Sathya Sai Baba created a mobile hospital unit as an extension of his free health service to the poor. They travel around Andhra Pradesh to serve villagers who cannot travel to brick and mortar hospitals.
Runs 15 minutes.
Showing posts with label Love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Love. Show all posts
Thursday, April 21, 2016
Saturday, August 1, 2015
Suffering and The Meaning of Life
Fitting in with what I've written two weeks ago about reincarnation, I'll talk here about the meaning of life.
Michael Prescott has some speculations about why there is suffering in the world where an intelligent but not omniscient God created the world to gain life experience. Here's what I left as a comment.
I don't like the idea of God creating the universe to experience things. That seems like a cosmic version of the TV show Jackass. "Wouldn't it be cool to see what it would be like to get burned alive in a car crash? Maybe I could get out before getting killed? Wouldn't that be fun to see if I could?" It's a bit of an oversimplification, but it seems to reduce God or Spirit or even individual souls to adrenaline junkies, or at the very least people who are extremely bored with too much free time. Seeking experience for the sake of experience seems so very underwhelming to me. In its absolute worst form, as seen in some versions of "new age" literature, souls plan their lives beforehand in minute details, so you end up with a scenario where souls are basically masochists. A group of souls floating around planning their next life together when one soul says to the others "I'll be the child and you'll be my parents. At age five, no four and a half, I'll get cancer and die and break your hearts. Then, fifty years of misery later, you'll die and we'll meet up back here and I'll point and laugh and say 'fooled ya!' Then, the next go around I'll be the parent and you two can be the children who die. It will be rousing great fun!"
There are two explanations for this world of suffering that I see merit to. They both say primarily that our purpose here is to escape the world and only really differ in explaining how we got stuck here in the first place, to a degree.
In the perennial traditions and in A Course in Miracles, we individual souls exist because God needed someone to love. It's not loneliness in the everyday sense, because God lacks nothing. This is a higher level need based on over-abundance. God is so overflowing with love that it wanted someone to share it with. The world itself is seen as illusory, but even if it's not there need be no problem with suffering at all.
"Natural suffering" like volcanoes and asteroids and having to kill other creatures to survive is an easy one. The world is pretty close to as optimal as one can get. The photoreceptors in the eye can detect single photons, so they can't get any better, for example. There are trade-offs to everything because of the physical constraints of the world (which need to be unimaginably precise to permit the universe and life to exist). Humans have easily injured backs and knees, and narrow hips make childbirth painful, but those are offset by the greater benefits that are gotten through walking upright. So natural suffering can be explained through utilitarianism. Certain unpleasant situations must exist to permit much greater benefits.
The much bigger problem is human caused suffering, like rape and murder and war. That is traditionally explained through the free will defense. God wants us to share in the divine love voluntarily. Forcing us to love would be a form of metaphysical rape.
Even if the world is to an extent "real", more good is wrought through the way the world is than the bad caused by the suffering. We can share in love in more ways, even if we choose not to. Suffering then is no longer God's problem, it is a problem of our own refusal to be moral and treat one another as we should.
Of course, if the world is illusory, then we are tricking ourselves into thinking this suffering exists and our goal is to realize this and get out and back to the perfection into which we were created.
A Course in Miracles explains this wonderfully. God did not create the world, we did, and suffering exists because of our fear and guilt. Unsatisfied with the equal love God was giving to all of us in perfection, we (who find ourselves in this universe) demanded special love. We wanted to be loved more. When God refused to give in to our egoistic demands we then imagined this world up where we could be special. The dream of suffering and death "prove" we are more powerful than the God who refused us the special status we "deserve". Knowing we can't really hurt ourselves, God permits us to sulk in the corner until we get over our upset. At the same time God descended into the dream to remind us that we are dreaming and can wake up at any time when we are ready to return to the perfection into which we were created.
It makes sense because real people do this all the time. There is nothing new that we can't test about what may or may not be the motivations of spirits who want to experience horrible things just to see what it's like. The psychology of the Course is real world human psychology and can be seen in child development all over the world. Children sulk. Adults sulk. We project our emotions and delusions onto the world. We punish ourselves unnecessarily out of misplaced guilt. It makes sense to suppose that if we do this on Earth than we would do the same on a grander scale in some higher dimension. There's nothing in it that resembles speculation about what stunts Superman would pull to see if he could jump off the Empire State Building or whatever.
Suffering acts also as a motivation to escape the world. It acts as a motivation to do good to others so that we can grow in wisdom and compassion. So we move up the evolutionary ladder from plants to animals on to humans, and while the capacity for suffering increases so too do the benefits increase at a much faster rate. So a plant suffers less than a cow but it gets less out of life than the cow, and the cow suffers less than a human but it gets less out of life than the human. And this continues until we realize that the world is illusory and then we can either leave it forever or we can take the path of the bodhisattva and deliberately return to the world and choose to suffer more to alleviate the suffering of others. We can grow into perfect expressions of morality rather than just being bored and bouncing around the universe to see what it's like.
And as I've written over a thousand words by now I'll end here.
Michael Prescott has some speculations about why there is suffering in the world where an intelligent but not omniscient God created the world to gain life experience. Here's what I left as a comment.
I don't like the idea of God creating the universe to experience things. That seems like a cosmic version of the TV show Jackass. "Wouldn't it be cool to see what it would be like to get burned alive in a car crash? Maybe I could get out before getting killed? Wouldn't that be fun to see if I could?" It's a bit of an oversimplification, but it seems to reduce God or Spirit or even individual souls to adrenaline junkies, or at the very least people who are extremely bored with too much free time. Seeking experience for the sake of experience seems so very underwhelming to me. In its absolute worst form, as seen in some versions of "new age" literature, souls plan their lives beforehand in minute details, so you end up with a scenario where souls are basically masochists. A group of souls floating around planning their next life together when one soul says to the others "I'll be the child and you'll be my parents. At age five, no four and a half, I'll get cancer and die and break your hearts. Then, fifty years of misery later, you'll die and we'll meet up back here and I'll point and laugh and say 'fooled ya!' Then, the next go around I'll be the parent and you two can be the children who die. It will be rousing great fun!"
