Mankind is at a crossroads. Too long have we periled each other and our Earth. Generations before us fell to ignorance, overrun by the promises of tomorrow. Today’s world is the product of unnecessary separation brought about by superficial incentives. It is up to current and subsequent generations to change this.
We now have the power to know that the truth is more than a deity in the sky. It is in each and every one of us. One can see it in the vastness of galaxies and the subtlety of granules or petals. Like our eyes, the world is round. Like the grass, our hair rises to the whims of the wind. Like a tree on its stump, we stand tall and mighty with knowledge. And yet we’ve overlooked these things so apparent. That the truth is not to be discovered nor created, that it is always here amongst us, before us, within us. There is no further proof man needs of this ultimate phenomenon than to simply live it. To know it and to know it well. To be its master, but to fall before it like the leaves to a winter’s gale.
In Nature, Emerson writes: “The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child.”
All beings are childish at heart. There remains magic, absurdity, and benign sarcasm in all things. The universe is both wondrous and amusing, serious and insane. Nothing is subjective or objective, and yet everything is.
The true vastness of that infinity strewn before us is incomprehensible and yet entirely known. At heart there is something in each and every one of us (termed the collective unconscious in The Present) that pushes us forward. It is known at birth, visible at death, and in attendance throughout life, no matter how discreet. It is why animal chases animal, wave pushes wave, cloud touches cloud. The order of things is in fact ordered, although not by God in the common sense of the word. See it as rather a collective energy that makes itself seen in life and all that is made up of it. Even a chair or a table has life. Energy rustles in each and every inanimate object, and animate, as well. We, as individuals, are forms, brought forth out of a universe filled with chaos and disruption. Earth is at a perfect point, so ideal that living things burst out of each and every one of its seams. We are the product of a conscious forming of energy to reflect a living thing, which contains a soul. Your structure is not coincidental, and yet it is.
So why is it that we find ourselves divided? In each direction conceivable, for hundreds of thousands of miles, there is nothing. We are alone, and yet we continue to quarrel. It is not only unwarranted, it is unacceptable. Violence, suffering, and hardship are pervasive on this Earth, and yet they don’t have to be. Somehow we’ve let the instinctual animal, innate in all of us, take over. This animal is controlled by our minds and it has led us astray. It was a necessary commodity for our survival and evolution – for us to get where we are today – but is no longer needed. We’ve reached a point in which we must lay down the animal side of us and embrace the spiritual, so that we are ready to pass from this world to the next with open arms when that time comes.
What is meant by the next world is unclear, as there are certain things unknowable. It is impossible to discern exactly what happens after death, but by looking at nature and its workings, one finds it far more simple and wonderful than ever imaginable. In fact, there is a very high chance there are no answers after death, only continuous life, for infinite existence would be made colorless if we knew the entire truth behind it. Once again our curious mind has tried to know those things indiscernible.
Our brains have thrown in the concepts of good and bad, heaven and hell, black and white. In reality these things do not exist. There is only the now, being in an infinite void of consciousness (spirit) and energy (life). Your immediate surroundings – what your five senses pick up and that sense of presence that is your soul – are all there is. Multiply that by infinite perspectives, beings, and frames of reference, and you find reality. An interlocking existence in space. Living for living’s sake.
The universe as we know it is infinite. Theories exist that claim numerous universes are present, showing the truly vast and immeasurable size and depth of the place we call home. Truth, stability, and safety never exist in this home, as everything is bound to chance, but when living in the Present one does not worry about tomorrow and thus this fact is made void. To truly be a child of nature and the universe, one must give up all that they hold dear – even their own identity and sense of “I” – for the larger experience. Think of lives as days, days as lives. You will soon pass from this one into a new one. More people, places, and discoveries are to be found there. Reality is the universe experiencing itself. You are a traveler on an endless journey, where the destination is now. To truly let go. To not think or judge. To simply listen, smell, see, taste, and touch. That is to simply live. And to live simply is to live entirely.
