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Many people wonder why some must spend so much time obsessed with the daily doings of others. It would seem that fear is once again the culprit. For fear of others drives us to become watchful of them -- monitoring their movements in case they might decide to attack us. Again this fear is counterproductive, driving us apart rather than together.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Fear
Perhaps the greatest enemy we face today is fear. For it is an "evolutionary holdover" -- a survival instinct which is dangerous in the modern world.
Fear is the emotion which protects a living thing from dangers and potential dangers. Fear gives us the "fight or flight" reaction: we either face what we fear and try to defeat it, or we run away.
Many are protected by this instinct in the wild. But in our modern "tame" world, fear becomes an explosive commodity.
Fear works by making anything unfamiliar to us seem to be a threat. Over time that fear grows into anger for this threat, and still later it becomes hatred and rage. Much of the bigotry and injustice in the world today is the result of overgrown fears.
Fear is the emotion which protects a living thing from dangers and potential dangers. Fear gives us the "fight or flight" reaction: we either face what we fear and try to defeat it, or we run away.
Many are protected by this instinct in the wild. But in our modern "tame" world, fear becomes an explosive commodity.
Fear works by making anything unfamiliar to us seem to be a threat. Over time that fear grows into anger for this threat, and still later it becomes hatred and rage. Much of the bigotry and injustice in the world today is the result of overgrown fears.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
In Part
God is known, in part, to all the religions of the world.
I say “in part” because our faiths have been formed by people who could only understand the world as they perceived it. Without a complete understanding of the diversity of our world it is impossible to fully understand our world. And likewise for understanding the Divine.
And so our world is full of people who lived in harsh climates who believed God to be an angry storm god. And in the prolific jungles, a mother-like spirit of fertility. In some places the divinity is understood as being many gods who influence the fate of the universe. And still others see no god-forms at all, but a unifying Whole to the universal whole.
I submit that our modern world of amazing communications makes it much easier to understand these many differing views of the Divine – and perhaps come up with a more complete view. For over a century we have been able to communicate with telephone and telegraph over incredible distances. And we have been able to travel by plane and boat to these places as well. More recently, we have been able to have images from distant lands on our televisions in our living rooms. And now we live in the information age. All one must do is touch the World Wide Web to hear the voice and thoughts of someone far away in the world. And we have access now to so many differing perspectives of the Divine.
And I believe it is now possible to gain a more complete understanding of “God” than our ancestors had. For religion is created by those who have lived before us. And they have only left us understandings of the world as they saw it.
Today, it’s like picking through a jigsaw puzzle of faith: trying to find out how all the pieces work together for a better understanding of the whole. I believe we can learn from our ancestors by understanding the many things that affected their world-view. If we can understand their climate and culture, and the peoples they interacted with, we can begin to unlock the mystery of why they believed the things they did.
And I believe that once we begin investigating, we won’t necessarily lose our belief in the Divine, but rather gain a stronger understanding. So many have believe that God is One, or God is Many; that God is formed, or that God is formless; that God is knowable, or that God is unknowable. And I believe that we can understand why they believed these things and maybe even understand how these things are not at all in conflict.
After many years of exploring these issues myself I came to the startling revelation one night that perhaps all these views are right after all. The solution I found was that God is the Living Universe: the sum total of all that exists. I came to understand that the universe is the largest living organism and that everything exists within it as a part of that much greater Body. God is One: the One of which we are all a part.
All the big things are made up of all the little things. Our bodies are made up of so many component cells. Our communities are made up of so many people. And our world is a diverse collection of many different living and non-living things. So too it is on the universal scale. For the universe is made of countless stars, worlds, and so much more. God is Many: the Many that we all are.
God is made of these many things: God is formed. And God is the Spirit which connects all these things together: God is formless. We can know this general view of God, but God is unknowable completely, for we are contained with it and therefore unable to see the whole picture.
The implications are enormous. Suddenly we are no longer the separate beings we appear to be: we are interrelated, interconnected, and interdependent. Many faiths use the phrase “The Web of Life” to describe this. Everything we do affects everything else everywhere. It’s like so many pebbles tossed in the Cosmic pond: the ripples may get smaller as they spread out, but eventually they reach every shore.
Another discovery is that we are all sacred people. If we are all a part of the body of God, then a tiny piece of that sacredness is in the heart of each one of us. There are no worthless or useless people. Indeed there are no truly evil people. Rather, there are misguided people, and those who fail to understand their potential and live up to it.