There are two explanations for this world of suffering that I see merit to. They both say primarily that our purpose here is to escape the world and only really differ in explaining how we got stuck here in the first place, to a degree.
In the perennial traditions and in A Course in Miracles, we individual souls exist because God needed someone to love. It's not loneliness in the everyday sense, because God lacks nothing. This is a higher level need based on over-abundance. God is so overflowing with love that it wanted someone to share it with. The world itself is seen as illusory, but even if it's not there need be no problem with suffering at all.
"Natural suffering" like volcanoes and asteroids and having to kill other creatures to survive is an easy one. The world is pretty close to as optimal as one can get. The photoreceptors in the eye can detect single photons, so they can't get any better, for example. There are trade-offs to everything because of the physical constraints of the world (which need to be unimaginably precise to permit the universe and life to exist). Humans have easily injured backs and knees, and narrow hips make childbirth painful, but those are offset by the greater benefits that are gotten through walking upright. So natural suffering can be explained through utilitarianism. Certain unpleasant situations must exist to permit much greater benefits.
The much bigger problem is human caused suffering, like rape and murder and war. That is traditionally explained through the free will defense. God wants us to share in the divine love voluntarily. Forcing us to love would be a form of metaphysical rape.
Even if the world is to an extent "real", more good is wrought through the way the world is than the bad caused by the suffering. We can share in love in more ways, even if we choose not to. Suffering then is no longer God's problem, it is a problem of our own refusal to be moral and treat one another as we should.
Of course, if the world is illusory, then we are tricking ourselves into thinking this suffering exists and our goal is to realize this and get out and back to the perfection into which we were created.
A Course in Miracles explains this wonderfully. God did not create the world, we did, and suffering exists because of our fear and guilt. Unsatisfied with the equal love God was giving to all of us in perfection, we (who find ourselves in this universe) demanded special love. We wanted to be loved more. When God refused to give in to our egoistic demands we then imagined this world up where we could be special. The dream of suffering and death "prove" we are more powerful than the God who refused us the special status we "deserve". Knowing we can't really hurt ourselves, God permits us to sulk in the corner until we get over our upset. At the same time God descended into the dream to remind us that we are dreaming and can wake up at any time when we are ready to return to the perfection into which we were created.
It makes sense because real people do this all the time. There is nothing new that we can't test about what may or may not be the motivations of spirits who want to experience horrible things just to see what it's like. The psychology of the Course is real world human psychology and can be seen in child development all over the world. Children sulk. Adults sulk. We project our emotions and delusions onto the world. We punish ourselves unnecessarily out of misplaced guilt. It makes sense to suppose that if we do this on Earth than we would do the same on a grander scale in some higher dimension. There's nothing in it that resembles speculation about what stunts Superman would pull to see if he could jump off the Empire State Building or whatever.
Suffering acts also as a motivation to escape the world. It acts as a motivation to do good to others so that we can grow in wisdom and compassion. So we move up the evolutionary ladder from plants to animals on to humans, and while the capacity for suffering increases so too do the benefits increase at a much faster rate. So a plant suffers less than a cow but it gets less out of life than the cow, and the cow suffers less than a human but it gets less out of life than the human. And this continues until we realize that the world is illusory and then we can either leave it forever or we can take the path of the bodhisattva and deliberately return to the world and choose to suffer more to alleviate the suffering of others. We can grow into perfect expressions of morality rather than just being bored and bouncing around the universe to see what it's like.
And as I've written over a thousand words by now I'll end here.
Thursday, December 4, 2014
Building a Civilization of Love
Catholic priest Rev. Jeffrey Mickler explains what love really is, what it is not, why every society in history has built itself around the natural family, and what horrors result from modern societies breaking with fifty thousand years of common sense. Runs 30 minutes.
Thursday, December 12, 2013
Eternal Day
A lovely short program (22 minutes) on the Super Specialty Hospitals founded by Sai Baba. This is in celebration of the 22nd anniversay of the hospitals, which opened in 1991. Tragically, Swami cannot be here in person to witness this event, but he is ever present, even if we cannot see his body.
The lovely ideal of selfless service (seva) is exemplified in this pair of free hospitals which have thus far helped 2.3 million patients.
This is the ideal. This is totally different from universal healthcare/ socialised medicine/ single payer. When people give of themselves of their own will selflessly that is the highest virtue. When a government steals money from people and redistributes it as it sees fit that is worse than thievery. A government cannot mandate morality, or else the value is totally removed. One cannot be moral or virtuous if one is compelled to act in such a way. It is only through one's own will that one may be virtuous.
The lovely ideal of selfless service (seva) is exemplified in this pair of free hospitals which have thus far helped 2.3 million patients.
This is the ideal. This is totally different from universal healthcare/ socialised medicine/ single payer. When people give of themselves of their own will selflessly that is the highest virtue. When a government steals money from people and redistributes it as it sees fit that is worse than thievery. A government cannot mandate morality, or else the value is totally removed. One cannot be moral or virtuous if one is compelled to act in such a way. It is only through one's own will that one may be virtuous.
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Mary, Did You Know?
Cee Lo Green performing "Mary, Did You Know?", the official video for the television series "The Bible". Just beautiful.
Thursday, December 20, 2012
The End of the World
In the great film Alexander, Hephaestion, Alexander's life long companion, asks Alexander "What would you do if you ever reached the end of the world?" At the other end of the world, near the International Date Line it is already 2 PM on Friday. Friday, 21 December 2012, the end of the world. According to some people, tomorrow (or today in some places that are already tomorrow) will be the last day ever, or something. To be fair, I had my own story "The L", which I began writing in 2006, have the end of the world begin tomorrow, when The Pinnacle Research Group initiated a global disaster from Bouvet Island. In my story the 21st is only the beginning of the end of the world, with the world not ending completely until fifteen years later after great tribulations have claimed five billion lives and ravaged the surface of the Earth.
