There was a Twilight Zone of exactly that; A criminal and murderer who dies in a shootout with the police. In the afterlife, he has everything he ever wanted: A beautiful penthouse apartment, all the money he wants, beautiful women, he wins every time he gambles. After a few weeks he finds himself going crazy and he says to his guardian angel: "I think I had enough of heaven. I'd like to try the other place." And the angel responds: "What made you think you were in heaven? This IS the other place."
I am therefore I reason. I am not a simulation against Eternity. I know my "I" s are flowing like a river in a bed and the headwaters arise in a cultural matrix. I also am aware that there is none alive who like Aristotle is the “maestro di color che sanno” (the master of those who know [ Inf. 4.131]), as Virgilio is “quel savio gentil, che tutto seppe” (that gentle sage, who knew everything [ Inf. 7.3]), in the third verse of this very canto. To then smile and say Paradiso is that way and you know the road. You travel it daily. A dancing collection of pre-Quarks in a morphogenic filed trapped in time constantly incarnating as the Ich. Aristotle, Metaphysica, Z i, I028 b 2-4: "And indeed the question
which was raised of old and is raised now and always, and is always the subject of doubt, viz., what being is, is just the question what is substance?" ...."And so we also must consider chiefly and primarily and almost exclusively what that is which is in this sense" (JSTOR served it up-The Greek Conceptions of Time and Being in the Light of Heidegger's Philosophy
Helene Weiss Philosophy and Phenomenological Research
Vol. 2, No. 2 (Dec., 1941), pp. 173-187 (15 pages)
Published By: International Phenomenological Society
It's so much easier than all their dogma makes it out to be.
And Infinitely harder to See, of course. But it doesn't get simpler than One.
Reincarnation in its traditional form places the ego divide at the "soul" level. "Well, that's just where their soul is. That's not my problem. They deserve this misfortune, or it wouldn't be happening."
Imagine their utter horror and revulsion to learn they'll live that life, too.
The fastest way to Truth is to destroy everything false that stands in the way of the direct perception of it. I didn't exactly wait around for Godot to show up and gift it to me.
What would be divine about divine revelations if it needed "authentication"? Albeit God himself put his stamp upon it, the stamp would be suspect.
What I'm saying is "How can people know?" is a dead-end question. There have been lots who faked their revelations, if only in the Bible, but that does not take away from a real one. Like a dream I heard this evening. Or so it seems to me.
Triangulating is fine where I have a personal suspicion. But really any decent triangle would straighten itself out when used to test a divine revelation. Not saying that I have any or that if I did I would tambour on it but I definitely would not reach for a triangle.
jus' read that harrowin' tale of the near-miss with the truck--wow. I think even those of us who've suffered great sorrows in our lives yet an' all have some'a those stories an' moments where we really think '"someone up there was watchin'" -- an' mebbe (mebbe?) might not let this great work on Earth (we human beans!) fail / die / an' git blown ta smithereens. I like ta think so!
Certainly we're approachin' the edge tho! Whatever "god" may be ta some folks... (in my heterodox humanistic chewish customized "non-doc-trinated" way I see the "entity known as god" more as a mostly benevolent an' mostly laissez-fair power--which iz why we have "free will"--that duz indeed reach down "energetically" in a sense an' lift us, our spirits, when it's noticed that such grace is most needed most--sometimes! Never could reckon with some bearded feller in sandals in a fawncy chair, however folks like ta anthropomorphize "him"-- tho' the artwork is often stunnin'!)--
I do believe there is hope an' that good energy remains in the universe, an' dark energy dies... mebbe in NewYawk Shitty (only half jokin'--the vibe there was palpably bad--an' that's my home!)
I believe in blessin's Ray--each of us humans kin make 'em, no need for a dude 'er dudette in religious "schmattas"--so I'm sendin' some yer way!, you've already been blessed (imo) sharin' yer "thinks" an' yer research an' yer dot-connectin'--that's a gift an' it duzn't need ta be wrapped up in any church, temple, 'er tabernackle! (I still think Shirley McClain an' her past lives are a bit woo but then agin' I'm a crackpot m'self!)
