There is sometimes such and such an area in our lives that we claim to dislike, or no longer support.
Such an activity or relationship that ‘weighs on us’.
It may be that this attachment to words and categorization that we associate to this reality is in fact a mechanism of protection.
That is to say that behind this weight, this displayed desire not to settle in this activity / relationship, hides in fact something / someone who is of great importance to us.
This importance is precisely the aspect that we are not ready to consider, for different reasons :
– This importance does not fit with the image we have of ourselves or our aspirations.
– This importance is such that we cannot assume it without revealing the emotional charge with which we are silently struggling.
This is why there is such a dissonance between the reality of our activities /relationships and our stated claims.
This means that if I do not leave this professional activity, it is quite simply because in reality, I do not wish to leave it.
If detachment (emotional, identification with…) was assumed, I would leave this situation, quit it straight away.
In the context of a job or a relationship, it may be a secondary attachment.
The primary attachment is related to the activity, or the person.
Secondary attachment concerns the consequences of the activity / relationship (financial and social status, emotional serenity, psychological representation, etc.)
These considerations, although called here “secondary” can nevertheless occupy the first row of what binds us to this or that situation / person.
Recognizing the attachment and above all, questioning the declared intention to put an end to it, can participate in the resolution of the dissonance one way (much franker positioning with regard to the activity, the relationship => no longer pretending to want to escape) or another (becoming aware of the underlying attachment and, if necessary, freeing oneself from it).
Notes & Silence 
Years ago, I was a member of a Christian sect. Eventually, I saw through the contradictions and dishonesty. Yet I remained a member for over a decade. My wife, I decided, had to decide for herself to walk away, without my intervention. So, patience…
Or, maybe, I was a coward. Having said that, I have never before been shy of walking away.
Today, I am thoroughly fed up of the way in which my work intrudes on the rather more important aspects of living. Yet I do not leave. I have too much invested in the pension arrangements to abandon and endanger the future financial security that will allow me to live.
Or, maybe, I am a coward.
Hmm…
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Thank you Simon for putting such concrete and personal words on what I tried to state in this post.
I believe what you say about your work intruding on more important aspects of your life is shared by many, if not all of us.
At least, it is something I’ve been struggling with throughout all my professional experiences.
I guess all our contemporary service-oriented functions involve a high done of mind work, and therefore feeds the fire of frustration.
Every day spent in such environments further densifies the layers of illusions causing of our suffering.
Spiritual practice, in its simplest form, therefore is daily hygiene.
In moment of little visibility, this is how I see it.
Blessed are the ‘limited’ ones, for they do not have to be caught in such entanglements.
Unless they are victims o other traps which I’m unable to perceive being myself a victim of my on limitations.
I guess we’re all experts in cowardice.
Once we start watching mind mechanisms, how could it be otherwise?
Maybe this watching is as truly brave as one can ever get…in which case, noticing cowardice is the other name for bravery.
Bravery, it its common acception, is often a result of the ignorance of such mechanisms.
Bravery can appear as the form taken by a lack of perspective and the incapacity to grasp the consequences of our actions.
…or as an act of Faith.
But I know this is a term which is not in your good books.
————
Oh, you mentioned a Christian sect,
isn’t that a pleonasm?
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Pleonasm? Maybe. Though, I think, there are those who claim no allegiance to any one denomination, yet remain « Christian ».
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of course…We could even go as far as to say any person genuinely on a quest to Reality is a Christian.
Christ is a name for the inner light.
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This is an answer the ‘remarkably similar’ post with another title…
It was indeed EXACTLY the same…I must have found it with no title as a draft weeks after having posting it, and forgot I had already done so.
There are moments when I get confused between, drafts, scheduled articles, types notes on tens of km-long OpenOffice pages, and handwritten notebooks piled everywhere in the house I ever get to spend more than ten minutes.
Oh …let’s not forget the loose and crumpled sheets in the car, bags, drawers, …
Well, I need help…And I don’t mean from a secretary…I mean from a therapist (with a specialty in CNWD
(Compulsive Note Writing Disorder)
I binned the duplicate.
Thanks for opening such a watchful.
This was a proof that you read this blog more than I do.
Thanks.
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Thought I was seeing double…
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