Friday, October 08, 2021

DE-AWESOME-FYING NON-DUAL TERMINOLOGY

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[Walter Driscoll asked to interview me in order to preserve on video some of the latest modifications and evolutions in the versions of the message offered here since 1989. Our discussion he would label as, "Unlearning with Floyd Henderson."
 
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DE-AWESOME-FYING NON-DUAL TERMINOLOGY

“Living is life’s only purpose.” 

--Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

More on the rationale for this series:

Long before Maharaj shared pointers on the bogus beliefs regarding body and mind and personality identification; and long before he advised seekers to abandon their religious and spiritual role-playing; and long before he advised them to give up their spiritual workaholism and merely abide naturally, he laid the groundwork for all the pointers to come by saying, “Question everything.”

He meant with those words that every belief accumulated by listening to others and by reading the words of others and by going to gatherings (where those he derided as “Big Name Teachers” were collecting millions of dollars a year from seekers) must be questioned.

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.”

In addition to “awesome,” so many simple and basic parts of the non-dual understanding have been “elevated in status” in a most supercilious, pompous fashion, reporting that various elements of the message are “noble,” “other-worldly,” “extraordinary,” “exceptional,” “distinctive,” and “exclusive.” None of them were, and none of them are. 

This series is offering a different perspective about those concepts / beliefs / pointers / whatever.

So 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 as . . .

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

the “Spiritual Malady”

and

“Higher Consciousness”

and

noble truths

and

“How to know God.”

Today, the discussion moves to this “popular teaching”:

FINDING YOUR LIFE’S PURPOSE

As noted above, Maharaj key pointer on this subject was that “living is life’s only purpose.”

Of the billions of life forms which have abided on planet earth, not a single one of those forms or species or organisms sought to define some personal “purpose,” except for one: modern day humans.

Maharaj asked: “What progress are you expecting? It is not for miracles, publicity, money, sex? What progress? So unless you know yourself in the real sense, your so-called progress so far will not count. Here (real) progress means that Truth is established totally within you, with the result that there are no expectations. No happiness, no unhappiness, no experience, no experiencer. No witness, no witnesser.

Who wants progress?

Among the realized, "the who" is always a false identity, a personality, a persona, a figment of humans’ imaginations.

So how can there be any sense of purpose when what exists is a set of elements with the witnessing consciousness that is circulating air? WHO would be doing the doings? The earth elements? The air? The witnessing consciousness that can do nothing except see accurately or inaccurately?

More than eleven years ago, the following was shared on this site:

A visitor wrote: “One thing you say on occasion is still nagging me. I was raised in a church home and was told to find the reason God put me on earth and that I could never be happy unless I found "His plan for me" and then spent my life doing whatever that was. I bought into that "raison d'etre" theory, tried to let that be the driving force in my life for years, came across your website, and started getting free of all of that.

“I thought I was, but whenever you talk about what some of the ‘big names' write about - you know, meaning and purpose and all - I flash back and then the nagging starts again and I hear someone say 

‘A LIFE WITHOUT MEANING IS WORTHLESS!’

“Will I ever be able to let go of that? How can anyone be free of the ideas of meaning and purpose and still feel fulfilled?”

Experience has shown me that when my thoughts and actions and deeds were being driven by that same mindset you describe, I was an arrogant, miserable ass. Who with any taste for peace and calm and relaxation would want to be sucked into the whirling dervish of chaos which those playing the roles of “Super Purpose Seekers” and “Super Purpose Do-ers” generate (unless, of course, they are similarly arrogant and miserable?)

The common attitude among those role players is this: “Ah, I have such an important purpose. My life has so much meaning, and if you’re smart, you’ll hand around me and follow my lead and find your purpose and give your life meaning.”

I shared the following with the fellow who wrote about the way his early programming and conditioning was taking complete control over every aspect of his entire relative existence:

Were one to study the history of humans on this planet objectively, it would become clear just how selfish and self-motivated and self-sustaining the notions of purpose and meaning really are.

