What changed around 1980? in my life?
I began to more fully understand what compassion was and what non-dualism was.
In one's 20s one often is "pretending to be an adult" or "faking it".
Or some people say: "Fake it until you make it."
But, by 1980 I didn't have to "Fake it" as an adult anymore because I had learned that I wasn't going to survive in life unless I sort of made my own rules to live by, just like every other adult I met who had created a way to survive here on earth.
I had realized during my 20s that there are only two kinds of people here on earth: Victims and masters.
And I had decided to not be a victim like many people are their whole lives. I had decided that I would rather die than live as a victim.
And this was a very good decision long term because this helped not only me become the man I needed to be for me but also helped me to be the man that my children and grandchildren needed me to be too.
Not being a victim is an attitude. For example, Mandela was never a victim in his life even though he spent many years in prison in South Africa. It is an attitude to not be a victim.
However, because I'm white and lived in the U.S. I had an easier time of it than other people in other parts of the world being the "Captain of my own ship and the master of my own destiny".
I began to see how people who are fundamentalists in any religion including Christian tend to enslave other people by their fundamentalist ideas which might result in the end of earth through nuclear weapons.
This was a major step in my move forward in life to being a master of my own destiny.
Then I began to see how compassion in the form of Buddhism and specifically Tibetan Buddhism for me would be helpful in my life. And I other friends of mine realized this too which was also helpful.
So, together we moved forward in better understanding both how important Compassion and non-dualism is in life. However, it is true that most people capable of this change were people who had been to college or at least had aspired to be college graduates during their lives.
Often people who hadn't studied enough or traveled enough couldn't get to this state of consciousness where they realized that compassion and non-dualism was useful to their ongoing survival and the survival and prospering of all their children and grandchildren as well.
Compassion I think most people understand as being helpful to the life around you so that people and animals and plants and fish and dolphins etc. can survive better here on earth.
But, non-dualism might be more difficult to understand for people.
Non-Dualism is sort of like this:
Is the rain good or bad. Is snow good or bad. Is wind good or bad?
That's right. Just like all things in life they are not necessarily good or bad for any individual person or animal or tree. They are just whatever they are.
So, in order to call something good or bad it is very individual and individualistic in nature.
Weather cannot usually be seen except in extreme situations to either be entirely good or bad.
For example, the flooding here in California destroyed many people's lives (at least temporarily).
But, it also filled up many of the reservoirs so animals and trees and people have water to drink and people and their pets have water to wash dishes and bathe in and water their plants and trees more come summer and fall.
So, was the flooding in California good or bad? It was Both. This is non-dualism in actuality.
And most of life is this.
DesCartes the philosopher once said, "There is nothing so bad that no good may come of it and there is nothing so good that no bad may come of it."
I have found this to be a true statement in life regarding pretty much all things.
People want everything to be good but the actual affects of life are usually at every point both good and bad at the same time. How does one deal with this?
By having compassion for oneself and all beings in all situations. This is the answer to life and living here on earth.
By living on as a compassionate being one better deals with all the good and bad in one's life and in every other person's life too.
By God's Grace
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