It’s easy to become discouraged, and to fall into a deeply depressive state, if we continually dwell upon all the death and destruction that takes place on daily basis, all around us at all times. There are many, many horrible deeds being consciously committed by many people, and there are also many small acts of ignorance which we all commit just as frequently, which cause a big impact on ourselves and on our planet in the long run, such as our extreme use of plastic, as well as our contribution to consumer culture. There is simply no escaping it, is how we often feel. We feel like there’s no way to go against the system, and that, if there’s no way of easing the people’s pain, or at least our own, then does life really have a point, does it hold any meaning? Is there any value in enjoying life while millions of others, human and non-human alike, suffer at the same time? Can we ever be free of fear in the face of a possible disease or an early and unexpected death? Must we be always alert, paranoid about whether death is just around the corner, constantly worried sick about the well-being of those we love, imagining the worst of possibilities whenever they come home a bit late or something like that? I never felt like this in Canada, but I often feel like this now, here in Honduras, when Maria goes to work in the mornings, since I join her there later in the day. I wonder if she’s okay all the way, and so I make sure I have her call me every day when she gets to work. We got another cell phone in order to make this happen, before we just had the one for both. But is this healthy? Is it good to be afraid of the world and of its unexpected dangers? Of car crashes or robberies and killings? Nowadays, thousands of people go watch a movie or attend a concert and they end up getting blasted on and killed by some psychopathic maniac. But is this an excuse to live in fear? Crime is very high here in Honduras, but I still don’t think it’s an excuse. One must have faith, in God is what I believe, but if you’re unsure of God as a concept at least you can have faith in the inherent goodness of the world, if you think of it reasonably. There is duality, yes, but the Spirit which inhabits our bodies is made up of all the attributes of the greatest good, and it cannot be shaken by duality. We can only believe ourselves defeated by life’s tragedies, if we are drowning in ignorance, leading us to forget our truly divine nature which is above such petty pleasures and pains. We shouldn’t focus on worry, on anxiety, on panic or frustration. We should focus on cultivating an unbreakable inner calm, a peace which is true and which pervades our entire life. We need to make this our priority, and we must come to love life, along with all its inescapable and painful situations, to be at peace with the process of life, and with everything it includes, to be grateful to be here, to be now, in this moment, to be alive. Once we truly feel this way, we will understand that, even with all the pain, even with all the evil we human beings are capable of, even with all the terrible crimes we’ve committed in the past, there is something within all of us which is beyond evil, which can break its chains, which can free us from bondage to our lower nature, to our sensual desires, to our lust and our greed and selfish satisfaction. We are trapped to these things, the great majority of us, yet we don’t try to break free. We are comfortable in our prison cells, and most of us have even decorated over the bars, we have become used to our posters, the decorations we’ve placed over the iron bars, and we’ve come to forget them. We don’t know we are locked up in physical existence, we don’t know that there’s more to us outside of this. We laugh at those who suggest this, we doubt the human spirit, we are quick to doubt ourselves, to harshly judge ourselves and others. Although we might not judge ourselves in front of others in order to pretend as if we have it all together, to keep our image, our identity, the real Self can never be lied to, and since within ourselves we know that we are wrong in whatever aspect of our lives, we judge ourselves and we feel guilty and ashamed. We become insecure, we develop and extreme mistrust for others, we become anti-social. We begin to project our fear onto everything, and all of a sudden life has become a great deception, something barely worth living, something we must simply endure, since we cannot take our own lives. We question existence, and just maybe it might be all completely random, totally pointless and stupid. We fail to understand that things are much deeper than what we perceive, and that we all suffer in this life, mostly because we wish things were different, we argue with life, we don’t look at things properly, we make the wrong decisions, we act impulsively, we do things for our own satisfaction, we give in to destructive vices and sacrifice our long-term health, sanity, and dignity. We all want to do everything we feel like, without knowing the impact it will have on ourselves and those around us, not to mention everyone else living life, since we are all one. Then we complain about the consequences, we act as if actions had no reactions, as if there were no principle of Cause and Effect. But this is something which is known since ancient times, and today, during the internet era, when we have access to so much information from so many different sources, ancient as well as contemporary, the fact that most of us don’t research this kind of information and take the time to learn from it is really great proof of our profound state of ignorance, which is the same exact cause as that of every single problem or disease which I mentioned during this post, and which most of us can see around us, which cause so much suffering for so many. What we need to do is to remain conscious of our true nature, and to focus on becoming free from the chains of ignorance.
To be continued tomorrow, on Day 50.
~ Rebel Spirit
rebel eye 