The evidence would hardly show that those with a clearly-defined purpose or meaning were the ones "living a life that had worth," at least in the estimate of the masses whose relative existence has been affected by such types or whose relative existence came to an end as a result of the actions of those driven by "their lives' meaning and purpose."

The leaders of the Spanish Inquisition (like their Puritan counterparts who organized witchcraft trials in the U.S.) had a purpose: to eliminate from their ranks those who had less faith than they should have had.

Europeans who believed in the concept of "Manifest Destiny" had a purpose: to rid the areas now known as "North, Central, and South America" of the 150,000,000 inhabitants that were standing in the way of Christians whose purpose was to "go to the fours corner of the earth and baptize everyone in the name of Jesus Christ" (and kill the ones in "the new world" who refused). Yet if you had asked them about their purpose, it would have been described as "noble" and "godly" and "good for the entire planet, ultimately."

Adolf Hitler and his henchmen had a purpose in life: to eliminate from the face of the earth every Jew, every homosexual, and every physically or mentally-handicapped person. Their lives were given meaning by working to erase everyone and everything that stood in the way of making a "master race" of the German people.

Kamikaze pilots in WWII had a purpose: my father watched from the deck of the ship that was transporting him from San Francisco to Okinawa as one plane after another tried to crash into the ships in their convoy and kill as many members of the Allied Forces as possible. Those pilots had a purpose, and their deaths were believed to have given meaning to their lives.

Today, Islamic extremists have a purpose. As with Christians who are instructed in their text to make everyone a Christian, the extremists want to make everyone a Muslim. (Gets rather confusing, though, when you try to pin down which brand of Christianity or which brand of Islam is believed to be the "right one.")

And the lives of the captains of Wall Street in the U.S. most assuredly had a clear-cut purpose and well-defined meaning, the result of which was a wrecking of the economies of most "developed" nations on the planet.

Ideologues in conflicting religions or political parties will tell you that their lives have a definite purpose and have significant meaning as they are driven by their religious and political personas which determine every ignorant thought they have, which control every bizarre word that comes from their mouths, and which drive all of their self-serving behaviors that follow.

Behind the claims of any and all persons who say they have found their life's purpose which is giving their life meaning, there is a hidden agenda that has nothing to do with the stated purpose or meaning.

Then there is not only the conflict but also the duality that accompany purpose-driven persons because the purpose of one will always run counter to the purpose of other persons involved, inserting duality into every aspect of (A) the lives of the purpose-driven vs. (B) the lives of those persons being affected by the "purposeful" agendas of those in Group "A."

There was the duality of the purposeful leaders of the Spanish Inquisition on one hand vs. the persons being tortured and slain on the other hand.

There was the duality of those Europeans whose lives were given meaning by helping to annihilate the 150,000,000 people who stood in the way of their goal of expansionism - driven by a belief in the natural superiority of the Anglo-Saxon race and justified with the claim that they needed to build a "Christian nation" to serve as a shining beacon to the rest of the world (a belief that is still used by politicians to help define "America's mission" in the world) vs. the interests of the native inhabitants of the invaded land who merely wanted to continue to live as they had lived for thousands of years on the other hand.

There was the duality of the purposeful, meaningful lives of the Nazis on one hand vs. the interests of the 12,000,000 killed in German death camps - and the 43,000,000 killed in a war to try to stop the Nazis' plans - on the other hand.

There's the duality of Kamikaze pilots and the duality of modern-day suicidal, Islamic extremists (with their lives' clearly-defined purpose and meaning that involved a sacrificing of their lives to kill other persons) vs. the interests of all those killed because of their differing beliefs on the other hand.

There was the duality of the purposeful leaders of Wall Street on one hand vs. the basic economic interests of billions of persons around the globe on the other hand.

