Shin'Ar
03-15-2012, 12:27 PM
Many humans worship a god of mercy, and are then confused and disappointed when their prayers go unanswered. But they alone are themselves to blame, for expecting their imaginations to become reality. The human should not expect anything from its Creator. The human must understand their place in creation as remaining a mystery, despite the thousands of years of philosophical attempts to de-mystify the unknown. Cultures and traditions have erected huge cities and populations around nothing more than wishful thinking. And however beneficial that hope might be to strength of will, it does nothing to enhance the true spirit of man. This is why all the great civilizations in the past have fallen into dust. Hope is fleeting and fragile, and its truth is realized the second it is smashed against the rocks of reality. It is only knowledge, love, wisdom, courage and honor that enhance the spirit of man. Becoming lost in the delusion of tradition does nothing to attain knowledge based on fact and truth, and can therefore never be considered beneficial to the evolution of man, spiritually or intellectually. And without spiritual advancement and enhancement, civilizations will continue to meet a demise at their own hands. The only way the spirit of man can evolve is through an increase in understanding, which can only come when truth is discovered and knowledge attained through these truths. Knowledge cannot be attained from falsehood, deception or delusion. To attain truth one must always be searching for it and prepared to adapt to the changes that truth will ultimately bring our way. Without an open mind to locating truth we will become stuck in something that may not be truth and simply wallow in the muck. It is this continuing quest to be certain that what we follow is truth that creates the environment for attaining knowledge, which then enhances the spirit. Without an open mind to collect the facts, deny the falacies, and discern the logic, we cannot continue to evolve.
Creation can be a glorious spectacle and can provide us with countless wonders and pleasure. There is much to appreciate and enjoy. A lifetime can be spent wandering the globe in search of knowledge and partaking of the glory of creation. But there is also a dangerous nature to creation which afflicts many of our brethren with great grief and torment. Compared to the very few who manage to go through life's struggles unscathed, there are many times more who have had to suffer great pain and toil just to provide the basic necessities of life for themselves and their loved ones.
So, should creation be regarded as something glorious of which to to partake and behold, without concern for the plight of the rest of your fellowman, for as long as you are able to do so without having to face the downside of creation yourself?
Or should creation be looked at as the typical struggle for survival that most of our fellow humans experience, and should we concern ourselves with assisting those who may require help?
I think we all know the right response to these two choices. But unfortunately far too many are only concerned with themselves, and the here and now. In my judgment creation is belittled by the lack of human compassion, which ironically, reflects what seems to be the character of 'The Source' toward us. Now that is something to think further on! Is the inconsiderate norm of the human path simply the reflection of its design? Or is our true design actually to be able to rise above and beyond that reflection and evolve into something else?
Maybe we have been left alone to see what we can become on our own, using these qualities that have been so intricately woven into our makeup, which we can choose to either express or deny. Maybe that is 'The Source's' challenge to us, and we are caught up in the midst of it, without being aware of it at all. Who knows?
In the end though, as vast and spectacular as creation is, it becomes either, a creation consisting of insensitive human physicality, or a creation in which primal humans have advanced to become more than their physical make-up; to become spiritually enhanced beings of love and wisdom. In the end, creation will be what we cause it to become, so in a sense, we are the creators ourselves. We can either strive to become more than we are, or we can settle with what we have. It only takes a glance at the war, religious persecution and inhumanity toward our brethren, to know what that choice should be.
The wisdom here is not in knowing what we should become, it is rather in devising a means of going against the grain to reach that goal. It is easy to settle onto the trodden path and follow the rest of the herd, even to the edge of the canyon's precipice and over the edge. It is much more difficult to climb the higher road that few will follow with you.
For me, solving creation is not about finding the origin to the mystery, it is about becoming something different from the rest, and being a part of that Great Mystery. It is about devising an improved creation. It's looking to the future of creation, and not to its past. What will creation become when it is enhanced by an improved me?
The future of creation can be a place of regret and lack of compassion, or a place of honor and respect for humanity. For my part, I want to bring honor and fellowship to the future. When I look back on my small part of creation I want to be able to say that I did what I believed to be the right and logical thing to do; not to whine about what I should have done instead.
