TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
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DE-AWESOME-FYING NON-DUAL TERMINOLOGY
The Rationale:
There have been millions of religious and spiritual and philosophical and ideological and Eastern and, yes, even non-dual concepts / beliefs which billions of humans have taken to be “awesome.” None of them were, and none of them are.
This series is offering a different perspective about those concepts / beliefs / pointers / whatever.
To continue:
Thus far, it has been shown that - far from being “awesome concepts or teachings” - there is actually no validity or logic at all to such concepts or teachings which have been made far more complicated than they should have ever been made, including the following:
continuity;
WHO-NESS and / or who-ness;
“SELF-Actualization”;
“SELF-Realization”;
“self-realization” (unless referring to the fact that one has realized that all assigned or assumed selves are illusions as are all assumed Selves as well)
and
liberation
and
enlightenment, awakening, and spiritual awakening
and today,
The True Self.
During interviews and discussions and writings, the process used here has long been to . . .
take a question,
then
maybe ask a question or two,
or
move directly to identifying the problem / the misunderstanding,
and then
offer a solution / explanation / clarification / elucidation for the listener to consider.
The same applies to questions about . . .
THE SPIRIT, THE SICK SPIRIT, THE SPIRITUAL MALADY
The problem:
Sometimes persons spend considerable amounts of time and energy to try to treat an illness or sickness or condition which they are told they have but which is actually based in a misdiagnosis which puts a label to a condition which they do not have at all.
Both medical “experts” and religious “experts” and spiritual "experts" have been misdiagnosing what ails persons for thousands of years and continue to do so to this day.
For example, in medicine, bloodletting was a medical procedure that involved removing blood from the body. It was used for thousands of years and was believed to alleviate a number of illness including pneumonia, fevers, back pain, rheumatism, headaches, melancholia, and many other ailments including mental illness. Millions of physicians and millions of their patients over the centuries believed it was an effective treatment.
In other cases, women were often given complete hysterectomies to address depression, anxiety, etc.
Of course the masses for the most part now understand that it was all just a bunch of BS.
In psychology and psychiatry, electric shock has been used and still is; also there is the lobotomy which was first performed on humans in the 1890s. The procedure was thought to be a cure for mental illness and is still used in some places. The V.A. in the U.S. gave over 2000 WWII vets lobotomies.
In religion, leaders taught their followers that there are spirits that were sometimes mischievous or vengeful and that were taught that they can enter into people and inspire them to behave in harmful ways.
Others in some religions taught their members from the past to this very day that there is a lord of evil - said to be the leader of fallen angels - that can inhabit bodies and who is identified as Lucifer, Satan, Beelzebub, the Devil, or _____ (fill in the blank with your own character based in superstition or myths or fairy tales).
Catholic leaders and leaders of many other such cults dreamed up the diagnosis that persons’ bodies (and minds and spirit or soul) have been occupied by the Devil and that the proper treatment for that condition is an exorcism performed by a priest. Exorcism is said to be the religious or spiritual practice which can evict demons, jinns, or other spiritually-evil entities from a person.
Is
this ancient history? Hardly. Following more than four months of racial justice
protests in Portland, Oregon, the Catholic Archbishop Alexander Sample led a
procession of more than two hundred other Catholics to a city park on Oct. 17, 2020
where he conducted a Latin exorcism rite intended to purge the community of
evil. (Not sure why he hasn't tried doing the same to purge his religious community of pedophiles.)
Many
might be aware of the horrible impact on children and adults who have undergone
exorcisms which can take on a violent nature. The practice is especially damaging
to persons who have mental health issues which have been misdiagnosed by
religious and cult leaders who claim the problems are being caused “by the
devil having entered into one’s spirit.” That is, of course, nothing less than “religious
abuse” and / or “spiritual abuse.” Why?
Humans are treated effectively for mental health issues on a daily basis, but if they are told that (1) they do not have personality disorders and neuroses and psychoses which a trained, professional counselor might be able to address but that (2) their problem is the devil or the forces of evil or the spiritual defects within, then they will not seek help in the venues which can actually help them heal.
Some of the major proponents of the spiritual malady concept now blame the ignorance and the insanity which characterized their (relatively speaking) harmful and self-harmful behaviors in the past on their spiritual malady;
thus, they too will not seek help in the venues which can actually help them heal because they believe that they have found a proper diagnosis: "Oh it was that dang spiritual malady. But now, being spiritual has eliminated my insanity. Now, I just have to commit to talking on a daily basis with others who have also been misdiagnosed and who have also done nothing to address the actual roots of their insanity. But nowadays, we all just self-diagnose and we have all found that we have been restored to sanity." Really?
Some among the masses now understand that the misdiagnoses set forth by religious and psychiatric and psychological and spiritual group leaders are also just a bunch of BS.
