Question for Steve

[impaul99]

Hey Steve, I've got a question for you. I was doing a lot of meditation today and went through some purpose finding exercises today as I like to do at least once a year.

The strange thing is that while in previous years, my goals and purpose revolved around all kinds of things in all different areas of my life, when I went to go through the exercises today I found that all my answers all revolved around spirituality.

In essence, I was really looking for ultimate purpose, not just purpose I guess you could say. This led me to ask myself questions regarding what purpose really is and I found myself thinking that the only true ultimate purpose has to revolve around the spiritual realm (the true self) since the ego and even the body are just temporary.

In essence, I guess you could roughly summarize that the only purpose I could identify worthy of pursueing is the spiritual purpose of ascending myself and helping others to ascend up the scale of consciousness. If the spirit exists, which I believe it does, that is really the only thing that would persist.

So, effectively, every endevour in life seems like it has to be measured against that.

For example, this presents an interesting case for something like becoming vegetarian. Previously I would look at something like the possibility of becoming vegetarian from the point of view of nutritional common sense, but I didn't really look at or consider becoming a vegetarian because animals are killed. However, if my ultimate purpose is to ascend throught he levels of consciousness, I would have to look at stopping eating the flesh of dead animals at some point.

Another example is in regards to physical exercise. Instead of working out for the purpose of building strength or looking good with my shirt off, I would now look at exercising as a way of training the body/spirit connection. Meaning, even if it's just a little bit of pain, working out IS painful, compared to lets say sitting on the couch watching TV. However, by working out, it allows my spirit to train my body to go past pain and essentially grab control over the body so that my spirit is running the show here on earth, not my body. Incidentally, when spirit is running the show, the body will be treated with the greatest respect anyways. However, if the body is allowed to pursue "bodily pleasures" it leads to the self destruction of the body due to excesses, addictions and such.

Essentially, you could really look at EVERYTHING you do every day and begin to immediately only do things for the purpose of living in spirit of your true self only.

Simplified even further, the purpose of life becomes to live life in such a way so that your spirit learns and ascends up the scales of consciousness as much as possible, while at the same time helping others do the same as well, INSTEAD OF the purpose of life being to "be happy".

I'm not saying "be miserable", or "suffer" but rather to be true to your spirit even if it means discomfort, pain, or whatever.

Is this partly what you meant by polarization? To choose to live this way of having the best spiritual life, versus living your life for the attainment of the most "happiness" this world currently has to offer?

[Mr.Mustache]

Originally Posted by impaul99

Simplified even further, the purpose of life becomes to live life in such a way so that your spirit learns and ascends up the scales of consciousness as much as possible, while at the same time helping others do the same as well, INSTEAD OF the purpose of life being to "be happy".

I wanted respond to this to above quote...

Lately I've been thinking about context and meaning as well. Contemplating this, I began thinking about the existence or non-existence of god and how that would relate to my decision making. I had a revelation of sorts...god (assuming he exists) does not add any source of meaning to life, at least to me.

Any state of pervasive euphoria, pleasure, love, beauty, unity, peace transcendence, "nowness" etc. makes concern for a higher power or purpose melt away. In those states I feel temporarily complete. I've realized that meaning isn't external, it is internal. This all seems obvious in retrospect but social conditioning is sometimes a difficult thing to unravel.

The point is, is that I've come to the opposite conclusion. That the meaning of life is, basically, to be happy.

So, from that perspective why don't I just start eating junk food, doing drugs or constantly seek sexual gratification. Simple, because these things don't make you happy, only temporarily, in the long run you'll feel sick, burnt out or bored.

I think your conclusion about ascending yourself is a good one if it makes you happy. The decision to be self-actualized or to fulfill your potential is considered a need according to some theories of motivation in psychology. So, its probably something you need to do to be content anyway.

[impaul99]

Is your purpose not limited to your present lifespan then?

Meaning, if happiness is your "persuit", does it not end at the end of your body's life and everything worked for in this lifetime becomes meaningless at death?

Or do you mean "happiness" in terms of what makes your spirit feel good, your True Self feel fulfilled? IF so, then that's the same thing I'm talking about.