It has been six years since I began my mystical career in January 2006, and started writing The Urban Mystic in February that same year (on AOL, which no longer exits, so you cannot access past archives which I have saved). It has been five years since I had my first taste of radical Freedom, One Taste, in January 2007, when the world was on the inside and my eyes were on the outside and my self was blasted across the face of the Kosmos. It has been four years since Christmas 2008 when I had a dream about the end of the world, 21 December 2012, where balls of light came to Earth and began erasing everything they touched. It has been nearly two years since I discovered My Little Pony, something that has really touched me and helped affect my life for the better. I have made predictions: the "Arab Spring", genetically modified viruses that mimic psychotropic drugs, the "Great Winter of 2010", among others. These past six years have been full of ups and downs, but I wouldn't trade them for the life I lived before.
Now, it seems like it is the end of the world. This year I was told that I need to make sacrifices to enter the next phase of my mystical career. The choice is mine, but it is a choice between being a mystic and living a normal life, and it is the greatest choice of my life, and the most difficult. A mirror reflects everything that falls on it, without altering the thing it is reflecting or becoming attached to it. A mirror mind, the mind of enlightenment, is the same. Cutting the fetters of attachment is necessary for enlightenment, and there are a few that seem too well entrenched in my psyche to be cut loose. If I go down this path farther I must deal with the death of the small self and all the little things it has accumulated over the years. What's really interesting is, I was told this would happen in the beginning! I was told in 2006 I would have these choices to make in 2012. I was told what to expect and when to expect it, and I failed to notice until most of the signs already passed and it was too late to prepare, just yesterday. Regardless of what happens in the external world tomorrow, it may well be the end of the world for my little self.
Come what may, it will be for the best. It has been a wonderful time, dear couple of readers (actually about 20 a day). I love you all.
Always Love.
It has been six years since I began my mystical career in January 2006, and started writing The Urban Mystic in February that same year (on AOL, which no longer exits, so you cannot access past archives which I have saved). It has been five years since I had my first taste of radical Freedom, One Taste, in January 2007, when the world was on the inside and my eyes were on the outside and my self was blasted across the face of the Kosmos. It has been four years since Christmas 2008 when I had a dream about the end of the world, 21 December 2012, where balls of light came to Earth and began erasing everything they touched. It has been nearly two years since I discovered My Little Pony, something that has really touched me and helped affect my life for the better. I have made predictions: the "Arab Spring", genetically modified viruses that mimic psychotropic drugs, the "Great Winter of 2010", among others. These past six years have been full of ups and downs, but I wouldn't trade them for the life I lived before.
Now, it seems like it is the end of the world. This year I was told that I need to make sacrifices to enter the next phase of my mystical career. The choice is mine, but it is a choice between being a mystic and living a normal life, and it is the greatest choice of my life, and the most difficult. A mirror reflects everything that falls on it, without altering the thing it is reflecting or becoming attached to it. A mirror mind, the mind of enlightenment, is the same. Cutting the fetters of attachment is necessary for enlightenment, and there are a few that seem too well entrenched in my psyche to be cut loose. If I go down this path farther I must deal with the death of the small self and all the little things it has accumulated over the years. What's really interesting is, I was told this would happen in the beginning! I was told in 2006 I would have these choices to make in 2012. I was told what to expect and when to expect it, and I failed to notice until most of the signs already passed and it was too late to prepare, just yesterday. Regardless of what happens in the external world tomorrow, it may well be the end of the world for my little self.
Come what may, it will be for the best. It has been a wonderful time, dear couple of readers (actually about 20 a day). I love you all.
Always Love.
Saturday, November 17, 2012
Veterans Day 2012
Hurricane Sandy made me late.
Here is the famous scene of the flag raising on Iwo Jima in black and white.
Here is the famous scene of the flag raising on Iwo Jima in black and white.
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
The 9/11 Bible
Yesterday was the eleventh aniversary of 9/11. Here is a video produced by the History Channel that really moved me.
Of all the items found among the rubble was a Bible fused to a piece of steel. The Bible was open to the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew Chapter 5. Could this be God's message to America after the attacks? I don't know, but of all the verses it was this that the Bible was opened to by the falling towers.
38 "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'
39 "But I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.
40 "If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him ahve your cloak also.
41 "And whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two.
42 "Give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you do not turn away.
43 "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'
44 "But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,
45 "That you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
46 "For if you love those you love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
47 "And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so?
48 "Therefore you shall be perfet, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.
Of all the items found among the rubble was a Bible fused to a piece of steel. The Bible was open to the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew Chapter 5. Could this be God's message to America after the attacks? I don't know, but of all the verses it was this that the Bible was opened to by the falling towers.
38 "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'
39 "But I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.
40 "If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him ahve your cloak also.
41 "And whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two.
42 "Give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you do not turn away.
43 "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'
44 "But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,
45 "That you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
46 "For if you love those you love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
47 "And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so?
48 "Therefore you shall be perfet, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
The Witness, the Ego, and the Shadow Walk into a Bar...
This is a bit personal, but it is actually really really good. I did a little (a lot actually) of introspection starting at around 10:50 PM yesterday and just finished up. It's sort of a dialogue between my normal personality and my more distant Witness. It's an integration (or an attempt at integration) between the Witness, the Ego, and the Shadow. I'm not saying I succeeded in much of anything but I am feeling a lot better now. The Ego and Witness do most of the talking (Witness is always in italics) and the Shadow chimes in some times. It can be a bit hard to follow. This is not as effective as the 3-2-1 technique I've done once before, but at the time I started I didn't really know what was going on.