Creation is now a place with me in it. The future creation will be a better place, because it will have an improved me in it.
So regardless of what we learn might be true, if we are truly on a path to truth and intelligence, then it is at 'The Source' that our paths should end. The question is, on that journey, does how we walk that path really matter when there seems to be no moral authority in this world. If all of the world's religion is merely traditional wishful thinking, than its directives are not authoritative. And if the governments are mostly corrupt, than their laws are useless as guidance. So if we are left to find our own path to 'The Source', and there seems to be no laws or authority to lead us, than does this mean we are free to disregard authority from other places?
It is this walk through the fog of mystery that is the true test of a man.
There is a house about three blocks from mine where the owners leave a small child's motorized jeep out in the yard everynight. My three year old son would love to have it. I would love for him to have it myself. I cannot afford to buy one, but I could easily have that one. What is to stop me from going there late one night and throwing it in the back of the car?
Well, there it is! This one dilemma can be asked with so many references to life's various situations. Religion easily addresses the dilemma by claiming the laws of their god as authoritative. But it is not so easily answered if you cannot assign a supreme directive. If I do not adhere to any authority, than why can't I have that little car for my son? I could force them to at least share it with me.
If man learns anything in this life at all it should be that the path he walks is the path he places 'before' him, and the one he leaves 'behind' him. This path can only be made as he places one foot ahead of the other and moves forward, and he can only do so by 'choosing' which direction he will take. Without direction from another source of authority he is forced to make these decisions himself, using only what knowledge and wisdom he has attained in life. Where this path leads to will be the 'person' that he will become. At the end of that path will be the 'person' that he created. This is why religion has been so unanimously accepted around the world. It offers man freedom from this fog of choice and sets a path before him that he can follow without having to choose for himself. Religion is a pre-cut path through the thickness of the jungle. But what happens to a man's personal experience when he begins to walk the path of another?
When I declare that I am a thought of the creator, moving forward, and evolving myself as I move, I acknowledge the fact that I am creating who and what I am, by the empowerment of the original thought of this mystery that we call the 'The Source'. Without the original I could not exist to become anything, and by the deliberate empowering design of the original I now freely design what I will become at the end of this path which I am traveling. So the reason why I would not steal that child's bike has nothing to do with the moral laws of some archaic religion, or even the laws of society. The reason I would not steal it away is simply because I want to become the type of 'person' who deals with others in a way that I would want them to deal with me.
An ancient wise counsel once said that we should do unto others as we would have done to ourselves. I suppose that counsel is agreeable, as long as the person following it is not a sadist. To steal from others, or to do any harm to others, would make me a thief and an abuser, and that is not what I want to create. We also have to consider here that if we make abusers of ourselves, we are also making the same of mankind as a whole, because if everyone follows the same path, we end up with a race of beings that have no regard for each other, and have absolutely no ability to live with each other. Always at war, they would soon exterminate their entire species. Is that something we should strive to create for our future? If not, than we have the responsibility to make sure that we do nothing to create that in ourselves.
So, as we walk that foggy path to the source of knowledge, the origin, we are faced with choices that result in who, and what, we will become based on the decisions we make around those choices. And there are qualities of character and personality that consist of moral and immoral aspects that cannot be designated by the laws of man's philosophies and beliefs. These are qualities that are more akin to the laws of natural physics and dynamics than they are to righteousness, which is more of a religious nature. It is simply a matter of what a man wants to add to his character and identity as he walks this path. It is what he collects as supplies, with which to build his character, that will create the building he becomes. So to collect qualities like courage, compassion, sensitivity, loyalty, and integrity will provide supplies for a character that is the opposite of one built by using deceit, insensitivity, hate and moral corruption. The supplies we choose along the way depend entirely on what we deliberately pick up and add to our warehouse.
In my warehouse there will be nothing that does not add to the morality and integrity of my character simply because I firmly believe that this is the goal for the entire human race, and the only way that we will ever live in harmony with each other, which is what I also believe is the ultimate goal for us as humans. Love and harmony should not be cast aside as weaknesses of wishful thinking pacifists only. These should be seen as building blocks that will construct the type of buildings suitable for a place where many like it will commune together in harmony, benefiting from each other in many ways. Whereas, building blocks of the anti types of these will result in a place where war and havoc will always rule over their lives. The decision is ours; the path, we will create ahead, and leave behind us.
