Breaking Character

Breaking character
is about removing oneself from the performance. This is the purpose of
deep meditation, but you need not always be in deep meditation to
achieve this experience, at least not in the standard manner of
achieving deep meditation. To break character is to stop the theater of
performances in your head. After all, your experiences are really
happening in your head. You process everything in your head, you
experience it all up there and your conclusions become the basis for the
character you play, as you continue adding to it. An example of this
would be questions that you may ask yourself about one person’s feelings
towards you. In your head you begin to gather evidence from previous
interactions, then before you know it you have created a story
supporting your conclusion that this person doesn’t like you. What do
you do with this assessment? You then create a series of conditions and
signals to alert you to more of this coming your way. Suddenly this has
developed into a handicap for you, limiting you from being more
engaging, perhaps. As you become less engaging in your interaction with
other or just in general your world has to adjust to accommodate your
fears. This of course spills over into your entire reality. It becomes
clear that you never break character. You never leave the stage because
you are compelled to maintain the experience.

Experiencing
our characters is so hypnotic that the thought of breaking character
is unappealing. In breaking character we run the risk of change. We are
typecast in our roles. It is challenging to switch characters. We have
become the role. We believe that we are our poverty, our illnesses,
our professions, our social status, our education, our spiritual
identities, our success, our so-called failures, our human status; they
are simply all characters traits. What are we if we are not that? We
feel we must identify ourselves as something. To be undefined is a
fearful position for most, for if you cannot be identified then do you
really exist? What will people say?

When we
break character by stepping away from the performance, we become
centered. We are not this thing or that thing, and in this space of
centeredness we can re-create the manner in which we would like to
return to our play, our adventure. You can change the construct of the
role you play. To see the manner in which you acquired this role is of
great significance in removing yourself from the hamster-wheel of
experiences. Consciously breaking character as needed allows you to
simplify and resolve issues without the interference of the limitations
of the character you have been playing.

How was
your character shaped? Is it from the traditions woven in your family’s
character tree? Are you shaped from your bloodline’s character
addictions? Have you inherited the character you now accept as who you
are, is it final in your mind? Is your character woven from the shadows
of the past?  Have you convinced yourself that you are “just this way”?
Have you confined yourself to a concept that you do not know how to
change? What you think you are on the stage of life is only a
character. To believe that this is who you are is simply part of the
agreement in taking on your character. A great actor must make the part
believable. This you have done so well that even you are convinced,
and to convince you otherwise could be a dangerous feat to the one who
attempts to do the convincing. However, there is no need to convince
anyone that they are trapped in a character, for they must play out
these roles. When we become tired of playing the same part repeatedly,
only then are we ready to return on occasion to who we are beyond these
roles. Our acknowledgment of this theatrical experience returns us to
our creative space as writers of reality.

To
recognize the dynamics involved in character building according to the
script of this reality is to gain tremendous power over your material
and mental manifestations. Ultimately this collective script has
character evolution written into it, where one can experience mind over
matter, a role quite opposite the limitations of mind interacting with
matter, at least on a conscious level. The roles commonly played come
equipped with boundaries allowing one to be blind to their existence.
When we are ill we are in character. When I had an allergy attack I was
in character, but when important projects arose I had to break
character and put the sneezing on hold.

However,
once I was finished with the project, the sneezing returned! We have
all experienced such moments. Falling in and out of love is part of the
role we play. Disliking one another for reasons imagined or
unimaginable is part of the role we play. We believe in all of our
reasons for being what we are when we are performing. We believe in our
financial dilemmas as we struggle, either with our riches or our
deficits, while at opposite ends these characters are built of the same
principle. One sees money as an end-all and another sees money as a
means to soothe the many plaguing deficiencies experienced by the
character, the role being played. Are both characters wealthy? Yes!
They are wealthy in unseen possibilities and the power to shift their
experiences. Our houses, our jobs, organizations we belong to, money,
banking systems, businesses, cities, cultural expressions,
relationships of all kinds—they are all props and background with a
supporting cast for your performance. We have established amazing set
designs according to the requirements of the character we are playing.
Living in a shack or a mansion—it’s still all a set or stage with
props.

The true essence of who you are does not experience lack
or deficiencies of any kind, but rather dives into vehicles such as
this body to experience variety and possibilities. The mortgage or rent
that your character might struggle to pay does not really
exist but exists only as an emotional experience tied to conditions
within your character’s role. We are experiencing the theater within
the game. The game is about these grand performances. Each one of us is
the star of our production. Your issues, imprints and programs are all
tied to the character according to what the role calls for. Your
character is your automated self!