Thinking Allowed
I was thinking about [Name Withheld] today. I'm dissatisfied with my otherwise boring life. I want one of those crazy drug and party lives.
Why?
Because self-destructive women have crazy drug and party lives.
Why should that matter?
Because I want a self-destructive woman.
Why the hell would you want that?
Because [Name Withheld] was a self-destructive woman and I want her back.
Why?
Because that part of my life, my being with her, if you can call it that, was a failure. She wounded me. I opened myself up to being wounded and I've been trying to remedy that ever since by finding a replacement for her whom I can conquer. I'm looking for a [Name Withheld] substitute because I want her.
I wanted to make her feel special. I wanted to make her feel loved. I wanted to hold her and protect her and just be with her – just the two of us. I'm full and she's empty and I want to empty myself into her.
I understand this is asinine on an intellectual level but it still hurts.
Is that okay?
I actually felt like crying but then I called myself a pussy so I didn't.
Do you really want her back?
What do you mean?
What is it that you really want? I mean, you weren't fulfilled when you were with her, were you?
I guess not.
So what is it that you really want if it's not to be back with her?
I don't know.
Maybe you were wounded before you met her? I'm not saying ending with her wasn't tough, but maybe you wanted someone who was damaged not because you had benevolent intentions, but because you wanted someone to shit on you. Maybe you wanted someone to check your anger. Anger is your sin, is it not? You set out to fail and you succeeded in that because you wanted to be shot down.
Why? Because I was angry with myself? Is that it? I was angry with myself and I wanted someone to tear my heart out?
I think so.
I feel powerless and that makes me angry. I focus my anger inward because I feel I should be more than this. It was different then – the specific conditions that is – but the feeling is still there. The feeling of powerlessness. This world has never made sense to me. It's always felt like exile. I'm here as penance. I left my eternal home, my ultimate freedom, my omnipotence, and I find myself in this tiny, limited, frightened body in this alien world and I don't know why and I want out. I look for what I am missing in myself out there, but I know it's not out there so I look for it in a way that I know I will fail to remind myself that the solution lies within, not without.
There is also the fullness and emptiness thing. I do want to fill what is empty, and empty what is full. I want to be empty. I want to return to emptiness. The ultimate effulgence wants to get out, to spread, to radiate on as many others as possible.
I guess I'm just lonely and I want someone to be lonely with? Is that it? I want to be with someone who is as confused as me, someone who is as lonely as me, as desparate for filling what is empty and emptying what is full as me. On one level I want to expand in love, which is my true nature, and since I can't do that to the fullest extent I get frustrated. On the other my little self wants validation in its state of confusion – in its state of being lost. It is the struggle between self and Self. I guess that doesn't go away.
No, it does not. Ego is always there at some level, and it's not bad either. Ego is just "I". Letting the Ego run around uncontrolled is bad, but when tamed it can be used for good. This is all a normal part of spiritual development.
-------------
I was going to include a KW video on the Ego and the Witness but it seem to have been taken down, so here's something else.
Thinking Allowed
I was thinking about [Name Withheld] today. I'm dissatisfied with my otherwise boring life. I want one of those crazy drug and party lives.
Why?
Because self-destructive women have crazy drug and party lives.
Why should that matter?
Because I want a self-destructive woman.
Why the hell would you want that?
Because [Name Withheld] was a self-destructive woman and I want her back.
Why?
Because that part of my life, my being with her, if you can call it that, was a failure. She wounded me. I opened myself up to being wounded and I've been trying to remedy that ever since by finding a replacement for her whom I can conquer. I'm looking for a [Name Withheld] substitute because I want her.
I wanted to make her feel special. I wanted to make her feel loved. I wanted to hold her and protect her and just be with her – just the two of us. I'm full and she's empty and I want to empty myself into her.
I understand this is asinine on an intellectual level but it still hurts.
Is that okay?
I actually felt like crying but then I called myself a pussy so I didn't.
Do you really want her back?
What do you mean?
What is it that you really want? I mean, you weren't fulfilled when you were with her, were you?
I guess not.
So what is it that you really want if it's not to be back with her?
I don't know.
Maybe you were wounded before you met her? I'm not saying ending with her wasn't tough, but maybe you wanted someone who was damaged not because you had benevolent intentions, but because you wanted someone to shit on you. Maybe you wanted someone to check your anger. Anger is your sin, is it not? You set out to fail and you succeeded in that because you wanted to be shot down.
Why? Because I was angry with myself? Is that it? I was angry with myself and I wanted someone to tear my heart out?
I think so.
I feel powerless and that makes me angry. I focus my anger inward because I feel I should be more than this. It was different then – the specific conditions that is – but the feeling is still there. The feeling of powerlessness. This world has never made sense to me. It's always felt like exile. I'm here as penance. I left my eternal home, my ultimate freedom, my omnipotence, and I find myself in this tiny, limited, frightened body in this alien world and I don't know why and I want out. I look for what I am missing in myself out there, but I know it's not out there so I look for it in a way that I know I will fail to remind myself that the solution lies within, not without.
There is also the fullness and emptiness thing. I do want to fill what is empty, and empty what is full. I want to be empty. I want to return to emptiness. The ultimate effulgence wants to get out, to spread, to radiate on as many others as possible.
I guess I'm just lonely and I want someone to be lonely with? Is that it? I want to be with someone who is as confused as me, someone who is as lonely as me, as desparate for filling what is empty and emptying what is full as me. On one level I want to expand in love, which is my true nature, and since I can't do that to the fullest extent I get frustrated. On the other my little self wants validation in its state of confusion – in its state of being lost. It is the struggle between self and Self. I guess that doesn't go away.
No, it does not. Ego is always there at some level, and it's not bad either. Ego is just "I". Letting the Ego run around uncontrolled is bad, but when tamed it can be used for good. This is all a normal part of spiritual development.
-------------
I was going to include a KW video on the Ego and the Witness but it seem to have been taken down, so here's something else.