Which brings us to the age we’re now living in; the opposite of these supposed truths. We live for objects and possessions, superficiality and fame. We are a “give me/I want/mine” collective that is self-absorbed and passé. We look at others as objects to sell, destroy, and defeat. We call ourselves individuals and see entire populations as insignificant. But when one person suffers, even if it be on the other end of the world, we all suffer, for we are all intricately linked. You may be in comfort now, but in a universe built on balance, things are bound to even out. Only by living for today, selfless and un-proud, can one truly sleep at night and rest peacefully when death is upon them.
It is said that we only truly live in the moments before our death. What we must do is spread those minutes across our lives, only then will we see the beauty of it all. The sole sin is boredom and indifference in a world so miraculous as our own. You will soon leave this place and may never return again (if so, as another being, be it a bird, a flower, or another human - or something entirely inconceivable). Cherish your time here as you, but never forget that you are not who you think you are. You belong to nature, each and every part of you, but nature is incomplete without you. It built you out of promise, and that’s where your significance lies. From the simplicity of a glass of water to the power of a rushing waterfall, one must see the beauty in all things big and small, before they find peace in their own heart. We must become one in every way possible. There can no longer be favoritism or prejudice.
A tree bears its fruit for each and every one of us equally. But it expects us to take only the amount we need. So why is it that parts of the world live in gluttony, greed, and materialism, while others cannot even find a meal? We say we care, but do we really? If we did there would not longer be hunger. Thousands upon thousands of men, women, and children would no longer suffer and die for no reason other than that the rest of the world would not share with them the love and relaxation they themselves cherish so much. Until the trivial concerns of this society are done away with, the world will continue to suffer. Until we realize we are not owed a large car and house, or seconds at dinner, or fortune, or fame, or piles of money atop money, we will never be content. Why is it that so many people in the riches and most fortunate part of the world still suffer at heart? It’s because they know they’re living unjustly, and that animal/mind side of them has taken over and told them it was okay.
They have sacrificed true universal contentment for the shallow desires and comforts of beasts. Life is not easy, but it does not have to be as hard as it is. When we come together as one we will see this. When borders and other forms of separations are forfeited we will find international happiness. When license plates say “Earth,” and when we truly live for today and for each other, that is when euphoria and bliss, beauty and pleasure immeasurable, are found.
Wars are never necessary. No matter what rhetoric or propaganda is used to defend them, they are always a means of separation – a way to keep one party safe and the other submissive. There must be debate and negotiations. Humbleness and humility are the only ways towards peace. Anything else fought is a losing battle. Fire can never destroy fire, this is evident by the fact man has been fighting man for millennia and still does so to this day. Why is it that so many nations spend so much of their GDP on their military?
All militaries are unnecessary, from the U.S. to Pakistan, France to Venezuela, Russia to North Korea. They serve only to separate, kill, and destroy. They are not made up of evil people, but as a whole form something savage and destructive. We all long for peace and harmony on the personal level, so why not on the global level, too? Why is it that our military develops and evolves time and time again, yet schoolchildren can’t get proper education and much of the world is still illiterate? Why are hundreds of thousands of people blown to pieces (quite literally) and yet schools crumble after years of neglect? This is pointless, foolish, immature, and quite frankly, outrageous. We are currently embracing all the negative aspects of our childhood - most notably ignorance - when we should be embracing the positive, such as a clean and clear look at the world, and an unconditional appreciation for all things, similar or not.
We are currently destroying ourselves and our world. We must become one. Harmony is nonexistent in our current practice towards Earth. We rape the land, never thinking of tomorrow’s consequences. Our planet is big to us, but small and fragile on the grand scale of things. If we continue to treat it as we do, we will fall. When Mother Nature bites back, she bites back hard. If we don’t destroy ourselves first, be it by some sort of nuclear ambition or self-inflicted plague, the enormous effect of our foolish treatment of Earth certainly will.
Only ignorance is to blame for the current state of society and man. People escape the realities of today with the promises of tomorrow. Yet tomorrow does not exist. It may never come. There is no heaven in the accepted sense. Heaven is now. It is the ability to experience a reality with five immersive senses and a spiritual consciousness. To interact with fellow souls on their journey through life. We no longer have the excuse of ignorance. We can no longer be bound by foolish pride. Things must change or mankind will cease to exist, and mankind is too promising a species for that. The world is too marvelous a place to let such a thing happen. Inside the heart of everyman lies reason and a conscience. When we embrace our most subtle inclinations and see ourselves for the truly unique, collective, and equal beings that we are, we will find true happiness on a global scale.