I say “in part” because our faiths have been formed by people who could only understand the world as they perceived it. Without a complete understanding of the diversity of our world it is impossible to fully understand our world. And likewise for understanding the Divine.
And so our world is full of people who lived in harsh climates who believed God to be an angry storm god. And in the prolific jungles, a mother-like spirit of fertility. In some places the divinity is understood as being many gods who influence the fate of the universe. And still others see no god-forms at all, but a unifying Whole to the universal whole.
I submit that our modern world of amazing communications makes it much easier to understand these many differing views of the Divine – and perhaps come up with a more complete view. For over a century we have been able to communicate with telephone and telegraph over incredible distances. And we have been able to travel by plane and boat to these places as well. More recently, we have been able to have images from distant lands on our televisions in our living rooms. And now we live in the information age. All one must do is touch the World Wide Web to hear the voice and thoughts of someone far away in the world. And we have access now to so many differing perspectives of the Divine.
And I believe it is now possible to gain a more complete understanding of “God” than our ancestors had. For religion is created by those who have lived before us. And they have only left us understandings of the world as they saw it.
Today, it’s like picking through a jigsaw puzzle of faith: trying to find out how all the pieces work together for a better understanding of the whole. I believe we can learn from our ancestors by understanding the many things that affected their world-view. If we can understand their climate and culture, and the peoples they interacted with, we can begin to unlock the mystery of why they believed the things they did.
And I believe that once we begin investigating, we won’t necessarily lose our belief in the Divine, but rather gain a stronger understanding. So many have believe that God is One, or God is Many; that God is formed, or that God is formless; that God is knowable, or that God is unknowable. And I believe that we can understand why they believed these things and maybe even understand how these things are not at all in conflict.
After many years of exploring these issues myself I came to the startling revelation one night that perhaps all these views are right after all. The solution I found was that God is the Living Universe: the sum total of all that exists. I came to understand that the universe is the largest living organism and that everything exists within it as a part of that much greater Body. God is One: the One of which we are all a part.
All the big things are made up of all the little things. Our bodies are made up of so many component cells. Our communities are made up of so many people. And our world is a diverse collection of many different living and non-living things. So too it is on the universal scale. For the universe is made of countless stars, worlds, and so much more. God is Many: the Many that we all are.
God is made of these many things: God is formed. And God is the Spirit which connects all these things together: God is formless. We can know this general view of God, but God is unknowable completely, for we are contained with it and therefore unable to see the whole picture.
The implications are enormous. Suddenly we are no longer the separate beings we appear to be: we are interrelated, interconnected, and interdependent. Many faiths use the phrase “The Web of Life” to describe this. Everything we do affects everything else everywhere. It’s like so many pebbles tossed in the Cosmic pond: the ripples may get smaller as they spread out, but eventually they reach every shore.
Another discovery is that we are all sacred people. If we are all a part of the body of God, then a tiny piece of that sacredness is in the heart of each one of us. There are no worthless or useless people. Indeed there are no truly evil people. Rather, there are misguided people, and those who fail to understand their potential and live up to it.
Friday, January 25, 2008
Inner And Outer Paths
We travel our spiritual paths in inward and outward focused directions. We must first find the sacred within ourselves before we bring it out of ourselves into the world. We work on ourselves first and the world later.
Two of our greatest tools for spiritual development are meditation and ritual:
Meditation (or prayer) is an inner process. We look within ourselves for answers. We learn, we grow. We find the holy within us. Meditation and prayer are ways of connecting on the personal level with the Sacred.
Ritual (or worship) is an outer process. We put our faith into action. We practice compassion. We celebrate the chorus of life. We may gather for a formal worship service or we may simply "practice what we preach".
And these processes should be balanced in our lives. We take as we give, we give as we take. We breathe in, we breathe out -- since the moment of birth, every breath in is mirrored by a breath out. Balance is important. Balance creates the harmony of the world.
Two of our greatest tools for spiritual development are meditation and ritual:
Meditation (or prayer) is an inner process. We look within ourselves for answers. We learn, we grow. We find the holy within us. Meditation and prayer are ways of connecting on the personal level with the Sacred.
Ritual (or worship) is an outer process. We put our faith into action. We practice compassion. We celebrate the chorus of life. We may gather for a formal worship service or we may simply "practice what we preach".
