TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
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Excerpts from the book entitled FREEDOM from BELIEFS (Believers, Non-Believers, and "No-Belief-ers") will continue with the a discussion of the way that personality-invoking "-ism's" are another source which generates a plethora of distortion-riddled beliefs:
"-ISM'S" and Beliefs Rooted in Personality
("-ism's," Part "E")
It can be seen, therefore, that attachment to personality is not only fueled by "-ism's" but also reinforced by the ideas, concepts, etc. ("beliefs") which are at the root of all "-ism's."
As long as thoughts and words and deeds are being driven subconsciously by the hidden agendas of false identities and by belief in the concepts that are promulgated by "-ism's," then every aspect of one's relative existence will be tarnished by the insanity of belief in "-ism"-based dualities and will be spoiled by the personality-induced trance that leaves them unawake, unconscious, and unaware.
In that condition, persons will claim that they "really do, most assuredly, have free will" when in fact they are thinking and talking and walking about in their sleep while feeling certain that they are awake. Where in that scenario is there even the slightest chance for "free will" to be exerted?
Maharaj: "In Hinduism, the very idea of 'free will' is non-existent, so there is no word for it. 'Will' is commitment, fixation, bondage."
Maharaj taught, therefore, that the purpose of the teachings is to free persons from their fixations and bondage; is to eliminate mind-driven chaos; is to put to an end once and for all personality-driven instability; is to free persons from the "-ism"-driven volatility that marks their existence.
He taught that the aim of the teachings is to eradicate culture-based ignorance and personality disorders and "stupidity" and "insanity" and "to liberate man from the thraldom of chaos and the burden of sorrow."
How offensive his words were (and are) to those trapped in ego-states and egotism.
How in error they assumed his teachings to be when he reported that they had no free will at all. How deluded the non-realized are, then, when they believe that they are abiding under the auspices of free will.
With that belief in place, they give themselves "credit" for the "good" things they accomplish via their "free will" or they blame themselves for the "bad" things that happen when they "do not hold their free will" in check.
Or, depending on their programming and conditioning, they will speak of other types of "will" that have been conjured up by their "religious leaders" or "spiritual guides" and which are even more magical and are of a totally fictitious character, namely, "God's will" or "the will of the universe."
The fact is, nothing is unfolding according to the will of any god or goddess. All is energy-matter, and neither can be created nor destroyed; thus, there is no creator at all to exert his / her will. Nor is anything unfolding under the supervision of "the universe." Nothing is happening per the auspices of some "plan" or "divine plan."
To study history and to see humankind's penchant for meanness and cruelty and ignorance and insanity is evidence enough to confirm that if there were someone or Someone planning what is happening on this planet, that plan could never be rightly classified as "divine." It could only be classified as "a very mean and cruel and ignorant and insane plan."
The fact is, instead, that persons are driven by the unconscious fears and desires of their personalities; are driven by the concepts that are promulgated and broadcast by their "-ism's";
are driven by the residual effects of trauma that are stored at a cellular level throughout their bodies; are driven by the learned ignorance that they accumulated via programming, conditioning, domestication, and acculturation; and are driven by the personality disorders that mark and mar their relative existence.
All sorts of processes are going on that determine thoughts and words and that subconsciously drive actions, processes which persons haven't the slightest awareness of:
Maharaj: "A tremendously complex work is going on all the time in your brain and body. Are you conscious of it? Not at all."
Moreover, all thoughts and words and deeds that are driven by the sick "minds" of the non-Realized which - from the age of two years and onward are contaminated with the germs of the Ultimate Sickness - leave persons in a prison while believing that they are free.
The prison is located between their ears, and each bar of the prison is a personality-based fear, a personality-based desire, or an "-ism"-based" concept or belief that is totally false but that is wholeheartedly believed to be true.
What - other than ignorance and insanity - would convince a person in prison that he or she is free or has the "free will" to choose? Again, to be "driven" in a car is to be in the passenger seat, the back seat, or the trunk (boot) but is to be precluded from being behind the steering wheel and freely choosing where one is going to go, how one is going to go, when one is going to go, etc.
"Free will" and "being driven" cannot co-exist. To be driven by entrapment in a personality trance - and to allow "-ism-based" concepts and beliefs to determine thoughts and words and deeds - is to block any chance for free will to manifest.
What - other than ignorance and insanity - would prevent persons from seeing that, according to Maharaj, they "are using things and people for purposes alien to them" and are playing "havoc with the world and yourself."
Such is the way it is when personalities and "-ism's" are in charge: they rob persons of free will, of the ability to consciously choose, and of the ability to behave in a sane manner.
And that is why all available tools (including the Enneagram) are employed here to allow seekers to identity the personality types that are driving them and to thereby have a chance to be free.
Only with the completion of the third step on the "path" from identification with the false "I" to understanding the Absolute can seekers move on to the total freedom that comes with the post-belief, post-concept, post-persona, post-personality assumption, post-Full Realization manner of abiding from the position of being fully awake, fully aware, and fully conscious.
To be continued.
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