(Page currently in renovation and text correction)
11 / 21 / 2011
Spirituality of the ego.
Who practice spirituality?
You or your ego?
You, of course!
So now, what's the difference between you and your ego?
Aren't you this "I" who think and do, who has a body and a mind, who tries to be free from them, who looks for the annihilation of suffering, who wishes to live in a state of bliss, who wants to know God, the truth, the Self, etc.? Who "desires" this liberation if it's not you? Is spiritual quest something else than the expression of a desire? Of a desire, of an act of will and the power of imagination, of dreaming, of illusions which characterize the so-called existence of the ego? What makes you believing that you are not the ego, but have an ego? Is research, spiritual or of any other kind, relies on beliefs or experiences? Did you ever perceive in some way your ego inside yourself? Or do you know that you have an ego because someone, very enlightened of course, told you so?
If the concept and psychological entity that represent "I and myself" don't determine what we call the ego, how do you define your own existence in your daily or spiritual life? Don't you understand the absurdity of having an ego, of an "I and myself" who could have another "I and myself"? Come down in the real world and stop believing in fake truths. You have a body and a mind, but you have not an ego because the ego represent this body and mind in all their activities. And if you don't represent yourself your own body with all its faculties and activities, then who are you?
"My or your ego" is much more than an ordinary expression very fashionable today. It's an open door on a wrong knowledge, fake spirituality and insane truth promulgated by crazy gurus who don't know what they are speaking about, but who know very well why they are speaking about it.
"My or your ego" is the best way to think that you are different of who you are, a human being with a mental life and a personal identity to express yourself. And today, it's common practice in spiritual teachings.
Why? Because it's good business, nothing more!
It's only for the profit of charlatans who want to teach you how to get rid of your ego without realizing that they are themselves this ego full of pride, greed and hypocrisy. And the best of all jokes is that they want you to believe that they are free from it.
To sum up their teaching, they want you to run after your shadow in hope of smashing it. In leading you in such a quest, they are sure to keep their customers a very very long time. And don't forget, who pay for it?
If you are truly seeking the truth, find it in your heart and traditional teachings, but forget all these insane New Age impostors who dare to call themselves gurus, sages, masters, teachers and so on.
12 / 10 / 2011
Spirituality, opium of the people and still the best.
It's not everybody who can afford caviar, champagne and a shrink to digest the egoism, greed, hypocrisy, self-esteem and other well-known qualities of the ego. We live our life with what we have and in the world we discover with our brain whatever the social and cultural context we live in. And if we truly expect to have a spiritual life, we have to understand that the mental experience, the one we really live moment after moment in our mind without noticing it and which also could be called spiritual experience, is infinitely more important than the material condition of the situation which determines our life in the present moment. We don't choose our life but how we comprehend the reality of this life. It's this comprehension, understanding and conceptualization which have truly consequences not only on our states of mind but also on the reality that we perceive at each moment. According the meaning we give to this mental and spiritual experience, everyday life becomes positive or negative, and thus it gets a great value or it can become a real nightmare. We cannot escape reality as it is. And what is reality if not a stream of direct experiences that we cannot avoid to interpret in terms of good and bad? What we think of these experiences is in fact much more important than reality itself. That's what spirituality can offer, not much but the most important, the possibility to change our understanding on ourself and the others in the reality of a world which will always be beyond understanding, but an eternal source of wonder too.
What are the big metaphysical questions and all the scientific theories of modern times? Nothing more than intellectual entertainments compared to the genius and beauty of the creation. But we have to open our eyes and be at peace with ourself to grasp the perfection of it. We live in the middle of the paradise in order to make of it a living hell and we don't even realize that our true nature is divine. What is consciousness, this faculty of knowing which determines the fact of being here and now, in space and time? For thousands of years, the sacred knowledge explains that the Divine is "Being, consciousness and bliss", Sat Chit Ananda. What else to understand, to realize and actualize in the world we are living to simply become really human and at last in peace with ourself? Humanity of today looks too much like a pack of sick beasts to be considered as civilized compared to animals without consciousness according our own understanding of wild life, but animals which never slaughter one another to defend ludicrous and inhuman values. If spirituality is not a necessity right now, it's quite possible that soon, it will be too late to realize it.
The middle class dream and the American way of life which is not more American than European are definitely over. We are more than 7 billions on the planet! Earth will never provide enough raw material for everybody to live like prince and princess born with a silver spoon in the mouth. Right now, we can stop dreaming on what will be the future.
So what would be left, not after the end of the world which should happen in about 340 000 years according Hindus that I trust much more than archaeologists who understand very little of calendars and a Mayan language forgotten a long time ago? Only sadness? What a shame! We are human and still have the most precious inside of us : being and consciousness, a brain to understand the essential and a heart able to love. And we have true spirituality and sacred knowledge to remind us that there is something else, something beyond our dreams, available here and now, not in the future or another world.
