Attention

I have often wondered why do people try to get back into contact with me? What do they
seek when they stalk me, try to reach me after I removed them from my life? Then, due to
an exercise I got from someone I am working with, it hit me.
They seek ATTENTION. I denied them my attention, and with attention, I denied
them value, meaning, acceptance etc. Here I am not talking about those people I
intentionally hurt, people with whom I played a game after noticing they were not what they
present themselves to be, or after realizing I don’t want to have anything to do with them
due to their character. I am talking about the people I cut off through no fault of their own;
I had no quarrel with them, I wasn’t mad at them, I didn’t have reactions to them. We
simply weren’t on the same wavelength. I removed people like this many times in my life,
often during an internal crossroad. During this kind of “biorhythms” in which these people
seek me out – sometimes it’s because of the Moon, or atmospheric pressure, during this so
called crisis and so on – I would wonder what is it that attracts them so much? I have been
very clear about the termination of our socializing, acquaintance, friendship (which I no
longer believe in nor hold such relations.) Still, they try to draw me back and get close to
me. Usually, when I finish with something I don’t go back. When I am done with something,
I am done, same goes for people. Clear cut.
Then it hit me. A T T E N T I O N.

With my act I have cut the flow of attention toward them, and the flow of their attention
toward me. They remained unpaid. Because, as my Mentor (If I may call him so) says
“attention is a universally accepted currency.” Attention is money of the universe.
Worth a lot more than the money we use. I know this.
I took away attention from them, and with it, I took away their value. To me they still have
value for being wonderful human beings. But since I am collapsing both the wonderful with
the bad within myself, it means nothing to me. I like to free myself from others, also, free
them from me.
Attention that we get is a means of payment, a means by which we pay while giving
attention. Attention is a Force. A Force which needs to flow toward you, not toward the
world or others. Energy can circulate, but attention needs to be on you. Our energy can go
toward something while our consciousness is focused on itself. But we are not used to
letting the energy flow while keeping our consciousness on us. No one had taught us that,
not even the ones who should have (masters, gurus, teachers) for they don’t know this
either, they merely imitate their roles. I know what it’s like when someone you deem
valuable and better than yourself collapses the game and pulls his attention away from you
and back to him. Today I am grateful for it, but there were days when I weren’t.
The more developed, more conscious, crystallized the man in front of us is, the more painful
it is for us to be denied his attention, so we seek to gain it back. Even those out of
spirituality and Work sense this.

When we are denied another’s attention, we feel pain, suffering, emptiness, rejection.
Especially if we don’t know how to give attention to ourselves. And since we don’t know
how, we seek it from outside. We even seek it from God.
The moment we realize that we don’t need anyone’s attention and that we should focus our
attention on us, crystallize ourselves through attention, is the moment when we become
truly Alone. We no longer seek attention from others. We will not, of course, cut off the
entire flow of attention because we live in a social environment, we share energy, and a
part of attention flows with that energy. But the larger part of attention we are used to
share freely – for not knowing its value, not knowing how to accept it and we are
demanding it from others (as do those who are mesmerized by us) – we need to focus on
us, on our goal, the Work, on attaining Awakeness.

Attention is the C U R R E N C Y of the universe. If you know how to use it, you have
money. Squandering money means being wasteful. Do you feel the same way when you are
squandering your attention?

People talk of “vampirism” as a means of taking someone’s energy, only because they don’t
know what attention is. Which is much worse than energy vampirism. Most things around
us, connections, relationships, values, would not exist if we denied them attention.
Energy is one thing, but Consciousness as Attention, Attention as a Force of Consciousness,
as its operative principle, is something else.
Energy flows where Attention goes. If we know how to divide Attention on two parts,
we know how to save both energy and attention. One part of Attention, the larger one,
must always be on us. Attention is a terrific Force. We all want this Force in us, on us,
around us, whether consciously or unconsciously. Simply pay attention to this, notice it for
yourself.
As I am writing this text, obviously, I am writing it for Attention. For Giving and Receiving
Attention. Energy flows through the text, if I know how to insert it into words, sentences,
meaning, etc. If I know how to do it, I will always keep the larger part of attention on
myself and divide the other part. I am able know why I am doing this, and due to the part
of attention which is on me, I am free to notice that there is some selfishness and wanting
attention in all this. I can evaluate how important this is to me, and how much of it I can
give freely, without expecting anything in return. Everything around us seeks this Force
of Attention. EVERYTHING.

What we don’t realize, or don’t realize it in time, is that this is the Force we need most
for our internal Development and Growth. The price of Immortality, the price of
crystallization, of internal maturation.
When we pull attention back from useless things, when we realize we are wasting it, that we
are attention-wasting-junkies and we stop doing it – that Force starts crystallizing within us.
And with it comes the energy which feeds the minds, making both consciousness and
attention itself stronger, and we notice that we have more of it every day. Instead of a dot
somewhere around solar plexus that we feel as ourselves, we feel that our feeling of self
has widened. It became huge compared to that small dot we used to feel as ourselves.

I remember when my feeling of self was like that dot. Like some ball in the middle of chest,
the size of a tennis ball perhaps. Now, when I look at the size of my feeling of self, it is
huge. Sometimes it is the size of the body, sometimes it is some half a meter around,
sometimes it’s tens of meters around me or as far as my visual perception can reach – a
few hundred meters. In these moments I feel that it is thick, everything enters it and it
enters into everything. I can condense it within limits of the body or into a point in the
chest, but it’s not the same dot that it used to be in the beginning of my work

In the end, when death comes, this Attention will go to its master, to the level from
which it comes, so it is not really my attention, although I can say it is mine. Each
part of me will go back to the level where it came from, attention included. This too is the
price of freedom. With it, I pay for my freedom, and with it I belong to the world or level
from which this structure comes, in this case attention. Attention is the operative
Consciousness or Force we are given, and which we have in a certain quantity. It is the
“gold” of ancient alchemists. Our duty, our purpose, is to increase this “stock of gold” within
“us”.

If you can feel what’s BEHIND attention – you can’t see it, but you can feel it – you will
experience that you are larger than your attention, thereby, you are not your attention.
Similar to perception we have through our senses, attention is the perception of
Consciousness. I know that many of those reading this have no “experience” of attention,
have never heard of this or have heard some hazy philosophies instead. But once you start
paying attention to attention: where it goes, how it goes, when you are giving it, when you
are seeking it, how things get our attention, how people take it and need it, how attention is
the food we feed ourselves with, how it feeds our feeling of ourselves, our value, meaning,
significance – you start valuing its worth. Then you know its value and you know how the
entire world is fighting for our attention – crises, problems, entertainment, family, friends,
partners, etc.- and how you yourself fight for it. Then you start handling this “universal
currency” more carefully. Attention we give is an investment. Whether our investment
pays off or not, depends on what we invested our attention into.

When we discard useless beliefs, problems, attitudes, reactions, attention starts crystallizing
in us. We start collecting it and we start maturing. A Mature man doesn’t hand out
attention wastefully, for he knows its worth. But an immature man depends on
attention he gets from others, and he quickly spends it on something immature, useless.
Convictions about this and that, values we ascribe to people and things, significance,
meaning, reactions to others and the world – all of this contains attention which we
squander. But once we learn to discard what we, in truth, don’t need – attention goes back
to us. Learning where to focus attention, learning to whom and what we should give it, is a
part of the Work, a part of Growth and Development. Which brings us to further evolution,
one beyond attention. To that which is Truly ours, to Realization of Truth and Being the
Truth.

https://bhaeravakaala.org/