Suicidal Thoughts

Ever had thoughts of wanting to wipe the slate clean and totally start over? I have. I never went as far as planning a way to do myself in, but if I were a video game, I would have wanted to hit the reset button.

I'm sure I can speak for anyone who has ever wanted to kill themselves, or at least had thoughts of erasing everything and starting fresh. This way of feeling and thinking is always brought on by a tremendous amount of stress (be it mental or physical).

The times I felt like this were years ago at this point, but I can easily remember what I was upset about and trying to avoid. I don't regret going through this depression stage because it played a role in bringing about an awakening within me. Since my shift in consciousness, I can see how and why this is a feeling more common to a whole lot of people than you may be lead to believe.

At the root of this urge to purge oneself of "life," lies a major paradox. You are life itself and will never die. You can move on past this physical world but will still live. So how can you "kill" yourself? You can't. You are only trying to kill your current situation.

Think about it. Who really wants to die? The ego. The identity you have adopted as yourself is in a huge amount of stress. Once separated from the identity, relief is experienced. Who wants relief from the identity? You do. The real you.

It really is like there are two people there. The phrase, "I hate myself," implies a 'hater' and a 'hatee', so to speak. To be unhappy with yourself/life situation is to be a house divided against itself. The solution is to become whole again. But how?

You can die while still living and gain even more life in the process! Sounds like another paradox, but it's true. Allowing yourself to become more aware of the part of you that is the eternal observer, will bring balance to your perspective. There is the part of you that cares so much about the stressful situations (ego identity) and there's the part of you that is good either way and just observes. Allowing yourself to simply, objectively, observe your ego identity and it's drama, you will watch that part of you die. It will start to seem less and less important and less of who you are. It will lose all power and you will regain it.

Killing your body is a waste of time. You will continue on and have to overcome the same tests that drove you to it in the first place. Killing the attachments that cause you stress will achieve all the relief you desire plus so much more! Meditate on theses words and suicide will never seem logical again.

Related posts:

• Why So Serious?
• Attachment and Identity
• Ego Trippin'
  

Just a Matter of Perspective

Ever thought about how 'perspective' and 'awareness' are two completely different aspects of our consciousness? They are tied together in our minds because one can not exist without the other. Because they can't exist without each other, they are indivisible, or one in the same. This is clearly a paradox since they are indeed different.

'Awareness' exists before 'perspective' can be formed. Awareness is the very sense of being that allows us to observe the outside world, and the inner world as well. Though 'awareness' comes before 'perspective', it will take the defining factors that 'perspective' brings to make any sense of 'awareness'. Or more simply stated, one doesn't make sense without the other.

I mention the difference because I've noticed that no matter how your perspective may change or shift; your awareness always remains the same in nature, only growing in degrees of intensity. You have the same awareness that you had when you were an infant. It is only the focus of this awareness and the perspective that have shifted. Who you think you are is all 'perspective'. Then there is the 'awareness' that gives this perspective life.

It is amazing how radically our perspective can shift while maintaining the same force of awareness. Some great movie plots illustrating this are "Face Off (1997)," " District 9 (2009)," and "Avatar (2009)." In all three films, main characters shift appearance and perspective greatly while remaining the same awareness. With almost 180 degree turns in seeing themselves and everything else, how else can you explain still being the same person? Though these are just movies, people in real life are able to change just as dramatically by way of changing who they 'think' they are!

When people talk about ego identity, they are referring to this 'perspective'. I've realized that 'ego' is indivisible from 'awareness.' When people speak of the ego as the part of us to be transcended so that we may experience the peace that is always with us, they are speaking of the small 'perspective' of being solely an individual. When this concept is transcended, there is still an ego. There is still a broader 'perspective.' The difference is that it is a perspective of wholeness, or oneness. If you are aware of this perspective, you have not discarded the ego, but matured and purified it.

Everything is literally a matter of perspective! And remembering that we are the unchanging (in nature) awareness that gives light to all perspectives, is a very powerful alley and brings balance to all perspective.

Become aware of your perspective on everything!