Yes, but what? God, the paradise, a cosmic mind, a universal consciousness, another dimension which will fulfill all of our desires at once? Nobody can explain what it really is, and especially not traders of spirituality, more spiritual maestros of hypocrisy than masters of anything who can jump very high to catch the cash and only know what to tell to flatter their customers. Enough of these ken-gurus with their delicate voice ready to break like a string of crystal!
If we truly want to spiritualize our life, we have to know that :
God and the sacred are not for sell.
Spirituality is already sold by charlatans.
Knowledge will always be freely available until the end of time.
Our own experience is what we live for.
Life is anyway a spiritual experience ; better to realize its true nature!
Don't you feel like to explore your mind and consciousness ? We live with them 24h a day since we are born, and what do we know about they really are? Nothing, and science which is supposed to explain everything prefers to ignore this subject which is probably not profitable enough. Psychologists, neurologists, pharmacologists, neurosurgeons... don't know what is consciousness and how works the mind. They have published enough books to prove and recognize it with sincere humility.
So what's left to discover inside yourself something else than thoughts which, most of the time, disturb more than make happy?
You and you alone!
Nobody else than you can see and understand what's going on in the mind and consciousness. It's a domain so vast and wild that each of us will live without the shadow of a doubt his or her own experience, a spiritual experience. And there you find the true genius of the creation.
Since eternity, the sacred knowledge of humanity tell us :
"Know Thyself" which means "Know the Self by yourself"
"Who am I?"
"The truth is inside yourself"
"Silence is gold"
Not difficult to understand ! You don't even need psychedelic substance to carry on this spiritual research. You need absolutely nothing to live an extraordinary experience, more divine than anything already known. But you have to be clear on the real purpose of your spiritual quest. Are you looking for a spectacular show inside yourself or just peace, freedom, love and bliss, and above all, knowledge and truth.
It's time to revalue spirituality and the experience we live day after day. The sacred is not somewhere else, but in the reality of every moment. We don't need to believe in anything to open our eyes and see this reality inside ourself, outside, everywhere. Ugly or beautiful, we are not here to give a verdict on the creation. Reality is always more interesting than living in the world of our thoughts.
The world is going to change. We can be sure of that. Everybody knows it, but we are too scared to face the fact and look for another way of life. So what to do? Always the same question, the only real question. Change the mind to bring about some change in the situation of the world or change the world to undergo against our will a transformation of the mind?
The civilization of today is in a full crisis of consciousness. What does it mean? It means very simply that we do anything and we do it without consciousness, without any question on the consequences of what we are doing. "Business as usual" would be the answer to the questions that anyway nobody will dare to ask. So what could be the remedy to this crisis if it's not in becoming more and more conscious, not revolutionaries, just conscious beings, which is the true purpose of spirituality. What's the point of a spiritual practice or spiritual life if it's not to see, know and understand, to be fully aware and develop the power of consciousness, if it's not finally to embody this consciousness? Thinking being or conscious being, we have the choice. And guess what? We can be both. In other words, we have nothing to loose in realizing the Self which is nothing more than another word to determine the presence of consciousness, our true nature. The annihilation of the ego is just the disappearance of an illusion, of what we always thought to be and has never truly been. No big deal! The ego itself as a personal identity is a necessity.
A kiss of eternity is always better than the most beautiful thought.
Spirituality, it's your own, the one you are living without knowing it since you are born. So why not to be fully conscious of it.
Spirituality is the interior experience, the only one truly worth to live for and the only one you will never be able to avoid. To have a consciousness is not a choice; better to avoid any conflict with it, but on the contrary, to recognize and love its presence. It's by reintroducing the sacred and a wonderful mystery in the world that we will truly distinguish ourselves from the rest of the creation.
The scientific knowledge of today doesn't have any value ; it has lost its roots which still are in consciousness. The value of the culture of today is less than nothing ; it's ego powder for the eyes, nothing more than the exacerbation of egocentric desires. How do we have reached such a level of decadence? We just have to sincerely ask the question to ourself to find out the answer. It's useless to blame the others. In spirituality and quest for the truth, face first yourself.
12 / 15 / 2011
Why spirituality?
To feel better in a better world.
Inside, outside.
Not one without the other.
12 / 16 / 2011
Herd instinct shades off to the benefit of emotional, intellectual and spiritual life.
Without peace in the mind and heart,
no happiness.
Do we know what we are looking for
and where to find it?
A pure consciousness.
1 / 5 / 2012
No disciple, no Guru.
Nothing also prevents you to follow a teaching.