According to the story of Eden, humans want to be born with the chance to give it a try on their own (which is often termed as the "original sin"). As you are saying it, God is saying, "Fine, go ahead." At the hour of my death, I am expecting a fantastically charismatic figure to show up and say, "All your wishes will come true; come with me." My only answer would be, "Let God's will be done, not mine." I'm pretty sure the tempter will vanish at that point. I'm also expecting to have a chance to ask for others to be with me, no matter how remote we were in real life, and they will also have the same chance. It will take place in a place where there time will stop, so everyone will have "all the time in the world." :)
The part I have revealed is only a tiny fraction of what I've been through. Obviously, it's not the bearded old man sitting on clouds, but after checking against what I had been told, it panned out. I won't reveal parts that nobody can relate to, and it will always be a personal decision for everyone, based on their lifetime experience. My poor sister died at the age of 32 without ever experiencing the Divine, no matter how I was trying to tell her the way to do it (it's like dropping a pebble into a bottomless well, and waiting for it to echo). She was a lot better person than I was, and I offered myself for her life, but I guess, God didn't care for me at that point, which also showed that surviving is not all it takes.
It seems to me that I am unworthy of blessings, yet I've been showered with them all my life, even when it was a close call a number of times, and my life would have ended without Providence or, when it comes to the voice that asked me at the age of five, a "guardian angel". In fact, cats are supposed to have nine lives, and I would have died well over 14 times, but I guess, I still have some more to do, and I will never know if I succeeded, but at least I'll die trying.
And yes, I firmly believe in the power of prayer, because I have experienced it so many times. Those who pray for each other can also save each other. I know, spouses come first, but the deal is certainly not limited to them. :) I've been thinking about you lots of times, and by prayer, I might mean not much more than thinking about someone else lovingly, wishing the best for them. If only humans could perform this feat! :) Oops! You and I are only humans.
Whoa Nellie, Dark Pirate--I've been stackin' fer near three years an' the LARPing you say you see is hogwarsh--but go ahead an' see what'cha like.
Accusin' folks of stuff they ain't guilty of?--not sure how that squares with your own faith or sens've ethics but I've commented on Ray's stack here in good faith fer quite some time an' I think he "sees me" quite clearly--a sincere human bean who writes in the vernacular an' sometimes has some wacky "idears."
So go ahead, truth teller of darkness, DO reveal my dark crimes an' dark "ahrts' which I myself cain't see even with a telly-scope. Go ahead an' do yer service ta mankind an' tell the world I'm masqueradin' as another stacker... that's kinda rich...
Ta tell truth--I ain't mockin' anybuddy but we old skool actors do impressions that mebbe ain't so peecee today. My "handle is a tribute to a character I admire heartily--the performer is gone (Irene Ryan if ya must) but I admire her work mightily an' she wuz also in moosicle the-ate-er (more my wheelhouse!). My degradin' the South? Nah, I have fambly that hailed from Kentucky-- Yer likely too young ta know Granny Clampett 'er the many references I make. But sure, whatever ya like, go assume I'm a dark "operator" if it floats yer boat... WARN the PUBLIC about the danger in readin' my comm-mints... Yer cherce as they say... but golly.
Since I'm asked about why I write as I do, I'll offer my boilerplate answer...
1. writin' in the vernacular in the Joel Chandler Harris / Lil' Abner-Al Capp / Mark Twain tradition I admire* saves me from a lotta bullies, bots an' AI mayhem that jus' cain't troll me this'a way (an' I'm no fan'a bots, trolls, 'er bullies) AI just cain't figger me out!
*ye kin even adin Steven Berkoff if ya like yer banter in cockney rhymin' slang
2. I'm an actor plyin' my trade anonymously via mah nom-de-plume cuz we "performers" who refused the jabs-bad-countermeasures & "mandates" became magically unemployed so I horizonally moved from stage to stack an' I frankly enjoy the "role" (now plyin' my trade in print) sans mandates an' still "in character"...
3. keepin' "in character" 'bout anythin' that so pleases me makes it less risky ta be frank, name names (I do!), an' pernt genu-ine fingers at the baddies while keepin' the target sign offa -- me an' my fambly... Ya might know that many who write on the stack have been targeted in all sorts'a ways--lit'rally included--which ain't good, no how...
I admit ta sometimes bein' snarky--but I'm not cruel as ya say. I've seen folks go off on these stacks purdy badly but I alway try ta be a laydee.
