As we look for ways to expand our awareness of how things work these days; positive thinking, the law of attraction, and similar “mind over matter” concepts are being sold as the new Messiah. Motivational gurus make some good points about human potential. However, it seems to me there are some wrinkles in this new religion.
My parents visited from out of town the other day, and they tried to teach me how to play cribbage while they were here. My mom was explaining the strategy and told me once that we wanted to draw a 5. So, I cut the deck and got a 5. It did help us, but it helped my son and father even more, so we lost that hand. Next, Mom told me we were hoping for a 6, so I cut and we got a 6. Same thing – we got a couple points but our opponents got even more, so we lost again. This little game reminded me why I stopped following conventional guidance many years ago.
Lately, the current wisdom that most of us hear says “Take control of your life. Manifest what you want to happen!”
Sometimes, people ask “Does it work?”
Yes! Of course it works!
The question we should be asking is “Is it in our best interest to work that magic?”
Like those hands of cribbage I lost when I made things happen that I thought I wanted, it’s incredibly easy to force the wrong situations into our lives. During these times of change (i.e. destruction, and the threat of destruction, of just about everything in our lives) pulling a rabbit out of a hat could be really handy! Still, it’s really important to learn to rely on the only thing that is really reliable, and destroy all of our other illusions before they try to destroy us.
Learning to harmonize rather than using all the forces at our disposal to force our own way is the difference between mysticism and magic. Magic make things happen that we want to happen. Mysticism puts our desires and energy in action but leaves us detached from the results, placing our faith instead on the intelligence of the universe.
Those who are religious might want to remember Commandment #1. Reliance on the wisdom of our own ego instead of on our supreme source is a violation of that commandment. The rest of us pragmatic types probably just need to realize that whenever we try to take complete control of a situation, we’re on thin ice. We need to take responsibility for our lives, but that’s entirely different from taking control away from the intelligent, mystical force around us.
Hunt Henion
www.shiftawareness.com
Showing posts with label human ego. Show all posts
Showing posts with label human ego. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Rant of "The Secret"
“Ever since we first took on selfish goals and priorities 5000 years ago in Babylon and built that temple to ego, we’ve been laboring under the illusion that the only essential thing in life is our own desires and will power. This has made the one real thing invisible to us.” I discuss this reality behind all that we perceive in my new book, “Looking, Seeing & Knowing.” And, I have to say, that what I describe as The One Real Thing in life seems to be in direct opposition to what some of the world's most famous motivational gurus have so successfully promoted as “The Secret” to all life.
True, they have been tremendously successful, and so far I haven’t. They’ve amassed an army to saturate the media with their message. I’m just whispering my messsage in what is, so far, an almost unknown little blog: The real secret to life has to do with our harmonious connection to all things.
True, we have a lot of power over the events that come into our lives, and people should generally take more responsibility for their own circumstances. However, because of our connection to all things, our own desire and will power are not the only influences in our lives! That would seem fairly intuitive to most people. However, the world of motivational speakers is selling a different theory.
I was in sales for many years, and I appreciate a good pep talk as much as the next guy. However, the authors of this book go so far with their “secret” principle as to say that those who were tortured and murdered in the WWII concentration camps must have set that condition up for themselves. The writers reach this conclusion because they only recognize one principle as the cause of all reality in the world. The problem is that these motivational gurus picked the wrong one thing in which to put all their faith.
Speaking biblically, you could say that their teachings promote a false god. They preach that without exception, we personally create everything that happens to us. This exclusive philosophy sets up human ego above the one real thing. It leads readers away from compassion for others, and thus away from their own heart, which would otherwise lead them to knowing what's real behind all that we see or perceive. Hearts connect us; egos divide us.
This idea that we personally create everything that happens to us by our own thought forms also drives a wedge into unity consciousness. If the only cause in our life is an internal one, who needs everyone else, except, of course, as targets for our marketing campaigns? According to this all-encompassing principle, if we don’t meet our quota, the ONLY reason could be that we must not have tried hard enough or held onto the right thought forms tightly enough.
This failure leaves no room for looking for other doors to open, or wondering about the universal plan. We simply failed; and failure, of course, is a bad thing, even though that’s how most of us learn best, AND even though learning is the whole point to being on Earth in the first place.
The only solution for this detestable failure is to cut ourselves off from any distracting outside influences even more, and get right back out on the streets and sell, sell, sell! Sales managers love this delusion, but it does the rest of us a tremendous disservice.
So… this egotistical “secret” of success cuts us off from our own heart center; it separates us from acknowledgement of our connection to others and how they influence us; and it furthers the illusion of duality by promoting verifiable goal-oriented “success” as the only good influence in our lives.
Years ago, when I was laid off, and my marriage fell apart, and I couldn’t get a job, and my little bit of life savings all disappeared, my best friends said it must be because of my karma. They said that somehow I must have brought this on myself. Because of their little bit knowledge into how karma and life worked, they had absolutely no compassion for my situation.
That was right before I picked up and moved to the far corner of Montana and resolved to be done with this world as soon as possible. Things got better after my life contract expired, and I started all over (The story of how and why I discovered that my prelife contract had actually run out even tho I still lived and breathed on Earth is also told in Looking, Seeing & Knowing.) Still, as I looked around and saw that I wasn't alone in having my life fall apart, I had to wonder what’s going on.
