F.: Yesterday’s post generated a huge volume of e-mails in response. Many reported that they saw for the first time ever the way that they have allowed a twisted, distorted image of a god (an image based on the unstable personality of parents and/or other authority figures) to haunt them throughout much of their adulthood.
Many shared that they had spent as many years trying to please that imaginary parent/god as they had spent trying to please their parents (without any sense of having accomplished either). What an arduous task children are programmed to undertake; what an exhausting mission it is that “The Childish Adult” works to fulfill. What misery exists when trapped in that dualistic effort to avoid “being bad” and trying to “be good” in order to avoid “punishment” (from a parent or a god or both) and trying to attain “rewards” (from a parent or a god or both).
Past postings have discussed instances where children in sixty-year-old bodies are still working to get an “attagirl” or an “attaboy” from a parent who was (and is) incapable of hugging, complimenting, or loving unconditionally. Now, as adults, love from their parent-inspired image of “god” also comes with “conditions”…and punishment…and unpredictability…and mysteries, such as, “Why did He make that bridge fall and hurt and kill those people?”
Some e-mails contained reports of fond recollections of childhood, but many more recalled long-repressed memories that resurfaced...memories of being judged, of being punished undeservedly, of being used, of normalizing the crazy conduct they had to witness and tolerate, of instability, of unpredictability, of fear, of the unavailability of parents when they seemed to be needed the most. So many are still held captive by the subsequent pain and suffering. This speck of consciousness was as bound as any before the Advaita teachings led to Realization which, in turn, finally led to liberation and independence and freedom from all of that.
A few still sense that they are the “apple of god’s eye” the way they have always been the “apple of their doting parents’ eyes”; however, many who identified themselves as “former believers” claimed they did see, while reading yesterday’s post, a parallel between their “distorted concepts about God” and their parents’ distorted ideas and often-bizarre conduct.
Some said that they are in a program that is telling them to “come up with their own conception of god” and claimed to “undertand now why they are receiving that advice” and why they “need to come up with a different concept from the one their parents provided.” (Maybe they will someday receive the truth of the pointer than any concept they come up with is still…just a concept; on the other hand, they might not. So it is.) Some saw how exactly their earlier beliefs about a male god were explained in a “right on” fashion in the posting, though they have since transcended their past belief in that male.
Many shared that they had spent as many years trying to please that imaginary parent/god as they had spent trying to please their parents (without any sense of having accomplished either). What an arduous task children are programmed to undertake; what an exhausting mission it is that “The Childish Adult” works to fulfill. What misery exists when trapped in that dualistic effort to avoid “being bad” and trying to “be good” in order to avoid “punishment” (from a parent or a god or both) and trying to attain “rewards” (from a parent or a god or both).
Past postings have discussed instances where children in sixty-year-old bodies are still working to get an “attagirl” or an “attaboy” from a parent who was (and is) incapable of hugging, complimenting, or loving unconditionally. Now, as adults, love from their parent-inspired image of “god” also comes with “conditions”…and punishment…and unpredictability…and mysteries, such as, “Why did He make that bridge fall and hurt and kill those people?”
Some e-mails contained reports of fond recollections of childhood, but many more recalled long-repressed memories that resurfaced...memories of being judged, of being punished undeservedly, of being used, of normalizing the crazy conduct they had to witness and tolerate, of instability, of unpredictability, of fear, of the unavailability of parents when they seemed to be needed the most. So many are still held captive by the subsequent pain and suffering. This speck of consciousness was as bound as any before the Advaita teachings led to Realization which, in turn, finally led to liberation and independence and freedom from all of that.
A few still sense that they are the “apple of god’s eye” the way they have always been the “apple of their doting parents’ eyes”; however, many who identified themselves as “former believers” claimed they did see, while reading yesterday’s post, a parallel between their “distorted concepts about God” and their parents’ distorted ideas and often-bizarre conduct.
Some said that they are in a program that is telling them to “come up with their own conception of god” and claimed to “undertand now why they are receiving that advice” and why they “need to come up with a different concept from the one their parents provided.” (Maybe they will someday receive the truth of the pointer than any concept they come up with is still…just a concept; on the other hand, they might not. So it is.) Some saw how exactly their earlier beliefs about a male god were explained in a “right on” fashion in the posting, though they have since transcended their past belief in that male.