"Persona?" a "game ta fool folks?" As I said, imagine whut'cha like--I spend a lotta time on my stacks AND in makin' my replies when I deem it wurthy--which it often is. What you call "intentional denigration in the guise of fun" ain't what I do but if that's whut my words mean to you--so be it.
"To each his own said the lady when she kissed her cow!" By all means WARN 'em all about me--good job! Well done! Scam alert--do not read whut the crackpot lady writes! Sir (I'm assumin' yer a fella, no?) if ya don't see anythin' good in whut I scribe, by all means hit the delete key... you accuse falsely but if that shoe fits by all means wear it! But it's not nice fer Pirates ta make ladies walk the plank ;-)
Here I repeat Myself - though perhaps not to You... My father taught Me never to believe anything. He told Me to place probabilities and adjust them as new data come along, asking the question, "Does that explain what I see?," so I believe nothing. LOL!
I was raised without religion - lots of love and Ethics, but no religion. And so far, I have not needed it to explain what I see. [shrug] What will happen when I die? Guess I will find out then!
In order to interpret ANYTHING, humans need an interpretive frame. That frame is usually based on something that the person deems to be necessary for life ("existential need"). That assumption becomes the fundamental tenet, the premise based on which all future experience is interpreted by the same person.
As Kant already proved it, the knowledge of right and wrong can be based only on the Divine. Otherwise, the secularized version is watered down to Rodney King's "Why can't we all get along?"
I shall dispute Kant. If You were to ask every Human if it's okay to do to Them any of the things proscribed in the three Laws of Ethics, to a One They will say no... In fact... I just did an article on this...
It's great to see you are thinking for yourself! That makes you one of the select few.
Your tenets are commendable, but they also overlap the Ten Commandments. Besides, as my text suggests, only divine revelation can show right from wrong, because everything else lacks the divine perspective.
Kant, is traditional philosophy, went as far as possible. Please, check out his Prolegomena, if you have the time and the inclination. Everything after him is compartmentalized; he managed to point out the limit of human judgment.
Yes, the ten commandments weakly express the Laws. And I cannot say the ten commandments are "divine..." SomeOne wanting to control Others could have written them. All religions I have studied could have been.
And "worship Me or else" is divine? I am an Ethical One, also caring, loving and giving, and if that is not good enough for any "God," that "God" is not One I could worship. Just saying.
Both approaches are traps. The “western” one-life-only exerts incredible pressure: you must be a success in your life. If you fail, which is inevitable because you have no experience in success, your net worth goes negative. Problem. If you manage well, but you fail at some time in the future, your peers will do the thing. Check stock quotes and how they depend on whims of “stakeholders”.
This fear of not finding the right balance between failure and success in progress pushes the mind into various directions. Everywhere, except the now. And you focus on work, business, management, at the expense of your family, children, relationships with neighbors and with yourself.
The “eastern” way means “whatever you do, you can do nothing about things as they develop”. If you fail, it comes from your past karma. If you succeed, who knows, maybe you will fail tomorrow. No need to worry. Next lifetime, you will do better. And the now is neglected, although in a different way.
Too much mind, too much time.
Just be here. You cannot predict any future, even a minute. Dragging your past with you is pointless, you can do nothing about it. The now is the only energy alive.
"Too many minds" can certainly be a problem and, more often than not, it probably is.
Focusing on the present is impossible without an interpretive frame (the senses are conditioned to notice certain things and ignore the rest), which about 95% of humans are lacking, because they can only think inductively. Deductive thinking cannot be evaded for a live cognitive model of the world:
Success and failure can be defined in specific systems. Which one are you and I talking about?
Actually, as I said, humans are imperfect no matter how million times they would try to be perfect, which is why they need divine redemption. If that's a trap, I'll let it be.
Success in life just doesn't add up without an eschatological perspective.
The stock market has always been rigged, so it might not be the best analogy, but your example is perfect for showing how people can be conditioned. Small lies are pointed out to make people believe big ones from the same sources (limited hangout).
Fatalism and karma, in my understanding, are two different things. Even karma has two meanings depending on the culture, but I like that you carry the outcome of your action with you:
“Too much mind” - one mind, and it is already too much. We are conditioned to think our way through life, and it works, somehow, until one day… we fall in love, or a sudden groundbreaking event (usually involving a loss of some kind) occurs, and we are stopped in our mind tracks. And we forget all the mind - because the life has knocked on our doors, and the doors opened…
I don’t mean “focusing” on the present - I mean being in the present, without thinking ahead of what is happening and without recalling the past. We find ourselves very often in this state, we just are not trained to recognize it.
