A Year with Anthony De Mello: Waking Up Week by Week

Left to its own devices, life would never produce love. Left to its own devices, life would only lead you to attraction, from attraction to pleasure, then to attachment, to satisfaction, which would finally lead to wearisomeness and boredom.

Now imagine saying to this person, “I’m perfectly happy without you, darling. I wish you nothing but good, and I leave you free. When we truly connect, I’m delighted; and when we don’t, I’m not miserable. When you go away, I don’t miss you.” Journal about your experience in relating to a loved one in this way. Does it cause a shock? Journal about i

Be open and alert to identifying your insecurities. Start by making a list of your insecurities and adding to it as you detect others. Be aware of the self-condemnation and self-doubt they cause you. Journal about it.

The mystics keep trying to tell us that reality is all right. The upset is in you, not in reality. Reality is not problematic. Problems exist only in the human mind. We might add “in the ignorant, programmed, conditioned, sleeping mind.” Reality is not problematic, but most people are not ready to hear that.

Get yourself ready for a shock. Here it comes: Nothing in reality, nothing in life, nothing in the world upsets you. Nothing has the power to upset you. All upset exists in you, not in reality. All upset is in you, not in life. For most people, life is something that happens to them while they’re busy suffering all sorts of other things.

If you take a good look at the way you have been put together and the way you function, you will find that inside your head there is a whole program stamped into you, a set of demands about how the world should be, how you should be, and what you should want. Now, however old you are or wherever you go, your computer goes along with you and is acti

When other people or outcomes don’t live up to your programmed expectations, you’re programmed to torment yourself with frustration, anger, or bitterness. As was stated before, people often do not realize how unhappy they have been until they experience a spontaneous moment of joy. If you wish to be happy, if you wish to be at peace, the first thin

What decides what will finally make its way to your conscious mind from all the material that is pouring in from the world? Three decisive filters: First, your attachments. Second, your beliefs. Third, your fears.

It was your parents, your society, your culture, your religion, and your past experiences that fed the operating instructions into your computer. These things depend on the criteria society establishes; they depend on your social conditioning that was stamped into you. You’ve been programmed with this. You’ve been conditioned this way. This is what