Be Grateful for the Ice Water in Your Face

Sometimes, God gives us a glass of ice water, not to drink but on the head, to wake us up. It may be a rude awakening, but for some people, it’s necessary. Otherwise, they won’t respond to gentle prompts or alarms, and will stay asleep until they die. The ice water, also known as a wakeup call, could be an illness, an injury, the death of a loved one, or some other grievous loss or trauma. When they wake up, they may realize that they’ve been in a deep sleep and now they’re in a lucid nightmare. But God will always show them the way out. If it's a terminal disease, God will show them how to defy the damning prognoses of doctors and heal themselves through right diet and other lifestyle changes.

The glass of ice water may not be something negative but positive. It could be a mystical experience triggered by something beautiful in nature. It could be a lucid dream or vision of an angel or a near-death experience. It could be falling in love. It could be giving birth to a baby. It may be just enough to wake the person up to get their life back on track to fulfilling their purpose. Or they may fall asleep again and require another glass, but, eventually, they wake up.

We are all asleep to some extent, for life is a dream. We only fully awake when we realize that our mind-body-situation is part of the dream of the Mind of God. Then we don’t get caught up in the drama but sit back and watch the dream unfold. We become one with the Mind of God and accept everything that happens with equanimity, for it’s only a dream. We no longer need shocks. Nothing shocks us anymore.

In the Fourth Way Teachings of Gurdjieff, people require the “First Conscious Shock” to begin Conscious Labor or spiritual work to develop themselves, to disidentify with the ego and become one with the God Self. A Second Conscious Shock occurs just before enlightenment.

In the life of Gautama Buddha, his father the king sheltered him from the world so he wouldn’t see suffering, disease, and death. But one day, when he went on a trip outside the palace, he saw all that. That was his First Conscious Shock, the ice water that woke him from his complacency, that motivated him to find the solution to suffering. Then when he sat under the bo tree, determined to reach enlightenment, he was confronted by Mara and received the Second Conscious Shock to become fully awakened (seeTake Refuge in Your Spirit). I, like Buddha, lived a sheltered life until I was 21. Then I joined the Peace Corps and went on a trip to Honduras. I saw suffering, disease, and death (two murders). When I returned, I quit the Peace Corps and joined a Gurdjieffian esoteric school to begin my Conscious Labor (see Be a Grounded Appliance of God's Energy).

Be grateful for conscious shocks, your glasses of ice water. They’re refreshing.