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All that sounds okay if you are enlightened and I certainly am not. So can we derive anything of comfort from all this? Is there something here which will help us in our daily lives even if we know we have not reached that exalted state of spiritual evolution? Let's first look at what is meant by saying that it is all a matter of perspective. From our perspective everything that we see around us is real, and this reality is the most important reality as far as we are concerned because we have to deal with it from moment to moment. We may be aware of some other levels of reality, but these are not nearly so real for us. Consequently we find ourselves very taken up with the present level of reality and we could be accused of being trapped by it. In Eastern philosophy this is called Pragyaparadh, the mistake of the intellect. It is similar to the illusion of separateness which I described in my last talk here. In our limited worldview we are convinced that we are separate from everybody else and that this is the only reality that there is. However we know from physics and from Eastern philosophy that we create our own reality in our consciousness. Physics tells us that we are surrounded by a universal field of energy, and that by observing it we cause it to collapse from a state of all possibilities to the particular possibility that we have selected. Eastern philosophy tells us that we have created this body and agreed to be limited by space and time in order to evolve spiritually and that this body is not who we really are. We are much more than this. But although our reality is a personally created version of reality, it seems to be the same for most other people and therefore we could call it a consensus reality. The existence of this consensus reality prevents us from seeing that we could really create whatever reality we want if we believed in ourselves. Here we got close to the subject of faith and maybe we can talk about faith in this context on another day. But this consensus reality is not universal. We see conflict at the interfaces. We see it, for example, where Western society and Islam rub against each other, where conventional Christians and Creationists collide or where some governments are in denial about global warming. But this merely goes to prove that people create their own reality. If enough people in a group believe something it becomes true for them. This is the effect of group consciousness. We have to respect it and the way to resolve conflict is not to start from the premise that “I am right and you are wrong” but “I am right and you are right”. The conflict is resolved at a higher level of truth – similar to Hegel’s idea of synthesis. (Hegel was a philosopher whose method of argument has been popularly presented as a thesis which proposes some theory or idea, an antithesis which contradicts it and a synthesis which resolves the conflict.) So we can say that from a more enlightened perspective, there is no conflict at all! Let’s try to find a few examples. We have moved on a lot in the last fifty years and although we have problems in society we are now much more concerned for human rights. Fifty years ago gay people were criminals. How have we resolved the apparent conflict of views - by seeing that it is not a conflict. Fifty years ago women were expected, once they got married, to stay at home and look after the children. Now their talents and skills and their contribution to society outside the home are recognized by equality legislation. Fifty years ago there was discrimination against people of different race and there would have been a huge resistance to today’s influx of migrant workers. But today, we not only can absorb them but we actually need them. How has these apparent conflicts been resolved? Because we are in a different place altogether now. We are looking at it from a different perspective. In looking at these problems from our perspective, from our level of awareness, all we can see are the problems and our reaction is often governed by fear. However, with some faith (there’s that word again), with some faith in our power to create a better reality or if you want to be dualistic about it, with a belief that God is on our side, maybe it will all work out OK. I have used the word “awareness” and I think it is worthwhile to consider exactly what is meant by awareness in a spiritual context. Usually we think of awareness as being present or absent. You are aware of something or you are not. But spiritually we can be not only aware of something but also aware of all its implications, of all its consequences into the future. The best way to illustrate this is to give an example of limited awareness. Imagine that you are sitting in a garden and there are small children playing with their toys on the ground at your feet. One child takes a toy belonging to another and all hell breaks loose. The child wants his toy back and nothing else matters. You could tell him that his father has just died of a heart attack and he would still be wailing for his toy. Narrow awareness leads to value rigidity which is described by Robert Pirsig in his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. It means giving something a higher value than you should due to a lack of awareness or limited vision. Pirsig gives an example. A monkey trap is made from a hollowed out coconut chained to a stake. The coconut contains some rice. There is a hole in it big enough for a monkey to get his hand in but too small for him to withdraw his hand full of rice. The monkey is caught in the trap because he will not let go of the rice. He is stuck in a framework of value rigidity where food is valued more than freedom. In his narrow world food is equated with survival. If he had a higher level of awareness he