Many people believe that truth is merely a matter of personal definition or personal experience, and that it is our consciousness, or awareness, that creates the definition of truth, which they say would not exist at all if no consciousness was aware of it.
I cannot accept that opinion. Reality is what it is, regardless of our interaction with it. The universe would exist with or without our recognition of it. The human brain seems to be conditioned to think in certain ways contrary to our reality. Why?
I once observed a Catholic monk walking down the street in his robe and sandals. It came to mind that we were both sharing this reality, and that nothing that either of us could do would alter the existence of this world or universe. We are merely a part of it all. The one thing which makes his reality and mine very different from each other is how we interact with our own individual environments. The choices he has made will make his reality very different from mine, but here we are talking about realities based upon personal experience, which is quite different from the reality of what has already been designed in which for us to have our experiences. We are devising our own environments within an already designed universal reality.
My understanding of religion is that it is always a matter of someone else's opinion being spoken to you. It is taught to you by another. The real problem today is that many of the traditional religions are centuries old and the original teacher's words are now being translated, interpreted and misinterpreted by many others. In this way original teachings are being seriously diluted and superimposed with many overlying opinions. We are always left to our own conclusions of what we hear, what we are logically able to gather for information, and ultimately, what we freely choose to believe. So, even though sacred texts might be socially helpful in some cases, it is usually the commentaries that gain the faithful followings, and we are left to decide for ourselves what truths may or may not be found within them.
Choice! The option to decide.
This seems to be the key. Some are born into religious traditions, and because their lives are so entangled in that cultural mesh, they feel there is no choice, and/or feel no reason to make any other choice. In other cases there seems to be no choice because of fears of persecution, or some sort of adverse repercussion on one's lifestyle.
Regardless, it is the choices that we make in this life, given the circumstances with which we are confronted, that ultimately create who and what we become. Everyone has their choices to make, even if it becomes a matter of life and death to choose.
From the second of conception into this life each and every one of us is walking the road to a certain death. This truth is without choice. How long that walk will take is determined by many factors along the way, but while we remain living, we always have the choice to continue along a certain course, or not. It is how we determine that road ahead, and who and what we will be as we forge forward, that creates our future. It is this truth that sets us apart from the rest of life on this planet. And it is this truth which causes many of us to adopt the idea that we are somehow gifted, or specially endowed, making us somehow better than other life forms.
It may be true that our higher intelligence sets us apart from the life forms we know of on this planet, but superiority depends entirely on the application of that higher intellectual ability. How can man say that he is better than animals when the result of his intellectual interaction with his environment is literally destroying his planet and constantly risking his own annihilation?
Creation can be a glorious spectacle and can provide us with countless wonders and pleasure. There is much to appreciate and enjoy. A lifetime can be spent wandering the globe in search of knowledge and partaking of the glory of creation. But there is also a dangerous nature to creation which afflicts many of our brethren with great grief and torment. Compared to the very few who manage to go through life's struggles unscathed, there are many times more who have had to suffer great pain and toil just to provide the basic necessities of life for themselves and their loved ones.
So, should creation be regarded as something glorious of which to to partake and behold, without concern for the plight of the rest of your fellowman, for as long as you are able to do so without having to face the downside of creation yourself?
Or should creation be looked at as the typical struggle for survival that most of our fellow humans experience, and should we concern ourselves with assisting those who may require help?
I think we all know the right response to these two choices. But unfortunately far too many are only concerned with themselves, and the here and now. In my judgment creation is belittled by the lack of human compassion, which ironically, reflects what seems to be the character of 'The Source' toward us. Now that is something to think further on! Is the inconsiderate norm of the human path simply the reflection of its design? Or is our true design actually to be able to rise above and beyond that reflection and evolve into something else?
Maybe we have been left alone to see what we can become on our own, using these qualities that have been so intricately woven into our makeup, which we can choose to either express or deny. Maybe that is 'The Source's' challenge to us, and we are caught up in the midst of it, without being aware of it at all. Who knows?