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Plutarch On Love (Repost - 15 February 2008)
I was reading Plutarch's Dialogue on Love when I got to thinking. Daphnaeus, who plays the part of Plutarch, seems to have some very good things to say about sexuality, responsibility, and self-satisfaction.
The modern notions of human sexuality would be completely alien to the ancient Greeks as their notions are alien to people living today. People from Greece, today, complained about Oliver Stone's movie Alexander for portraying Alexander the Great as a homosexual, yet not only does the film not portray Alexander as homosexual (even considering the one minute deleted scene where Alexander and Bagoas are getting ready to have sex) but the concept didn't exist in his time that exists today. What happened between a man and a woman, or a man and a man, or a woman and a woman, or a woman and a woman and a man (I don't need to go through all the combinations) was a seperate sphere of society as what happened at home to keep your duty to the state. People persued sexual liasons outside the home, with members of the same sex and the opposite sex and at the end of the day went home and (at least tried) to be good spouses and to have children and raise them right. Sex could be about individual physical pleasure but it also was a show of power and authority one person held over a subordinate. How would you show you are someone's superior -- through sexual acts.
The ancient Greeks made it clear: you are free to express yourself sexually any way you want, but society runs by order and every member of that society has a duty to fulfill (a dharma) to keep that order in place and assure everybody is happy and safe. And what is one of the primary duties a Greek citizen has to uphold the order? That would be to create and maintain a good home and to have children. What you do at home is for the children, not for you; what you do outside the home is for you, but at home you have a duty to your children because they are the future of the state and maintaining the order of the state is your duty. When you put it like that notions of homosexuals and heterosexuals seem unimportant. Marriage isn't about love, it's about children; it's about admitting there's something bigger and more important than your petty self-endulgence and your personal enjoyment. I think in our culture ruled by materialism we have forgotten this.
And what did Plutarch say? Protogenes is going on for hours about how women are incapable of feeling love and that the only true love that can exist is betwen two men (actually between a man and a boy), and that it is only begrudgingly he fulfills the lawful requirement of having kids with his wife. After courteously letting him talk for a long time Daphnaeus chuckles and retorts something to the effect of "well, Protogenes, you say that you cannot know love except the love that exists between two men but we all know what happens between you and your wife when you get home, and you certainly don't seem to be reluctant or antipathetic about it."
The modern notions of human sexuality would be completely alien to the ancient Greeks as their notions are alien to people living today. People from Greece, today, complained about Oliver Stone's movie Alexander for portraying Alexander the Great as a homosexual, yet not only does the film not portray Alexander as homosexual (even considering the one minute deleted scene where Alexander and Bagoas are getting ready to have sex) but the concept didn't exist in his time that exists today. What happened between a man and a woman, or a man and a man, or a woman and a woman, or a woman and a woman and a man (I don't need to go through all the combinations) was a seperate sphere of society as what happened at home to keep your duty to the state. People persued sexual liasons outside the home, with members of the same sex and the opposite sex and at the end of the day went home and (at least tried) to be good spouses and to have children and raise them right. Sex could be about individual physical pleasure but it also was a show of power and authority one person held over a subordinate. How would you show you are someone's superior -- through sexual acts.
The ancient Greeks made it clear: you are free to express yourself sexually any way you want, but society runs by order and every member of that society has a duty to fulfill (a dharma) to keep that order in place and assure everybody is happy and safe. And what is one of the primary duties a Greek citizen has to uphold the order? That would be to create and maintain a good home and to have children. What you do at home is for the children, not for you; what you do outside the home is for you, but at home you have a duty to your children because they are the future of the state and maintaining the order of the state is your duty. When you put it like that notions of homosexuals and heterosexuals seem unimportant. Marriage isn't about love, it's about children; it's about admitting there's something bigger and more important than your petty self-endulgence and your personal enjoyment. I think in our culture ruled by materialism we have forgotten this.
And what did Plutarch say? Protogenes is going on for hours about how women are incapable of feeling love and that the only true love that can exist is betwen two men (actually between a man and a boy), and that it is only begrudgingly he fulfills the lawful requirement of having kids with his wife. After courteously letting him talk for a long time Daphnaeus chuckles and retorts something to the effect of "well, Protogenes, you say that you cannot know love except the love that exists between two men but we all know what happens between you and your wife when you get home, and you certainly don't seem to be reluctant or antipathetic about it."
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Exploring the Near Death Experience
Someone called TheSurvivalIndex has put out a 15 minute video detailing the cultural phenomena associated with the NDE. He says three main groups of people form the bulk of the popular presentation on the NDE:
1. Fundamentalist Christians,
2. New Age Haberdashers, and
3. Fundamaterialist Skep-Dicks.
Group 1 latches on to the pro-Fundamentalist Christian NDEs as proof of their beliefs and ignores or even denigrates NDEs that are favourable to other religions or to no religions at all (like atheists who have NDEs that tell them part of their life's mission is to be an atheist). Group 2 extrapolates from the NDE to believe all sorts of stuff that most likely is untrue (Loch Ness Monster, Fairies, Vampires, etc.*) and often tries to profit large offering spurious services to unknowledgable people. Group 3 likes to come up with bullshit just-so stories to explain away the NDE because they are committed to materialism, even when those stories blatantly ignore real facts, are based on illogic, and other fundamaterialists disagree and tear apart opposing stories. All three groups are able to thrive because the general populous doesn't actually read the primary material - actual NDE accounts and the reports of NDE investigators. Even though all three groups are contradicted by the evidence that doesn't bother them because as long as the vast majority of people are ignorant of that evidence they can still come off looking like authority figures.
