Spray Painting Clouds
with Bubble Gum Dreams
Today I've been tricked... tricked into believing there will someday be peace and understanding... a world without war... a life that respects each and every one of us. But the reality always comes back and slaps me, sometimes gently and other times quite harshly, enough where I'm forced to ask myself what it is that I've done to deserve such treatment from myself? with Bubble Gum Dreams
I do know better. I have read and even accepted the Buddhist concept of impermanence which certainly includes those tricks that have played with me today, i.e. peace and understanding, etc., etc... Sure, we all have had our personal moments where we feel at peace with ourselves, moments when we feel we have an understanding of our world... and as far as war - war always subsides sooner or later giving us time to reflect upon our losses or gains derived from war. War is as impermanent as all things and stuff are. We have to regenerate and reconfigure our next moves as individuals, as communities, as countries... and this time we use is life without war. Not necessarily at peace, but without war.
As Buddhism states regarding impermanence of which there are five: the process of growing old, of not falling sick, of dying, of decay of things that are perishable and of the passing away of that which is liable to pass. These are the inevitability of existence which includes not only we hu'mans but all of life that inhabits our planet. Buddhism also speaks of an escape from these five processes - attaining Nirvana.
These processes are also spoken about in Hinduism although, not surprisingly, it deals with the answer a bit differently - impermanence can be overcome by finding then uniting with the center of permanence that exists within oneself. This center is the Soul or the self that is immortal, permanent and ever stable, (this I might add, is a process which attains a conclusion which is Nirvana).
To elaborate a bit on this, these 'escapes' from impermanence do not allow our hu'man bodies, this vessel for our True Self, to live permanently. That is expecting the unnatural to overcome the way of life, and wishfully believing our bodies will out survive the impermanence of all things of this world.
The inner being that all awakened religions have touched upon, is the same for all life. Life is not given by multiplicities but by an Absolute which is commonly referred to as 'God' or 'Allah' or a number of other names we have bestowed upon that which is, in reality, nameless... which makes it difficult to talk about, but being hu'man as we all are, we cannot do anything but talk... it is our nature to do so.
As a hu'man being, I am more than willing to talk about this subject which I find endlessly fascinating while on the other hand, equally frustrating to speak of clearly and as concisely as possible as to not overstate or even understate the facts behind what I am attempting to say. This is the number one reasoning behind religion, all religions great and small and in between. Each religion, even though they will assure their followers that their religion is principally one of the Five Great Religions, each religion or it's offshoot is but yet one more different way to explain the ideals and concepts that have given rise to the religion... or more easily understood, to explain or paraphrase the words of the individual who preached their own words that became that religion.
Christianity is a good example with several different sects each of which claim Jesus as their Lord and Master, but do so in a manner that the individual church finds more understandable and therefore acceptable. This is also the fact of any other religion.. which side do you choose to believe in? Normally that would be the side that offers the clearest and easiest path to travel in order for each person to find what it is they are looking for in a religion.
I find it foolish whenever I see those of the same religion but espousing different paths, (Protestant and Baptist; the 2 schools of Buddhism: Theravada and Mahayana; Islam with it's Shia and Sunni), fighting with each other somehow belittling their religious convictions. How important are their religions to them? How many of us become so entangled in our religion that we isolate ourselves to the extent where there is no room in our lives for anything beyond that singular belief in that religion? Once we learn and accept the fact that in actuality, the differences in religions are as different as each one of us. The common ground is no matter which religion we adopt into our lives, that religion came from the seed of a single person who had 'escaped' from the impermanence of life and became one with that Inner Self, that Single Light within each of us, and in so doing, that person did what any person will do - talked about their experiences in hopes that there will be at least one other that will listen... and even learn, just as they did.
We are all connected and joined at the spiritual hip, our consciousness at one with all. Like the single drop of the ocean is the same in that one drop as it is from which it came, one day in our evolutionary process, we will come to know our True Origin.. our True Self.
cecil
2.19.12
Picture of the Week:
"Drops"
How many drops
does it take
to make an Ocean
?
How many grains of sand
does it take
to make a Beach
?
How many words
must we speak
before we hear
the Silence
?
How many lives
must we live
before we know
the True Self
?
_______
photo: cecilHow many drops
does it take
to make an Ocean
?
How many grains of sand
does it take
to make a Beach
?
How many words
must we speak
before we hear
the Silence
?
How many lives
must we live
before we know
the True Self
?
_______