would see that freedom is more important for survival than the immediate availability of food. In previous talks I have mentioned the subject of reincarnation, and I want to come back to it again now as it provides a useful framework for seeing how we are trapped by our present reality, by our limited vision, by our value rigidity. When we encounter problems in our lives, our reaction is often one of non-acceptance. "Why did this happen to me" we ask? However, the philosophy of reincarnation indicates to us that we have taken on this body and this life in order to overcome certain challenges as a learning experience which forms part of our spiritual evolution. In other words, when things go wrong, we had already agreed to it in advance even though it is painful. Perhaps we needed to undergo some suffering to balance the books of karmic debt, or from another perspective, when we encounter suffering, we have two options, to resist it and continue to suffer, or to accept it, learn from it and move on. Since I have got involved in aspects of new spirituality, I have met many people who have encountered serious problems in their lives but have seen this eventually as having been something that they needed to experience because it has changed their lives fundamentally. I remember one couple, who lost a child at a very young age, and were devastated by it. However, in the search for an understanding of this event, a whole new spiritual dimension opened up in their lives, and they eventually received guidance that their young son whom they had lost, had come into this world specifically for the purpose of helping them to advance spiritually. His life had been short, but that was its purpose. They were then able to accept it. I'm a great believer in the principle of the ill wind. When something goes wrong I try to remember that there might be some good in it somewhere and after some time, I usually find out that there was. In talking about matters in this way, I am always conscious of the fact that I may appear to be dismissive of things that have affected people very deeply. This is not my intention at all, and if anybody feels that I am trivialising their suffering, I apologise as I have no wish to offend. However, one of the key principles I have learnt is that if something makes you feel uncomfortable, that's the area where you need to do a bit of spiritual work. Sometimes it is very hard to let go of things which have affected us deeply but maybe now is the time to see if you can look at it in a new way. We are told that suffering and pain are subjective experiences. We can experience pain without suffering. Deepak Chopra gives the example of two people on a roller coaster. One is terrified but the other is exhilarated. It’s just a matter of how you perceive the experience. The purpose of pain is to warn us of danger but it does not have to be associated with suffering. People can be trained to endure pain by not fearing it and so not tensing up when they experience it. Spiritual evolution leads to a state of bliss or ecstasy. This is not the same as pleasure because is not caused, nor can it be removed, by any event in a person’s life. The secret, we are told by the Buddha, is to seek the middle way since both pleasure and pain can be stressful. We are told of the river of pleasure and pain. One bank is pleasure and the other is pain. The trick, we are told, is to drift down the river without hitting either bank. Ram Dass says: “pleasure or pain, fame or shame, loss or gain, it's all the same.” These lofty sentiments are all very well, but they make me feel a bit helpless. How about you? I wondered if there was anything that we can do about the situation? Is there anything we can do collectively to make the world a better place? Lynne McTaggart has just produced a new book called The Intention Experiment. Her previous book The Field, reviewed scientific research which showed that we are all connected together by a universal energy field. In her latest book she tackles the whole question of how human intention can be transmitted through this universal energy field and how it can effect change in our lives and in the world. This supports the spiritual concept of affirmations and suggests that collective negative thinking based on fear is responsible for creating that reality in certain parts of the world. Changing to a positive or compassionate mode of thinking could produce fundamental change for the better. The next intention experiment is due to take place on the 24th of March at 5pm. Thousands of people who have registered on her website will be asked to direct their thoughts to a particular outcome at that time. A pilot experiment has already been successful. In this, McTaggart asked a group of 16 meditators based in London to direct their thoughts to four remote targets in a laboratory in Germany. The targets were: two types of algae, a plant and a human volunteer. The meditators were asked to attempt to lower certain measurable biodynamic processes. Significant changes were discovered in all four targets while the intentions were being sent, compared to times the meditators were ‘resting’. I’d like to leave you with some thoughts on global warming. Global warming could be considered to be a group learning experience in connectedness. From global warming we begin to see that everything that we do affects everybody else. However if The Intention Experiment is correct, we can do something about global warming by thinking positively and constructively about it. The idea of a co-ordinated group intention to alleviate global warming is something that we should consider. The next intention experiment on the 24th of March is going to attempt to do just that on a controlled small area. I’ll keep you posted!
Kieran Comerford
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