It’s like… you are doing what you are doing, and the situation requires your presence - you need to attend to the activities at hand. Like an operating surgeon. Despite your expertise and knowledge, every operation is new. And you have a limit of time, so you enter an altered state of mind (the western term) or you flow with what is (the eastern view). You make choices, do cuts, and re-arrange the patient’s body guided by unique, highly specific snippets from your training. These “hints” (or guidance) come as they are. You do not review 20 options while the patient is cooling down… This is being there.
Being available to the moment. Doing what is asking to be done. Old-style farmers know this and live by this every day. They go out in the field, cover their crops, or take their animals home in midday, with beautiful weather, no reason to do this. Half an hour later, boom, a sudden storm or wind… No mind there, no decisions, no thinking.
The constant battle to be successful at the risk of being a failure is pointless. People let society judge them as they desire to keep up with the Jones's of the world. The true self has no concerns about success and failure other than from a practical view. One's successes and failures are not the defining criterion of a life well lived or just lived.
There was a Twilight Zone of exactly that; A criminal and murderer who dies in a shootout with the police. In the afterlife, he has everything he ever wanted: A beautiful penthouse apartment, all the money he wants, beautiful women, he wins every time he gambles. After a few weeks he finds himself going crazy and he says to his guardian angel: "I think I had enough of heaven. I'd like to try the other place." And the angel responds: "What made you think you were in heaven? This IS the other place."
I am therefore I reason. I am not a simulation against Eternity. I know my "I" s are flowing like a river in a bed and the headwaters arise in a cultural matrix. I also am aware that there is none alive who like Aristotle is the “maestro di color che sanno” (the master of those who know [ Inf. 4.131]), as Virgilio is “quel savio gentil, che tutto seppe” (that gentle sage, who knew everything [ Inf. 7.3]), in the third verse of this very canto. To then smile and say Paradiso is that way and you know the road. You travel it daily. A dancing collection of pre-Quarks in a morphogenic filed trapped in time constantly incarnating as the Ich. Aristotle, Metaphysica, Z i, I028 b 2-4: "And indeed the question
which was raised of old and is raised now and always, and is always the subject of doubt, viz., what being is, is just the question what is substance?" ...."And so we also must consider chiefly and primarily and almost exclusively what that is which is in this sense" (JSTOR served it up-The Greek Conceptions of Time and Being in the Light of Heidegger's Philosophy
Helene Weiss Philosophy and Phenomenological Research
Vol. 2, No. 2 (Dec., 1941), pp. 173-187 (15 pages)
Published By: International Phenomenological Society
It's so much easier than all their dogma makes it out to be.
And Infinitely harder to See, of course. But it doesn't get simpler than One.
Reincarnation in its traditional form places the ego divide at the "soul" level. "Well, that's just where their soul is. That's not my problem. They deserve this misfortune, or it wouldn't be happening."
Imagine their utter horror and revulsion to learn they'll live that life, too.
Yes, even THAT one.
You get one shot as "you."
But *You* get infinite lives.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=aJh0qaKMem4
--🔑
You know, my problem with all this is "How can people know?" Logically, they need divine revelation. How can they determine that it is authentic?
After that, as I said in the article, too, it depends on one's personal experience.
The fastest way to Truth is to destroy everything false that stands in the way of the direct perception of it. I didn't exactly wait around for Godot to show up and gift it to me.
______ helps those who help themselves, right?
What would be divine about divine revelations if it needed "authentication"? Albeit God himself put his stamp upon it, the stamp would be suspect.
What I'm saying is "How can people know?" is a dead-end question. There have been lots who faked their revelations, if only in the Bible, but that does not take away from a real one. Like a dream I heard this evening. Or so it seems to me.
Sometimes triangulating can't hurt. When all sources assumed to be divine and personal experience match, that might be a good start.
