4. Do not accumulate more than you need - There is no real distinction in being the richest man in the graveyard. Many earnest citizens act as though there were pockets in shrouds. We are supposed to have outgrown the primitive belief that we should bury a mans goods with him so that his spirit might enjoy them in the afterworld. Here, again, the middle course is the wisest. Let us reserve some of our energy for enjoyment, and not give all of ourselves to the task of accumulation. Many a man who has made a million has not lived to spend it. A rich life can be more practical than a monumental bank account.
If we're dead, what does it matter if we are the riches person? Do the dead care? Would any of the dead know who's the wealthiest person in the graveyard? Are we able to take our wealth and material possessions to the next world?
Jesus said:
"For how is a man benefited if he should gain the whole world and should lose his soul. Or what payment shall a man give to regain his soul." - Mark 8:36-37
If we are greedy, then we can assume we have egos of greed and that means we have parts of our essence, parts of our consciousness imprisoned within them. If we take the time to study our minds and hearts we may find that we are in fact greedy. If so, let us ask ourselves, "how does greed benefit us and those around us?" If we don't feel that we are greedy let's ask ourselves, "am I charitable?" When someone needs our help, do we help them? Or do we worry about our bank account looking a little less full? Our egos of greed cloud our perception. We think money is going to save us and that money creates happiness. Our conditioned consciousness that is trapped within greed has us hypnotized and in a delusional state of being. If we study todays humanity what do we find pertaining to greed? We may find that a large percentage of our lives is motivated by greed. Most of us are taught from a young age that we have to earn a living. Meaning; we have to make money in order to survive. Overtime, our need to make a living in order to pay our bills, buy food, clothing, take care of our family, etc, turns into something more. Overtime, we may become greedy and this can happen at a very early period in our life. We may envy what others have and become consumed by jealousy. That mistaken perception, what we call subjective reasoning creates many envious monsters within us and those egos may motivate us to find a way to obtain whatever it is that we desire. It may be that we know someone that has a great deal of wealth and they are capable of owning many things that our envious, greedy aggregates desire. There may be many factors. What we see on tv, the internet, etc. As we get older, we begin to think about death. We may fear losing what we have or we may believe we can take our wealth with us.
Throughout our history people believed they could take their wealth with them to the afterlife. Many cultures all over the world buried people with some of their possessions. Why? Early religions often held that the dead carried objects with them on their travel to the afterlife. People would entomb their loved ones with items that could accompany their journey. When we visit museums all over the world we find artifacts from burial sites. Throughout history, Kings, Queens, Warlords, Pharaohs, Emperors, etc, were buried with what they considered their most beloved possessions. This practice was motivated by tradition, religion, etc. Today, that tradition is still alive: Family and friends routinely bury or inter the deceased with treasured possessions from life.
The following is from the Lecture "After we Die" given by Glorian.org:
"When we die, most of what we right now think as "ourselves" will be taken away from us. It is obvious that when we die, the physical body is taken from us. What is also taken is the vital body which is the energy of the physical body. What is also taken is our personality, our name, our language, our cultural tastes, what we like as music, what we like as food, our clothing tastes. All of those behavioral characteristics that we think are our identity. All of that is abandoned. What goes into the other world is the raw content of our mind and heart, and trapped inside of that is the consciousness. The person who dies faces three potential outcomes. The ones who have earned it achieve a vacation of sorts in the superior worlds, in which they experience the pleasures, happiness, and serenity of the heavens, those dimensions that are not corrupted by desire. The second path is to be reborn immediately with no break, but instead immediately come back into a physical body to continue suffering their karma, the results of their actions. The third outcome is where the person is unable to pay their debts or earn the ticket to have a vacation, so they descend into the lower worlds, what we call "hell," in order to start paying what they owe. So here on this map we see these options. In the middle is Malkuth, the physical body. When the physical body is dead, when it dies, our karma and state of consciousness determine if we get reborn immediately, do we earn a vacation in the superior worlds, or do we descend into the lower worlds. It depends on us." - Lecture After we die/Glorian.org
So, today why is it that we think we can take our material possessions with us to the afterlife? Is it perhaps our sentiments, attachments, ego, etc. Is it because we lost our connection to Divinity? Is it because we are idolators? Do we worship the Golden Calf (money)? Why is it that we believe we can enter paradise with our ego (Pride, Anger, Greed, Lust, Envy, Gluttony, Sloth, Etc)?
