What is True?

“Reality is what we take to be true,” pioneering physicist David Bohm asserted in 1977. “What we take to be true is what we believe. What we believe is based upon our perceptions. What we perceive depends on what we look for. What we look for depends on what we think. What we think depends on what we perceive. What we perceive determines what we believe. What we believe determines what we take to be true. What we take to be true is our reality.” **

What indeed is true and what is not? I don't think anyone really knows. Everything is about what one believes to be true. All the beliefs have eventually become laws that govern our lives in the material world. They are not the same as the spiritual laws of the Universe.  The spiritual laws would be too hard to accept and put into place because they would involve Kindness and Mercy at every level of our existence which human beings would have to be initiated into - and I mean this in the kindest way possible, because most of us are still learning the ropes of compassionate living in our personal lives.

The purpose of Life is to live as we are 'meant' to.  But here again, most of us do not know what we are meant to do or even what that means.  What I know for sure is that one's spiritual practice is meant to EMPOWER one to dig deep and find out for oneself what indeed is really true. It is the spiritual practice that begins to change the brain and cells in our body to feel, think and act better as people.

I have been on this spiritual journey for a long time now, and I now realise I missed out the most important ingredient in the mix of duality.  I completely forgot to actually study the human nature to figure out why we keep repeating our errors.  Why do we need a spiritual influence in our lives to change the dynamics of living?  Old experiences which I thought were purged, seem to be resurfacing in various, very creative ways to get my attention.  Its like, something within is not letting up!! Somewhere in the middle of all of it, I suddenly got this thought that the cycle would stop only when I truly began to understand the nature of everything, especially my own volatile nature. I suffered so much guilt for being the way I usually am when dealing with negative situations. I had dived straight into spirituality as a means of escape imagining all my "badness" will become "good" instead of deeply understanding where I am right now, right here, presently is the best gift possible to alchemize my darkness. Everything has a nature. Each human being has a different nature and people act and behave typically according to their natures.  My husband always says a person's nature cannot change. That used to sound really harsh and final to me because that is what I am always banking on (change) since most people do not seem to show the better side of their natures on a daily basis due to the stress conditions in the environment.  I am always imagining people will change magically including myself and there will be a "happily ever after". But there's nothing to change really.

Nothing is ever going to be "perfect". Some relationships will suck and some will bloom. Sometimes there's harvest and sometimes there's famine. Big deal. That's a fact of life. We have gone used to so much drama that we make a big deal about everything. We want perfect everything.  But that is never going to happen, atleast not in this realm. When one begins to understand the human nature, I think we begin to embark on another path of change. Study is really important. Study promotes understanding and eventually compassion.

Duality is the name of the game and how we approach this game of life depends much on our spiritual endeavors and our understanding of Life's Nature. To pierce the veil is the individual responsibility. There is no savior. Nobody is going to fall from the skies to rescue anybody, because no one needs rescuing.  Life is perfect in its so-called imperfection. We have certain beliefs about what "perfect" means and looks like and they are only in the mind. An imperfect mind reflects a fragmented mind. Its okay if we cannot get it right.  God is not a punishing deity sitting up in the skies sending everyone to the punishing line for all the sins committed.  This is NOT my belief and so all that I write is according to my understanding of Truth.  It very well can be something very different for another person and differ greatly from mine.  And that is perfectly okay. 

Here are a few enlightening quotes from Alfred Kazin, Jewish American Writer and Literary Critic. They are inspiring too and carries depth of his personal understanding. 

"Trust to the contradictions and see them all. Never annul one force to give supremacy to another. The contradiction itself is the reality in all its manifoldness. Man from his vantage point can see reality only in contradictions. And the more faithful he is to his perception of the contradiction, the more he is open to what there is for him to know. "Harmony” as an absolute good is for the gods, not for man."

 "A thinker (like [Ralph Waldo Emerson]) misleads us as soon as he promotes harmony as the exclusive goal, and especially misleads us when he preaches harmony as a method. Man’s life is full of contradiction and he must be; we see through a glass darkly — we want more than we can have; we see more than we can understand. But a contradiction that is faced leads to true knowledge… Contradictions are on the surface, the symbols of deeper and more fertile forces that can unleash the most marvelous energy when they are embraced. Never try to achieve “order,” sacrifice symmetry — seek to relate all these antagonistic forces, not to let the elimination of one to the other. The idea of “God” as perfect order is perilous to man as an ideal, for us to follow…"

 

 

"But the “modern” epoch is precisely that in which each of us must discover our gods for ourselves. This is why so much in our language reverts to the idea of a fall, a descent. As Satan fell, to rise again as a prince of life, so we fall into this maelstrom, this madness — this world in which nothing any longer is given to us — to discover, in pain and awe, our own sacred objects."

 

"Without worship, without respect, without wonder, without the great work with which our wonder and awe plunge us, what is there — what?" **

Life Happens!!

~ Lavina ~


** http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=13eb080d8a315477042e0d5b1&id=ed7ac71960&e=0d9cb6ad91