Removing Your Mask
by Barry Long
A long, long time ago, when human beings
were not so fixed in their physical bodies as they are today, there lived a man (or was it
a woman?) who made for himself a marvelous mask - a mask that could pull many faces. The
man used to put on the mask and entertain himself by suddenly accosting people and
watching their reactions. Sometimes the mask would be laughing, sometimes crying,
sometimes grimacing and scowling.
His victims were always shocked at the sight of such an
extraordinary, unnatural, unfamiliar face - even when it was smiling. Whether they laughed
or cried made no difference to him. All he wanted was the excitement of their reactions.
He knew he was himself behind the mask. He knew he was the joker - and that the joke was
on them.
Masking Yourself
At first, he'd pop out with the mask on a
couple of times a day. Then, as he got used to the excitement and wanted more, he began
leaving the mask on all day. Finally, he saw no need to take it off at all - and slept in
it.
The biggest load you're carrying in
your life
is your personality -- the strain of pretense.
For years, the man wandered through the
land enjoying himself behind the mask. Then one day he awoke, feeling a feeling he'd never
felt before - he felt lonely, cut-off, something missing. Jumping up in alarm he stepped
out in front of a beautiful woman - and immediately he fell in love with her. But the
woman screamed and ran away, shocked by the frightening, unfamiliar face.
"Stop," he cried, "It's
not me!" wrenching at the mask to tear it off. But it was him. The mask wouldn't come
off. It was stuck to his flesh. It had become his face. The man, through his fabulous
mask, was the first person to enter this unhappy world.
Time went by. No matter how hard he tried
to tell everyone what a disaster he'd brought on himself, no one would believe him. No one
was interested in listening anyway, because they'd all copied him. They'd all put on masks
of their own - to get the new excitement of playing at being what they were not. Like him,
they'd all become the mask.
How the man eventually put a stop to the
masquerade and returned to his joyous being, is the finale of the story; for all fables
must have a happy ending. However, only when you, the reader, are joyous and free of
unhappiness now (which is any moment) will the story truly come to an end. For you are the
man or woman in the mask.
The Personal Mask
The mask you are wearing is your
personality. Look in the bathroom mirror - that's it. Watch the face you pull. Sometimes
approving; often disapproving. You can't really believe it's you. So you look in every
passing mirror, even shop windows, to reassure yourself and confirm it's YOU. Sometimes,
you even get the weird, irrational feeling of wanting to strip off the mask, don't you?
This is not uncommon. It's just that people don't like to talk about it; it sounds silly.
But it's not so silly, is it? - when you start being honest.
The biggest load you're carrying in your
life is your personality - the strain of pretense. Keeping it up weighs you down and sucks
the life out of you. You blame so many things for the feeling of heaviness and lack of
life. You blame your work, your relationships, your diet, your problems. And yet it's your
personality that has cut you off from your natural joy and vibrancy.
The personality makes you worried and
emotional. It's the cause of your moods and self-doubt, your depressions and times of
misery. It confuses your mind. It's fearful of the future and guilty or regretful of the
past. It gets listless, bored and restless with the present. It's the unsuspected shadow
that slides in between you and your partner. It's the cunning and knowing in the eyes. It
lives off every kind of stimulus, good and bad, depression and excitement. And it's
utterly terrified of being found out - discovered as the phony and spoiler it is.
Do you recognize any of these symptoms in
yourself? Then you're ready to begin dismantling the personality. I say dismantle because
the personality is a `mantle', a cloak. And you've thrown the mantle of the personality
around you, to shield you from the nastiness of the world and the hurtfulness of people.
You have made the personality your
protector. You have handed over much of your authority. So the personality jumps to your
defense immediately when you feel hurt, threatened or criticized. It hits out for you with
piercing or bludgeoning words. Sometimes you wince at its violence and insensitivity. But
then it's your champion, your defender. So you meekly go along with its often appalling
behavior, and make excuses for it to yourself. The wily protector, given absolute power,
becomes the absolute dictator. And you despair of ever being free.
The truth is, you have no need of this
protection. The personality is like a bully at school whose gang you once joined to be on
the safe side. After you've grown up he comes back and convinces you that you still need
him. He's able to do this because, without knowing it, you harbor all the pain of
yesterday - the old fears and hurts of your childhood, your youth and adult life. The
bully, knowing your fear, won't leave you alone. And you're terrified to lose his
protection.
Notwithstanding this, the personality
does have its place and role. It makes a rotten master, but is a good servant. The servant
must no longer be allowed to run your life. It's fouled it up long enough.
Everything you perceive as wrong with the
world is the result of someone's personality. In fact, the world itself was constructed by
personality's ignorance. That's why the world is such a cruel, exploitative and dishonest
place, compared with the beauty and integrity of the earth and nature. Just as the
personality lives off you, and drains your resources, so the world is exhausting the
earth's resources.
Developing Character
Behind every personality, behind every
mask, is a character. Character is your God-given uniqueness. Character is what you have
to return to more consciously in yourself - the character of your joyous being behind the
personality. Everybody without exception has character. The personality so often obscures
and deprives you of the pleasure of your character, but this lovable or admirable
character appears when the personality is no longer active, when the frontal awareness is
connected directly with the flame of innocence. The man or woman is then seen in a
different light; the unique character shines forth, and we feel pleased or privileged to
be in their company.
The stress of the personality arises out
of the terrible contradiction of trying to hold on to existence, while the life that you
are lets go every moment. Life is ceaseless movement. Everything now is different in some
way to what it was yesterday.
Why don't we move like life, with the
speed of love that lets go every moment? The answer is in the two words life and
existence. Life is in existence but existence is not life. Life is new every moment.
Existence also should be new every moment, but we hold on to it and it becomes painful. If
you don't hold on to existence, you are the life in it, new every moment. Then the two
become a harmony. Then being is joyous.
The harmonious interchange between life
within and existence without depends on you keeping your psyche free-flowing. The
personality clogs the psychic system which is naturally ever moving. The personality
freeze-frames our existence. We've freeze-framed our houses, our possessions, our
children; and made them `mine'. We hang on to them as though they'd disappear if we don't
cling to them. It's all due to the insecure personality that feels it must either hold on
or lose its identity. So we fight people or countries to hold on to what we have. But life
as we see it around us, behind all the personable people and their personal problems,
holds on to nothing.
Time To Energize
So now we come to the crucial question.
How can you learn to let go, and be life that is new every moment? How do you start to
live joyously? The answer is you have to get more energy.
The remarkable thing is that all the
energy you require is already in you now. But it's being wasted by your personality. There
is only so much energy in your system, your body. It's not unlimited, but there is
sufficient to enable you to realize the truth; to return you to the joyous life behind the
mask - your original, vast and untroubled state of being.
 This
article was excerpted with permission from:
Only Fear Dies
by Barry Long.
Published in England by Barry Long Books. ©1994.
Info/Order
book.
More books by this author.
About The
Author
Barry
Long is an Australian writer and spiritual teacher who travels and
lectures internationally spreading his practical approach to the truth
of life. Contact The Barry Long
Foundation, c/o P.O. Box 251, Cerrillos, NM 87010. Visit the foundation's
website at www.barrylong.org.
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