*I'm not necessarily saying things like the Loch Ness Monster and fairies are not real - they may be - but I have looked into the topics and can't really find any good evidence for them. Loch Ness almost certainly can't support a single large creature, let alone a breeding population. There were biosonar signals detected in Lake Champlain though, indicating that, while not a "monster" there has to be a freshwater equivalent of a cetacean, something that has never before been seen. Things like fairies, gnomes, and other little people stretch my credulity a might, but they may have something to do with some spiritual force, I don't know and am open to the possibility. Vampires, either corpses reanimated by evil spirits (as the original vampires were), people infected with a virus that compells them to drink blood, or these psychic vampires who are real people who claim to drain people's energy in some way they never quite explain, are probably one of the least likely of these "paranormal" phenomena. If vampires reproduce like zombies there should have been a "vampire" apocalypse by now. The vampires in the Blade movies kept changing to suit the story and the Underworld vampires were never really explained very well, so I don't know how they stayed in hiding all these centuries. Psychic vampirism appears to be a lifestyle choice, like hippies or bikers other such groups, and probably aren't vampires at all, although they get happiness from playing a role. There are people who are difficult or depressed or assaholic and drain your energy that way, but there's nothing "paranormal" about that.
1. Fundamentalist Christians,
2. New Age Haberdashers, and
3. Fundamaterialist Skep-Dicks.
Group 1 latches on to the pro-Fundamentalist Christian NDEs as proof of their beliefs and ignores or even denigrates NDEs that are favourable to other religions or to no religions at all (like atheists who have NDEs that tell them part of their life's mission is to be an atheist). Group 2 extrapolates from the NDE to believe all sorts of stuff that most likely is untrue (Loch Ness Monster, Fairies, Vampires, etc.*) and often tries to profit large offering spurious services to unknowledgable people. Group 3 likes to come up with bullshit just-so stories to explain away the NDE because they are committed to materialism, even when those stories blatantly ignore real facts, are based on illogic, and other fundamaterialists disagree and tear apart opposing stories. All three groups are able to thrive because the general populous doesn't actually read the primary material - actual NDE accounts and the reports of NDE investigators. Even though all three groups are contradicted by the evidence that doesn't bother them because as long as the vast majority of people are ignorant of that evidence they can still come off looking like authority figures.
*I'm not necessarily saying things like the Loch Ness Monster and fairies are not real - they may be - but I have looked into the topics and can't really find any good evidence for them. Loch Ness almost certainly can't support a single large creature, let alone a breeding population. There were biosonar signals detected in Lake Champlain though, indicating that, while not a "monster" there has to be a freshwater equivalent of a cetacean, something that has never before been seen. Things like fairies, gnomes, and other little people stretch my credulity a might, but they may have something to do with some spiritual force, I don't know and am open to the possibility. Vampires, either corpses reanimated by evil spirits (as the original vampires were), people infected with a virus that compells them to drink blood, or these psychic vampires who are real people who claim to drain people's energy in some way they never quite explain, are probably one of the least likely of these "paranormal" phenomena. If vampires reproduce like zombies there should have been a "vampire" apocalypse by now. The vampires in the Blade movies kept changing to suit the story and the Underworld vampires were never really explained very well, so I don't know how they stayed in hiding all these centuries. Psychic vampirism appears to be a lifestyle choice, like hippies or bikers other such groups, and probably aren't vampires at all, although they get happiness from playing a role. There are people who are difficult or depressed or assaholic and drain your energy that way, but there's nothing "paranormal" about that.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
The One Beyond Duality
Prior to being. Above essence. Here is a thirty minute lecture with Prof. Philip Cary on Plotinus, Neoplatonism, and the unity of all things. First is a diagram I made while listening of Plotinus' cosmology:
In the center is the One, beyond distinctions, the source of all existence, shining like the sun. Around it is the Divine Mind (Nous), which is suffused with the light of the One. It is perfect in its intelligence and is unmoved and unchanging. Beyond this is the Soul. When turned in, to take part in the perfection of the Divine Mind, it is the one World Soul. When turned out it takes on the multiplicity of every individual soul. Beyond this is the world of matter and seperation, suffering, desire, and death. The soul looks out and falsly identifies with images in the physical world. Everything is created as an outflowing of the One, its superabundance, although it is not actually doing anything. The rays of the One become more and more diffuse the farther out one goes, and the more imperfect and fragmented things become.
Here is another 30 minute lecture, also by Prof. Cary, that gets into Plotinus' spirituality. I think it is actually better than the first.
In the center is the One, beyond distinctions, the source of all existence, shining like the sun. Around it is the Divine Mind (Nous), which is suffused with the light of the One. It is perfect in its intelligence and is unmoved and unchanging. Beyond this is the Soul. When turned in, to take part in the perfection of the Divine Mind, it is the one World Soul. When turned out it takes on the multiplicity of every individual soul. Beyond this is the world of matter and seperation, suffering, desire, and death. The soul looks out and falsly identifies with images in the physical world. Everything is created as an outflowing of the One, its superabundance, although it is not actually doing anything. The rays of the One become more and more diffuse the farther out one goes, and the more imperfect and fragmented things become.Here is another 30 minute lecture, also by Prof. Cary, that gets into Plotinus' spirituality. I think it is actually better than the first.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Love All, Serve All
So many questions. I was sick and confused yesterday. Terrified of flying and drowning I was looking forward to the day that, in spite of those fears, I could afford to go to Prashanti Nilayam to have Baba's darshan, reassured in his earlier statement that he would be around another ten years.
Why did Baba choose to leave more than a decade early? Was his mission finished, or did he see the world falling apart as evidence that humanity no longer wished to listen to his message?
I know Baba produced often several Shiva Lingas every year as part of a big celebration (Lingodbhava). What did they do with them all? Is there a warehouse full of them somewhere or do they give them away?
Who will run Prashanti Nilayam now? Who will run the Sri Satya Sai Central Trust, estimated to hold assets worth $8 billion? Looking back at other gurus who started organizations, Yogananda, Ramakrishna, their organizations quickly became corrupt after their founders were no longer around to supervise everything. Will the same thing happen to Baba's organization? Will the millions helped by his charitable projects be neglected in coming years?
