From a site visitor concerning abandonment of the drama: “I’ve tried it all--religions, programs, spirituality, philosophy, etc. and now conclude that this life is so crazy, I might as well get lost in the play. You asked why not abandon it. I ask why not get lost in it?”
F.: Escapism and denial are two of the more popular tools used by persons to “avoid reality.” In fact, it is the condition of not being in touch with reality that persons are trying to escape. They are trying to escape the misery that comes from being out of touch with reality (that is, “being insane”), but the methods used in those efforts only generate more insanity. The methods make the U.S. culture #1 in many areas in statistical studies:
#1 in the number of persons addicted to something in an effort to escape, to “get lost,” as you call it
#1 in the number of persons in “relationships” who eventually kill each other as a result of “getting lost in the play”
#1 in the number of persons who tried to "get lost in the play" but who eventually kill themselves to try to escape the insanity
The list could continue, but the pointer is offered: getting "lost in the play" prevents blissful, AS IF living and produces a miserable relative existence. In terms of the relative vs. the Absolute, none of those relative existence stats mean a thing, but for those who will allow the manifestation of the consciousness to run its course, why will most never run the course sanely? Because persons—being out of touch with Reality—are addicted to chaos, to the lie, and to the mental games whereby they can put a “spin” on their experiences and ignore the truth of the patterns of their behaviors that result in occasional moments of happiness that are eventually interrupted by one miserable experience after another. They can even deny that the misery exists, but denial does not eliminate the unhappiness. Yet your concept is commonly-held. Most in this culture will continue to try to "get lost in the drama." It goes with the culture and it goes with the personality type that is most dominant in the U.S., with what the Sufis called “Personality Type Three—The Performer.”
Use of that tool might help you see what you were up against in this culture when you were making an effort (studying "religions, programs, spirituality, philosophy, etc.") to try to overcome the culture’s influence and to be restored to the sanity of purified consciousness. The Sufis offered an "enneagram method" of personality analysis with nine personality types and their three “centers” (compare with the Advaita “gunas”). Among enneagram scholars, the U.S. is used most often as an example of a “Personality Type Three Nation”: one in which image is king, in which the drama is most frequently taken to be the real, and in which the fewest ever awaken. Of the nine personality types, Types Fives are ranked at the top as those who have the greatest chance of reaching Full Realization because they are most willing to question what they have been told rather than accept it all on blind faith. Type Threes are ranked at the bottom and have the least chance among the nine types of reaching Realization. (Those with a “Three-Wing”—Type Twos and Type Fours—are also handicapped to a degree in terms of seeing the false, seeing the truth, and eventually realizing fully. A correlation exists that might interest you, or not: Two's, Three's, and Four's--being the "heart centered group"--account for a greater than expected number of those with addictions. The heart-centered types--all influenced by the over-powering Three--are also the self-centered types. They are emotion based, they are image conscious, and they are often busy doing rather than merely being. Thus, these three types are more susceptible to becoming dependent on the "bad" addictions of alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs as well as the "good" addictions of "religions, programs, spirituality, and philosophies.") Threes are the actors and the performers and the achievers among the nine personality types, and they have the greatest propensity for “getting lost in the play.” Everything said by a Three and every action taken by a Three is motivated by a desire to create an image, enhance an image, or restore an image. (And the desire to create an image, enhance an image, or restore an image is also based in one or more fears.) If you live in the U.S., you have a greater chance of being programmed and conditioned to behave as a Type Three, you have a greater chance of "getting lost in the play," and you face a far greater task in terms of setting aside the images and becoming fully in touch with reality. Your faulty thinking has convinced you that escapism is the easier route; however, you might find (if you invited objective feedback from an impartial source who has available all the facts concerning the actual results of your efforts to escape) that you’ve always put a type of “spin” on all of your personal experiences which has distorted the truth about the actual facts surrounding those events. That spin might include, “My suffering produces benefits in the long run” or “All these things I keep doing that are resulting in chaos and misery are opportunities”; or “There’s an overall plan and I’m being guided along so I don’t need to be concerned with accepting responsibility, seeking greater enlightenment, or abandoning the fraud generated by my personas.”
All that said, you can see what persons in the U.S. (and in similar Western cultures) are up against in any effort to realize: readily-available tools for escape; a culture that endorses image over reality, chaos over stability, and putting a spin on facts rather than accepting the truth; and a preponderance of persons in the population who have a personality type that is the most likely to work at fostering images, that is the least likely to want to get in touch with reality, and that is least likely to realize fully by abandoning completely all personas and all false images. As far as the Absolute goes, none of the above matters a wit. As far as the relative goes, all of the above results in misery for those "lost in the play" as well as for all of those who must deal with those lost in the play. Thanks for writing. Please enter the silence of contemplation.