Related posts:

• The Evolution Revolution
• Attachment and Identity
• Ego Trippin'
  

True Depth Is Paradoxical

If you want more clarity on this, definitely read the related posts!
Related posts:

• The Pure Paradox
  
• Absolute Relativity
• The Art of Peace
• Arm Me With Harmony
• Enjoy the Game & Play Your Position
• One of a Kind, Like Everybody Else
• The Illusion of Opposites
  

The Middle Road

The Middle Road, more traditionally known as the Middle Way, or the Middle Path, is the practice of non-extremism. This practice has been a part of many disciplines for centuries around the world. Those who master the road or way are called 'enlightened'.

As stated in this passage from the Pali Canon ( Samyutta Nikaya's Kaccāyanagotta Sutta):

"'Everything exists': That is one extreme.
'Everything doesn't exist': That is a second extreme.
Avoiding these two extremes,
the Tathagata teaches the Dhamma via the middle...."

In everyday life situations, this can be practiced through the perspective you use to watch events unfold. It is a state of awareness that can sound paradoxical when described. It's like looking in opposite directions at once. You give attention to your surroundings and present situations, yet simultaneously stay focused on how you feel and the thought processes (or lack there of) going on. In other words, you are looking out and looking in.

This perspective slows the mind. Whenever we give our attention to our mind and/or our breathing, they will slow down. Our awareness is present like always but we watch the amount of thoughts passing slow down. Of course this attention can only be given in the present moment and aligns your awareness with the present moment. In this frame of consciousness, extremes fall away.

Extremes are resorted to in stressful situations. Ego threatened thought produces stress. When a person slows or eliminates excessive thoughts, they can effectively slow or eliminate stress. No stress...no extremes. The middle road. The middle way.



Related posts:

• Zero is Nothing AND Everything
• The Illusion of Opposites
• Blinding Light and Blinding Darkness
• Absolute Relativity
  

Enjoy the Game & Play Your Position

As with many things in life, the middle ground is the most beneficial place to be. When extremes are avoided, we get to experience the "best of both worlds". This is a delicate balance that leads to a higher state of awareness or consciousness and can be seen as paradoxical or abstract in nature.

To illustrate this, look at how we can view life as a game. As a spectator with no particular bias or association with either side, you can enjoy the game regardless of what happens. Once you take a position, what determines a win and a loss comes right along with that position. With a position of any kind, perspective is automatically determined.

The same is true for playing a financial market. As a market trader, once you choose a position on the market, the trend could go with you or against you. You could earn money when your position appreciates in value, or you could lose money when it depreciates. If you are just watching the market with no open position, nothing that happens can affect you negatively or positively.

People who have achieved overall peace and happiness, or any high level of success in a specific field will tell you that a balance between being the objective Observer and the subject being observed, is required. In other words, be a spectator and the player at the same time. Watch yourself play. Maintain a certain level of being detached and it is easier to adapt and be in tune with everything. As a result, being detached allows you to be a better player.

Transcending the limits of 'good' and 'bad' or 'win' and 'lose' give new freedom to the player. "Got to be in it to win it," is not necessarily true. It ceases to be true when "being in it" stops you from enjoying the game. How can you win when the experience feels like a loss? How can you lose when the experience feels like a win? In the moment this concept is realized(experienced), it's all good, and it's all win.

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• Absolute Relativity
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Absolute Relativity

Some people believe that in life, there are no absolute truths and that everything is relative. Some people believe that life is governed by certain absolutes that can never be otherwise. Though it seems like a paradox, in reality, we can see that both are true in a sense.

Bring both concepts together we get 'absolute relativity' or 'relative absoluteness'. If we over think it, we can get caught up in the semantics of them and try to derive different definitions. But both point to the fact that one can not exist with out the other. And both abstractly describe a place of oneness.

In life there are always variables and constants.
variables = relative
constants = absolute
What maybe a constant in your life might be a variable in mine. This creates our relative points of view. What is an absolute truth to you is a relative truth to me. And we absolutely see things relatively.

