A Different Way to Live
Posted: Thursday, October 22, 2009
by e
Dhammabucha Rocksprings Meditation
The way that we have been living is called the way of least resistance. This way involves emotionally and logically going after what we believe will make us happy. For the vast majority of us, this usually includes a career, a partner, then a house, cars, furniture, kids, college tuition, grandkids - you get the picture. These become our goals and triumphs in life.
And most people are satisfied with this and really don't expect much more. This is enough to fulfill them, with most of their generosity and compassion going to their immediate family.
To suggest that this generosity and compassion should go elsewhere other than the immediate family, except for some token charity work, would be considered strange indeed. We protect and take care of our own - that is natures way - and whatever is left over we put away for a rainy day.
So actually, our natural instincts are to hoard our money and not share it, isn't this true? What is YOUR bank account and investments for? Isn't it for your retirement or something for yourself, or the kids, or some emergency?
The current thinking in some political circles reflects this attitude as well. Why should hard working people give their money to the government who will just turn around and give it to lazy, poopy people who don't want to work? That logic is very basic and understandable regarding the barest of survival instincts.
So what we have here is a philosophy and psychology of self survival. The idea is to have as many offspring as we can so that if and when we become destitute and disabled ourselves we can rely on family, friends and church, not government, to bail us out. In the meantime, we invest our excess funds, which are in turn used by corporations that have exactly the same philosophy and psychology in mind as we do - to look out after themselves and their stockholders.
This is capitalism; wealth accumulation, and within this system there is little wiggle room for anyone who is not successful. Laws are passed to keep the poor, stupid, and destitute in a holding pattern so that they don't take to the streets to vent their frustrations, but in reality the system will gradually restrict as much money as it can from these people so that real investments can go to work, rather than be wasted on lazy, unimportant individuals who just buy wine and can't make it on their own.
And here we are. This is us. And the funny thing about all of this is that the more we look out for only ourselves and ours, the unhappier we become as a society. Why is this?
Many, many years ago, as legends have it, two men lived an entirely different kind of life from the one that was just explained. These men had more interest in everyone else than themselves. If they would have had any money, which they never had and never wanted, they would have immediately given it to the next person they met on the road. They knew that the person they met needed the money more than they did. Why? Because Jesus and the Buddha had something going that was much more satisfying and refined than the illusory and false security of money and the things that money can buy.
What would happen if everybody in the entire world one day would give away whatever they owned to someone who needed it more than they did? Well, for one thing, if the entire world was in this mindset, no one would ever lack for anything! And we wouldn't require all the nonsensical things that we amuse ourselves with everyday, because we would be cultivating those deeper interests of Jesus and the Buddha.
Wasn‘t that what these two men were telling us about; how to live by their example so that there would be peace in our hearts and peace on earth? Or did they picture themselves as simply freaks who would never be understood by common people and therefore idolized and prayed to instead of their footsteps being followed? I don't think so.
And it's not impossible to live as they did, just difficult if you depend upon your money for your salvation. Trust me, regardless of how loosely you might interpret the Bible, wealth will kill your soul. There is no doubt in my mind about that. Wealth accumulation kills off humility, compassion, love, understanding, caring about one's fellow man and woman, and just plain goodness. Wealth creation fosters greed, hatred, miserliness, disaffection, ego, aggressiveness, and fear - simply because of the definition of accumulation: "To heap up, pile up" . . .(money).
Justify it as you will - saying that money creates jobs, etc., - I don't buy any of it because that is the way of the world, and the way of the world is the way to hell. Period. In my humble opinion. I believe that if you could see your destiny after a wealth accumulating life, you would be so shocked that you would immediately give away everything and live under an overpass somewhere. I do believe this.