There is the duality of those whose life purpose it is to impose their ideological beliefs on everyone else vs. those who prefer lives where decisions are based in logic and reason on the other hand.

There is the duality of 2.1 billion Christians and 1.5 billion Muslims whose purpose in life is to convert everyone to believe in their beliefs and to worship their version of the God of Abraham on one hand vs. the persons who would rather not join them in converting and worshipping on the other hand.

And there is the duality of those who believe that their purpose is to "save people" or to change people vs. those who have no interest at all in being saved or changed.

If you had a choice of whether to spend an entire relative existence with

(1) persons on a quest who claim to have a clearly-defined purpose that gives their lives meaning

or with

(2) one that is enjoying the lightness of being, abiding as the contented deer that are not conscious of any supposed meaning or purpose at all

and if, before making your choice between #1 or # 2 above, you were to study objectively the impact of persons who have claimed to have found the meaning-giving purpose of their lives

could it be any clearer at all about what the sane and sound choice would be?

Again, consider the message from Maharaj to those who think their lives have been given meaning as a result of their having found their purpose in life:

Questioner: "Is there no salvation for the world?"

Maharaj: "Which world do you want to save? The world of your own projection? Save it yourself. My world? Show me my world and I shall deal with it. I am not aware of any world separate from myself . . . . "

And, even more to the point,

Maharaj: "What business have you with saving the world, when all the world needs is to be saved from you?"

Or from inquisitionists; or from thieves and murderers who kill millions and take their land in the name of God; or from those willing to die for their causes and those willing to kill millions in the process, be they killing and dying for an emperor or for the God of Abraham or for Allah; or from greedy capitalists; or from political and religious ideologues, ad infinitum.

Finally, the notion that there is some "one" who can find a purpose to give her / his life meaning ignores the fact that no "one" exists at all. There is a coming together of elements which form a body-cum-consciousness through which air circulates. Elements. Conscious-energy. Air. That's it, and even that form is a temporary space.

This was shared in 2010:

There is no do-er who can find a purpose and then do whatever that purpose supposedly involves. Only when the pure consciousness is blocked can "one" think something more exists during this relative existence than a temporary space with consciousness and air; only when the pure consciousness is blocked can "one" mistake itself as a person with purpose: the helper, the savior, the rescuer, the teacher, the leader, the reformer or one or more of an infinite variety of false roles that are assumed to be doing something "good" and "meaningful."

Maharaj: The realized "do not identify with success or failure - the very idea of becoming ‘this’ or ‘that’ is unthinkable"

and

"The ‘world’ is but a show, glittering and empty. It is, and yet is not. It is there as long as I want to see it and take part in it. When I cease caring, it dissolves. It has no cause and serves no purpose"

and

"There is no sense of purpose in my doing anything. Things happens as they happen not because I make them happen; it is because I am that they happen"

and

"Obsessed with the idea of means and end, of work and purpose, you see me apparently functioning. In reality I only look. Whatever is done, is done on the stage. Joy and sorrow, life and death, they all are real to the man in bondage; to me they are all in the show, as unreal as the show itself"

and

"Through the film of your mind you project a world and also a God to give it cause and purpose. It is all imagination - step out of it."

The suggestion offered to the visitor who wrote about his feeling of guilt when he was not living according to his early programming and conditioning in a church?

“Forget all the nonsensical talk about ‘suffering being meaningful,’ about ‘birth and death and about purpose and meaning in between,’ about ‘never being happy unless you find God's plan for you and then spend your life doing whatever that was pre-determined to be."

[Of that, Maharaj said, "You mean to say everybody's life is totally determined at his birth? What a strange idea! Were it so, 'the power that determines' would see to it that nobody should suffer."]

I continued:

“Live without any delusions, including the delusion that you are changing the world or that you have some noble purpose or that you are giving meaning to your life or that of others. That's all delusional. What happens can still happen, yet it need never again be cloaked in delusion and egotism or in anything assumed to be personal or purposeful or meaningful.”

