.
Most of all Abraham-Hicks remind us that life is meant to be a joyous affair. We don’t have to work so hard at it. In fact, their advice is:
“The Current will carry you. . .just let go of the oars.” (APOE, P.39)
My suggestion for you this week, then, is to use the Scale of Emotion listed above to navigate from negative feeling to positive feeling thoughts. Remember that it is only in a state of positive feeling that you are a vibrational match with what you truly Desire. The Law of Attraction responds to your positive feeling with positive circumstances and events. Your life experience is an energetic match to how you think and feel.
Share your experiences of shifting to more positive feeling thoughts in the coming week. As always, I look forward to hearing from you.
I’d also love to hear from you on our Group Coaching Call next Sunday. Look for an email with call-in details.
Until next time,
Happy Practicing,
Kevin