7 deadly sims

All simulated life is adjacent to death – to manifest any artificiality, we have to open a space and a time for it to enter our lives, and that comes at the expense of the true experience that would otherwise be happening in its place.

All such forms are a degree of (self) deception, but what is especially damaging in pretend-attitudes is that they, and the behaviours they develop to fulfil the illusion, require energetic resource to be maintained over extended periods of time. We use up our life-force to keep up the way they seem, to create the way they look, and play out the way they play out. These constructs practically eat our life away, in exchange for a fake appearance, action or inaction that serves only to cover an unpleasant or inconvenient truth we would otherwise have to face.

Anything, from being unhappy with where we are in life at the moment, suffering in unhealthy relationships or habitual pleasure seeking, can transform our precious life into a hunt for a substitute for the uncomfortable truth. And while admitting the uncomfortable and hard truths may indeed be an unpleasant and painful experience – a suffering – once it’s done, it’s done, and we can be released from the chore of perpetual performance of the masking rituals: the things we do to avoid truth.

Pretending can last a lifetime and exhaust all our energy, leading to an exit filled with regrets and the pain of the accrued harm to body and soul.

We all have some or many things we mask and disguise, but here are 7 to start the cleaning with and begin aligning with our true selves:

1. Pretending we are hungry

Comfort eating, snacking, nibbling and other forms of taking in food when we are not actually hungry will gradually destroy our ability to sense hunger, and consequently what we are hungry for. It is the basis of bad food craving, over-consumption, and the addiction to high-intensity tastes in every meal, like sugar and chemically enhanced flavours. We lose sense of our body, of the way it feels and performs and become exceedingly focused on the pleasure stimulus, until we have only it, and thus we let it have its way, destroying our digestive system, the vigour and vitality of our body. Food is an enhancement and a love letter to our body and our life, and we needn’t turn it into a burden.

2. Pretending we are fine

How many times in life would we rather just say “I’m fine” to stop the conversation that would otherwise inquire into our discomfort? – “I don’t want to bother the others”, “it will go away”, “now is not a good time for that”, “no one cares about my predicament”, “I can keep going regardless...”, etc.

What is happening to us right now and how we feel is the life we are living and an opportunity to discover something about ourselves, face it, acknowledge, accept and release it – let it go, freeing both it and ourselves.

There is no need to substitute an opportunity to be free of something with the pretence of not having an issue to deal with – big or small, it is better to face it and tackle it when its time has come. That is the time an opportunity to be free from it has presented itself. When we have a high temperature – that is when we take a rest and cool down; when we hurt our leg – that is when we stop jumping, so why postpone this moment to lighten the load on our body and soul? When we are not fine – that is when we address what is bothering us, because it is our life now, and we really cannot make it be later – only suffer longer.

3. Pretending we are a hero

A "fan favourite". We overwork, overexert, try ever harder, lose ourselves, sacrificing our health, our harmony, our relationship with ourselves, our happiness and joy, for the “mission”, for the others – and it is good and great, and necessary to be kind, loving and caring to others, but to chase heroism is to ignore all that.

A hero becomes a hero when he emerges, when he returns, when he has grown, but he doesn’t start as a hero. He starts without pretence, faces what lies ahead and returns as himself – having lost all insincerity and having defeated his dragons, but having revealed himself, and resting in the calming truth of his purity.

Hero is a consequence, not a motive.

4. Pretending to love

Love is the deepest subject in existence, and to know it fully is our deepest desire.

Love is an expression of totality, of wholeness, of fullness, of true intimate connection and sacred unity, of infinite abundance and selfless eternity, of friendship and freedom.

It is like jumping into water – when we know we are in it, it is because all of ourselves is submerged in it. Without any doubt, we feel it in all of our being.

Pretending we are wet on dry land will leave us thirsty...

5. Pretending we have no time

We never have and never have had time. Time is a cyclical, recurring opportunity to manage our being until we can let time go.

Time is not ours to have, but ironically, we can perpetuate this excuse throughout all time. We need time to understand rhythm and flow, not to fill it with life or empty it of it. That is not our job. Time is always here, and so are we. We are called to work together with it if we are ever to escape the illusion it is not enough.

Time is enough, we are enough – as we both are. When the song plays, we can dance or not dance, but there is enough song to dance to! Dance in its rhythm!

6. Pretending we “don’t really like it”

"I don't really like smoking even though I smoke." Whatever it is, we may like it for – whether the thing itself or for the refuge it provides us from that other thing we do not want to visit – either way, we like it for something it gives us and admitting that may open our vision to what we actually do not like about a harmful habit and, even better – allow us to see what it covers, see underneath, explore our depth. Whatever we find is something we carry, that we can also not carry. It may be easy or often not so easy to let go, but it is much more arduous to cover it for a lifetime, stumbling around it pretending we feel differently, while acting the same.

7. Pretending our life is the obstacle

That is another favourite, isn’t it? – that we have no responsibility for the life we lead, because of fate, circumstances, injustice, weakness, etc. That is simply not true. Life we do not control at all, but our response to it we do choose – it is at the core of our freedom and the glory of our spirit that we respond to life in a loving and caring way, even when it doesn’t feel great.

We do not throw away or ignore a sick child – we tend to it and give it all our love and care until it is healthy again. Such is the nature of our ability to respond to life that the more we respond with love and care to it, the closer and more intimate we become with it and the healthier it becomes – until it is strong, zesty, joyful and happy.

Life is not the obstacle; it is the opportunity to overcome or let go of it. So let us respond!

Good luck, brothers and sisters, sisters and brothers, we are together, we are not others. In truth and in spirit, the way is revealed, and all of our truths can be fulfilled!