1 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 9-10:
"Or do you not know that evil men do not inherit the Kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; no fornicators, neither worshipers of idols, neither adulterers, neither sexual molesters, neither homosexuals, neither frauds, nor thieves, neither drunkards, nor the insolent, neither extortioners; these do not inherit The Kingdom of God."
Jesus said:
"I say to you that it is easier for a camel to enter the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God." - Matthew 19:24
By rich we mean someone who has a lot of ego and attachment to things in this physical world. If we are attached to our wealth and material possessions, then it's very hard for us to enter the "Kingdom of God." Obviously in this day and age we need to earn money. We need to be upright citizens. What do I mean by upright citizens? Well, we need to abide by the laws of the land. If we do not pay our bills, taxes, help feed, cloth and provide shelter for ourselves and perhaps some loved ones, are we acting in an upright manner? It's ok to have money, it's ok to save money, it's ok to have wealth, but what we do with our wealth is what matters and how we acquire our wealth as well. How do we behave when we have money and what are we doing with it? Are we creating attachment to our wealth? Are we stressed out when our bank account gets low? What do we do if we have a lot of money? What would we do if someone needed our help and we have the means to help them? Obviously we don't want to give money to just anyone. There are ways to help others financially without having to give them cash. The point is, is what are our actions inside and outside of us? How do we think, feel and act? Do we fight and argue about money with our spouse or anyone for that matter? Is money all we think about? Is wealth our daily motivating factor for living? Do we love to buy things for ourselves and are we creating attachments to those possessions? If we do not have a lot of wealth do we envy and covet what others have? Are we creating a lot of jealousy because we covet what we see on tv, and all around us? How much energy are we wasting on frivolous activities that involve greed and covetousness? What should we be doing? How should we be utilizing our energies?
The following is from a lecture given by an instructor from Glorian pertaining to Ethics and non virtuous actions:
"Covetousness: Covetousness or envy, why? To my experience, it is because it's so strong. Samael Aun Weor said that envy is the secret trigger of all action in the world. When we analyze what is happening with our governments, with big companies, with our family members, with ourselves, we can pretty much always find envy. What is envy? It is wanting what someone else has. We want that car, we want that job, one country wants the resources of another, wants the respect of another, one family member wants the money of another, the love that another one gets. Envy is when we want something that is not naturally ours. Envy always says, "I want it." I challenge you to watch for that in your mind. "I want it." That is covetousness. In most cases, we experience it in relation with material things. "I want money, a spouse, a better place to live, a big house, an island." We have a list, probably had it since we were kids. I will give you a little secret: burn it. Burn the list, you will have so much more peace when you have no covetousness. When you are content with what God has given you. You see, in the Bible it says: "Let every man accept what God has given him." Who among us does that? Who accepts gratefully what we have? None of us, we are all craving and dying and scratching out a living trying to get more and get more and get more. Why? Because we have not comprehended death. We have not understood that we are going to die and all of those things we are working so hard to get will be useless. So why did we spend years and years and years struggling so hard to get something that we have to give up? What is the value of that, what is the point? Reflect on that. When a desire emerges in you, really reflect: "What will this fundamentally change for my soul? What will this change about the moment I am dying?" Have you meditated on the moment of your death? You should. Sit and imagine it. Do not hide from it, do not run from it. If you avoid death, when it comes you will be unprepared. And you will die in a panic and afraid, and those energies will affect your next transition. But if you prepare every day for death, it will not come as a surprise, you will be ready, and you will pass into that transition with happiness, with contentment, conscious. The true Gnostic prepares for death every day. The true Gnostic path is a path of dying from moment to moment, preparing for death. And if you are doing that, what is there to be attached to? Why do you really need those shoes or those new pants or that new computer, or