A world without spirituality, it’s…
"enjoy the show !"
1 / 12 / 2012
If Lao Tseu had started the Tao Te King writing that the true Tao is so simple to explain that there is in fact not much to say about it, nobody would have become interested in it. By writing that it cannot be spoken of, he was sure to attract the attention of everybody. What the legend doesn’t say too is that he spent all his life to explain that the Tao is extremely simple to understand and he knew after many years of experience that nobody really cares and that's why he left to the west to never come back. So better to explain that we cannot speak about the Tao and write 81 chapters about what cannot be spoken of to make it very clear that there is nothing to speak about.
Morality blues :
The Tao like the Dharma, the presence of consciousness and the truth are so simple and especially obvious that very few people can find this subject interesting. The path of powers is certainly more attractive, and the power to delude oneself even more.
Egocentricity is the heart of the Mandala,
spirituality being itself the Mandala.
Consciousness is that and something else.
The Mandala is also the mind, the cosmic mind, the creation, the universe...,
everything but not that which is watching it.
In this world we live in, the first and last Guru is life itself.
Good news!
Everybody has a Guru and life will always be a true spiritual teaching.
Better to recognize this teaching instead of denying it and suffering a great deal of pain for nothing.
Mystery or hypothesis
It seems that we are here to enjoy and learn.
But what and why?
If you think it’s impossible to live without lying, choose politics, business, get married, do anything you want, but forget spirituality.
The sacred
If you don't see it everywhere,
you will never find it anywhere.
2 / 10 / 2012
You should be happy, but...
Spirituality is not about God, the paradise, psychic powers, parallel worlds and so on.
It's only about you (ego and mind).
2 / 23 / 2012
Ethos
We don’t need to learn what is good or bad, what is true or fake, because we know it intuitively.
But to go beyond this kind of duality, first we have to cultivate the qualities of a natural ethic. And that’s more difficult than to speak about it sitting around a table drinking tea. That's what could be called true spirituality. What did you expect? A new lie which would allow you to be and do anything? Stop dreaming, spirituality is first an ethic. The so-called left hand of God and tantric path beyond morality is a dream that the dreamer is not going to enjoy when he or she will have to pay the price of it.
4 / 14 / 2012
Slave of the mind or slave?
Epictetus was born ca. 55 AD. He spent his youth as a slave in Rome. After obtaining his freedom, he started teaching philosophy and then moved to Greece where he founded a philosophical school. None of his writings are known, but his best pupil, Arrian, compiled his teaching in two works, “The discourses” and “The manual”, available for free on Internet and worth reading by any seeker of truth, especially "The manual" which is a very small book of meditation, very easy to read and so deep that it’s difficult to say if Epictetus was a philosopher, a sage or a spiritual master. There was probably no difference at that time. A spiritual master was obviously a sage and a philosopher, and not an impostor who thinks to be God like the ken-gurus of today. (To understand among other things how a slave could be free and treated as a human being, the movie "Agora" of Amenabar and Mateo Gil is quite interesting.)
Epictetus maintains that the foundation of all philosophy is self-knowledge which is precisely the purpose of Advaita philosophy. He also states that freedom or liberation can only be achieved by honesty and sincerity, what should be obvious for any seeker of truth and what people who think to have a spiritual life are very often keen to forget. It's not because spirituality is an ego-trip that it has to be a stupid trip. And what could be more stupid in spirituality or somewhere else than hypocrisy and dishonesty.
Here are some aphorisms from "The manual" of Epictetus:
"Some things are in our control and others not. Things in our control are opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion, and, in a word, whatever are our own actions. Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our own actions."
"But if you take for your own only that which is your own, and view what belongs to others just as it really is, then no one will ever compel you or restrain you. Further, you will find fault with no one or accuse no one. You will do nothing against your will. No one will hurt you, you will have no enemies, and you not be harmed."
(It has to be said that when Epictetus was a slave, his master deliberately broke his leg and he became crippled all the rest of his life.)
"Men are disturbed, not by things, but by the principles and notions which they form concerning things. Death, for instance, is not terrible, else it would have appeared so to Socrates. But the terror consists in our notion of death that it is terrible. When therefore we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never attribute it to others, but to ourselves; that is, to our own principles. An uninstructed person will lay the fault of his own bad condition upon others. Someone just starting instruction will lay the fault on himself. Some who is perfectly instructed will place blame neither on others nor on himself."
"He is the master of every other person who is able to confer or remove whatever that person wishes either to have or to avoid. Whoever, then, would be free, let him wish nothing, let him decline nothing, which depends on others else he must necessarily be a slave."
