No Religion Too...
Perhaps the first line in the Constitution of the Republic of the Imagination would be -
"Thoughts are not Facts."
The notion that our thought describe reality is at the root of the world's insanity. All thoughts are merely ideas. Sure, these ideas help us make sense of the world and give life meaning, but they are only ideas. Believing them to be true doesn't make them true, it just makes you less open to what's happening in the moment...which is the only thing that can be true...because it's what's happening.
Right now the idea that we must kill to defend our faith is being very strongly believed, and the more suffering invested in that belief the stronger it gets in those communities. People would rather be 'right' than happy and at peace. That's how great religion is.
Religion comes from a moment of awareness, an awakening to something that is divine in all of us...this is just an idea too by the way...then people gather around the individual or group who has broken through and awakened. This state of awareness might continue in that person or group for a lifetime or it might just be a temporary experience. Either way, thought constructs a scaffolding around the experience of being awakened in order either to sustain it or a sense of it (in the same way we create synthetic aromas to make our toilets smell like a pine forest) or to try and communicate to those who are still asleep an idea of the nature of this awakened state. Either way thoughts get confused with facts and hey presto religion becomes a stimulant for meaning and a sedative for truth.
What truth is we can only start to recognize when thought becomes quiet, and the only way for thought to become quiet (without having to concentrate very hard on an object, which is impractical if you want to do anything other than sit in a cave)is to actually see where thought comes from and where it goes...tricky, but possible.
One can tell you that thoughts are not facts but that's one idea that no amount of believeing will help you see. But if you watch what's happening in your noggin really carefully, relentlessly and with deep curiosity, then you might just see it. The stirring of a thought and it's fading away...and you'll see that this whole world of meaning we have built for ourselves is like the yarn conjured by a storyteller from shapes in the sparks of a fire.
"Thoughts are not Facts."
The notion that our thought describe reality is at the root of the world's insanity. All thoughts are merely ideas. Sure, these ideas help us make sense of the world and give life meaning, but they are only ideas. Believing them to be true doesn't make them true, it just makes you less open to what's happening in the moment...which is the only thing that can be true...because it's what's happening.
Right now the idea that we must kill to defend our faith is being very strongly believed, and the more suffering invested in that belief the stronger it gets in those communities. People would rather be 'right' than happy and at peace. That's how great religion is.
Religion comes from a moment of awareness, an awakening to something that is divine in all of us...this is just an idea too by the way...then people gather around the individual or group who has broken through and awakened. This state of awareness might continue in that person or group for a lifetime or it might just be a temporary experience. Either way, thought constructs a scaffolding around the experience of being awakened in order either to sustain it or a sense of it (in the same way we create synthetic aromas to make our toilets smell like a pine forest) or to try and communicate to those who are still asleep an idea of the nature of this awakened state. Either way thoughts get confused with facts and hey presto religion becomes a stimulant for meaning and a sedative for truth.
What truth is we can only start to recognize when thought becomes quiet, and the only way for thought to become quiet (without having to concentrate very hard on an object, which is impractical if you want to do anything other than sit in a cave)is to actually see where thought comes from and where it goes...tricky, but possible.
One can tell you that thoughts are not facts but that's one idea that no amount of believeing will help you see. But if you watch what's happening in your noggin really carefully, relentlessly and with deep curiosity, then you might just see it. The stirring of a thought and it's fading away...and you'll see that this whole world of meaning we have built for ourselves is like the yarn conjured by a storyteller from shapes in the sparks of a fire.
posted by ArmchairDJ at 6:13 pm
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