My spiritual principle

[DecisionTime]

I want to hear some opinions. Here goes.


"I believe that the path to ending struggle is through mindful and intentional pursuit of alignment with reality through understanding and acceptance thereof where reality is defined as the intersection of all that is uniquely true about me and externally true of the world."

Edit: I could substitute "universe" for "world" but hey, it's a work in progress and right now I need to keep things simple.

[OAAN]

That was a, for me, long and complex sentence. Did you mean; accepting everything for it's true nature and aligning yourself to it will end struggle?

If I understood you correctly, I'd say that it's a part of it. But then again I think choosing to incarnate in the 3rd dimension means choosing struggle. Maybe it's only to learn how to reach beyond it. But I doubt this level of existence was meant to be free of struggle.

Maybe it's not about ending what we interpret as struggles. It's just seeing those things as other than struggles.

[ButterflyWoman]

I'd be careful with the "believe" part. Beliefs are pretty serious stuff, and they tend to form the foundation of our experience of reality. Choose them carefully, or choose to adopt a "best current working theory" position rather than a strong "belief".

[ChrisGinsburg]

Originally Posted by DecisionTime

I want to hear some opinions. Here goes.


"I believe that the path to ending struggle is through mindful and intentional pursuit of alignment with reality through understanding and acceptance thereof where reality is defined as the intersection of all that is uniquely true about me and externally true of the world."

Edit: I could substitute "universe" for "world" but hey, it's a work in progress and right now I need to keep things simple.

All I can picture while reading that beast of a sentence is a mind tying itself into knots.

[inri]

Originally Posted by CaterpillarWoman

I'd be careful with the "believe" part. Beliefs are pretty serious stuff, and they tend to form the foundation of our experience of reality. Choose them carefully, or choose to adopt a "best current working theory" position rather than a strong "belief".

Very well said...as usual.

[SethWilliams]

Originally Posted by CaterpillarWoman

I'd be careful with the "believe" part. Beliefs are pretty serious stuff, and they tend to form the foundation of our experience of reality. Choose them carefully, or choose to adopt a "best current working theory" position rather than a strong "belief".

Ain't that the truth CaterpillarWoman.

[DecisionTime]

Originally Posted by ChrisGinsburg

All I can picture while reading that beast of a sentence is a mind tying itself into knots.

Agreed, it's a little beastly but I was just trying to make it fit into one sentence. I'll try again with more and simpler words. And sorry, but I'm sticking with "I believe" for now because I'm not sure how to get where I want to go (and possibly even what where I want to go even is). When I say, "I believe," I mean "I think" but "believe" sounds better to me. Here goes again.

"I believe that my perception of struggle will end when I fully align myself with reality. I define reality in two parts. One is the nature of the universe and the other is the set of desires, characteristics, etc. that make me who I am. I will attempt to align myself with reality by aiming to understand it and then accept it. I believe that each phase of understanding, acceptance, and alignment will incrementally ease that struggle."

It's funny that you mention knots, because I've been looking at this like trying to untie a big knot. I've discovered a lot about myself but I think that I'm at a critical point. I am now aware of a lot that I believed, but wasn't aware that I believed, but I still feel like I don't know much about who I really am or what I stand for outside of those beliefs. Only time will tell.

[ChrisGinsburg]

Originally Posted by DecisionTime

Agreed, it's a little beastly but I was just trying to make it fit into one sentence. I'll try again with more and simpler words. And sorry, but I'm sticking with "I believe" for now because I'm not sure how to get where I want to go (and possibly even what where I want to go even is). When I say, "I believe," I mean "I think" but "believe" sounds better to me. Here goes again.

"I believe that my perception of struggle will end when I fully align myself with reality. I define reality in two parts. One is the nature of the universe and the other is the set of desires, characteristics, etc. that make me who I am. I will attempt to align myself with reality by aiming to understand it and then accept it. I believe that each phase of understanding, acceptance, and alignment will incrementally ease that struggle."

It's funny that you mention knots, because I've been looking at this like trying to untie a big knot. I've discovered a lot about myself but I think that I'm at a critical point. I am now aware of a lot that I believed, but wasn't aware that I believed, but I still feel like I don't know much about who I really am or what I stand for outside of those beliefs. Only time will tell.

How can you ever not be 'aligned' with reality? Is it not believing that you need to do something to align with it which is precisely making you feel out of alignment?

[DecisionTime]

Originally Posted by ChrisGinsburg

How can you ever not be 'aligned' with reality? Is it not believing that you need to do something to align with it which is precisely making you feel out of alignment?

When I talk about alignment with reality, I'm basically referring to my thoughts and the realities of the world. An example of nonacceptance of reality might be rationalizing an emotion to try to avoid it instead of embracing it and an example of misalignment might be doing a job that you hate to try to make a lot of money. Starting to embrace my negative emotions has had a hugely positive effect on my life already and, when added with self-inquiry in order to determine from those emotions what it is that I really want, they are starting to disappear.

A life that is more aligned than the one I am living now is one in which I am able to be who I want to be without fear and do things that I am passionate about. Right now, I think I am at the stage of emptying my cup, so to speak, and have not yet begun to refill it. I just hope I haven't read too much about the path to actually create my own.

[ChrisGinsburg]

Originally Posted by DecisionTime

When I talk about alignment with reality, I'm basically referring to my thoughts and the realities of the world. An example of nonacceptance of reality might be rationalizing an emotion to try to avoid it instead of embracing it and an example of misalignment might be doing a job that you hate to try to make a lot of money. Starting to embrace my negative emotions has had a hugely positive effect on my life already and, when added with self-inquiry in order to determine from those emotions what it is that I really want, they are starting to disappear.

A life that is more aligned than the one I am living now is one in which I am able to be who I want to be without fear and do things that I am passionate about. Right now, I think I am at the stage of emptying my cup, so to speak, and have not yet begun to refill it. I just hope I haven't read too much about the path to actually create my own.

I see. Would it be safe to say you are seeing the benefits of lowering your resistance to that which you previously thought needed to be avoided?

[DecisionTime]

Originally Posted by ChrisGinsburg

I see. Would it be safe to say you are seeing the benefits of lowering your resistance to that which you previously thought needed to be avoided?

I think that I am. Of course it's very easy to stop rationalizing in one direction and start in another, but I feel that I have largely eliminated my social anxieties which I think was my biggest issue at the beginning.

I'm not sure if you buy into the Hawkins levels of consciousness, but I do, at least those below Courage. Right now, all of the bottom levels seem to be merging and it's almost like I'm feeling all of them at once but in a small dose, both individually and in total. After I started trying to apply this theory, I had several drops from Pride to the Shame. Every time the drop was in an instant and resulted from a seemingly insignificant failure and each successive time it hurt less and I recovered more quickly. I think that the perception of feeling them simultaneously might simply be caused by the drop and recovery cycle getting faster.

I think Hawkins hinted at this in one book, but my theory is that pride can be transcended when the mind associates it with shame. I'm hoping that that's what is happening with this fusion state that I seem to be experiencing but, again, I don't know. I'd just like to be free of self-imposed mental restrictions without becoming insane.