Reading those e-mails, it became clear why so many adult believers are overwhelmed, trying their best to make sense of nonsense; trying to “be good” and to “get rewards”; and trying to “feel worthy” and to “escape fear” and to “be pleasing in the eyes of God.” How exhausting it was to see all of the energy expended; to see all of the mental and emotional machinations generated by their concepts of god; to see their distorted beliefs about what an imagined god requires; to see the frustration of years of wanting an explanation for what is unexplainable because it is based in myth and fiction.
Now, to continue. The level of nonsense that humans are capable of believing in becomes most obvious during their “times of crisis”: discussions about a collapsed bridge include the on-going debate about “god’s role in that event.” Thousands more are expressing their surprise that a bridge that was predicted to fall…actually fell. Equally as insane were the actions of one “woman of faith” who said that, seconds after the bridge fell, she “just had a desire to get as many people praying as possible.”
She stepped before a group of fifty people who were near the bridge and began screaming out orders for them to fall to their knees and pray. They did. They allowed a woman of faith to convince them not to rush forth and render aid to the injured and drowning but to fall to their knees and pray instead.
But of all of the nonsense so far, one major piece of nonsense made the national news last week when the actual bridge that collapsed was compared to a fictional bridge that collapsed and killed five pedestrians in Thornton Wilder’s novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey. One purpose of that novel was “to study god’s role in disasters.” The broadcasting of such claptrap is another example of the way that an entire nation can be enculturated and conditioned to accept total nonsense as truth and fact when reported by a supposed "authority."
In Wilder’s novel a character named Brother Juniper asks, “Why did this happen to those five?” Thornton says, “If there were any plan in the universe at all, if there were any pattern in a human life, surely it could be discovered mysteriously latent in those lives so suddenly cut off. Either we live by accident and die by accident, or we live by plan and die by plan.” Herein lies another Advaita pointer:
In a nation of magical thinkers attached to the supernatural, only two explanations are being considered: either (A) the bridge in Minneapolis fell by accident (to the degree that eroding materials and governmental negligence can be written off as “an accident”) or (B) there really is a god who made the bridge fall and who killed and injured people. Over 89% of the people in a U.S. poll taken several years ago said that they believe that “everything that happens is caused by God…all part of 'His Divine Plan'.” Could there possibility be a third explanation that you might be able to raise for consideration? Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
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Now, to continue. The level of nonsense that humans are capable of believing in becomes most obvious during their “times of crisis”: discussions about a collapsed bridge include the on-going debate about “god’s role in that event.” Thousands more are expressing their surprise that a bridge that was predicted to fall…actually fell. Equally as insane were the actions of one “woman of faith” who said that, seconds after the bridge fell, she “just had a desire to get as many people praying as possible.”
She stepped before a group of fifty people who were near the bridge and began screaming out orders for them to fall to their knees and pray. They did. They allowed a woman of faith to convince them not to rush forth and render aid to the injured and drowning but to fall to their knees and pray instead.
But of all of the nonsense so far, one major piece of nonsense made the national news last week when the actual bridge that collapsed was compared to a fictional bridge that collapsed and killed five pedestrians in Thornton Wilder’s novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey. One purpose of that novel was “to study god’s role in disasters.” The broadcasting of such claptrap is another example of the way that an entire nation can be enculturated and conditioned to accept total nonsense as truth and fact when reported by a supposed "authority."
In Wilder’s novel a character named Brother Juniper asks, “Why did this happen to those five?” Thornton says, “If there were any plan in the universe at all, if there were any pattern in a human life, surely it could be discovered mysteriously latent in those lives so suddenly cut off. Either we live by accident and die by accident, or we live by plan and die by plan.” Herein lies another Advaita pointer:
In a nation of magical thinkers attached to the supernatural, only two explanations are being considered: either (A) the bridge in Minneapolis fell by accident (to the degree that eroding materials and governmental negligence can be written off as “an accident”) or (B) there really is a god who made the bridge fall and who killed and injured people. Over 89% of the people in a U.S. poll taken several years ago said that they believe that “everything that happens is caused by God…all part of 'His Divine Plan'.” Could there possibility be a third explanation that you might be able to raise for consideration? Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
READINGS RELATED TO TODAY’S DISCUSSION:
SALE ITEM FOR THE WEEK: 15% OFF ON “WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I DIE?”