Triangulating is fine where I have a personal suspicion. But really any decent triangle would straighten itself out when used to test a divine revelation. Not saying that I have any or that if I did I would tambour on it but I definitely would not reach for a triangle.
jus' read that harrowin' tale of the near-miss with the truck--wow. I think even those of us who've suffered great sorrows in our lives yet an' all have some'a those stories an' moments where we really think '"someone up there was watchin'" -- an' mebbe (mebbe?) might not let this great work on Earth (we human beans!) fail / die / an' git blown ta smithereens. I like ta think so!
Certainly we're approachin' the edge tho! Whatever "god" may be ta some folks... (in my heterodox humanistic chewish customized "non-doc-trinated" way I see the "entity known as god" more as a mostly benevolent an' mostly laissez-fair power--which iz why we have "free will"--that duz indeed reach down "energetically" in a sense an' lift us, our spirits, when it's noticed that such grace is most needed most--sometimes! Never could reckon with some bearded feller in sandals in a fawncy chair, however folks like ta anthropomorphize "him"-- tho' the artwork is often stunnin'!)--
I do believe there is hope an' that good energy remains in the universe, an' dark energy dies... mebbe in NewYawk Shitty (only half jokin'--the vibe there was palpably bad--an' that's my home!)
I believe in blessin's Ray--each of us humans kin make 'em, no need for a dude 'er dudette in religious "schmattas"--so I'm sendin' some yer way!, you've already been blessed (imo) sharin' yer "thinks" an' yer research an' yer dot-connectin'--that's a gift an' it duzn't need ta be wrapped up in any church, temple, 'er tabernackle! (I still think Shirley McClain an' her past lives are a bit woo but then agin' I'm a crackpot m'self!)
It's good to reconsider what "Free Will" is. As for me, it only affects existential decisions, and only when it can:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/i-have-solved-the-question-of-free
According to the story of Eden, humans want to be born with the chance to give it a try on their own (which is often termed as the "original sin"). As you are saying it, God is saying, "Fine, go ahead." At the hour of my death, I am expecting a fantastically charismatic figure to show up and say, "All your wishes will come true; come with me." My only answer would be, "Let God's will be done, not mine." I'm pretty sure the tempter will vanish at that point. I'm also expecting to have a chance to ask for others to be with me, no matter how remote we were in real life, and they will also have the same chance. It will take place in a place where there time will stop, so everyone will have "all the time in the world." :)
The part I have revealed is only a tiny fraction of what I've been through. Obviously, it's not the bearded old man sitting on clouds, but after checking against what I had been told, it panned out. I won't reveal parts that nobody can relate to, and it will always be a personal decision for everyone, based on their lifetime experience. My poor sister died at the age of 32 without ever experiencing the Divine, no matter how I was trying to tell her the way to do it (it's like dropping a pebble into a bottomless well, and waiting for it to echo). She was a lot better person than I was, and I offered myself for her life, but I guess, God didn't care for me at that point, which also showed that surviving is not all it takes.
It seems to me that I am unworthy of blessings, yet I've been showered with them all my life, even when it was a close call a number of times, and my life would have ended without Providence or, when it comes to the voice that asked me at the age of five, a "guardian angel". In fact, cats are supposed to have nine lives, and I would have died well over 14 times, but I guess, I still have some more to do, and I will never know if I succeeded, but at least I'll die trying.
And yes, I firmly believe in the power of prayer, because I have experienced it so many times. Those who pray for each other can also save each other. I know, spouses come first, but the deal is certainly not limited to them. :) I've been thinking about you lots of times, and by prayer, I might mean not much more than thinking about someone else lovingly, wishing the best for them. If only humans could perform this feat! :) Oops! You and I are only humans.
happy ta send ya sum' more blessin's yer way ta add to that shower! the time ya take ta write is a gift much appreciated!
This might be my penultimate job around here. :)
Can you explain what you mean, please? Lots of readers here are not native speakers of English.
I'm bein' attacked as a LARP Ray--jus' responded--sincere crackpot that I am!
:)
Whoa Nellie, Dark Pirate--I've been stackin' fer near three years an' the LARPing you say you see is hogwarsh--but go ahead an' see what'cha like.
Accusin' folks of stuff they ain't guilty of?--not sure how that squares with your own faith or sens've ethics but I've commented on Ray's stack here in good faith fer quite some time an' I think he "sees me" quite clearly--a sincere human bean who writes in the vernacular an' sometimes has some wacky "idears."
