Quote:
Originally Posted by backpocket  The thought usually goes something like this: "Who am I to sit in a room, enjoy myself..., |
If you could do just this much (and I mean actually do it) you would be doing far more for the good of humanity than any "feed-the-children" organization has ever accomplished.
In one way, you could
literally reduce all of the world's problems down to a single cause, which is the fact that virtually no man (or woman) on earth has discovered how to sit alone in a room, with nothing to do, and be perfectly content with their own company.
Thoreau once wrote, "For every one person striking at the root of evil, there are a thousand striking at the branches." The only thing save-the-________ organizations can do is strike away at the branches of the problem. Feed a million starving children this year and there will be a million to feed next year. And that's because the problem (whatever it is) originates within the individual.... you and me. Until someone begins working there, at the root, the cycle of oppression-and-relief will live on unceasingly, just like the seasons.
The truth is that there are deplorable conditions (and actions) on this planet because you and I are the way we are, moment-to-moment. There is no other reason.
For example, take terrorism. Well, first I should be clear: By "terrorism" I mean real terrorism... not the kind that governments stage to keep their citizens in fear. I mean the real deal. The actual hatred of another group of people.
Surely that is a very isolated circumstance... caused by misguided fanatical beliefs in some radical religion or culture. But am I truly innocent in the matter? Do I play no role?
At one point in my life I would have said, "You better believe I'm innocent. I've never hated another group of people at any point in my life." But then as I started to look closer, I was surprised (shocked) to see something I wasn't expecting:
Terrorism was actually playing itself out in all sorts of ways in my individual life... where I was the terrorist. Here's one example:
Have you ever been cut off in traffic by someone who, for whatever reason, had absolutely no regard for you or your safety? If so, what rushes through you when that happens?
Hatred does, doesn't it? And when it surges inside of you (if the conditions are right) wouldn't you agree that that hatred has absolutely no regard for that other person. If it could have its way, it would see that the other person is crushed, or at least pained in some way. We've all done this one way or another.
Now, if we look really, really closely at that hatred and compare it to the terrorist who wants to inflict pain on another group of people, is there any difference at all in its
quality?
There isn't. It's exactly the same hatred. There may be differences in the physical outcome of what that hatred "decides to do",
but the hatred itself is exactly the same.
When that hatred is given control of my faculties, and, in this example, I do something to get back at the driver who cut me off, my action is quite literally the cultivation of all terrorism everywhere... because it is the cultivation of terrorism itself.
The terrorist cell that causes the deaths of thousands of people is simply the accumulated result of billions of people all over the world caving in to hatred within themselves day after day after day.
Anything that manifests in society is the result of the actions of all individuals compounded daily.
By now you're probably wondering, "Where the heck is he going with all this?"
If your path through life in one way or another helps you to transcend this hatred within yourself (hatred is just one example, it could be some other dark condition) then no matter how selfish it may seem to you or to others, it has done something truly good for the entire world.
Fortunately, in the end, it makes very little difference what you choose to do in the outer world because transcending our interior limitations (transforming our consciousness) is what really we're here to do.
And no matter what you choose to do, whether it's something you love or something you believe is your duty, you will be brought face-to-face with those limitations over and over again.
Hope that helps a little.