to redecorate the whole house, why? It is not that anything is wrong with those objects, what is wrong is our attitude and our enslavement to attachment. You see, attachment is the key factor of covetousness. The state of our world is because of this factor. Some examples that you can look for in your mind: "How nice if I were the one in charge." Now you might hear that and think "That does not sound like covetousness to me, it sounds like pride." But it is covetousness. How else will we get the idea unless we are trying to get it from someone else? We see the boss who is in charge: "Look at that nice car he drives, everybody respects him, they bow at his feet when he walks by, everybody salutes the guy in charge, I want to be that guy." Covetousness. All of these apply spiritually, by the way. A lot of people want to be the Lama or the master who all the students bow to. Why? Not to benefit the students, but to get the praise, to feed pride. To hide from their fear. "How nice to have the wife of so-and-so, to have their possessions? How nice if I could eat that food?" This is all covetousness. "How nice if others knew me to be humble, to be compassionate, to be wise?" Every spiritually inclined person has thought that. "I hope everybody can see me as a spiritual person, very humble." That is covetousness. That is not true spirituality. When you want something from someone else, when you are attached to how people see you, when you want their attention, when you want their respect, it is covetousness. It is not sincere, it is not conscious. It is the ego."How nice if people in high places respected me?" Some people think "If everybody respected me, even celebrities would respect me, even politicians would respect me." That is covetousness."How nice if I could be reborn in Nirvana (heaven) with powers and servants." Covetousness."How nice if I had the ability to go in the astral body, how nice if I was a master of Samadhi," Covetousness. We should not covet what we do not have. If you want something different, analyze that want, and give it to God. This does not mean that you sit back and wait. We have to give up our desires, analyze our wants, but we also have to work for what is right. Some people always say "Well if I accept what God has given me, does that mean I do not have to work? Does that mean I should quit my job? If I am not supposed to worry about my clothes and paying my bills and eating, should I just stop doing anything?" No, because if you do not do anything, you will starve. You have to work, you have to act, you have to be prudent, you have to be intelligent."
If we spend our whole life trying to obtain what others have or if we make a lot of money but we are selfish with what we have, what are the consequences of our actions?
Jesus said:
"Do not place treasures for yourselves on the earth, where moths and corrosion disfigure and where thieves break in and steal. But place treasures for yourselves in Heaven, where neither moths nor corrosion disfigure and where thieves neither break in nor steal." - Matthew 6:19-20
So, how should we spend the time we've been given while we are here in a physical body? This is something we should all meditate on. Should we spend our time trying to accumulate as much money as possible, and accumulating as many material possessions as we can? Should we spend our time coveting other peoples material possessions and thus using up all our creative, mental and emotional energy fantasizing about the things that we don't have? Should we invest our time in something authentic, real and true.
We cannot take our material possessions with us to heaven. All our wealth cannot go with us into the next world and we have no need of it there. Our true treasures in heaven are made through sacrifice, selflessness, compassion, generosity, humility, love, kindness, charity, chastity, purity, divinity, etc, etc. We should work to build a relationship with our inner divinity and remember that money, envy, covetousness, etc, do not create authentic happiness. Let's work on paying attention to ourselves. Let's become aware of how we think, feel, and act. We are much more than a greedy egotistical person.
Next we have:
5. Learn to relax - Great tension is an abomination. The more tense we become, the more stupidly we are likely to act, and, according to the old Buddhists, stupidity is a cardinal sin. Today, many so-called efficient people are perpetually on the verge of a nervous breakdown. This is not so likely to be due to overwork as to unreasonable driving impulses from within themselves. Some say that they are overtaxing their resources to keep their jobs or to maintain extravagant families. Whether you believe it or not, you are a better producer and a better provider if you do not collapse from psychic exhaustion at some critical moment when you are most in need of good health. If your associates do not realize this, they may be in need of practical counsel.
