Wednesday, September 27, 2023

Reality - Beautiful and True

The truth is a difficult concept to define...
We live in an era where it's becoming more and more difficult to 
determine the facts and what's fake.”
Gary Schwartz
 
     Most, perhaps all of us, are born with a deep intuitive knowing of reality that is indescribably beautiful, inconceivably vast, and is therefore impossible to put into words
 
    But society conditions us to agree on a greatly-simplified model of reality that most of us can understand, describe, work with & manipulate - "consensus reality." Gradually, most of us forget reality and start to assume that our simplified working model (consensus reality ie our "common sense" understanding) is not just a dumbed-down model, but actually real
   The other major distorting influence on most of us is that of trauma. The combined affect of consensus reality & trauma is so potent, that as Anais Nin observed, we can't see things as they are. We only see things as we are - ie what's left behind after trauma & forgetting our true nature.  "... we live in the distortion ... " Thomas Hübl https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4Ktsi3KX2I
    The greater our distorting influences, the more vehemently we defend the accuracy of our perception AND the more rigidly we resist opening our mind-heart!

                 “What you resist not only persists, but will grow in size.” Carl Jung
 
    Learning about mystics, saints and the increasing numbers of people who are serious about Truth, intrigues us by resonating with that deepest intuition we still retain about reality. It can't be directly expressed in words, but only pointed towards poetically, by way of metaphors, stories, music, etc.

Half of any person
is confused and bewildered
and way off The Path.

Half!

The other half
is dancing
in some Invisible Joy.”
Rumi
 
    As to which half of our self we choose to inhabit has most to do with which of two, very different ways of being we trust more: fear - or - love. Me alone against the world - or - pulling together for our collective well-being. As long as we remain convinced that life & the world are basically hostile to ourselves & our loved ones, we remain fearful, tight, aggressive & alone. This sad, hurt, angry mood is common, especially in old age, when we finally realize that craving for material possessions will never satisfy our deepest hunger for realizing what's true - reality.
    Many of us would deeply benefit from BOTH psychotherapy AND a deep spiritual path. It's easier to wallow in simmering discontent, ending life in bitter cynicism - "ordinary unhappiness."
    BUT if we let go of craving, and open-up & lovingly nurture those around us, we are re-born to be who we've always been.
 

    Walking the path toward the complete ending of clinging & suffering is the noblest thing a person can do. It opens the fist of the mind, and allows a person to walk in the world with gift-bestowing hands.” Gil Fronsdal

 

 
by Mollycules www.BuddhaDoodles.com

 
 

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