TOMORROW: A response to an e-mail regarding the glossary entry on “death”
F.: Escapism and denial are two of the more popular tools used by persons to “avoid reality.” In fact, it is the condition of not being in touch with reality that persons are trying to escape. They are trying to escape the misery that comes from being out of touch with reality (that is, “being insane”), but the methods used in those efforts only generate more insanity. The methods make the U.S. culture #1 in many areas in statistical studies:
#1 in the number of persons addicted to something in an effort to escape, to “get lost,” as you call it
#1 in the number of persons in “relationships” who eventually kill each other as a result of “getting lost in the play”
#1 in the number of persons who tried to "get lost in the play" but who eventually kill themselves to try to escape the insanity
The list could continue, but the pointer is offered: getting "lost in the play" prevents blissful, AS IF living and produces a miserable relative existence. In terms of the relative vs. the Absolute, none of those relative existence stats mean a thing, but for those who will allow the manifestation of the consciousness to run its course, why will most never run the course sanely? Because persons—being out of touch with Reality—are addicted to chaos, to the lie, and to the mental games whereby they can put a “spin” on their experiences and ignore the truth of the patterns of their behaviors that result in occasional moments of happiness that are eventually interrupted by one miserable experience after another. They can even deny that the misery exists, but denial does not eliminate the unhappiness. Yet your concept is commonly-held. Most in this culture will continue to try to "get lost in the drama." It goes with the culture and it goes with the personality type that is most dominant in the U.S., with what the Sufis called “Personality Type Three—The Performer.”
Use of that tool might help you see what you were up against in this culture when you were making an effort (studying "religions, programs, spirituality, philosophy, etc.") to try to overcome the culture’s influence and to be restored to the sanity of purified consciousness. The Sufis offered an "enneagram method" of personality analysis with nine personality types and their three “centers” (compare with the Advaita “gunas”). Among enneagram scholars, the U.S. is used most often as an example of a “Personality Type Three Nation”: one in which image is king, in which the drama is most frequently taken to be the real, and in which the fewest ever awaken. Of the nine personality types, Types Fives are ranked at the top as those who have the greatest chance of reaching Full Realization because they are most willing to question what they have been told rather than accept it all on blind faith. Type Threes are ranked at the bottom and have the least chance among the nine types of reaching Realization. (Those with a “Three-Wing”—Type Twos and Type Fours—are also handicapped to a degree in terms of seeing the false, seeing the truth, and eventually realizing fully. A correlation exists that might interest you, or not: Two's, Three's, and Four's--being the "heart centered group"--account for a greater than expected number of those with addictions. The heart-centered types--all influenced by the over-powering Three--are also the self-centered types. They are emotion based, they are image conscious, and they are often busy doing rather than merely being. Thus, these three types are more susceptible to becoming dependent on the "bad" addictions of alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs as well as the "good" addictions of "religions, programs, spirituality, and philosophies.") Threes are the actors and the performers and the achievers among the nine personality types, and they have the greatest propensity for “getting lost in the play.” Everything said by a Three and every action taken by a Three is motivated by a desire to create an image, enhance an image, or restore an image. (And the desire to create an image, enhance an image, or restore an image is also based in one or more fears.) If you live in the U.S., you have a greater chance of being programmed and conditioned to behave as a Type Three, you have a greater chance of "getting lost in the play," and you face a far greater task in terms of setting aside the images and becoming fully in touch with reality. Your faulty thinking has convinced you that escapism is the easier route; however, you might find (if you invited objective feedback from an impartial source who has available all the facts concerning the actual results of your efforts to escape) that you’ve always put a type of “spin” on all of your personal experiences which has distorted the truth about the actual facts surrounding those events. That spin might include, “My suffering produces benefits in the long run” or “All these things I keep doing that are resulting in chaos and misery are opportunities”; or “There’s an overall plan and I’m being guided along so I don’t need to be concerned with accepting responsibility, seeking greater enlightenment, or abandoning the fraud generated by my personas.”
All that said, you can see what persons in the U.S. (and in similar Western cultures) are up against in any effort to realize: readily-available tools for escape; a culture that endorses image over reality, chaos over stability, and putting a spin on facts rather than accepting the truth; and a preponderance of persons in the population who have a personality type that is the most likely to work at fostering images, that is the least likely to want to get in touch with reality, and that is least likely to realize fully by abandoning completely all personas and all false images. As far as the Absolute goes, none of the above matters a wit. As far as the relative goes, all of the above results in misery for those "lost in the play" as well as for all of those who must deal with those lost in the play. Thanks for writing. Please enter the silence of contemplation.
TOMORROW: A response to an e-mail regarding the glossary entry on “death”