In the end though, as vast and spectacular as creation is, it becomes either, a creation consisting of insensitive human physicality, or a creation in which primal humans have advanced to become more than their physical make-up; to become spiritually enhanced beings of love and wisdom. In the end, creation will be what we cause it to become, so in a sense, we are the creators ourselves. We can either strive to become more than we are, or we can settle with what we have. It only takes a glance at the war, religious persecution and inhumanity toward our brethren, to know what that choice should be.
The wisdom here is not in knowing what we should become, it is rather in devising a means of going against the grain to reach that goal. It is easy to settle onto the trodden path and follow the rest of the herd, even to the edge of the canyon's precipice and over the edge. It is much more difficult to climb the higher road that few will follow with you.
For me, solving creation is not about finding the origin to the mystery, it is about becoming something different from the rest, and being a part of that Great Mystery. It is about devising an improved creation. It's looking to the future of creation, and not to its past. What will creation become when it is enhanced by an improved me?
The future of creation can be a place of regret and lack of compassion, or a place of honor and respect for humanity. For my part, I want to bring honor and fellowship to the future. When I look back on my small part of creation I want to be able to say that I did what I believed to be the right and logical thing to do; not to whine about what I should have done instead.
Creation is now a place with me in it. The future creation will be a better place, because it will have an improved me in it.
So regardless of what we learn might be true, if we are truly on a path to truth and intelligence, then it is at 'The Source' that our paths should end. The question is, on that journey, does how we walk that path really matter when there seems to be no moral authority in this world. If all of the world's religion is merely traditional wishful thinking, than its directives are not authoritative. And if the governments are mostly corrupt, than their laws are useless as guidance. So if we are left to find our own path to 'The Source', and there seems to be no laws or authority to lead us, than does this mean we are free to disregard authority from other places?
It is this walk through the fog of mystery that is the true test of a man.
There is a house about three blocks from mine where the owners leave a small child's motorized jeep out in the yard everynight. My three year old son would love to have it. I would love for him to have it myself. I cannot afford to buy one, but I could easily have that one. What is to stop me from going there late one night and throwing it in the back of the car?
Well, there it is! This one dilemma can be asked with so many references to life's various situations. Religion easily addresses the dilemma by claiming the laws of their god as authoritative. But it is not so easily answered if you cannot assign a supreme directive. If I do not adhere to any authority, than why can't I have that little car for my son? I could force them to at least share it with me.
If man learns anything in this life at all it should be that the path he walks is the path he places 'before' him, and the one he leaves 'behind' him. This path can only be made as he places one foot ahead of the other and moves forward, and he can only do so by 'choosing' which direction he will take. Without direction from another source of authority he is forced to make these decisions himself, using only what knowledge and wisdom he has attained in life. Where this path leads to will be the 'person' that he will become. At the end of that path will be the 'person' that he created. This is why religion has been so unanimously accepted around the world. It offers man freedom from this fog of choice and sets a path before him that he can follow without having to choose for himself. Religion is a pre-cut path through the thickness of the jungle. But what happens to a man's personal experience when he begins to walk the path of another?
When I declare that I am a thought of the creator, moving forward, and evolving myself as I move, I acknowledge the fact that I am creating who and what I am, by the empowerment of the original thought of this mystery that we call the 'The Source'. Without the original I could not exist to become anything, and by the deliberate empowering design of the original I now freely design what I will become at the end of this path which I am traveling. So the reason why I would not steal that child's bike has nothing to do with the moral laws of some archaic religion, or even the laws of society. The reason I would not steal it away is simply because I want to become the type of 'person' who deals with others in a way that I would want them to deal with me.
An ancient wise counsel once said that we should do unto others as we would have done to ourselves. I suppose that counsel is agreeable, as long as the person following it is not a sadist. To steal from others, or to do any harm to others, would make me a thief and an abuser, and that is not what I want to create. We also have to consider here that if we make abusers of ourselves, we are also making the same of mankind as a whole, because if everyone follows the same path, we end up with a race of beings that have no regard for each other, and have absolutely no ability to live with each other. Always at war, they would soon exterminate their entire species. Is that something we should strive to create for our future? If not, than we have the responsibility to make sure that we do nothing to create that in ourselves.