And these processes should be balanced in our lives. We take as we give, we give as we take. We breathe in, we breathe out -- since the moment of birth, every breath in is mirrored by a breath out. Balance is important. Balance creates the harmony of the world.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Balance
We live in a closed system, where nothing is created nor destroyed, but simply changed. Everything is in balance. Everything which is constructed must one day be destroyed. Every birth must be balanced with a death.
We must understand this balance and work with it. For every action there is a reaction. For every breath taken in one must be given back. And so we should strive for balance to work with the greater whole.
This seems to be a difficult concept for us. For we are, after all, animals; the product of centuries of evolution. And we contain within us some very selfish survival instincts. We want as much as we can get, for our genetic programming tells us that there will be times of need on down the road. Yet, in our modern world our basic needs are so easy to fill. Our own selfishness drives us to want more than we need: more than we can use. And as a result many starve and freeze, due to our greed.
We must understand this balance and work with it. For every action there is a reaction. For every breath taken in one must be given back. And so we should strive for balance to work with the greater whole.
This seems to be a difficult concept for us. For we are, after all, animals; the product of centuries of evolution. And we contain within us some very selfish survival instincts. We want as much as we can get, for our genetic programming tells us that there will be times of need on down the road. Yet, in our modern world our basic needs are so easy to fill. Our own selfishness drives us to want more than we need: more than we can use. And as a result many starve and freeze, due to our greed.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Breathing
The most important thing to learn in life is the lesson of breathing. Everything else about the universe comes from this one lesson.
For every breath in must be balanced by a breath out. And so everything is life is kept in balance. Breathing is the art of balance: the skill of taking in and giving back.
We live in a modern world of give and take; a world where it is better to give than to receive. Yet, we receive the moment we are born. If only we should give back later. We receive the gift of life. And we should give back the gifts of living. Perhaps we will also create life. Perhaps we will aid the living. Perhaps we will teach, or share the lessons we have learned. In any case, as with breathing, we take in and we give back.
As in breathing the universe exists in balance. Every law, every property, all is defined by balance. For every action there is an opposing reaction. Matter and energy are neither created nor destroyed, but they can change form. All remain in harmony with one another.
The Eastern philosophers have known for many centuries that all the mysteries of the universe can be understood through breathing. Understanding begins with but a single breath!
For every breath in must be balanced by a breath out. And so everything is life is kept in balance. Breathing is the art of balance: the skill of taking in and giving back.
We live in a modern world of give and take; a world where it is better to give than to receive. Yet, we receive the moment we are born. If only we should give back later. We receive the gift of life. And we should give back the gifts of living. Perhaps we will also create life. Perhaps we will aid the living. Perhaps we will teach, or share the lessons we have learned. In any case, as with breathing, we take in and we give back.
As in breathing the universe exists in balance. Every law, every property, all is defined by balance. For every action there is an opposing reaction. Matter and energy are neither created nor destroyed, but they can change form. All remain in harmony with one another.
The Eastern philosophers have known for many centuries that all the mysteries of the universe can be understood through breathing. Understanding begins with but a single breath!
All We Need To Know Is How To Breathe
Breathe in...
Breathe out...
We do it every moment of our lives, from the moment of birth to the moment of death.
Breathe in...
Breathe out...
We are doing it now. And we've done it all day.
But how often to we stop to realize what a truly spiritual event breathing really is?
Breathing does many things for our bodies: it adds all-important oxygen to our blood and our cells, it helps cool the heat our fragile bodies produce, it helps us remove unneeded or harmful gases from our bodies, and so forth. And all of these physical processes are important to our physical well-being.
But if we examine the process of breathing we learn a number of important things about our relationship to the web of life.
First, breathing is the process of taking in. It is an inner path of taking from the rest of the world, for our air is truly shared with all other life around the globe.
Second, breathing is giving back.
Breathe out...
We do it every moment of our lives, from the moment of birth to the moment of death.
Breathe in...
Breathe out...
We are doing it now. And we've done it all day.
But how often to we stop to realize what a truly spiritual event breathing really is?
Breathing does many things for our bodies: it adds all-important oxygen to our blood and our cells, it helps cool the heat our fragile bodies produce, it helps us remove unneeded or harmful gases from our bodies, and so forth. And all of these physical processes are important to our physical well-being.
But if we examine the process of breathing we learn a number of important things about our relationship to the web of life.
First, breathing is the process of taking in. It is an inner path of taking from the rest of the world, for our air is truly shared with all other life around the globe.
Second, breathing is giving back.
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