So go ahead, truth teller of darkness, DO reveal my dark crimes an' dark "ahrts' which I myself cain't see even with a telly-scope. Go ahead an' do yer service ta mankind an' tell the world I'm masqueradin' as another stacker... that's kinda rich...
Ta tell truth--I ain't mockin' anybuddy but we old skool actors do impressions that mebbe ain't so peecee today. My "handle is a tribute to a character I admire heartily--the performer is gone (Irene Ryan if ya must) but I admire her work mightily an' she wuz also in moosicle the-ate-er (more my wheelhouse!). My degradin' the South? Nah, I have fambly that hailed from Kentucky-- Yer likely too young ta know Granny Clampett 'er the many references I make. But sure, whatever ya like, go assume I'm a dark "operator" if it floats yer boat... WARN the PUBLIC about the danger in readin' my comm-mints... Yer cherce as they say... but golly.
Since I'm asked about why I write as I do, I'll offer my boilerplate answer...
1. writin' in the vernacular in the Joel Chandler Harris / Lil' Abner-Al Capp / Mark Twain tradition I admire* saves me from a lotta bullies, bots an' AI mayhem that jus' cain't troll me this'a way (an' I'm no fan'a bots, trolls, 'er bullies) AI just cain't figger me out!
*ye kin even adin Steven Berkoff if ya like yer banter in cockney rhymin' slang
2. I'm an actor plyin' my trade anonymously via mah nom-de-plume cuz we "performers" who refused the jabs-bad-countermeasures & "mandates" became magically unemployed so I horizonally moved from stage to stack an' I frankly enjoy the "role" (now plyin' my trade in print) sans mandates an' still "in character"...
3. keepin' "in character" 'bout anythin' that so pleases me makes it less risky ta be frank, name names (I do!), an' pernt genu-ine fingers at the baddies while keepin' the target sign offa -- me an' my fambly... Ya might know that many who write on the stack have been targeted in all sorts'a ways--lit'rally included--which ain't good, no how...
I admit ta sometimes bein' snarky--but I'm not cruel as ya say. I've seen folks go off on these stacks purdy badly but I alway try ta be a laydee.
"Persona?" a "game ta fool folks?" As I said, imagine whut'cha like--I spend a lotta time on my stacks AND in makin' my replies when I deem it wurthy--which it often is. What you call "intentional denigration in the guise of fun" ain't what I do but if that's whut my words mean to you--so be it.
"To each his own said the lady when she kissed her cow!" By all means WARN 'em all about me--good job! Well done! Scam alert--do not read whut the crackpot lady writes! Sir (I'm assumin' yer a fella, no?) if ya don't see anythin' good in whut I scribe, by all means hit the delete key... you accuse falsely but if that shoe fits by all means wear it! But it's not nice fer Pirates ta make ladies walk the plank ;-)
Here I repeat Myself - though perhaps not to You... My father taught Me never to believe anything. He told Me to place probabilities and adjust them as new data come along, asking the question, "Does that explain what I see?," so I believe nothing. LOL!
I was raised without religion - lots of love and Ethics, but no religion. And so far, I have not needed it to explain what I see. [shrug] What will happen when I die? Guess I will find out then!
In order to interpret ANYTHING, humans need an interpretive frame. That frame is usually based on something that the person deems to be necessary for life ("existential need"). That assumption becomes the fundamental tenet, the premise based on which all future experience is interpreted by the same person.
As Kant already proved it, the knowledge of right and wrong can be based only on the Divine. Otherwise, the secularized version is watered down to Rodney King's "Why can't we all get along?"
I shall dispute Kant. If You were to ask every Human if it's okay to do to Them any of the things proscribed in the three Laws of Ethics, to a One They will say no... In fact... I just did an article on this...
A Discussion I Had on Ethics: https://amaterasusolar.substack.com/p/a-discussion-i-had-on-ethics
Everything else is a matter of taste.
The three Laws of Ethics (Natural Law expressed as the three things not to do):
1. Do not willfully and without fully informed consent hurt or kill the flesh of anOther
2. Do not willfully and without fully informed consent take or damage anything that does not belong to You alone
3. Do not willfully defraud anOther (which can only happen without fully informed consent)
It's great to see you are thinking for yourself! That makes you one of the select few.
Your tenets are commendable, but they also overlap the Ten Commandments. Besides, as my text suggests, only divine revelation can show right from wrong, because everything else lacks the divine perspective.