So, as we walk that foggy path to the source of knowledge, the origin, we are faced with choices that result in who, and what, we will become based on the decisions we make around those choices. And there are qualities of character and personality that consist of moral and immoral aspects that cannot be designated by the laws of man's philosophies and beliefs. These are qualities that are more akin to the laws of natural physics and dynamics than they are to righteousness, which is more of a religious nature. It is simply a matter of what a man wants to add to his character and identity as he walks this path. It is what he collects as supplies, with which to build his character, that will create the building he becomes. So to collect qualities like courage, compassion, sensitivity, loyalty, and integrity will provide supplies for a character that is the opposite of one built by using deceit, insensitivity, hate and moral corruption. The supplies we choose along the way depend entirely on what we deliberately pick up and add to our warehouse.
In my warehouse there will be nothing that does not add to the morality and integrity of my character simply because I firmly believe that this is the goal for the entire human race, and the only way that we will ever live in harmony with each other, which is what I also believe is the ultimate goal for us as humans. Love and harmony should not be cast aside as weaknesses of wishful thinking pacifists only. These should be seen as building blocks that will construct the type of buildings suitable for a place where many like it will commune together in harmony, benefiting from each other in many ways. Whereas, building blocks of the anti types of these will result in a place where war and havoc will always rule over their lives. The decision is ours; the path, we will create ahead, and leave behind us.
Many people believe that truth is merely a matter of personal definition or personal experience, and that it is our consciousness, or awareness, that creates the definition of truth, which they say would not exist at all if no consciousness was aware of it.
I cannot accept that opinion. Reality is what it is, regardless of our interaction with it. The universe would exist with or without our recognition of it. The human brain seems to be conditioned to think in certain ways contrary to our reality. Why?
I once observed a Catholic monk walking down the street in his robe and sandals. It came to mind that we were both sharing this reality, and that nothing that either of us could do would alter the existence of this world or universe. We are merely a part of it all. The one thing which makes his reality and mine very different from each other is how we interact with our own individual environments. The choices he has made will make his reality very different from mine, but here we are talking about realities based upon personal experience, which is quite different from the reality of what has already been designed in which for us to have our experiences. We are devising our own environments within an already designed universal reality.
My understanding of religion is that it is always a matter of someone else's opinion being spoken to you. It is taught to you by another. The real problem today is that many of the traditional religions are centuries old and the original teacher's words are now being translated, interpreted and misinterpreted by many others. In this way original teachings are being seriously diluted and superimposed with many overlying opinions. We are always left to our own conclusions of what we hear, what we are logically able to gather for information, and ultimately, what we freely choose to believe. So, even though sacred texts might be socially helpful in some cases, it is usually the commentaries that gain the faithful followings, and we are left to decide for ourselves what truths may or may not be found within them.
Choice! The option to decide.
This seems to be the key. Some are born into religious traditions, and because their lives are so entangled in that cultural mesh, they feel there is no choice, and/or feel no reason to make any other choice. In other cases there seems to be no choice because of fears of persecution, or some sort of adverse repercussion on one's lifestyle.
Regardless, it is the choices that we make in this life, given the circumstances with which we are confronted, that ultimately create who and what we become. Everyone has their choices to make, even if it becomes a matter of life and death to choose.
From the second of conception into this life each and every one of us is walking the road to a certain death. This truth is without choice. How long that walk will take is determined by many factors along the way, but while we remain living, we always have the choice to continue along a certain course, or not. It is how we determine that road ahead, and who and what we will be as we forge forward, that creates our future. It is this truth that sets us apart from the rest of life on this planet. And it is this truth which causes many of us to adopt the idea that we are somehow gifted, or specially endowed, making us somehow better than other life forms.
It may be true that our higher intelligence sets us apart from the life forms we know of on this planet, but superiority depends entirely on the application of that higher intellectual ability. How can man say that he is better than animals when the result of his intellectual interaction with his environment is literally destroying his planet and constantly risking his own annihilation?