I don’t completely agree with this statement because people are overworked all over the world, and being overworked can cause us to become imbalanced. Sometimes we overwork ourselves. Nevertheless, if our day to day life is nothing but work we can obviously do our best to treat each moment at work as a spiritual experience, remembering Divinity. How? By remaining mindful, conscious and aware of ourselves. We can practice being humble and not being so negative about our current circumstance, etc. One of the ways we suffer at work is by not remaining in the here and now. While at work, we daydream that we’re somewhere else and wish that we were not at work but doing something else. If we were to transform our thoughts of “wish I wasn’t here, I’d rather be doing that,” into, “I need to provide for myself and my family, my work helps others, etc,” then we may learn to be more humble and learn to enjoy our vocation. We worry about all kinds of things we have no control over and this causes us to become tense. So, it is important to relax. When we sit to meditate we begin with our posture and get into a comfortable position. During that transition, we may become aware of how tense we are, but why are we tense? What has created tension? Is it stress, anxiety, anger, fear, etc? Our job, our family, our friends, news, politics, all the impressions we take in, the way we live life in general may help create stress and tension. It also depends on how we react to it. How do we feel, think and act while at work, watching the news or reading the paper? Do we become stressed, sad, angry, etc? Do we feel drained of energy afterwards? If we follow politics or watch the news; we should pay attention to how we feel physically, emotionally, and mentally.
Nicolas Gomez Davila said:
"Man matures when he stops believing that politics solves his problems."
How about when we're with friends or family? Do we gossip? Do we talk about worldly matters that create stress and anxiety? Do we forget ourselves? How about our job? Do we like our job? Do we feel that we are overworked? How do we feel about our boss and co-workers? Do we pay attention to our thoughts, emotions and actions (self-observation) while at work? Do we remember our Innermost while at work (self-remembering)? Are we practicing upright behaviors (Ethics) or are we thinking badly of others and speaking negatively of others, whether internally or externally? Are we spending a significant amount of energy stressing about things that we have no control over? Why? All of the diverse circumstances that we allow ourselves to stress over create a lot of tension. Do these issues last forever? Or are they impermanent?
The following is from "Suffering and Right View" by a Glorian.org Gnostic Instructor:
The First Noble Truth tells us that suffering is everywhere: that all manifest creatures suffer, life itself is suffering, life as we know it. The comprehension of that one truth would cause radical changes in our every moment, in our every behavior, but we do not comprehend that truth, so we have to precede and understand what that truth means and how to change it.
We can help ourselves by comprehending that to exist in this world is to endure suffering in some way and that everything passes; "this too shall pass." Suffering will eventually pass. Something else that I feel is very important, that personally helped me was when I heard an instructor state the following: "We can treat every moment as a spiritual experience,” and “if we want to end suffering we have to comprehend what causes it.”
Gnostic Instructor continued:
Unfortunately, the psyche that we have believes that somehow at that horizon line that we see up ahead, there is this plateau where suffering will cease, where we will get all of the objects and circumstances that we need in order to have happiness. And so we keep running towards that horizon line, which we think is a plateau, and we keep saying to ourselves, "If I can only get a better job, if I can only get a better boss, if I can only get a better apartment, or a better spouse, or a better friend, better clothes, more money, more respect. Once I get that promotion, then I will be happy." This is what we call a delusion, it is not real. This delusion is produced by what we call the I, the ego, the sense of self.
Round and round we chase our desires and desire is never satisfied. The ego is never satisfied. Our desires create stress and tension. When we desire something we waste catastrophic amounts of energy in order for it to be satisfied but if we spend our time and energy aspiring to know our inner divinity, to observe ourselves, to become a better person from moment to moment, we will experience life in a spiritual manner. Life wouldn't be so stressful. Life wouldn't be so dark and gloomy. Living life this way gives it meaning. There is meaning to this great drama we call life. Most of us here on earth are searching for the meaning of our existence; searching aimlessly. We think that the meaning of life is in our desires, in a video game, money, sex, intoxicants, to follow someone, to serve ourselves, which are all a form of Idolatry, or we simply have no idea and we give up. Perhaps some of us feel that there is no meaning and this all happened by chance.
Carl Jung stated:
Meaninglessness inhibits fullness of life and is therefore equivalent to illness. Meaning makes a great many things endurable. When we are unconscious, life has no meaning. Whether we are rich or poor, has family and social position or not, alters nothing, for outer circumstances are far from giving our life a meaning. Man positively needs general ideas and convictions that will give a meaning to our life and enable us to find our place in the universe.”
Building a relationship with our Higher Power will help us find the meaning that we've been searching for. Putting the sacred spiritual teachings to use in our daily life will help us come to know ourselves better and better. Our inner guiding star will help show us the way.
