Re: Ordinary loneliness -- The PM Refugees' Forum

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, [2], 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 20:50:47 08/24/08 Sun
Author: iteo
Subject: Re: Ordinary loneliness
In reply to: Roger 's message, "Ordinary loneliness" on 23:47:39 08/17/08 Sun

I realize that my posts usually fall on deaf ears - probably because they are long winded, but Roger, your heartfelt post makes me want to reply in kind.

Here's my two cents for what it is worth. I have been contemplating this idea for the past few weeks and I think it might even be of use to you.

To begin, I have to say that I am certain that everything we do is a spiritual event - our entire existence is a spiritual experience - and God (or consciousness) is central to everything. Every little thing that happens to you should be regarded as a spiritual event, including this event.

Everything that happens to us is God's way of helping of progress spiritually - to return to God. Every annoyance we have to put up with, every jerk that cuts us off on the road, etc etc, is God - and it's God trying to help us relinquish control to a higher power - to abandon the ego. Point in fact - your wife's actions was God.

Now I want to mention that I don't see God as separate from ourselves - in fact I tend to see God as our "higher self" - i.e. we are God, but our little ego thinks we're separate from God and this little self (ego) believes that it knows what's best for us. I believe in some ways our lower self is similar, or maybe exactly like, "satan", i.e. created by God, but regards himself as separate and better - or rather, in charge of his own destiny.

In Isaiah 45:7 it is written:

�I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.�

Think about that one - God creates evil. This means that God is responsible for the bad things that happen to you - but what we regard as bad is part of our belief in the opposites of good and evil, which "satan" (aka: ego) taught us:

�You will not surely die,� the serpent said to the woman. �For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.� �Gen 3:4-5

You and I became "like" God when we acknowledged evil. According to Buddhist and Hindu masters, there is no such thing as good and bad, right and wrong.

From the Hsin Hsin Ming, by Seng T�san, the third Zen patriarch of China [d.606 AD]

�The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised. Make the smallest distinction however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart. If you wish to see the truth then hold no opinions for or against anything. To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind.�

�If you are attached to your thinking, then everything has name and form. This is the world of opposites.

�Zen Master Seung Sahn

��the true Renouncer, firm and fixed,
Who�seeking nought, rejecting nought�dwells proof
Against the �opposites�.

�Bhagavadgita

So when things don't go our way, we may curse the situation - which IMHO is another way of cursing God - which many do when things go south.

So rather than feel sorry for yourself, maybe look at exactly why you're upset. Namely, your ego feels unappreciated. Your ego wants validation - and your ego is, in a way, satan - and satan wants to be acknowledged. You, in this world of opposites, both good and evil - or put another way: both God and Satan.

Some quotes to ponder:

�There are only two ways to conquer destiny or be independent of it. One is to enquire for whom is this destiny and discover that only the ego is bound by destiny and not the Self and that the ego is non-existent.

�The other way is to kill the ego by completely surrendering to the Lord, by realizing one�s helplessness and saying all the time, �Not I, but Thou, oh Lord� and giving up all sense of �I� and �mine�, and leaving it to the Lord to do what he likes with you. Complete effacement of the ego is necessary to conquer destiny, whether you achieve this effacement through Self-enquiry or bhakti marga (path).�

��Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi

�If a student is too serious, the benevolent deities will make perfectly adequate teachers, but if the student is too frivolous, only the wrathful deities will be able to do the job.�

�Ch�gyam Trungpa Rinpoche

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

Re: Ordinary loneliness -- Roger, 23:02:02 08/24/08 Sun
- Re: Ordinary loneliness -- michael, 01:26:23 08/26/08 Tue