Think of it this way. If you were an extraterrestrial being – or better yet, a baby being born into this world – would you rather emerge into things as they are, or a planet much better? If you could choose to live on this planet from the beginning would you? Keep in mind that you could end up anywhere on Earth, in the poorest slums of Africa or in the throws of war and conflict somewhere far off and unknown to you.
We have to make a place that living things – spirits – would want to be born into. We must build a world that identifies itself as one beautiful, semi-stable mass in an uncontrollable universe.
Envision a world without smokestacks, where clean energy that is renewable and plentiful (think solar, wind, etc.) defeats the self-serving money grabbers of yesterday and today.
Envision a world where people are no longer separated by foolish beliefs in an afterlife that doesn’t exist. What if you find yourself reborn into this world, stuck with the same problems as now? People must live for today and see this world as the heaven they so actively (and needlessly) pursue.
Envision a world where the selfish no longer role around in their own greed and money, and where all people, regardless of monetary gain, are equal. Money does not exist. In the end it is only numbers, paper, and interest. It is our belief in it that helps it survive. It must be done away with. No person should have any more than another. Just as a tree bears its fruit for all, we must live so that each person gets their fare share. One day it may be you in the unlucky seat.
Envision a world where nature is respected and all recognize themselves as a part of it. Man is not above nor below it. Man is of it, as are all plants and animals. The belief that man can have dominion over other animals in the animal kingdom is a farce. One day you may come back as the piglet bound for the slaughterer. Animals are conscious as we are. You know it as does everyone else. Now accept it.
Envision a world where God did not create earth, but is of it, for all the good and ill.
Envision a world where we see ourselves as one. We all have hands and feet, brains and eyes, noses and tongues, ears and hearts. And most of all, we are all conscious and feel. There is no separation except false separation.
Envision a world that faces reality. One that quits hiding behind false falsettos. Until we acknowledge that our similarities run far more deep than our differences, will we truly find equality and happiness for all. Also, we must come to terms with the fact that is death. Living in a dream world will not change things. Remember that the infinitude of life is seen everywhere in nature. You have been before and will come back again, forever. It will not be in a fake heaven where you live in gluttony and pleasure, but in the vast, fair, universal phenomenon right before your eyes.
Envision a world where truth, knowledge, and harmony are international realities.
Next: Spread the Truth
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Hello.
ReplyDeleteMy name is Eric. You will view me as the antagonist in this quest for truth. What I say may not necessarily be a depiction of my own beliefs, but as the antagonist, I represent the "ability to think critically and reason," an ability you have lauded in a later post. I will follow you through your quest, and I will appear where I see fit to challenge your perceptions of truth.
Adam, in this post, you seem to be drawn to the relationship between humans and nature. You refer to us as an essential part of nature, yet we seem to have created a rather large separation between the two. No longer do many of us even feel the soil under our feet or breathe the air that the earth provides. We have built around us a world of technology exclusive to us as humans, and in doing so, we can be seen as no longer a part of nature. Yet, there is one crucial part of the equation that seems to be missing - that of evolution. I believe in evolution, and I feel safe to assume that you do as well. Can we not describe evolution as the course that nature has written for its world to play out? Every natural thing, be it bacteria, trees, birds, and humans ourselves, have become what they are today through this process of evolution. The bear has fur to keep itself warm, unrestricted by the climate around it, when before, the body temperature of animals was dependent on surrounding aspects such as light and shade. Thus, the mammal sets itself apart from the reptile and continues this line of evolution. As humans, we are quite different. Yet, are we not still part of this process of evolution? Have we not evolved from ardipithecus ramidus to the homo sapiens we are today? Throughout the past several thousand years, we have seen a decrease in our physical evolution as an indirect correlation to the increase in our mental evolution. As we continued to expand our mental capacities, we have given up the need for any more physical change. Through this, we have utilized our mental capacities to sculpt a world around us to fit our physical needs. Many people argue that homo sapiens is one of the weakest and most imperfect animals alive. However, I firmly believe that the human is the perfect animal, or at least the most powerful animal, because of what we are able to do with our minds. Our hands and feet, they may be clumsy and imperfect, but we have built the car and the airplane around it so we can use our hands and feet to their maximum potential to move faster than any other animal in the world. It is because we have the mental capacity to create our own adaptations that any future physical adaptations have become largely unnecessary. This brings me to my point - would you not consider the technological world we have built around us using our mental capacity as a part of the process of evolution? Do these technologies not also represent the human battle for survival, be it in the natural world or our artificial world? Regardless, it is utmostly natural that we, as humans, have built everything around us as an effort to survive. And survival - this is the essence of evolution.