Jesus said:
Do not love the world, neither the things that are in it, for whoever loves the world does not have the love of The Father in him. For everything that is in the world: the desire of the body and the lust of the eyes and the pride of temporal life, these are from the world. The world is passing and its lust, but he who does the will of God continues for eternity. 1 John 2:15-17
Through our process of building a relationship with our Innermost Being we come to depend on its guidance and learn to renounce the mundaneness of this world. The teachings of Samael Aun Weor help us learn to develop a relationship with our Divine Mother and Father, awaken our intuition, listen to our conscience, meditate and pray.
A prayer that is great to perform daily is the following:
“You who are my True Being, you who are my internal God, help me, guide me, make me see my own defects.” - Introduction to Gnosis, Samael Aun Weor
Samael Aun Weor said in his book “Introduction to Gnosis,” to “concentrate on this prayer until deep sleep arrives. Try to discover all your defects. We advise you to read the Bible. The word of the Divine Master is found in the four Gospels. There you will see the virtues that you need, there you will discover the virtues that you lack. Wherever a virtue is lacking, a defect exists.”
When we perform this prayer with our heart we are begging our Innermost Being to help us discover our egos. Overtime, we discover them through the process of self-observation, self-remembering, meditation, etc. As we discover our defects and meditate on them we learn through experience that we don't have to stress over everything that we cannot control. We don't have to react to everything we see and hear on tv. We have been taught most of our life that we should react to things without processing them first. When faced with different circumstances we react in certain ways because we have egos that interpret the impressions that we take in through our five senses. We react with pride, anger, envy, lust, etc, etc. When we react that way we are unconscious and this type of reasoning is subjective and they create a lot of suffering. Why do we react without observing, and studying the situation? Perhaps because we’ve been behaving in certain ways for so long that we have completely forgotten ourselves. So, why are we stressed? Why are we tense? Is it perhaps that we are psychologically asleep. If we observe ourselves from moment to moment we discover that we get frustrated and stressed very easily. Why? Throughout our lives we fantasize and daydream about everything we would rather be doing. We are never satisfied. For instance: While at work we think about what we'd rather be doing instead of being focused on the task at hand. When our spouse upsets us or we don't feel we have much in common, etc, we may fantasize about another spouse. If we don't have a spouse we fantasize about finding the perfect one. It's all a lie we feed ourselves. None of us are perfect. What do we create within ourselves when we fantasize, desire, gossip, covet more money, depend on political leaders to fix everything, depend on something external for our happiness, etc, etc? What do our desires for self-gratification create? Anxiety, anger, stress, tension, laziness, greed, envy, lust, illusions, etc. All kinds of suffering right?. All kinds of tension. All kinds of stress. All kinds of ego.
Samuel Aun Weor said:
It is easy to mistake desire with that which we call love. Desire is a substance that decomposes into thoughts, volitions, sentiments, romances, poetries, tenderness, sweetness, anger, hatred, violence, etc. The poison of desire always cheats people. Those who are in love always swear that they are loving, when in reality they are desiring. Love has its peculiar happiness and its infinite beauty. Most of us do not know that which is love. Love is similar to the sentiments shown by a new born baby. Love forgives everything, gives everything, it does not demand anything, it does not ask for anything, it only wants the best for the one that it loves and that is all. The true sentiment of love is perfect, and Satan knows nothing of perfection, because Satan is desire. If you want to love, be prudent; do not confuse love with desire. Do not allow yourself to be cheated by desire, the great swindler.
"Do not worry; cultivate the habit of being happy." - Samael Aun Weor
Happiness comes from the Being not the ego.