Kant, is traditional philosophy, went as far as possible. Please, check out his Prolegomena, if you have the time and the inclination. Everything after him is compartmentalized; he managed to point out the limit of human judgment.
Yes, the ten commandments weakly express the Laws. And I cannot say the ten commandments are "divine..." SomeOne wanting to control Others could have written them. All religions I have studied could have been.
And "worship Me or else" is divine? I am an Ethical One, also caring, loving and giving, and if that is not good enough for any "God," that "God" is not One I could worship. Just saying.
Both approaches are traps. The “western” one-life-only exerts incredible pressure: you must be a success in your life. If you fail, which is inevitable because you have no experience in success, your net worth goes negative. Problem. If you manage well, but you fail at some time in the future, your peers will do the thing. Check stock quotes and how they depend on whims of “stakeholders”.
This fear of not finding the right balance between failure and success in progress pushes the mind into various directions. Everywhere, except the now. And you focus on work, business, management, at the expense of your family, children, relationships with neighbors and with yourself.
The “eastern” way means “whatever you do, you can do nothing about things as they develop”. If you fail, it comes from your past karma. If you succeed, who knows, maybe you will fail tomorrow. No need to worry. Next lifetime, you will do better. And the now is neglected, although in a different way.
Too much mind, too much time.
Just be here. You cannot predict any future, even a minute. Dragging your past with you is pointless, you can do nothing about it. The now is the only energy alive.
"Too many minds" can certainly be a problem and, more often than not, it probably is.
Focusing on the present is impossible without an interpretive frame (the senses are conditioned to notice certain things and ignore the rest), which about 95% of humans are lacking, because they can only think inductively. Deductive thinking cannot be evaded for a live cognitive model of the world:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/a-formidable-tool-at-your-disposal
Success and failure can be defined in specific systems. Which one are you and I talking about?
Actually, as I said, humans are imperfect no matter how million times they would try to be perfect, which is why they need divine redemption. If that's a trap, I'll let it be.
Success in life just doesn't add up without an eschatological perspective.
The stock market has always been rigged, so it might not be the best analogy, but your example is perfect for showing how people can be conditioned. Small lies are pointed out to make people believe big ones from the same sources (limited hangout).
Fatalism and karma, in my understanding, are two different things. Even karma has two meanings depending on the culture, but I like that you carry the outcome of your action with you:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/crime-and-punishment
Of course, as the Dalai Lama put it, if they mean to harm me, I have the right to defend myself (well, that's also ancient Catholic teaching).
I'm sure you mean more than what you are saying, when you say "just be there." If you could elaborate, your contribution might be invaluable.
“Too much mind” - one mind, and it is already too much. We are conditioned to think our way through life, and it works, somehow, until one day… we fall in love, or a sudden groundbreaking event (usually involving a loss of some kind) occurs, and we are stopped in our mind tracks. And we forget all the mind - because the life has knocked on our doors, and the doors opened…
I don’t mean “focusing” on the present - I mean being in the present, without thinking ahead of what is happening and without recalling the past. We find ourselves very often in this state, we just are not trained to recognize it.
It’s like… you are doing what you are doing, and the situation requires your presence - you need to attend to the activities at hand. Like an operating surgeon. Despite your expertise and knowledge, every operation is new. And you have a limit of time, so you enter an altered state of mind (the western term) or you flow with what is (the eastern view). You make choices, do cuts, and re-arrange the patient’s body guided by unique, highly specific snippets from your training. These “hints” (or guidance) come as they are. You do not review 20 options while the patient is cooling down… This is being there.
Being available to the moment. Doing what is asking to be done. Old-style farmers know this and live by this every day. They go out in the field, cover their crops, or take their animals home in midday, with beautiful weather, no reason to do this. Half an hour later, boom, a sudden storm or wind… No mind there, no decisions, no thinking.
The constant battle to be successful at the risk of being a failure is pointless. People let society judge them as they desire to keep up with the Jones's of the world. The true self has no concerns about success and failure other than from a practical view. One's successes and failures are not the defining criterion of a life well lived or just lived.
Because the emphasis is being shifted from finding fulfillment to “winning” as perceived by others. Maybe.
Perhaps success or failure is not the point, but a life well lived is.