But there is an alternative way to live where you can function in society in a loving and compassionate way and still follow in the footsteps of these two great men, compassionate men who were trying to shine a light for us. It's called; living for others; giving your heart to others - not just those in your comfort zone, but all others. Because when you are able to give your heart away with no holdbacks, that means that you have beaten the idea of a selfish existence, and once you beat that, you will spiritually be able to release yourself from the idea of me and mine, which is what Jesus and the Buddha had done.
Regardless of whether your generosity is returned or not, that won't matter. What will matter is that you will be following in the footsteps of great men who knew the score, and this is the true freedom, not the freedom of wealth which is a noose around your neck, but the freedom of eternity, where it really matters.
Because now, after passing away at 78.5 years with perhaps no one remembering you because you have become selfless and no longer look for recognition, you will no longer be reborn hundreds of thousands of more times to again have to selfishly fend for and take care of your own. Now you will escape physical existence on earth with all its foibles such a stress, illness, old age and death. And isn't this what Jesus and the Buddha were trying to compassionately point us toward: life in better place other than this physical earth?
I always liked this little quote from "The Little Zen Companion" by David Schiller, I‘m not sure it is completely word for word because I gave the book away.
"Never follow what wise men say, follow in their footsteps."
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)Have you ever heard the song by John Lennon "Imagine" e? some of the lyrics "Imagine all the people sharing all the world" Yeah he was a dreamer but just imagine if it could be so.That was a great song. I remember it. I remember seeing the lyrics posted in a restaurant somewhere. I believe it was Boulder. Idealistic, perhaps, but I think its normal, and the way we are living is abnormal. The difference between love and fear.
Thanks for the comment David. Always nice to hear from a gentle person like yourself. .
Jesus came to the earth not just to set an example. He came to save us not by showing us how to do good works, but by sacrificing his life for us. He rose three days later. If you want to go to heaven you admit to God that you have sinned, you believe that he sent his son Jesus to die on the cross and you accept the gift of Jesus dying on the cross to pay for your sins, by asking him to be your savior. It takes a prayer. The Bible tells us that we have to get Baptized if we are Christians. (A B C) Admit. Believe. Commit. The Bible tells us that we can't get to heaven by good works alone. The Bible tells us that Jesus is the way to get to God.Hi Caroline, that sounds a little preachy. You must remember that Non-Christians view Christianity quite differently than a "believer" who may have been indoctrinated since birth. A non-Christian, after reading many of the open minded articles that are now all over the internet and backed by compelling historical facts, may more easily conclude that Jesus of Nazareth was doing something during the lost years, and perhaps wandered to the East and picked up some Eastern ways.
The Buddhist religion was well established for over 500 years before Christ was born. Buddhist monks were arriving in Jerusalem over the trade routes by the time of Jesus, and through the power of their advanced meditation, could heal, walk on water plus many other powers, etc. Jesus was able to master some of these as well, but these powers were developed 4,000 years before Christ in India.
Jesus' mentor on earth was an Essene; John the Baptist, who lived in the desert with a group of followers, again in the footsteps of Buddhist monks. Then Jesus co-incidentally formed a group of followers as well, again in the footsteps of the Buddhist Sangha of monks and the Essenes, which was again very radical for a Jewish rabbi to do!
Another example of a non-Christian looking open-mindedly at Christianity might be that when observing the Bible and looking into its history, a non-Christian might more easily make some conclusions that a Christian would find unacceptable and upsetting, i.e., it's being hinted at, and someday may be resolved, that the original church fathers, over 60 years after Jesus of Nazareth's death, were looking for someone to be their savior, the Son of God, so that they could say that they have fulfilled a biblical prophecy (and hopefully create a new religion)!
In attempting to start this new religion, they ran across one of Jesus' disciple's writings . . . and what may have happened is a made-up deification of a hapless rabbi, Jesus of Nazareth, where the original Church fathers borrowed heavily from pagan religions for many of their ideas, even stealing the main story lines of the Buddha's birth story (and again the Buddha was born 550 years before Christ) and created in their own minds the Christian religion.