M stated the following:
Every man/woman born is intended to ascend to a higher place and position. To reach a higher or Golden Age of expression, from within and from without, is his or her natural inheritance, so that he or she can harmonize themself with the finer forces which go to make up natures highest expression. Man/woman was intended to become a commanding principal in nature (shepherds not destroyers). Man/woman is the master of their own destiny; yet he or she fails to realize that uncontrolled thoughts, passions and desires, speech without thought, envy, hatred, and malice cause movements which do not harmonize man/woman with the keynote within. This disorganizes the harmony of the whole plan within and without, and thus brings about a retrograde movement. It does not mean that he or she is stopped in his or her evolution, but it withholds them from assuming positiveness, and it stops him or her from relating themself to the urge which natures consciousness would give them. The pull from his or her natural man/woman is withdrawn, for he or she has acted contrary to the wisdom of the Lord God of Truth within (Innermost). Through lack of harmony with his or her central note he or she is not able to achieve the monumental objective for which he or she incarnated. Therefore, according to the cyclic law of being, he or she misses opportunities for this finer expression.
So let’s not waste the wonderful opportunity that we have been given. Let's come to recognize the desires we create, feed and chase. The creation of our ego through desire disconnected us from reality and truth. The ego creates tension, all kinds of suffering, it is suffering, pain, bitterness, and "withholds us from assuming positiveness."
Symbolically speaking: We have tangled ourselves in many self-created webs of illusion and our inner spider, the ego, feeds off the energy we spend trying to satisfy our desires.
In the beginning, before we conditioned ourselves, our consciousness represented a beautiful mirror that reflected the universe.
Overtime, we dropped that mirror and shattered it into many pieces. All those pieces represent our consciousness which is conditioned and trapped within desire. Trapped within our inner children of chaos that we created; psychological defects, vices, errors (Ego).
A Gnostic Instructor stated the following in the “suffering and right view” lecture, Glorian.org
There are some of us who feel emptiness in our hearts. That emptiness becomes a black hole. A black hole that we feed with negative behaviors. Some of us become addicted to mind altering substances. Some of us become addicted to negative, perverse sexual behaviors. Some of us are addicted to buying things. We see others with a new car, clothes, house, etc and become envious. We think I've got to have that too or I deserve one of those too. We are addicted to our desires and escaping reality. What we need is Love. What we need is compassion for others. What we need is true happiness.
Thankfully we have some of our consciousness that is still free. Samael Aun Weor taught us that the average person has at least 3% consciousness that is not bottled up within desire, the me, the myself, the I. We need to learn to utilize the three percent. We do this by becoming aware of our psychological defects, aggregates, vices and errors. In this way we enter into a battle. Which is a battle against ourself, our own sinning shadow.
Our inner David (free consciousness) stands up to Goliath (Ego). We do our best to remain aware, cognizant, and alert, so that we can discover our pride, anger, envy, lust, greed, laziness, gluttony, etc, that all create more suffering, tension, etc, etc. If we find ourselves in a situation that stimulates our egos to motivate us to react or think and feel a certain way; and we are aware of this process, then we can study it. We also need to transform it and comprehend it. After we gain comprehension of whatever it may be we pray to our Divine Mother to destroy it and little by little we begin to change, we begin to process things and react differently. We begin to discover the things that used to bother us and create tension don't anymore. Parts of our anger, our pride that we used to feel is gone and what's beginning to replace them is compassion and humility. Obviously, this isn't going to happen overnight. It’s a process that takes a lot of work. It is a battle that we can win. We all seek happiness, but the issue is, we've been barking up the wrong tree.