    
(1)       “One of Bohm’s most startling assertions is that the
tangible reality of our everyday lives is really a kind of illusion,
like a holographic image. Underlying it is a deeper order of existence,
a vast and more primary level of reality that gives birth to all the
objects and appearances of our physical world in much the same way that
a piece of holographic film gives birth to a hologram.

Bohm
calls this deeper level of reality the implicate (which means enfolded
or hidden) order, and he refers to our own level or existence as the
explicate, or unfolded order. Put another way, electrons and all other
particles are no more substantive or permanent than the form a geyser of
water takes as it gushes out of a fountain. They are sustained by a
constant influx from the implicate order, and when a particle appears to
be destroyed, it is not lost. It has merely enfolded back into the
deeper order from which it sprang.

“GH –
The central point here is that our mind represents our senses (due to
our evolution based on survival) rather than providing a true picture
of reality. However, reason tells us that matter is clearly
interconnected (e.g. the earth orbits the sun) and that there must be
knowledge flowing into matter to explain how we can see things around
us. This is correct, and explained by the Spherical In-Waves which form
the ‘particle’ effect of matter at their Wave-Center.”

“Sonia, that all sounds good, but I am here, struggling! I
understand all kinds of struggle and I also understand that we have
the power to leave the stage, to break character for but a moment in
order to change the game, the play. If you never break character you
will never be able to change your circumstances. Certain actions ensure
that you are always in character and that you never leave the stage. 
There are those who want to continuously talk about how severe their
situation is. They don’t really want solutions, and will generally
shoot down any solutions presented to them. They see only obstacles to
changing their situation—their attention span is short, and when
attempting to break character they bring the character with them, and
then complain that they can’t focus.

How do you
know that you have brought your character with you? When you notice
that you keep thinking about all of your external conditions when you
sit to meditate or to focus, when you can’t stop thinking about your
problems, when the dialog is relentless in your head—this is how you
confirm that you have brought your character with you. STOP TAKING YOUR
CHARACTER WITH YOU!!! STOP SAYING WHAT YOU CAN’T DO!!! (This of course
is only being said to those who wish to experience moments without the
running script.) Even if you are at work you have the power to leave
the stage, break character, go to the restroom for a minute or two. You
enter that bathroom stall with the realization that “I am only playing a character, this is not who I really am.”
Say this with conviction, then you go silent, nothing needs to be said,
and all that is left is a feeling of creating something new. You can
do this anywhere, at any time. To convince yourself that you must sit
in the lotus position in silence in order to break character and
connect inwards is simply another part of the character you play. You
can leave the stage at any time and in any crowd. It allows you to be
the observer, without thought, without judgment, without the
echoing of your character. From this space you can move into
experiencing yourself as a conscious creator. Here you have the
opportunity to observe a different character, a different role that you
will play when engaging on stage.

For some the
idea that we are playing a role is jolting. For them to accept such
concepts may provide a sense of invalidation of their existence,
perhaps bringing a sense of insignificance to those things that they had
placed importance on. “What will become of me?”  Well, you
will continue to exist, but perhaps taking on a new character submerged
in confusion about who you are, or perhaps you will find the courage
to see a wealth of possibilities in what can be experienced. Perhaps
you will no longer feel trapped by the life you have been living based
your old character. These characters allow us a rich array of
experiences.

So whatever it is that you are
experiencing at this time, remind yourself that whatever challenge lies
before you is but a result of the components of the role or roles you
have played. Don’t become lost in your head, for when you do you cannot
see clearly, and you will only become more of the character you have
been. Stop and take a break from the stage…it will all be there when
you return, if you so choose. Break character and rewrite the script,
not with old solutions from a worn-out role, but with fresh insight and
a desire for change. Don’t spend time energizing what you don’t want,
and if you don’t want solutions, don’t pretend that you do by
complaining. When you are ready for change you will no longer complain,
but you will simply begin to take character breaks; you will leave
your role behind, along with the entire supporting cast. When you
return to the stage you may find that all that had supported your
production is slowly fading. Not to worry, no cause for alarm. If you
have indeed reshaped your character, then so must everything around you
be reshaped. Whatever you are dealing with, it’s temporary, unless you
choose to create an illusion of permanence. Breaking character is your
ticket to change, for you are not your character, but simply an actor
in your own production.

 (1)  http://www.spaceandmotion.com/Physics-David-Bohm-Holographic-Universe.ht…

©2010 Sonia Barrett