THE ABUSED-ABUSERS-ABUSED STRESS-PERPETUATING CYCLE

 

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THE ABUSED-ABUSERS-ABUSED STRESS-PERPETUATING CYCLE

(continued) 

“The cause of all is all.”

--Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The National Geographic film A Portrait of a Killer, mentioned yesterday, examines the types of stress which living beings can endure, and how it can thus affect the rest of their bodies. Severe chronic stress can even lead to the destruction of brain cells.

A Portrait of a Killer

What humans can learn from primates about the roots of humankind's problems which result from untreated trauma and stressors:

Delayed responses to untreated trauma can include persistent fatigue, sleep disorders, nightmares, fear of recurrence, anxiety focused on flashbacks, depression, and avoidance of emotions, sensations, or activities which are associated with the trauma, even remotely.

Before moving on with the discussion of the pointers offered in the film “STRESS: PORTRAIT OF A KILLER,” the various forms of stress and the various causes of stress might be considered, along with what the non-dual understanding might address and what it cannot. 

There are certainly many causes of stress and Maharaj taught that “the cause of all is all.” Might there not only be multiple root causes of stress (both internal and external) but also more than one form of stress? That would certainly complicate some of non-duality’s stress-reducing-or-stress-eliminating counsel. 

Non-duality’s “first line of defense” is to encouragement seekers to look internally to find the root of one’s problems rather than looking externally.

Yet on the savannah, it has been shown that the baboons at the lower end of a troop’s rigidly-defined hierarchy can be tending to their own business and will still be affected by externals - that is, by alpha males that are exhibiting the same kinds of sociopathic tendencies when on the attack that are observable in their human counterparts. 

And certainly valid non-dual pointers are spot on when they point out that no one can stress any part of a composite unity; that no one can stress energy (including the conscious-energy); that no one can stress the air circulating through a space;

that no one can stress earth elements; and that much human stress is rooted in imaginary ego-state that are forever feeling as if they are being hurt or interfered with or threatened. 

And also certainly Derek Hough was onto something when he made the point that “pressure does not exist” . . . that persons “create pressure” for themselves. That is, pressure is an illusion, an illusion that is as much a product of the mind as any other illusion. 

Yet might there be both internal and external causes of stress during the relative existence as experienced by most humans? Is the pressure real - at least relatively speaking - for one being assaulted by a brutal alpha male on the savannah? 

[It might be of especial interest to some when the discussion here reaches the point where the researcher and filmmaker Sapolsky explained “the how and why” regarding a previously-violent, hostile troop culture that was transformed into a peaceful troop that eventually came to enjoy an existence marked by equality and a state of cooperation that was marked by calmness and quietness and serenity.] 

Moreover, might it be possible to eliminate many sources of human stress through “the understanding” and then reduce the effects from other sources of stress through identifying any external stressors and staying the heck away from those?

Then, might other sources that cannot be avoided - like those imposed by governmental interference or by dominating religions which control the members of many cultures - might those be addressed to some degree through non-attachment and through pure witnessing? 

Are you seeing how truly complicated the quest for peace and serenity and a stress-free existence is nowadays, all around the globe? Are you seeing that no single, simple solution can exist?

Are you seeing that the overly-simplistic solution offered by most among the non-realized masses - to “just have faith” or to “be more spiritual” - cannot even begin to provide a solution to the complex, stress-aggravated problems now facing almost all of humanity?

Are you seeing why Maharaj abandoned entirely any and all religious and spiritual methods of trying to treat the Ultimate Sickness and focused more on the psychologically-rooted problems generated by the adulterated mind? Quite the challenge, yes? 
 

Humanity’s stress today around mortgages as mentioned in the film - or around the millions of foreclosures that resulted from human greed in over-buying and from human greed from over-selling - had so many causes that the explanations in many cases are book length. Some causes involved persons who bought what they could not afford while other causes dealt with the avarice of investment bankers. 

Discussions of the roots of the stress that came as a result of being imprisoned in a Nazi-run work or extermination camp because one was either a Jew or a gay or mentally-ill or physically-deformed have filled volumes of books. 

However, it has been seen that on some occasions - though rarely, true enough - some have shifted their place in the hierarchy by abandoning their willingness to tolerate any further abuse.

The result is a shift in the “quality” of one’s relative existence by casting aside excessive tolerance of what should not be tolerated at all. 

Recall this from Louise Sterling, offered earlier after viewing the Sapolsky documentary: “Perhaps this research will feed into a refusal amongst the oppressed to put up with exploitation, abuse, narcissistic capitalism, the One Percent, the lies, and the BS. Because it is LITERALLY killing them.” 

As noted, the “refusal” is starting to happen in some quarters, even without an awareness of Sapolsky’s research. 

Miners in Africa are finally rebelling against owners who have been made billionaires by miners who are working under the most dangerous and debilitating conditions for pennies an hour. The workers are striking and being shot by the police authorities who represent the rich owners, yet the protests continue. 

Workers at McDonald’s all around the globe struck to express their discontentment. The “straw that broke that camel’s back” was a publication from corporate headquarters providing “a budget plan for McDonald’s workers” which did seem to show that they could live just fine on their McDonald’s salary. The rub? An entry in the back of the plan that made an addition to their income total that had to come from a second, full-time job. 

Workers at the Walmart chain, owned by a family whose annual net income is equal to the annual income of the bottom 41% of all people working in the U.S., are rebelling against the fact that one of the richest families on the planet refuses to take slightly less in order to provide a decent income to those workers who are making it possible for six people to have a net worth of $152 billion. 

(If those six people live to their average U.S. life expectancy and if they never earn another penny, they would have to spend $18,000,000.00 - that’s 18 million dollars - every day in order to deplete by the time of their “demise” what they already have accumulated.) 

Workers at Amazon around the globe are beginning to rebel against the intolerable working conditions that the company has set in place. 

Automobile manufacturing plants are being closet as workers strike. The same happened with workers in the entertainment industry. Workers are walking off the job at some Walgreen’s pharmacy stores. Health care workers have been on strike.

Some teacher unions in the U.S. are on strike as are workers employed by Mack Trucks. Some government workers in other nations are presently on strike. Religions are seeing more and more people give up on organized religion and reject the stresses that it puts on members.

There seems to be an increasing number of people who endured the stress of the pandemic who are saying, “The relative existence is too short to live under the heavy hand of leaders in who are abusing their power and enriching the top 1% while treating everyone else like serfs who were bound under the feudal system to work on their lord’s estate and like it or leave it.

There is some “refusal” happening globally; however, 50% of all persons are driven by their fear-based and loyalty-based Personality Type Six which drives them to accept what should be unacceptable, whether that involves “personal relationships” or “business relationships.” 

Fifty percent of all persons on the planet are therefore programming to find a caretaker and let him or her take care of them, not matter the toll that caretaker’s abuse tasks on those below the leaders in all of the hierarchies on the planet.

Tomorrow: More of Sapolsky’s revelations about stress inducers, stress effects, and the ways that stress was reduced in the formerly-aggressive and formerly angst-filled troop that he studied.

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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