(cont.)
Now we must take a look at some of the more sensitive nuances of our "naturally human" world. A good place to start is with the idea of money. Many animals really embrace the idea of ownership - take the lioness who urinates on territory she deems her own. As humans, we are no different. We need to own things - it has been programmed into us through millions of years of natural evolution. To us, money is the representation of the ownership of aspects of survival. To us, money is food, water, shelter, the ability to travel better than any other animal, the ability to communicate better than any other animal. To us, money is survival. It is not only our representation of survival, but the ability to survive better than any other animal. These are all traits that are inherent to evolution. Yet, money itself - what is it but merely some paper, some pieces of metal, and a bunch of numbers? Money is deceptively simple and seemingly worthless, but underneath it all, it represents something far greater than the ability to survive - it represents our ability to think. Adam, towards the end of your post, you claim that the pig is just as conscious as we are. However, I argue that it is not. Humans have an extremely different level of awareness than any other animal in the world, and the key to this awareness is our system of language. Think about it. Whenever you think, you think in language. Animals can't think, at least not in the same way we do. Animals are cognizant of the world around them in a much more immediate way - animals don't think, they perceive. With language, however, humans can think passively and are self-aware - "we have the ability to think critically and reason," as both you and I have emphasized, and no other animal in the world can do this. There is a famous quote that I'm sure both of you are familiar with, "Cogito ergo sum," the cartesian anthem that defines who we are as humans. And through our unique ability to think in the way we do, we have been able to create the artificial world around us to fit our needs. Our system of money, our system of language, our system of government, these are systems that we've created to utilize our ability to conceptualize to the fullest degree, whether they work the way you want them to or not. We can have dominion over the animal kingdom because we have the ability to think in that way, whereas animals do not. Humans are not animals, we are vastly different. Ultimately, however, in whatever way we may be different from animals, we will always be a part of the process of evolution. We are what we are today because we have evolved into it. And if what we have evolved into will eventually destroy us, then so be it - it is the course of evolution. The dinosaurs died off because they evolved into something that couldn't survive whatever it is that killed them - we may see the same fate, and there is nothing we can do about it.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, asking us to surrender religion, money, ownership, competition, is asking us to surrender what makes us both human and a part of nature. Things such as ownership and competition are extremely natural - they exist in every aspect of the natural world, from the fight for food to the fight for a mate - animals must compete and must own in order to survive. These ideas are not too far from the way humans survive, we just have a very different way of approaching it. Money is the greatest example of the human interpretation of the natural fight for survival. It is the representation of the human mind in a natural world. We are not animals, but we will always be a part of nature, whether we sleep under the stars or under an insulated roof with air-conditioning. And if that air-conditioning will be what results in the mass extinction of humans in the end, well, that extinction will be the only time we are able to give up those things that make us both human and natural. It took us millions of years to get here. It can only take millions more to change that. Or death.
Think about it. Because being human, I know you can.
Eric
Eric.
ReplyDeleteThe word is dead.
Language is dead.
It has divided us.
God has become the Devil.
Lose your thinking mind, gain eternity.
That which is not real shall perish.
In other words, we have all built glass boats that have attempted to sever ourselves from the reality that we ARE the river of evolution and of life. You are not just part of the stars and the trees. You ARE them. The systems you mention are designed to fool you into thinking and believing that you are not not, and with this mankind dies inside. You are not alone.
ReplyDelete