So, quite to the contrary of the popular notions which the masses hold toward purpose and meaning, the closest that anyone can accurately come to identifying a human’s “life purpose” would be to say:

“Living is life’s only purpose.”

To be continued.

Please enter into the silence of contemplation.

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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "god," the "Son of god," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns.

THE EXPLANATION


If looked at as nouns, they point to illusions and are, therefore, a total waste of time to even discuss; if looked at as verbs which are resulting in certain sane but rare behaviors among humanity, then they are worthy of some attention during the relative existence.

Meaning? There are members of certain groups who say things such as "My concept of god in the past was of a weak god, an absentee god, A Santa Claus-type god, a mean, punishing, vindictive god, etc. Today, I am in close contact with a loving and caring god whom I worship and praise and glorify and give thanks to."

The reply to that usually goes like this: "If you are in contact with a god that wants to be worshipped and praised and glorified, then you're dealing with someone like yourself - a narcissist - and hanging out with narcissists will never bring an end to your narcissism (that narcissism evidenced by the fact that you think you are "godly").

Next, in the phrase 'loving and caring god,' any supposed god that truly had her or his act together would tell you that the totally irrelevant part of that phrase is 'god' and that the only part that is relevant is the "loving and caring" part.

"That is, a non-narcissistic their god / their goddess would say, "I care not an iota about being worshipped and praised and glorified by you or anyone else. How arrogant and insecure and needy would I have to be to want that? Forget the man-made, dreamed up noun 'god' and focus on the 'god as a verb' understanding and then go forth and let loving and caring be verbs - not adjectives - and let them generate the act of love and the act of caring and let those actions manifest through you." 

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"

--Yeshu'a (Jesus)

and 


"Heaven and earth shall fade away."

--Yeshu'a (Jesus)

and 


"Heaven and hell are not geographic places

but are states of mind, nothing more than

concepts dreamed up by men."

--Pope John Paul II 

"There is no hell."

--Pope Francis, the current pope

in an interview with journalist Eugenio Scalfari,

a writer used by the Pope to issue off the record

teachings which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.

[That said, would that the popes who have shown the courage to reject a core concept of their dogma - namely, "hell" - would find the additional courage required to question the very existence of their institution in light of the centuries-long cover-up of their history of raping children and in light of the mental and emotional and psychological scarring of billions of their members past and present.

And that need for courage also applies as questions need to be asked about why so many other sky cults are still being supported and allowed to continue to exist as well. When certain types of programming and conditioning have been shown to blind the masses, they should end. Will they? Not likely. Why?

Because what the masses think and say and do is most influenced by the international crime families which hold sway over the masses as criminals conduct their planet-wide operations. What are the major international crime families and which are the most influential and have the largest memberships?

The Mafia / La Cosa Nostra; the Catholic Church (with it 1.2 billion followers) whose Vatican Bank worked for decades with the Mafia while laundering mob earnings (for a 15% all-profit charge by the Bank); Protestant and Evangelical Churches (with over 1.2 billion followers) like the one I was raised in where the youth director molested and sexually assaulted young girls; big business which has long created environments in which people have been abused; powerful political bodies like the U.S. Congress, etc., etc., etc.)

With all of those crime families, neither the followers nor the leadership ever voluntarily step down or shut down their criminal activities. Be they gangs, organized crime families, religions, big business, politicians, etc., they all want control and they all want power and they all want money, and nothing internal will interfere with the driving forces at play.

The masses must demand that all those in charge must step down and their groups and institutions must shut down, and there's the real problem because the continuation of their crimes are enabled not as much by the people running such crime organizations as they are enabled by the masses of people who - wanting some perceived "payoff" - remain involved with them and give them money and support them and aid and abet the continued existence of those criminal enterprises and thus facilitate the ability of church criminals and political criminals and other types of criminals to continue to commit their crimes.] 

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