For example, lets say that you decide to work out every day doing 2-3 hours of intense training, but it has no real practical use in the physical world. Meaning, you're not doing it to train for the olympics or some UFC fight or anything like that. You are simply doing it because it makes your spirit feel fulfilled. It doesn't make you feel "pleasure" but it is fulfilling. Kind of hard to explain because the concept of "being happy" is subjective.

Happy. Fulfilled. On purpose. Inspired. These are all subjective terms, seemingly the same thing, yet totally different.

The state of being I equte with "happiness" is like laughter and joy and pleasure. THe state of being I equate with "fulfilled" or "living in spirit" is a state of transcending those and just being "stillness" (as Eckhart Tolle would say).

From my perspective "Stillness" can be achieved no matter where you are. Even if you're in prison. Whereas, "happiness" requires some sort of external circumstances.

[BladeRunner]

Originally Posted by impaul99

Hey Steve, I've got a question for you. I was doing a lot of meditation today and went through some purpose finding exercises today as I like to do at least once a year.

The strange thing is that while in previous years, my goals and purpose revolved around all kinds of things in all different areas of my life, when I went to go through the exercises today I found that all my answers all revolved around spirituality.

In essence, I was really looking for ultimate purpose, not just purpose I guess you could say. This led me to ask myself questions regarding what purpose really is and I found myself thinking that the only true ultimate purpose has to revolve around the spiritual realm (the true self) since the ego and even the body are just temporary.

In essence, I guess you could roughly summarize that the only purpose I could identify worthy of pursueing is the spiritual purpose of ascending myself and helping others to ascend up the scale of consciousness. If the spirit exists, which I believe it does, that is really the only thing that would persist.

So, effectively, every endevour in life seems like it has to be measured against that.

For example, this presents an interesting case for something like becoming vegetarian. Previously I would look at something like the possibility of becoming vegetarian from the point of view of nutritional common sense, but I didn't really look at or consider becoming a vegetarian because animals are killed. However, if my ultimate purpose is to ascend throught he levels of consciousness, I would have to look at stopping eating the flesh of dead animals at some point.

Another example is in regards to physical exercise. Instead of working out for the purpose of building strength or looking good with my shirt off, I would now look at exercising as a way of training the body/spirit connection. Meaning, even if it's just a little bit of pain, working out IS painful, compared to lets say sitting on the couch watching TV. However, by working out, it allows my spirit to train my body to go past pain and essentially grab control over the body so that my spirit is running the show here on earth, not my body. Incidentally, when spirit is running the show, the body will be treated with the greatest respect anyways. However, if the body is allowed to pursue "bodily pleasures" it leads to the self destruction of the body due to excesses, addictions and such.

Essentially, you could really look at EVERYTHING you do every day and begin to immediately only do things for the purpose of living in spirit of your true self only.

Simplified even further, the purpose of life becomes to live life in such a way so that your spirit learns and ascends up the scales of consciousness as much as possible, while at the same time helping others do the same as well, INSTEAD OF the purpose of life being to "be happy".

I'm not saying "be miserable", or "suffer" but rather to be true to your spirit even if it means discomfort, pain, or whatever.

Is this partly what you meant by polarization? To choose to live this way of having the best spiritual life, versus living your life for the attainment of the most "happiness" this world currently has to offer?

I think most of living well is grounded in fear of dying.

Why be a vegie or in top physical condition? To honor something? To not make the spirit angry or unwell?

Scales of consciousness aren't accessible by the worthy of physical being. That is fear again. I don't even believe there are scales, more spiel to deny simplicity of truth.

When becoming one with spirituality puts you on a fasting for 10 years wrapped in a sheet on top of a mountain that's not honoring the spirit or aligning with consciousness, that's fear that doing otherwise will harm your consciousness.

Making the choice to be here and then denying the bounty of creation is denying consciousness made the choice in the first place.

Fear again

This is just my OP, I like beer and dead animals more than ascending somewhere. I'd hardly create things to enjoy and then deny myself the chance to enjoy them.........doesn't make a lot of sense.

Dex

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by BladeRunner

I'd hardly create things to enjoy and then deny myself the chance to enjoy them.........doesn't make a lot of sense.