I made this picture late last night. Believe it or not, this is the first time I have ever drawn Swami.
Why did Baba choose to leave more than a decade early? Was his mission finished, or did he see the world falling apart as evidence that humanity no longer wished to listen to his message?
I know Baba produced often several Shiva Lingas every year as part of a big celebration (Lingodbhava). What did they do with them all? Is there a warehouse full of them somewhere or do they give them away?
Who will run Prashanti Nilayam now? Who will run the Sri Satya Sai Central Trust, estimated to hold assets worth $8 billion? Looking back at other gurus who started organizations, Yogananda, Ramakrishna, their organizations quickly became corrupt after their founders were no longer around to supervise everything. Will the same thing happen to Baba's organization? Will the millions helped by his charitable projects be neglected in coming years?
I made this picture late last night. Believe it or not, this is the first time I have ever drawn Swami.
Friday, April 22, 2011
The Miracle of Pure Love
I just got finished watching a 45 minute video from Radio Sai called "The Miracle of Pure Love" detailing Sri Sai Baba's charity work over the past several decades. I and many others are very concerned over Swami's health, which is very bad. He is in the hands of the best doctors available, in the hospital he built two decades ago this November.
The two Super Speciality Hospitals provide medical care completely free of charge to millions. According to the video during the last fiscal year the two hospitals provided three billion Rupees of medical care free of charge ($67.7 million or £41 million). My question is, where does all that money come from? That's a crap load of money, and as far as I can tell it all comes from donations, from the government (electricity is provided for free), from computer and medical equipment companies, and devotees all over the world.
Coupled with the university, the water projects, and numerous other endevours, how could anyone NOT like Baba? How could someone like Robert Priddy become a vicious, hate-filled man when he found out his "die-mind" ring was a zircon? How could former devotees come out with phony, unsubstantiated charges against Swami? Where does the hate come from against someone who has done so much good to so many millions of people? It doesn't matter whether you believe in Swami or not, he's done more good than all of his critics combined, and that alone is worthy of admiration. There are times I just don't understand the world, or maybe I don't want to understand it. It's times like this that we need Swami more than ever.
-Dee
The two Super Speciality Hospitals provide medical care completely free of charge to millions. According to the video during the last fiscal year the two hospitals provided three billion Rupees of medical care free of charge ($67.7 million or £41 million). My question is, where does all that money come from? That's a crap load of money, and as far as I can tell it all comes from donations, from the government (electricity is provided for free), from computer and medical equipment companies, and devotees all over the world.
Coupled with the university, the water projects, and numerous other endevours, how could anyone NOT like Baba? How could someone like Robert Priddy become a vicious, hate-filled man when he found out his "die-mind" ring was a zircon? How could former devotees come out with phony, unsubstantiated charges against Swami? Where does the hate come from against someone who has done so much good to so many millions of people? It doesn't matter whether you believe in Swami or not, he's done more good than all of his critics combined, and that alone is worthy of admiration. There are times I just don't understand the world, or maybe I don't want to understand it. It's times like this that we need Swami more than ever.
-Dee
Thursday, August 26, 2010
In The Company of The Lord
Yesterday, 26 August 2010, would have been the 100th birthday of Mother Teresa, the modern age's most famous saint. Born in 1910 in Albania, she traveled to India in 1929 where she would later take her religious vows two years later. In 1946 she had a mystical experience that prompted her to embark on a life of charity in 1948. For 50 years St. Teresa (she's one miracle away from "official" sainthood as described by the Catholic church, and I've no doubt she'll be proclaimed a saint within my lifetime) worked tirelessly serving the poor and destitute of India, those suffering from horrible disease, malnutrition, and crippling poverty. Although the owner of Empire State Building, Anthony Malkin, did not light his edifice blue and white to honour her, claiming he doesn't light it for religious figures, despite lighting the building to honour the end of Ramadan (this is America, don't forget, everyone with power is deathly afraid of Muslims and has to appease them, not realizing the difference between Muslims and terrorists), and lighting the tower for completely asinine reasons like a Mariah Carey album and the Ninja Turtles, The Urban Mystic none-the-less feels the need to commemorate a shining example of selfless service and the hights to which humans can aspire to. India opened a new train line, the Mother Express, in her honour yesterday.
Let us pray that more people are inspired by Mother Teresa's example and try to live their lives with love, especially now when the world is in such dire conditions.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
In the World, Not Of It
From The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
Wednesday, June 25, 1884
MASTER: ...."What is the use of making pilgrimages if you can attain love of God remaining where you are? I have been to Benares and noticed the same trees there as here. The same green tamarind-leaves!
"Pilgrimage becomes futile if it does not enable you to attain love of God. Love of God is the one essential and necessary thing. Do you know the meaning of 'kites' and 'vultures'? There are many people who talk big and who say that they have performed most of the duties enjoined in the scriptures. But with all that their minds are engrossed in worldliness and deeply preoccupied with money, riches, name, fame, creature comforts, and such things."
The Master was about to take his leave. The pundit and his friends bowed low before him.
It was not yet dusk, and Sri Ramakrishna returned to Ishan's house with the devotees. The Master took his seat in the drawing-room with Ishan and his sons, a pundit, and a few devotees.
MASTER (smiling, to Ishan): "I said to Pundit Shashadhar: 'You have hardly set your foot on the tree, and yet you aspire to lay hold of a big bunch of fruit. First of all practise some spiritual discipline; then you may teach others.'"
ISHAN: "Every preacher thinks that he enlightens others. The glow-worm also may think that it illuminates the world. Imagining this to be the glow-worm's feeling, someone said to it: 'O glow-worm, how can you bring light to the world? You only reveal the intensity of the darkness.'"
MASTER: (with a smile): "But Shashadahr is not just a scholar. He also has a little discrimination and dispassion."