So all of the medical and religious and psychological and spiritual nonsense over the ages has paved the way currently for a related and very popular misdiagnosis of what is ailing people, namely, that people who are not behaving in the way that their culture or a political party does not approve of must surely be suffering from . . .
THE SPIRITUAL MALADY
Is it possible, however, that there is no such thing?
Might the belief that persons have an internal problem caused by the presence of evil within them or within their spirit or by certain religious shortcomings or by their spiritual defects also be just so much BS?
Might those who claim that they can “feel the spirit within” and claim that they can literally sense that it is sick are as deceived as amputees who report literally “feeling” what is actually a “phantom itch.”
To explain: many people who have an amputation have some degree of phantom sensation. This is when they seem to “feel” the missing part of a limb and report that they “feel an itch or a tickle” as if the missing part of a limb is present and is “asleep.”
The feeling seems real, but it is just a phantom sensation.
What if “the spiritual malady” is also a “phantom sensation”?
Some believe that they must work constantly to heal or improve or perfect what they believe to be their spirit . . . their sick spirit . . . their spiritual malady.
More significantly is this question: what if persons cannot develop a sick spirit or a spiritual malady because there is no spirit within to be sick or well, no spirit within that can be in a state of malady and contagion and unhealthiness as opposed to being in a state of well-being or fitness or soundness?
When I asked one believer of the “spiritual malady” concept, "Where exactly does the supposed spirit within reside," he answered, “In the heart.” Yet over the last few years on three occasions, I’ve lain on my back on a table in cardiac cauterization labs and watched tubes being run through blood vessels all throughout my heart.
During those procedures, the images are pretty clear, so I have seen on one occasion or another every centimeter within my heart;
however, not once have I seen “a spirit” or “the spirit” or “my spirit” or any malady that has anything to do with anything more than the evidence of my genetic heart disease and my imposed heart disease which has blocked some key arteries on occasion.
Moreover, doctors and their assisting technicians have seen millions of hearts, but not once has anyone published in any medical journal a report that they have seen “the spirit” and included a photo taken with their imaging equipment as proof of its presence.
The same viewing opportunities have been available as millions of doctors have explored every centimeter within the human body as they have performed surgeries or autopsies from the top to the bottom. So far, from the millions upon millions of surgeries and autopsies conducted, there have been no reports of “a spirit” having been witnessed.
Among the advocates of the spiritual malady theory, a common claim made by many is this: “I am a spiritual being having a human experience.” Okay, but what is your proof? It always boils down to “blind faith,” you know, the method that God supposedly prefers.
The entire 5000+ years-old debate about “Is there a god or not?” has only gone on because God - if "He" exists - supposedly wants person to have “blind faith” in “Him” rather that faith based in visual proof.
Not once has the God of Abraham (the founder / father of Judaism, Christianity and Islam) ever shown “His” face to settle the argument. All “He” would have to do to prove “His” existence would be to take over the big screen in Times Square and say, "Okay, dammit, is this what you need? Is this what you want? Well then watch closely. I’ll give you a five-second peek at my face. Here goes! There it is. Good looking, huh? Now are you satisfied? Now will you believe?”
The same would apply if there has been one reported factual case of a spirit within having been found. Yet humans seem to prefer to pledge their greatest devotion and loyalty and fidelity and affection and dedication to things unseen or to someone hiding out in a burning bush.
Are there invisible things that are still real? Sure, but belief in a spirit and a soul which can last for eternity or can be reborn as a winged half bird / half human entity, is a bit too grand a stretch here.
Here, there is no spirit, much less a sick spirit or a now-healthy spirit or a spiritual malady or a healed spirit. There is only a temporary composite unity made of visible - yes, visible - plant food elements through which air and conscious-energy are constantly cycling, constantly coming and going.
Post-mahasamadhi, the visible elements will return to the universal pool of elements; the air will return to the universal pool of air; and the conscious-energy will return to the universal pool of conscious-energy.
Wait. No spirit that will go to a heaven or hell? Nope. The Advaitin Yeshu’a / “Jesus” said, “Heaven and earth will fade away” (as the consciousness which dreamed up those concepts fades away someday.).
The same applies to the spirit, to the Tooth Fairy, to the Easter Bunny, to Santa Claus, to the power of the rabbit’s foot and to the inverted horseshoe. Except for “the spirit,” those are all myths associated with one’s childhood - a belief which continues into the adult years for many who are still quite childish in many ways.
Again, the invitation is to see that a simple message has been complicated and bastardized by persons who have attached “awesome,” “noble,” “other-worldly,” “extraordinary,” “exceptional,” “distinctive,” and “exclusive” status to key parts of the message and who have attached all sorts of extraneous and fictional concepts as well.
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
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THE EXPLANATION
Yeshu'a (Jesus) and Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis were spot on:
"No one shall ever see 'the kingdom of heaven.' It is within"
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places
"There is no hell."
teachings which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.