From what I hear the high from injecting heroin into your bloodstream is very enjoyable. Are you saying that just because something like heroin exists, it should automatically mean we should use it because it doesn't make sense that something like that would be created if it wasn't to be used?

[BladeRunner]

Originally Posted by impaul99

Are you saying that just because something like heroin exists, it should automatically mean we should use it because it doesn't make sense that something like that would be created if it wasn't to be used?

Do you stand still all day long and stare at the sun?

Now do you understand?

Dex

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by BladeRunner

Do you stand still all day long and stare at the sun?

Now do you understand?

Dex

Firstly, I like how you communicate. It's blunt and gets the point across.

Secondly, I think you misunderstand what I mean by "spiritual life". The pinnacle is not becoming a monk sitting on a hilltop, meditating and eating berries all day. One can just as easily ascend the scales of consciousness while working as a mechanic.

With your way of thinking, do you propose that as long as something is legal and socially acceptable, it's all fair game? Don't worry about any form of spiritual purpose, just do whatever you can to have as much fun in this life as possible even if it hurts other people or animals or anything/anyone else, as long as it's not illegal, it's fair game?

[qed]

Originally Posted by impaul99

One can just as easily ascend the scales of consciousness while working as a mechanic.

Chuckles

Can you learn anything new while your attention is directed towards something else? Maybe intellectually, but not "consciously"!

The alignment of the undivided attention is very important for developing and enhancing skills, both new and old.

[Mags]

Originally Posted by impaul99

Essentially, you could really look at EVERYTHING you do every day and begin to immediately only do things for the purpose of living in spirit of your true self only.

Paul, have you read "Conversations with God"? I ask because what you said reminded me of the book's message to decide who you want to be and then to live that every day. So, decisions, choices and actions stop being "right" and "wrong", but instead become more or less effective at expressing your true self.

It feels like you've made a significant shift in your own journey, and I'm sure it will benefit others that you teach in these forums and in your blog.

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by Mags

Paul, have you read "Conversations with God"? I ask because what you said reminded me of the book's message to decide who you want to be and then to live that every day. So, decisions, choices and actions stop being "right" and "wrong", but instead become more or less effective at expressing your true self.

It feels like you've made a significant shift in your own journey, and I'm sure it will benefit others that you teach in these forums and in your blog.

No, I don't think I have read that book yet. It's so weird, because my spiritual "shifts" always lead back to one source which kind of explains everything to me - A Course in Miracles. Well, "The Disappearance of the Universe" and "Your Immortal Reality" as well as ACIM.

You are correct. Things being "right" and "wrong" disappear, and just either living in spirit or not takes precedence. The more I study this path the more I realize that this reality is just here to be played with and forgiven.

[Mr.Mustache]

Originally Posted by impaul99

Is your purpose not limited to your present lifespan then?

Meaning, if happiness is your "persuit", does it not end at the end of your body's life and everything worked for in this lifetime becomes meaningless at death?

Or do you mean "happiness" in terms of what makes your spirit feel good, your True Self feel fulfilled? IF so, then that's the same thing I'm talking about.

For example, lets say that you decide to work out every day doing 2-3 hours of intense training, but it has no real practical use in the physical world. Meaning, you're not doing it to train for the olympics or some UFC fight or anything like that. You are simply doing it because it makes your spirit feel fulfilled. It doesn't make you feel "pleasure" but it is fulfilling.

I don't feel that there need be a dichotomy between pleasure and fulfillment. I mean its not mutually exclusive. Its simply a matter of where you want to focus. If you're focused on the ego the joy that you can experience is limited and vulnerable and can only bring you a certain amount of pleasure. When your focus is beyond the ego, it is both pleasurable and fulfilling; those two go hand in hand.

Abraham Maslow noted that fulfilled (or self-actualized) people often have transcendent experiences that are very uplifting. Satisfying need of fulfillment and having lasting joy basically require a focus beyond the ego. I know this out of my own experience as well, I don't feel is just abstract philosophizing.

So, yeah its a matter of focus in my opinion not happiness vs. stillness so to speak. Just clearing that up. We are in agreeance.