Quotes On Awakening

 

Artwork in progress for Essays On Awakening

Some quotes from my forthcoming book, Essays On Awakening:

Any choice you opt for, any candidate you vote for, that is offered by the system, is opting for and supportive of the system. Any corporate product you buy or political candidate you invest your energy in is profiting the corporate system. There is no way within the system to fight the system. That’s not an option they are going to give you. Prison guards don’t give weapons to the prisoners they profit from controlling.

This may sound very discouraging, as if there is no way out of the dilemma. And when we feel discouraged, when we feel there is no real way to improve things, we shut down, stop trying, ignore the problem because we feel as if we can do nothing to fix it. This isn’t the case at all, but it is what the existing system wants you to think. They want you to think that there is no hope and there are no solutions. And that is true, but only when you look to the system for answers. The system will only give you answers that support the system, therefore they will only give you lies that will ultimately leave you feeling hopeless. That’s where you are now whether you are fully aware of it or not. You have been beaten down and made to feel that you can only hope for the crumbs that they throw you.

If you cannot say no and you always come up with reasons for supporting those who rule you in ways you should not be ruled, you are a slave. And good for you if you want to be a slave, that’s your choice. But for God’s sake, don’t try to lecture the rest of us. If we do not listen to your master, we are not going to listen to his lackeys. Go live your slave lives but don’t go preaching to us.

So how do you know when you are effectively opposing a system that is created to oppress rather than encourage individual rights? When the system tells you you are wrong. When they try to silence you, when they tell you you are not merely wrong but dangerous. You ARE dangerous. Dangerous to THEM. Dangerous to the power they have usurped from the masses. You are dangerous to unjust power. And when you are dangerous to unjust power, that means you are powerful to oppose injustice. And that’s a good thing.

The courage that permits wisdom demands you relinquish all of your biases, which act as defenses. You must abandon not only self but your larger affiliations, which, after all, are merely larger sorts of self. You must attempt to see reality through God’s eyes. And in doing so, you must not limit God to what you believe Him to be or what your larger group tells you God is. Again, you must see through the eyes of others. You must attempt to see God through the eyes of those who call him Allah, must see him through the eyes of those who call him Vishnu, those who do not call him by any name and yet seek him though they know it not.

Seek the wisdom of the young, who see life through unbiased eyes. Seek the wisdom of the old, who at last have seen through the many stages of life. Though their eyes be weak, their vision blurry, their knowledge of what to look for is unsurpassed.

The greatest courage we can attain is to step out of our own little shells, to leave self and ego behind and float, selfless and vulnerable, through all the life we encounter. In leaving our home, we find everywhere to be home. In leaving ourselves, we find everybody and everything to be us.

Once wisdom is attained, courage is no longer required.

Do not fear that you will never be free from their machinations. They will always be ahead of you in the games they play, but all their plotting will come to nothing if you keep to the basic principles you know in your heart to be true. They cannot manipulate you if they cannot make you stray from your core values.

Do not hate, even when you do not understand. Do not support violence, even when you are afraid for yourself and your family. Hatred and violence are their tools, not ours. Hatred and violence make tyrants strong but they are the ruin of civilizations.

Have faith, in yourself and in the overall goodness of humanity. Perhaps people are not naturally angels, but neither are they naturally devils. The deciding factor is the way we choose to perceive ourselves and others. If you commit to seeing the better angels of your own soul and of those you meet, you will turn the tide in favor of goodness.

Primitive man realized he was part of a family as much as he was an individual. Advancing, he realized he was part of something larger, part of a clan. Then still something larger, a tribe, a city, a nation. The history of humanity is one of searching for belonging in an ever-bigger community. We have now arrived at the logical endpoint, the realization that we are all one people, a global family, each of us depending upon others for our own survival.

P.S. Essays On Awakening will be a sort of sequel to my book Essays On The Media, which is available HERE

Random Thoughts Part 23

Every one of these is a potential essay. Mention one you want me to write about and it shall be done:

How can one who truly loves life not have moments of intense sadness? How can one love the myriad people, places, and situations we encounter without grieving their impermanence?

I cry for the young because they will one day grow old. I cry for the old because they were once children. I weep for myself because I am not the one but will be the other.

I am even more hungry for life now than when I was young, but it seems I am only able to take small bites.

What makes fiction literature? It must speak to the times and yet be timeless. It need not be trendy or cutting edge, in fact it seldom is. Truth is seldom fashionable.

We have created a world we don’t like, don’t understand and don’t trust, and we are too frightened to try to change it.

If God rewards the faithful with earthly rewards, then what leverage does the devil have?

If food did not go bad, gold would be next to worthless. Gold is man’s vain attempt at security, at keeping for tomorrow what we have today..

What I don’t like about Christians is when they are self-righteous and sanctimonious, demanding all others fall in line with their belief system. Now if I don’t like such traits in Christians, why do you think I’d tolerate them any better coming from other groups? 

Humans were meant to meander, to roam and to graze. We were meant to sit beneath the stars, to gather around a fire with family and friends.

