"All truth passes through three stages.
First, it is ridiculed.
Second, it is violently opposed.
Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer
Within every individual, every family, culture, society, and civilization, we may observe there are known and unknown agreements which determine the relative nature of our individual relationships to ourselves, others, and reality via the consequential programming of our beliefs, reactions, and behavioral patterns. These habitual patterns of relating to self, others and reality are the foundation of how we react to every experience, how we remember events, how we formulate the entire schema of our conceptualized reality, whereby our future courses of action and perspective are determined, and new habits are constructed or deconstructed. And yet, it is vitally important to recognize that no matter how much experience or knowledge one acquires, everything we know, how we think of reality and ourselves, anything we perceive of, in some way, as far as our understanding of such is concerned, is tainted by the very vehicle of mind we use to traverse these mysterious depths of human --- being. In this sense we truly cannot know what anything IS, perhaps not even after we experience it, not even ourselves...
Though we can say fire is hot, ice is cold, that so and so behaves like a fool, while another seems evil, or still others are holy and intelligent, what any of this really means or who anyone really is, Is forever a Mystery of perceptual relativity. Like our minds and bodies, thoughts and emotions, our symbology of languages are but tools created to describe what it is we are experiencing, to enable us to communicate of our singularity of perceptions/thoughts/feelings/sensations/intuitions, helping us to evolve our relative understanding and synthesis of reality, of Being. And still, symbols are only representations, idols that over time may seemingly take on a life of their own, lives which exist in the mind's eye of the beholder and often have little or nothing to do with the original essence of the object or subject for which they were intended to signify.
A witness who is concerned with truths which maintain some sort of transcendental objectivity and rationale cannot afford to suffer denial of this sentient phenomena, as it is just as important to realize that death is not necessarily an ending and that life is not a beginning, as it is that everything in between and after me, you, and us, does not dictate the nature of universal Essence amongst the myriad dimensions of space and time. To arrogantly stand firm in false projections of "knowing", is to postulate that our symbology or understanding of reality and self via our own and other's projections is the only reality, which is to egocentrically buy into the illusion that perceiving is knowing, or that experience is only what we think/feel/intuit it is... yet all is much much more. Any habitual viewpoints shared with us by our families, teachers, culture, society, and species, are all facets of an experience we have adapted to and are even now living through. A reality which is a human mutation of the natural order, for though humanity be of nature --- in our capacity to enact free will, to believe, focus upon, and do what we want --- we have exhibited many anomalies that neither make sense in relation to the harmony or order of the universe surrounding us, but also have evidenced intense destructive capabilities both psychologically and physically.
How many forms of suicide must one witness outside or feel inside, to understand the ultimate paradox we represent in the universe? In this regard we seem as so many stars which have grown extremely dense under the intense pressures of living and thus implode, becoming primordial black holes.... Hence, the collective manifestation we know as reality is not Reality per say, but is rather succinctly a highly pressurized human reality wrought in the imbalanced byproducts of heartlessness and consequentially unnecessary pain and suffering. Consider these reflections on habitual patterns of behavior from George Weinberg's, The Heart of Psychotherapy:
William James was one of the first to point out that the role of human habits is to "smooth out" behavior. While learning any habit, we form an elaborate perception, think about the activity, and then choose it, in preference to one or more alternatives. When it seems to work, we repeat it. With repetition, we are able to execute the act with less thinking and feeling. Mentally and physically, the activity simplifies. We become better at it, quicker to resort to it. After a while, we may lose access to our real reasons for it. Does a person stand still during his national anthem because he loves his country and is showing respect for it, or because he would be embarrassed to make himself conspicuous through any other action? For most of us, the answer is "both," but the relative contribution of these two motives differs among people. Regardless of the original reason, once a habit is formed we merely repeat the act. This James pointed out, is the chief function of habits, that they put us on automatic, and free our consciousness to make decisions in new, uncharted territories.
The child---and often the adult---forms a complex perception, which is loaded with impulses and thoughts of different kinds; behind it lies a world view, a philosophy. Repetition of any activity puts the complex motivational pattern behind the activity to rest. Only when we stop the activity abruptly do we experience its unconscious reasons. For an instant, the patient stopping a habit in midstream, experiences himself and life as it relates to his choices of the activity.
As the person continues to hold out against the activity, his hunger for it first rises and then diminishes. Metaphorically, it's as if the urge cried out to be heard, did so repeatedly, and then gave up. One can see the survival value in this. Any unusual---or impulsive---act, since it is unconsidered and untested, may be dangerous. The same may be said of giving up a habitual act. However, after constant repetition of the act (or the refusal to act), we see that we are safe, and free to explore. Along with the initial rise of the hunger comes the person's most vivid experience of the imagery of the past, the unconscious imagery associated with the behavior.