Realizing that the very concept of absoluteness is bound to have an opposite in relativity, we can see that both are illusions. They are really describing a point of view from different perspectives. Without one, the other has no meaning. It does not exist. The two concepts are indivisible. If something is indivisible than it is one.
all variables = a constant
all relativity = an absolute

Related posts:

• 7 Absolute Truths
• The Illusion of Opposites
• Morality Is Relative
• Blinding Light and Blinding Darkness
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Wonders Never Cease

The way we look at our reality, with out a doubt, determines our life experience. Funny enough, learning certain things that are indeed factual will sometimes seem to constrict our freedom as opposed to expand it. This is true when you learn that there are limits to what you once thought was limitless. A comical illustration of this that comes to mind, is the coyote from the old Warner Brothers roadrunner cartoons. Often he would run clear off a cliff; but he would not fall until he realized that the ground was no longer below him.

Learning of limitations, in reality, does not constrict our freedom but may even stretch its boundaries. Another paradox, it seems. It is perfectly logical though, if you remember that freedom and responsibility are one in the same. When you take heed to the limit, you take responsibility for it. When you are responsible, you can adapt the limit to be of service and not an obstacle for you.

This can be illustrated with today's economy. The whole world is supposedly in a recession right now. I spoke of this in a previous post (see What Is Money? Really.). Of course this boils down to the Federal Reserve and all other world banks and the fractional banking system.

Check out Zeitgeist Addendum for a good understanding of what I am referring to. The tone of the beginning of the film is somewhat grim, but there are plenty of good facts there to jar you out of any ignorance about what money really is. Like my post about money, it does come around to explaining that we are the true power behind money and that we can change everything for the best.

I mention the film also, because it supports my previous point that the limited way our economy is set up can be seen as a good reason to change it. We can adapt what we have learned from this "economic experiment". In other words, if it was not broke, we would never fix it. The way things are going now will force a reevaluation by the masses as to what actually works. Everything does indeed happen for the best.

Wonder will never cease as long as we have the awareness and perspective to appreciate it. Doom and gloom are only one way to look at the process of making room for something more glorious to bloom.

For more great perspective, read What Is Really Good? and stay tuned!

The Pure Paradox

Language can often be misleading. Because of the inanimate nature of words; all too often words really can not express the abstract essence of what they are attempting to describe. Even when articulated very well; the depth of the concept makes language contradict itself. The result is a paradox.

Let's see what a paradox looks like in action. Here are a few from the book, "Oxymoronica" by Mardy Grothe, that make it clear exactly what a paradox is:

The superfluous is the most necessary.
-Voltaire

Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else.
-Margaret Mead

I shut my eyes in order to see.
-Paul Gauguin

We learn from history that we do not learn from history.
-Georg Hegel

We are never prepared for what we expect.
-James Michener

To be believed, make the truth unbelievable.
-Napoleon Bonaparte

What we really want is for things to remain the same but get better.
-Sydney J. Harris

When a dog runs at you, whistle for him.
-Henry David Thoreau

Always be sincere, even if you don’t mean it.
-Harry S. Truman

Man can believe the impossible, but can never believe the improbable.
-Oscar Wilde

War is a series of catastrophes which result in a victory.
-Georges Clemenceau

First I dream my painting, then I paint my dream.
-Vincent van Gogh

We are confronted by insurmountable opportunities.
-Walt Kelly, From Pogo

I want peace and I’m willing to fight for it.
-Harry S. Truman

Study the past, if you would divine the future.
-Confucius, in Analects

Love is a kind of warfare.
-Ovid

All works of art should begin…at the end.
-Edgar Allan Poe

The final delusion is the belief that one has lost all delusions.
-Maurice Chapelain

A man chases a woman until she catches him.
-Anonymous

The very nature of our true selves, when described, seems to be a paradox. There are countless contradictions about our reality and the way things work, due to the depth of the concepts. Just to name a few that I have observed:

• Empty space is full of infinite possibilities.
• The more you accept, the more control you have
• The better you teach, the more you learn

The list goes on and on. For plenty more on paradox and contradiction, read What Is Really Good? and stay tuned!