TODAY’S CONSIDERATIONS
Every child within a matter of a few years will be shifted out of the no-knowing state, and the shifting will result in greater and greater degrees of distortion. The pattern goes like this:
From
no-knowing (and, therefore, no distortion)
to
knowing (that is, knowing the ignorance which has been taught and learned)
to (by the teen years)
supposedly knowing it all (though actually being trapped in total distortion)
and then to
being in total distortion throughout the adult years as a result of hanging onto a belief about "knowing it all" for the remainder of the manifestation.
And what is learned? Thousands of dualistic concepts, all of which support a know-it-all mentality.
Yet who can even say what is good and what is bad with any accuracy at all? No one.
Some persons over the last weekend wanted rain. Some wanted sunny days.
Here in the Houston, TX area by Monday, storms had moved through the region slowly, dumping 20+ inches of rain and flooding streets and homes and drainage ditches and bayous and creeks.
On Tuesday, those bayous and creeks were overloaded with runoff of waters from upstream and thousands of people had to be evacuated from their homes and their inundated neighborhoods.
Rain. Good? Or bad?
It's all in the perspective, all in the selfish views of the one wishing for rain or for dryness.
In the southern part of the state, cotton fields and vineyards are side by side. While farmers are praying to their god for rain, wine growers are praying that rain will not fall on their grapes.
Pregnancy. Good? Or bad?
Each year, 1,000,000 teenage girls in the U.S. pray for their period to begin, but it does not, so an unwanted pregnancy has to be dealt with. Meanwhile, 1,000,000 other women celebrate over a wanted pregnancy, only to have their hopes dashed when they miscarry.
Pregnancy. Good? Nor as far as 1,000,000 females a year are concerned. Good? Yes, as far as 1,000,000 other females a year are concerned.
Consider an example shared in the past which illustrates the insanity of trying to categorize any event as being absolutely good or absolutely bad:
In the Wild West in the nineteenth-century U.S., a man was concerned that he had not recently heard from a neighbor who was also a cattle rancher. He saddled up his horse and set out on a half-hour ride to check on his friend.
As he approached the main house, he saw that the gate on the horse corral was open and that the horses were gone.
Then he saw that the fencing had a huge gap in it and that the cows were also missing. He spurred his horse to hurry toward the front door of the ranch house, and the door there was also open.
He walked inside unnoticed and saw his friend seated in a chair in the living area, obviously preoccupied.
He shouted, “Ernest, what the heck is going on!?”
Ernest looked up and said, "Oh, hi, Josh. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
Josh said, “Try me!”
Ernest began his tale: “Well, several months ago my son was checking the fencing on the back range and came across a rattlesnake and his horse reared up and threw him off and broke his leg.”
The neighbor said, “Oh my gosh, that’s really bad.”
The rancher replied: “No, that was good because of what happened after that. One evening a couple of months ago, my son and I were having dinner in the house and the ranch hands were all having their meals in the bunkhouse. Suddenly, we heard yelling and screaming and shots fired, and just as we stood up, some bandits kicked in the back door and the front door simultaneously and leveled their guns at us and told us to sit down and then they tied me to my chair.
Next thing I know, there’s dozens of them outside and they’re stealing our cattle and our horses and taking all of our ranch hands with them as work slaves."
“But your son’s broken leg was still a bad thing.”
“No, that turned out to be a good thing because they were going to take him too, but when they saw his leg in a cast, they knew he couldn’t work for them so they left him.”
“Well then, that a good thing alright.”
“No, that was a bad thing because of this: his leg healed and he formed a posse and they tracked the marauders across the border and found our cattle and horses.”
“Well that’s good.”
“No, that’s bad, because they walked into a trap and were put to work by the thieves who had taken over a prospector’s gold mine.”
“Dad gum. That is bad."
“No, that was good because some guards drank too much one night and passed out and my son and the posse and the ranch hands were all able to escape and took a lot of the gold with them.”
“Well, that’s good.”
“No, not really, because the ranch hands took off in one direction and my son headed to the nearest large town. But he's always had a gambling problem, so when he went into the saloon and got into a card game, he lost every bit of the gold he had.”
“Oh man! Now that’s bad.”
“No, it’s good because he happened to meet another rancher living nearby who felt sorry for him because of his loss, so he took my son in and while there my boy met the rancher’s gorgeous daughter and they ended up getting married almost immediately. After that, my son came back here and he and his new bride moved in and we started making plans to rebuild out herd.”
“Well now that’s good.”
“No, that turned out to be bad, because that woman was a gold-digger and she met a rich man traveling through town and ran away with him. My son took off after them and caught up with 'em a few towns over and he shot the guy and his bride. Now, my son’s in jail awaiting trial.”
“Okay, I'm not going to try to guess. This time, let me ask. I’m sorta thinking that's bad, but I’m gonna stop guessing and let you tell me if I’m right.”
Ernest looked up slowly and turned his eyes to meet those of Josh and said, “Have you been listening to a damn thing I’m being saying? How the hell could I possibly know if anything is actually good or bad!?”
Josh walked out in silence, mounted his horse, and rode off toward home, a bit wiser when it comes to thinking anyone could possibly know what is good or what is bad in the long run.
He got a little humility that day, realizing as he looked back over the happenings in his own existence that, actually, he’d never had a clue about what’s good or what’s bad. He saw that most of what he had spent days or months or years anticipating and dreading ended up never happening, and he realized that all the things which had ended up being full-blown catastrophes - as far as his entire relative existence was concerned - he never saw any of those coming at all but instead had actually been totally blindsided in every case.
Maharaj:
"First of all you identify something as being good or bad for yourself. Then, in an effort to acquire good or to get rid of the bad, you have invented a God. Then you worship such a God and . . . you pray to that God for something good to happen to you."
"The world is nothing but the picture of your own 'I' consciousness."
"Whatever spiritual things you aspire to know are all happening in this objective world, in the illusion. All this is happening in the objective world. All is dishonesty. There is no truth in this fraud."
“Whatever you have tried to understand during your spiritual search will prove false.”
"Only that person will visit this place whose virtue and sin have come to an end."
That is, only persons whose previously-unalterable-attachment to all of the duality which had been taught begins to end if wisdom comes and inspires the rejection of all concepts, ideas, notions, a.k.a., "beliefs," which are always rooted in ignorance and insanity.
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
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