Consider these two facts together. An activity renews its motive, the underlying perception that gives rise to it. The second, that the same repeated activity silences its motive. When the activity is abruptly stopped, that underlying perceptual drive becomes loudly conscious. The point of view, the underlying perception carried forward by the activity, is the very one soon to weaken once the activity is stopped. What the person experiences at the time of stopping the activity, the way she sees herself and life, is exactly what is going to change over time.
Habitual actions and habitual perspectives and beliefs are the major component in our species evolution, and are now proving to be just as important in our de-evolution. Setting aside for a moment the mystic's notion that pain is an illusion, or the new age viewpoint that reality is only what we think it is, or that the perceiver is wholly responsible for what they perceive, and instead, grounding down into that uncomfortable muck and mire of manmade reality to look at the mundane problem of our individual and collective relations polluted by ignorance and industrialized toxins, one must relate. To relate to the seemingly disenchanted reality of the third dimension where nature is being destroyed, animals slaughtered, and sanity forsaken for a slew of lies and social fronts by common men and women who are not perfect or enlightened, and yet have reformed the world by the blood, sweat, and tears of their joined will power and brute strength --- meanwhile populating it with scores of children who so soon become adults, whom continue to repeat this universal cycle of self destructiveness unexplored and shunned --- one can see that life as we know it is seemingly out of control, and that we are all a part of this cyclic system for better or worse.
Our existence in this sense seems more and more a series of random events instituted by instinctual drives and developmental programming, and any peace or civility which does persist seems to be held loosely together by social conventions of consideration and behavioral actions and reactions that may be guaged by degrees of love and fear, truth and ignorance, which can be labeled in the aftermath of their manifestations, either 'functional or dysfunctional' as judged by the long term evidence of cause and effect patterns... And while 'life happens' and 'people do the best with what they have been taught' axioms play themselves out in an optimistic sense, the darkness just keeps going on just as much as the light does.... From this vantage point, the darkness of ignorance proves that it shall thrive as long as men and women continue to give their love and respect to human beings and icons that are ignorant and mean.. Just as the same can be said if parents continue to teach their children that abuse and lies and self-destruction (as in: driving fossil fuel burning cars, using electricity wantonly, wasting water, ignoring the dangers of nuclear realities, being in awe of military might and weapons manufacturers, worshiping surface beauty and hardened attitudes, respecting gangs/militaries/and violent men and women the world over, venerating the misuse of intelligence and expensive educations, fearing speaking the truth because we might get hurt or made fun of/dismissed, etc, etc...) are our only choices... Whatever the case, as long as polite forms of denial continue to support the masses in avoiding the real issues of corporate money making machines and capitalistic worship systems of belief engendering abusive power dynamics and socialized immorality, then we will move ever more quickly towards a violent ending as a species, with no hope of real change.
Just as we in civilized nations are taught to be obedient and fulfill our human roles diligently and honorably while in the meantime our governments and militaries abuse third world nations and the earth, so do the foul indoctrinations and double standards persist and continue on and on into a myriad variations of how to lie about the effects of our collective and individual behaviors within the time we are allotted here... We are a species whom has been programmed to lie to ourselves while looking straight into the mirror, to hide the truth behind facades, and in this way we have imbibed the shame of our nations and civilized modes of self destruction and egocentrism. Even our spirits have been legally bound through contracts, and are thus implicated in the violence of this human species. In this we are universal, we are one in that we have all been programmed by others, by cultures, by behavioral norms, by spoken and unspoken examples of how to believe and think and act and feel.
Every time we go to the movies or turn on the TV or read a magazine or book (whether fiction of nonfiction), listen to music, listen to a teacher at school, relate to others whether our friends or enemies, each and every interaction we have with the outsides world, has some sort of effect upon how we behave, what we believe, how we react, and how we develop. Even so-called tough-hardened seemingly impenetrable invulnerable individuals are affected, they are just better at hiding the effects by seeking to destroy or attack or dismiss any others or ideas/etc. that may threaten them. War, terrorism, fights, bullying, teasing, molestation, rape, each and all represent the same fear based pattern of seeking to dominate or pacify or transfer our pain and fear to others when confronted inwardly or outwardly with certain mental-emotional triggers.
