Today I visited my grandparents

Today I went to visit my grandparents. I like to do so at least once a week as they are somewhat old and I want to enjoy them as long as I can.

I went in and gramps was sitting on the couch, quiet, calm. Gramma was out, so it was just the two of us. 

At first I enjoyed it; the feeling of "silence", the time stopping, the sun getting through the windows. Some small talk here and there, and nothing else. However, that feeling of calmness didn't last long; I started to get anxious, and was incapable of dealing with silence, so I started checking my phone. It wasn't uncomfortable, it wasn't weird, on the contrary, the overall sensation I had was to be at a safe space with someone who has seen me growing up but to whom I have almost nothing to talk about, and it's not necessarily a problem. I was, in fact, tranquil, but at the same time, I wasn't capable to enjoy it, I needed some kind of stimuli.

I've been trying to look inwards for a while now; the inner castle, the carmelite mystics, St. Augustine, ... everyone tells me that God dwells within, but I have no clue about how to do so. 

I initially thought there must have been some sort of magic or ritual or whatever, that it couldn't be as simple as just staying still and enjoying the presence of the living God. And that's why I felt attracted to freemasons and such cults; they were offering me a clear way to achieve what I was desiring, but at the cost of the very thing I was looking for.

So, what do these two themes have in common? Well, that I am having the exact same problem with gramps as I have with God; with one I've trying to talk to him about the old times, bullfighting, ... whilst with the other I've prayed, go to mass, read the mystics and the hermetics, did pilgrimages... and none of these are working, at least, as intended.

I just figured out that the problem is mine alone; I have a profound fear towards silence, towards losing control, towards not understanding, and that manifests as an issue, because I seem to be incapable to deal with this weird nothingness I am facing. It may be due to the ingsoc trying to fry my brain and dopamine receptors or maybe because the fountain of the self, as Theresa said, needs more work to keep up with our innate fount of spirituality provided by God. I have no clue.

It would be great if the mystics also published the "how" about the way they achieved their mystic state, the most profound room of the castle were God lives, and not the "finished product" so to speak, I mean, not the part of praying and following a rule of life, etc, but rather how did they mastered themselves, how did they abandon the fear towards the void and embraced the purest form of "fiat".

As all of them are dead and I have no clue about who to ask about this, I guess I will have to figure it out myself, among the pots and pans and the new age mass.

For now I will start by turning off my phone when I visit my grandparents. I think it's a good start.