Do I make a break for the island I see in the distance, or do I cling to whatever wreckage I happen upon and let the tide take me where it will?

I have decided to make a go of it at writing, to do whatever it takes to become successful at it. And after audaciously announcing this, I asked myself, as I always do, “Anything? Would you sell your very soul to be a writer?” And a voice within me answered “Writing is my soul.”

If we do not work for peace, struggle for peace, if we do not keep peace always in our hearts, our minds, and on our lips, we will never achieve peace. Peace is a choice, it is a commitment, a lifestyle. It will never happen accidently, or as a result of pursuing other aims. Peace is a religion, or at least it is at the heart of all religions.

If you want a language to survive, capture great thoughts within it. William Shakespeare has ensured Elizabethan English will never perish from this world.

When arrogance takes the place of facts and logic in an argument, intimidation and violence will not be far behind.

One of the worst sins you can commit is to create explanations for something you know in your heart is not true.

They are not my enemy, whoever “they” happens to be.

I fear absolutism, simplistic solutions, and fundamentalism, just as I would fear trying to sit on a one-legged chair.

Only through spirituality can we be in touch with the all. Anything else is to be a part of something less. Anything else is to be part of a faction at war with another.

The cunning will always be able to outthink even the wise, it is what they spend their lives at. They live within their plans, creating schemes to confuse the straight and obvious paths of others. The only way to prevent ourselves from being led astray is to never put aside our core values even when confronted with the most compelling of evidence. Never must we act in fear or in hatred. Never must we allow ourselves to be convinced that it is okay to kill or to steal. Never should we believe that cruelty is the only path, deserting kindness.

The mark of a civilized man is not that he does not think of baser things but that he is quite often capable of rising above such matters.

Evil is the word used by the ignorant to explain the motivation of those with whom they disagree or do not understand.

If there is divinity within us, it is hewn from our baser clay by words and ideas.

The law of supply and demand, which states that the greater supply the cheaper the cost, does not apply to ignorance. The greater the amount of ignorance people have, the more they value ignorance in their art, politics, and their fellow man.

Random Thoughts Part 16

The greatest artistic talent of our day is busy constructing packaging rather than art.

Brave men need people looking after them, people to say enough, no more. This holds true for boxers as well as soldiers. Don't send people to get hurt when they have nothing to gain from it. Don't let others profit from the bravery of others.

Morality is really no different on a societal scale than for individuals. I do what I feel to be moral and right because I truly believe it will benefit me and in some small way the world. It's not so much about making rules for others to follow so much as setting an example that others will want to follow.

Hate doesn’t need a reason, just an excuse.

All countries memorialize the dates when they were wronged, but never do they recall the wrongs they have done. Looked at from the inside, each nation is blameless.

We can judge without understanding, but if we are able to truly understand, we will not be able to judge.

We can disagree on 95% of the problems facing the world, but if we are able to work together on the 5% we agree on, we can make the world a better place.

Weak arguments hide behind strong emotions.

Many seek the path of judgment rather than the path of understanding. But how do you judge what you do not understand? And understanding, how can one then judge?

We all have a role to play and it is nobody’s role to despair. It would be a poorly written play if there was, a group of characters sitting around awaiting an inevitable end. Nor is it your role to fault your fellow performers, to tell them their actions are wrong. Play your role as it is written in your heart and let the written words come to life.

Arrogance passes as intelligence to the ignorant.

The problem with a philosophy or a belief is that you soon start changing the facts to fit it.

Wisdom that does not lead to contentment is not wisdom. It is better to be a happy fool than a miserable wise man.

Our society needs more grandmothers and less facelifts, more grandfathers and less ED pills.

A philosophy becomes a religion the moment you replace questioning with belief, when you forget that is but one way among many to see the world.

Difficult questions, even if never fully answered, are still more useful than simple answers.

Walls are Illusions, illusions are walls. There are no borders that are not artificial, no “over there”, no place called “away” where we can throw something. We cannot wall ourselves off, at least not for long. There is no hiding place. We cannot lock something away without it festering in the darkness. There is no there and them, there is only here and us.

The more you have the less you have need of your fellow man and the more you begin to fear them.

The more you see differences, the more you see the need for walls, bars, and guns.

Our society currently respects profit more than work, which means that it gives a higher regard to those who take rather than give.

Christian, Jew, Liberal, or Conservative. If you are a halfway thoughtful person you will inevitably end up being embarrassed by whatever group you identify with.

Assuredly science is superior to religion in understanding the physical universe. But maybe, just maybe, religion is better at seeing our position in relation to that universe.

You were born to solve the problems you confront, not complain that nobody is doing anything about them. If you see and feel a problem so acutely, who better than yourself to solve it?

Dinosaurs had brains the size of marbles but even they weren’t dumb enough to cause their own extinction.

It is dangerous to ignore facts, just as it is dangerous to become too enamored with them.

The job of keeping you informed and enlightened will never pay as well as the job of keeping you misinformed and frightened.

Perhaps the one unanswerable question in life is why so many of us choose to live in a fantasy world of our own creation that offers us nothing but pain.