Those at the very top who are supporting us in behaving in this ignorant way, paying us to fight one another, paying us to give of our sex, lives, and precious time, they are as yet still hidden by the protection of big money, global media propaganda, bullets, bombs and cold hard steel, while those at the very bottom are still slaves to a system that is meant to keep them slaves. There are a great many adults who excuse this system and its inherent violence and ignorance by associating our cruelty of human behavior with the animal kingdom (an insulting form of anthropomorphism), standing upon argumentative projections that: because we are descended from animals we are equally instinctually predestined towards violence and unconscious behaviors (scientific layman's viewpoint); and because we are wrought in original sin or karmically bound (religious layman's viewpoint) we are predestined to commit acts of evil, or to be punished for past or future wrong doings. Thus the enforcement of unhealthy disharmonious collective agreements through habitual violence and passive-aggressive coercion --- proposing that light cannot exist without darkness --- has become the norm of brainwashing indoctrinations of human minds into self-limited and self-induced lacks of imagination.
The habitual domination and collective habitual dissemination of ignorance by the ruling class to habitually disempower and thus habitually control the common people --- is constantly being implemented. And though this sort of habitual psychological terrorism of illogical belief systems wrought in habitual ignorance and habitual self-limitation of mind, body, and spirit, has always been an essential ingredient in ruling over relatively small numbers of people as well as larger groups, neither our planet nor our human hearts can bear the weight of this ignorance any longer. Adults whom we call elders used such methods of intimidation to control us and discipline as was done to them, these techniques are meant to scare us into conformity, and unfortunately the extension of this immature and short sided behavior into the adult realms of complex systems has created mass perversion of truth, love, and healthy relationships. So that any whom are in positions of power, use these same techniques to dominate adults, animals, and all of nature, even themselves, so the darkness of cruelty has penetrated every aspect of human relationships and experiential being
What is the 'best' path towards evolution has yet to be succinctly defined in human history, though it has been touched upon from every angle of varying time and space. One could postulate that human evolution at this point is determined by behavioral adaptations which promote a higher quality of life, rather than the beastial notion of survival of the fittest, by which we now see humanity destroying itself in unending competitive violence. The new definition of fittest is then that being or group of beings who can play the game of survival 'most harmoniously' whilst caught in the grips of so many divergent forces of nature and socialization. For now the collective of humanity is behaving as any drug addict or psychopath, supporting denial of real awareness because it is considered depressing and seemingly self-defeatist to speak the truth of the third dimension, and thus many human psyches continually shun taking responsibility for the instinctual patterns of behavior ruling over themselves. Because human beings can lie, because we are comprised of free will, because we can hide behind beauty, strength, size, money, and educational degrees and honorable titles, age, youth, identity structures, etc, we are enabling our own denial and thus our own and others global nihilism.
Through the habitual fear of punishment and shame, we are taught to seek to hide our mistakes, our wrong doing, our ignorance, our denial, our sexual desires, exactly because we are afraid of being socially despised and hated for what we have done or want to do. This makes healing difficult, for where there is no acceptance there can be no truth, and where there is no truth there can be no love, and where there is no love there can be no life. This is why self perpetuated compassionate awareness, or simply 'self-realization', is essential, because each unit of consciousness must learn to accept its self, reality, and others, As Is. To accept all of this without acting out in violence (though the particulars of self defense are a complex and tricky point many masters of combat and martial arts are better suited to deal with...) or self destructiveness, is the key to Being in existence.
Within the demystification of evil and the awareness of familial/cultural programming and habitual paradigms of belief and behavior, lies the answer to global healing... If we can see that all global ills are the byproducts of ignorance, unawareness, and of habitual human behavior and misguided belief systems, then the solution to humanity's nihilism is quite clear! We must everyday intend towards the complex task of re-educating ourselves on the issues that matter in living and dying, opening to awareness of what habitual patterns have made us who we are, what we believe, and how we react to the experience of living, so that through it all we may create new habitual patterns of belief and behaviors which are holistic in their considerations and effects, as well as loving in their expressions and manifestations. It is not so hard to see that most of us are nonchalantly taught how to pollute the planet and kill other organisms for various agendas of self interest as if such behavior were perfectly normal and acceptable, so we have our work cut out for us... But becoming aware of this ignorance that has been shared with us is half the battle towards eradicating the reign of global ignorance and revealing the wizards of Oz at the top of the financial food chain whom are setting us all against one another, even ourselves.
Habit R' Us by Shen Orion
{All images linked/Programming by DPC}
due to the cumulative effect of preconditioned meaningful coincidences...
Therefore, there is no enduring universe.
By the same reasoning,
human beings are constantly changing
during every moment from birth to death.
There is no permanent ego-self
that manifests the same qualities
through-out time and space.
{Story Time?}
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