Samael Aun Weor stated in his chapter "Happiness" stated:
People confuse pleasure with happiness. Parties, bar hopping, drinking sprees and orgies are brutish pleasures, but they are not happiness. There are, however, wholesome get-togethers without over-indulgence, vulgar behavior and the abuse of alcohol. But that is not happiness either. People spend a lifetime looking for happiness everywhere and die without ever having found it. In America and everywhere there are many who hope to win the lottery some day; they think that this way they will find happiness. Some in fact do win. However, this does not bring them the happiness for which they yearn so much. When one is a young man, one dreams of the perfect woman, a princess from One Thousand and One Arabian Nights, someone extraordinary. Then the harsh reality of life hits: a wife and small children to support, difficult financial problems, etc. There is no doubt that as the children grow so do the problems, and they might even become impossible to cope with... Naturally, as children get bigger they need bigger shoes, which are more expensive. This is obvious. Naturally, as the children grow, their clothing is ever more costly. If you have money it is no problem; but if not, then it is a serious matter and there is a great deal of suffering. Everything would be more or less bearable with a good wife, but if a man is betrayed, that is, if his wife cheats on him, then what is the use of him struggling to earn money for the household? There are unfortunately extraordinary examples of wonderful women, true companions through both fortune and misfortune. However, to make matters worse, their husbands take them for granted, and worse still, abandon them for other women who will embitter their lives. There are many young girls who dream of their prince. Unfortunately, the harsh reality is in fact different, and they end up marrying tyrants. The greatest dream for a woman is to have a lovely home and be a mother, a blessed predestination. However, even if she marries a good man, who may be unlikely, all things come to pass in the end. Sons and daughters get married and leave home or they are ungrateful to their parents. Ultimately, family life ends. All in all, in this cruel world in which we live there are no happy people... All the unfortunate human beings are unhappy. In life we have met many individuals who are loaded with money and full of problems: they are involved in lawsuits, overtaxed, etc. They are not happy. What is the use of being rich if one does not have good health? Sometimes they are more unfortunate than any beggar. Everything passes in this life: things, people, ideas, etc. Those who have money and those who have none also pass away. Nobody experiences genuine happiness! Many people want to escape from themselves through drugs or alcohol. In truth, they not only fail to escape, but worse, they get trapped in an inferno of vice. Friends in alcohol, marijuana or L.S.D. disappear as if by magic when an addict resolves to change his life. Happiness is not achieved by running away from the Me, Myself, the Ego. Instead it would be interesting to grab the bull by the horns, to observe the 'I', to study the 'I' in order to discover the causes of suffering. When one discovers the real cause of so much misery and bitterness, it becomes obvious that something can be done... If we manage to eliminate our Me, Myself, our 'I' of drinking sprees, our 'I' of vices and our 'I' of attachments that cause so much heartfelt sorrow in us; if we manage to eliminate those worries that torment our minds and make us ill etc., etc., then clearly what arrives is that which is timeless, that which is beyond the body, that which is beyond attachments and beyond the mind, that which is truly beyond our comprehension and is called happiness! Unquestionably, while our consciousness remains trapped within the Ego, the Me, Myself, the 'I' , in no way will it be able to know genuine happiness. Happiness has a quality that neither the Me, Myself, the 'I' , or the Ego has ever known.
True happiness is acquired after we liberate ourselves from the Ego. True happiness comes from within. We acquire moments of happiness throughout our journey. We begin to discover true happiness throughout our struggles, ordeals, trials and tribulations. As we conquer parts of our false sense of self we begin to know our true selves better and better. As we transform our hate into love, anger into compassion, pride into humility, envy into happiness for others we begin to obtain true happiness which comes from the Being. We begin to know our purpose and discover a reason for our existence. We may also earn experiences from the Being that give us gnosis of what happiness is and what it would be like to be without the ego. We can enter into different levels of samadhi and that experience helps us understand moments of bliss, moments of happiness. But those experiences don’t last forever. If we were to enter into Nirvana for a vacation we’d eventually have to come back into a new body. So if we do the work we begin to see and feel what it's like without the weight of our desires. These kinds of experiences help motivate us to keep going, to keep working and help us in many ways. We can live without tension, we can know what love and happiness are. We can achieve victory. Again, we achieve authentic eternal happiness after we have liberated ourselves from the ego and united with our Inner Divinity. Happiness, absence of suffering comes from our Innermost Being. We all have work to do, so let's get to work.
Practice:
Now we will perform a practice together. If it's possible for you to get into a meditative posture please do so. Preferably sitting with your spine straight or laying down face up with your spine straight. We are going to focus our concentration on different regions of our body and do our best to discover where we are tense. First we we will spend some time focusing our attention on the region from our feet to our knees. Concentrate on your feet and work your way up to your knees. Let's become aware of any tension and relax those areas. Next do the same from your upper knees to your waste. Next do the same from your upper waste to your chest. Next do the same from your arms to your shoulders. Next do the same to your neck and head. Relax the areas where you find tension.
For more information:
The Great Rebellion, Treatise of Revolutionary Psychology, Revolution of the Dialectic by Samael Aun Weor.
The Lord God of Truth Within by M
Books by Manly P Hall
Comentarios