Spiritual Abundance

Different spiritual and religious theories raise the question of the nature of man and his journey through life. Whatever the theory, there is an in agreement that a person is more than mere bones, brain, and flesh. Based on your personal understanding and faith, you probably often wonder the same question as everyone else. What else is there in life? In the face of suffering, despair, and depression this question pops up in our minds habitually. Life is not a cup of instant coffee and neither is self-discovery and inner growth. It requires work. Just as a gardener tends to his garden, a person must tend to his soul – with care, patience and anticipation for his fruits.

My grandparents used to always say to me during my childhood that: “life has big teeth and it bites.” When I was a child, I did not really understand what this meant, nor did I think much about it. I went on with my childhood carefree. Later, in our adulthood we actually comprehend the meaning of this. Yes, life is full of struggles, disappointments and heartbreaks.

Eastern religions view life as a constantly turning wheel of birth after birth, pain after pain with some brief moments of laughter and peace. Others believe that this is our only life here on earth and that afterwards we move to another plane of existence such as heaven or hell. Sometimes I think that these are only technicalities. Whatever the case is, we are here Now.

None of us are immune to the pains of life. Then again, we are also able to savor sweet moments basking in the sun, getting kisses from our dogs, smelling the salty ocean air just because we are here and alive. It is natural for all beings to strive towards pleasure and the escape of pain. This is when the art of living comes into play. We are all alive, but some of us move through life as though we are in a spiritual limbo. That is when depression, disappointment, and hopelessness set in.

Hinduism identifies three problems to suffering. The first one is the desire for wealth, fame, and power. As we acquire each of these, we realize that we cannot hold on to material wealth forever because everything has its limitations. The second is the drive for success that plunges us into overworking ourselves and missing the little pleasures of everyday life such as quiet walks, beautiful sunsets or the scent of flowers. Our drive to succeed washes away our objectivity and we become enslaved by our desires. The more power we place on worldly possessions, the more hungry and dissatisfied we are. We become discontent and want more and more. One car or a decent income is no longer enough. We crave to have more of what we think we do not possess. This leads to the last problem identified by Hinduism – the issue of hedonism. The more we busy ourselves with seeking pleasures and avoiding struggles to meet deadlines, escaping traffic jams, pleasing bosses and corporations, the less we please our inner spiritual self and the less energy we have to give genuinely to other beings. In the Essene Gospel of Peace Book I, we read: “And Jesus answered: Seek not the law in your scriptures, for the law is life, whereas the scripture is dead. I tell you truly, Moses received not his laws from God in writing, but through the living word.” The law refers to our lifestyle and relations with other sentient beings. The living word refers to the life source present in us and all around us. The further we get away from acknowledging our inner self, the unhappier we become. Even when we have things in abundance, we feel spiritually poor. When we feel that we are swimming up the stream in our life, we are most likely out of balance with the Tao or the ever-present God within.

Excerpt from: Guru in Jeans: Inward Journey to Psychospiritual Awakening.

Karma

More and more, especially in the Western world, people are becoming dependant on others for one or another thing. A person may blame his therapist for the lack of progress, another may blame his lawmakers for the way their decisions have affected his life directly or indirectly. Another may blame his childhood and his parents by seeing them as the contributors to the flaws in his character today. A criminal may blame the justice system for not providing enough comfort while in prison; the list goes on. In fact, we are responsible for all of our emotions, thoughts and behaviors. Yes, we do not live an isolated life and come in contact with others all of the time, but eventually we are the ones that are fully responsible for our own moral and spiritual attitude. In the New Testament, we read that Jesus healed a man who had been sick for thirty-eight years. After he was healed, Jesus instructed him “Listen, you are well now; so stop sinning or something worse may happen to you” John 5-14. This example shows us that we ourselves can hurt our physical, mental, and spiritual well-being through the nature of our actions.

A person that is spiritually mature realizes that no one is to blame for the unpleasant events in his life. Such a person acknowledges that everything in nature is connected and that sooner or later as the popular layman’s saying goes: “What goes around comes around.” The law of cause and affect does not apply only to our actions towards others, but it holds true regarding our thoughts, feelings, and behavior in general. When we are too busy arguing, craving, hating and blaming, our mind becomes predisposed to this destructive pattern. We become consumed with the task of justifying our behavior because of our ignorance in recognizing that we create our own reality. Therefore, when we experience something without recognizing its roots, we will continue to reinforce its presence in our daily life. We may mistakenly assume that once a certain condition has passed away that it has vanished forever. For example, if we get angry with someone, we feel anger due to a specific event that triggered it at that specific time. What we fail to realize is that all of our emotions and behavior will manifest continuously in our life if we do not learn how to control them. Anger will come again, triggered by someone or something. In return, we develop psychological and physical ailments such as anxiety, depression, substance abuse, high blood pressure, ulcers and headaches to name just a few. Karma refers to the existence of cause and effect over a period of time, as well as the quality of our well-being, and our state of mind during every moment of our existence. I think that we can only learn from our mistakes if we are truly conscious of them. I believe that if a person is unaware of the afflictions his behavior has caused to another sentient being, that he or she will continue to hurt others.

If someone believes in the analogy that a man can be saved by the grace of an external God, then by this same analogy his own wrongdoings have condemned him in the first place. A person will not grow spiritually as long as he is ignorant. God permeates everything. The Divine is limitless. God is a live energy source. It is neither holy nor evil nor wrathful. It is neutral. Man gives it a quality based on his human versus spiritual views of reality. How can man then say that God caused him to suffer or that God was testing him through trials and tribulations? Man creates his own fate and then experiences the outcome of his own actions. Man has freewill to choose whatever he wants to do or not to do within the limitations of external circumstances. This is what it means to be like God - to have the ability to know that actions cause reactions and that there is no one, not even a deity, to hold responsible for our experiences.
Eastern thought tells us that karma pertains to the laws of cause and affect, which means that actions have outcomes and that we experience all of the fruits of our own behavior throughout many lifetimes. This notion goes even further to postulate that actions in a past life carry consequences into the present one. Karma does not mean that the wrongdoer should be wronged. Man has freewill to decide how to react to an affliction and there are many, many possible reactions. Our freewill, within the power of circumstantial limitations, allows us to look at events and to choose how to interpret and remember them. The discord I have with the Eastern interpretation of karma is that if one is unaware of his past mistakes, how can one change? I do not think that a person has to endure suffering at the hands of those whom he had oppressed in a past life in order to learn a lesson. Jesus said: “turn your other cheek.” Karma is not set in stone.

Excerpt from: Guru in Jeans: Inward Journey to Psychospiritual Awakening.