The Master was about to leave for Dakshineswar. Ishan and the other devotees stood around him while he gave Ishan various words of advice.
MASTER: "A devotee who can call on God while living a householder's life is a hero indeed. God thinks: 'He who has renounced the world for My sake will surely pray to Me; he must serve Me. Is there anything very remarkable about it? People will cry shame on him if he fails to do so. But he is blessed indeed who prays to Me in the midst of his worldly duties. He is trying to find Me, overcoming a great obstacle – pushing away, as it were, a huge block of stone weighing a ton. Such a man is a real hero.'
"Live in the world like an ant. The world contains a mixture of truth and untruth, sugar and sand. Be an ant and take the sugar.
"Again, the world is a mixture of milk and water, the bliss of God-Consciousness and the pleasure of sense enjoyment. Be a swan and drink the milk, leaving the water aside.
(Pages 307-309)
Here Sri Ramakrishna makes two very good points about the search for God (the journey without distance):
1. God is everywhere. One does not need to visit some holy place, some temple or church, or make some grand physical journey to commune with God. All that matters is love. "Love of God is the one essential and necessary thing." People can make grand gestures of visiting holy sites to pray and yet have it all just be a show to win fame and recognition, whereas someone who is filled with the love of God can find God while going for a walk in the woods or helping a poor beggar on the streets.
2. One does not need to renounce the world to find God. Indeed, it is a truly great feat to find God while retaining one's worldly duties. Anyone can sell their possessions, become a monk, and meditate for twelve hours a day. That's no challenge at all. What is really difficult is to take the time to practice while not renouncing the world. Turning everyday activities into opportunities for consciousness growth, such as washing the dishes, maintaining ethical practices at work, and helping your aging parents. As Jesus said, be in the world but not of it (John 17: 14-16, though the exact phrase does not appear in the text, it is a nice, concise summary). You have a greater opportunity to grow in compassion and to see the universal love of God that permeates everyone by completing your duties in the world while remembering that you are not this little, limited, physical body born of the world.
A good example of this is Lahiri Mahasaya, the householder-yogi who reintroduced the lost art of Kriya Yoga to the world.
Wednesday, June 25, 1884
MASTER: ...."What is the use of making pilgrimages if you can attain love of God remaining where you are? I have been to Benares and noticed the same trees there as here. The same green tamarind-leaves!
"Pilgrimage becomes futile if it does not enable you to attain love of God. Love of God is the one essential and necessary thing. Do you know the meaning of 'kites' and 'vultures'? There are many people who talk big and who say that they have performed most of the duties enjoined in the scriptures. But with all that their minds are engrossed in worldliness and deeply preoccupied with money, riches, name, fame, creature comforts, and such things."
The Master was about to take his leave. The pundit and his friends bowed low before him.
It was not yet dusk, and Sri Ramakrishna returned to Ishan's house with the devotees. The Master took his seat in the drawing-room with Ishan and his sons, a pundit, and a few devotees.
MASTER (smiling, to Ishan): "I said to Pundit Shashadhar: 'You have hardly set your foot on the tree, and yet you aspire to lay hold of a big bunch of fruit. First of all practise some spiritual discipline; then you may teach others.'"
ISHAN: "Every preacher thinks that he enlightens others. The glow-worm also may think that it illuminates the world. Imagining this to be the glow-worm's feeling, someone said to it: 'O glow-worm, how can you bring light to the world? You only reveal the intensity of the darkness.'"
MASTER: (with a smile): "But Shashadahr is not just a scholar. He also has a little discrimination and dispassion."
The Master was about to leave for Dakshineswar. Ishan and the other devotees stood around him while he gave Ishan various words of advice.
MASTER: "A devotee who can call on God while living a householder's life is a hero indeed. God thinks: 'He who has renounced the world for My sake will surely pray to Me; he must serve Me. Is there anything very remarkable about it? People will cry shame on him if he fails to do so. But he is blessed indeed who prays to Me in the midst of his worldly duties. He is trying to find Me, overcoming a great obstacle – pushing away, as it were, a huge block of stone weighing a ton. Such a man is a real hero.'
"Live in the world like an ant. The world contains a mixture of truth and untruth, sugar and sand. Be an ant and take the sugar.
"Again, the world is a mixture of milk and water, the bliss of God-Consciousness and the pleasure of sense enjoyment. Be a swan and drink the milk, leaving the water aside.
(Pages 307-309)
Here Sri Ramakrishna makes two very good points about the search for God (the journey without distance):
1. God is everywhere. One does not need to visit some holy place, some temple or church, or make some grand physical journey to commune with God. All that matters is love. "Love of God is the one essential and necessary thing." People can make grand gestures of visiting holy sites to pray and yet have it all just be a show to win fame and recognition, whereas someone who is filled with the love of God can find God while going for a walk in the woods or helping a poor beggar on the streets.
2. One does not need to renounce the world to find God. Indeed, it is a truly great feat to find God while retaining one's worldly duties. Anyone can sell their possessions, become a monk, and meditate for twelve hours a day. That's no challenge at all. What is really difficult is to take the time to practice while not renouncing the world. Turning everyday activities into opportunities for consciousness growth, such as washing the dishes, maintaining ethical practices at work, and helping your aging parents. As Jesus said, be in the world but not of it (John 17: 14-16, though the exact phrase does not appear in the text, it is a nice, concise summary). You have a greater opportunity to grow in compassion and to see the universal love of God that permeates everyone by completing your duties in the world while remembering that you are not this little, limited, physical body born of the world.
A good example of this is Lahiri Mahasaya, the householder-yogi who reintroduced the lost art of Kriya Yoga to the world.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Monday, January 18, 2010
Celebrating Freedom
Dr. King might not have made it to the promised land, but we're moving toward his dream. A time when we all love one another and treat eachother with respect regardless of any petty differences in these physical bodies is approaching. I can't say when, but we are getting there. Here is his "I Have A Dream" speech.
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