Furthermore, from a non-Christian, unbiased approach, the bible itself, from which the church fathers were trying to fulfill a prophecy (i.e. a prophet and savior), could be considered historically a mish-mash of legends and myths carried forward by word of mouth by scores of different people from thousands of years ago. (from an anonymous commenter): "There is not overwhelming evidence that the Bible is a reliable reflection of history. The authors of the four canonical Gospels were certainly not eyewitnesses to the life and times of Jesus, they were reporting secondhand accounts, and probably much worse. First of all, the very earliest gospel was still a generation after the purported date of Jesus' death. Secondly, that means details of his birth, of his mother and father, would be very unreliable. Thirdly, there is no credible evidence that John, named for the apostle, was even written by the actual Apostle named John. Luke never knew Jesus. Mark was a consort of Paul, who himself never met Jesus. That leaves Matthew, the tax collector. Modern scholars question that Matthew wrote the Gospel of Mathew, and its date is placed later than Mark, between 70 C.E. and 80 C.E."
The non-Christian keeps in mind that even a few minutes after a car accident, eye witnesses all have different stories, and to believe that a myth or legend could go down through history unchanged, not only after a few minutes, or hours, or years, or decades, or hundreds of years, but thousands of years, is not viable in a non-Christians mind. Add to this all the heavy editing of the bible in different ages with different agendas, and the bible could have become the most incongruent hoax every played on humanity - again, according to a non-Christian. This is possibly why quoting Biblical passages to a non-Christian goes in one ear and out the other!
Yet no one who is Christian can accept these things, because Christians, understandably, are attached to their religion. It has become their entire reason for living.
But if the non-Christian view of Christianity proves true in the future, this could possibly explain why many Christians don't seem to follow their faith regarding how they should live - in poverty and giving everything away to others. Could it be that Jesus' teachings were made up by human minds? And that Jesus never existed as the Church fathers depicted him to exist? And if he did in fact exist as a Jewish rabii, was he merely a creation of the church father's imagination, and not, in any case, as the religion has made him appear to be? This is how a non-Christian might look at the religion from non-biased standpoint.
So what is really true? No one can really say, and it really doesn't matter as long as you are satisfied with your beliefs and your life is going well. But time will tell, and the truth about religions, all religions, as well as with everything else, will eventually prevail in this blossoming information age.
To get an independent perspective on the whole bible, Christ thing, key in such things as "Christ's birth date, and Who Wrote the Bible, etc. Many people view the Bible and Christ quite differently than Christians i.e.
Sometimes we read only what we want to believe and turn our backs on other information without even considering it. It's a power and loss of power thing. We hang on to our beliefs because it is exactly that - a controlling, power thing. That's why religions proselytize. Proselytizing never comes from a loving place, but from a place of power thirst. Nothing more than a salesperson who has to fight all the objections to make the sale - and he or she must win. It's very aggressive and hateful, actually.
Have you ever noticed that Buddhism, arguably the most peaceful religion historically, never proselytizes? We put info out, but never twist arms because we have found that until people reach a certain level of spiritual and intellectual capacity, which is beyond simple, blind beliefs that can be anything from Christianity to Islam, and based wholly on what we read or what a preacher tells us or what we dream of, they won't understand Buddhism. I can see this clearly every day. Don't forget, it took the church 300 (That's three hundred - poor Galileo!) years to get over the fact that the earth wasn't the center of the universe! "A classic example of why religious entities should not have power to enforce their beliefs." (Key in: Galileo VS the church.)
That was quite a blow to the Church's dogma and entrenched beliefs that people were willing to die for, dogma and beliefs that proved to be false. Keep an open mind if you can. Otherwise you might be irreparably psychologically harmed when the truth comes out, and it slowly but surely is. Meditation is safer - no beliefs, no indoctrinations, just a simple observance of mind until mind disappears and you get out of the way, then you may really catch a glimpse of God (in Christian terms) for yourself instead of just reading and talking about it.
Best........e
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