The simple answer is that our higher selves are finding a way for many, if not most, of us to face our worst fears in order to help us move past them before this historical human cycle ends in a few years. The egotistical illusion that we alone created our present circumstances through our utter failure just adds insult to injury. It totally negates the influence of our connection with an intelligent universe or anyone around us. Personal ego, perspective and preferences are important, but they are by no means The One Real Thing!
I’m not sure what a happy ending to all my predicaments would look like anymore. I’m sure I’ll be fine. In fact, I constantly work on happy expectations for the outcome of my situations. However, I don’t know what that outcome will be yet because I don’t know exactly what Spirit has in mind for me.
There’s always more going on than we can possibly know. Things may result in realizing the opposite of my goals (which I work on for about 15 hours every day). That’s obviously not my first choice. Yet THE Secret is that it doesn’t matter!
Our willingness to do the work of the One Thing, with all the love and creative hope in the universe, instead of trying to wield the power of the gods over it for our own petty preferences, is where the real magic for our future lies. The benevolent universe won’t deny us what we need, but THE Secret is learning to work with It, rather trying to control It. Measuring ourselves by how well we attain our personal goals is ONLY the secret to entirely missing the whole point of life.
True, they have been tremendously successful, and so far I haven’t. They’ve amassed an army to saturate the media with their message. I’m just whispering my messsage in what is, so far, an almost unknown little blog: The real secret to life has to do with our harmonious connection to all things.
True, we have a lot of power over the events that come into our lives, and people should generally take more responsibility for their own circumstances. However, because of our connection to all things, our own desire and will power are not the only influences in our lives! That would seem fairly intuitive to most people. However, the world of motivational speakers is selling a different theory.
I was in sales for many years, and I appreciate a good pep talk as much as the next guy. However, the authors of this book go so far with their “secret” principle as to say that those who were tortured and murdered in the WWII concentration camps must have set that condition up for themselves. The writers reach this conclusion because they only recognize one principle as the cause of all reality in the world. The problem is that these motivational gurus picked the wrong one thing in which to put all their faith.
Speaking biblically, you could say that their teachings promote a false god. They preach that without exception, we personally create everything that happens to us. This exclusive philosophy sets up human ego above the one real thing. It leads readers away from compassion for others, and thus away from their own heart, which would otherwise lead them to knowing what's real behind all that we see or perceive. Hearts connect us; egos divide us.
This idea that we personally create everything that happens to us by our own thought forms also drives a wedge into unity consciousness. If the only cause in our life is an internal one, who needs everyone else, except, of course, as targets for our marketing campaigns? According to this all-encompassing principle, if we don’t meet our quota, the ONLY reason could be that we must not have tried hard enough or held onto the right thought forms tightly enough.
This failure leaves no room for looking for other doors to open, or wondering about the universal plan. We simply failed; and failure, of course, is a bad thing, even though that’s how most of us learn best, AND even though learning is the whole point to being on Earth in the first place.
The only solution for this detestable failure is to cut ourselves off from any distracting outside influences even more, and get right back out on the streets and sell, sell, sell! Sales managers love this delusion, but it does the rest of us a tremendous disservice.
So… this egotistical “secret” of success cuts us off from our own heart center; it separates us from acknowledgement of our connection to others and how they influence us; and it furthers the illusion of duality by promoting verifiable goal-oriented “success” as the only good influence in our lives.
Years ago, when I was laid off, and my marriage fell apart, and I couldn’t get a job, and my little bit of life savings all disappeared, my best friends said it must be because of my karma. They said that somehow I must have brought this on myself. Because of their little bit knowledge into how karma and life worked, they had absolutely no compassion for my situation.
That was right before I picked up and moved to the far corner of Montana and resolved to be done with this world as soon as possible. Things got better after my life contract expired, and I started all over (The story of how and why I discovered that my prelife contract had actually run out even tho I still lived and breathed on Earth is also told in Looking, Seeing & Knowing.) Still, as I looked around and saw that I wasn't alone in having my life fall apart, I had to wonder what’s going on.
The simple answer is that our higher selves are finding a way for many, if not most, of us to face our worst fears in order to help us move past them before this historical human cycle ends in a few years. The egotistical illusion that we alone created our present circumstances through our utter failure just adds insult to injury. It totally negates the influence of our connection with an intelligent universe or anyone around us. Personal ego, perspective and preferences are important, but they are by no means The One Real Thing!
I’m not sure what a happy ending to all my predicaments would look like anymore. I’m sure I’ll be fine. In fact, I constantly work on happy expectations for the outcome of my situations. However, I don’t know what that outcome will be yet because I don’t know exactly what Spirit has in mind for me.
There’s always more going on than we can possibly know. Things may result in realizing the opposite of my goals (which I work on for about 15 hours every day). That’s obviously not my first choice. Yet THE Secret is that it doesn’t matter!
Our willingness to do the work of the One Thing, with all the love and creative hope in the universe, instead of trying to wield the power of the gods over it for our own petty preferences, is where the real magic for our future lies. The benevolent universe won’t deny us what we need, but THE Secret is learning to work with It, rather trying to control It. Measuring ourselves by how well we attain our personal goals is ONLY the secret to entirely missing the whole point of life.
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