"Remember that you are an actor in a drama, of such a kind as the author pleases to make it. If short, of a short one; if long, of a long one. If it is his pleasure you should act a poor man, a cripple, a governor, or a private person, see that you act it naturally. For this is your business, to act well the character assigned you; to choose it is another's."
"But, for your part, don't wish to be a general, or a senator, or a consul, but to be free; and the only way to this is a contempt of things not in our own control."
"Remember, that not he who gives ill language or a blow insults, but the principle which represents these things as insulting. When, therefore, anyone provokes you, be assured that it is your own opinion which provokes you. Try, therefore, in the first place, not to be hurried away with the appearance. For if you once gain time and respite, you will more easily command yourself."
"Don't allow such considerations as these distress you. "I will live in dishonor, and be nobody anywhere." For, if dishonor is an evil, you can no more be involved in any evil by the means of another, than be engaged in anything base. Is it any business of yours, then, to get power, or to be admitted to an entertainment? By no means. How, then, after all, is this a dishonor? And how is it true that you will be nobody anywhere, when you ought to be somebody in those things only which are in your own control, in which you may be of the greatest consequence?"
"As a mark is not set up for the sake of missing the aim, so neither does the nature of evil exist in the world."
"If you have assumed any character above your strength, you have both made an ill figure in that and quited one which you might have supported."
"The condition and characteristic of a vulgar person, is, that he never expects either benefit or hurt from himself, but from externals. The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is, that he expects all hurt and benefit from himself. The marks of a proficient are, that he censures no one, praises no one, blames no one, accuses no one, says nothing concerning himself as being anybody, or knowing anything: when he is, in any instance, hindered or restrained, he accuses himself; and, if he is praised, he secretly laughs at the person who praises him; and, if he is censured, he makes no defense. But he goes about with the caution of sick or injured people, dreading to move anything that is set right, before it is perfectly fixed. He suppresses all desire in himself; he transfers his aversion to those things only which thwart the proper use of our own faculty of choice; the exertion of his active powers towards anything is very gentle; if he appears stupid or ignorant, he does not care, and, in a word, he watches himself as an enemy, and one in ambush."
And of course, about truthfulness and hypocrisy:
"The first and most necessary topic in philosophy is that of the use of moral theorems, such as, "We ought not to lie;" the second is that of demonstrations, such as, "What is the origin of our obligation not to lie;" the third gives strength and articulation to the other two, such as, "What is the origin of this is a demonstration." For what is demonstration? What is consequence? What contradiction? What truth? What falsehood? The third topic, then, is necessary on the account of the second, and the second on the account of the first. But the most necessary, and that whereon we ought to rest, is the first. But we act just on the contrary. For we spend all our time on the third topic, and employ all our diligence about that, and entirely neglect the first. Therefore, at the same time that we lie, we are immediately prepared to show how it is demonstrated that lying is not right. "
"In everything (circumstance) we should hold these maxims ready to hand:
… O Crito, if so it pleases the Gods, so let it be; Anytus and Meletus are able to kill me, but they cannot harm me.”
Epictetus was a philosopher of the past and maybe a sage for the present and future too.
How to speak about Greek philosophers and not mentioning Diogenes of Sinope, the wisest of all the wise men according to Alexander the Great and certainly an amazing character who really reappraised the purpose of philosophy? Son of a banker, he lived in great poverty, begging and disdaining all forms of luxury. He is well known to have lived in a barrel or more precisely a tub and destroyed the single wooden bowl he possessed on seeing a peasant boy drinking from the hollow of his hands. He used to stroll about in full daylight with a lamp. When asked what he was doing, he would answer: "I am just looking for an honest man." Once someone took him into a magnificent house and warned him not to spit on the floor, whereupon, having cleared his throat, he spat into the man's face, being unable, he said, to find a meaner receptacle. Diogenes maintained that all the artificial growths of society were incompatible with happiness and that morality implies a return to the simplicity of nature. In his words, "Humans have complicated every simple gift of the gods." No writings of Diogenes survived even though he is reported to have written over ten books, a volume of letters and seven tragedies. What we know about Diogenes is contained in anecdotes concerning his life and sayings attributed to him in a number of scattered classical sources. Here are some of them:
"_ Why is it, Diogenes, that pupils leave you to go to other teachers, but rarely do they leave them to come to you?"
"_ Because," replied Diogenes, "one can make eunuchs out of men, but no one can make a man out of eunuchs."
Plato was discoursing on his theory of ideas and, pointing to the cups on the table before him, said while there are many cups in the world, there is only one 'idea' of a cup, and this cupness precedes the existence of all particular cups.
"I can see the cup on the table," interrupted Diogenes, "but I can't see the 'cupness' ".
"That's because you have the eyes to see the cup," said Plato, "but", tapping his head with his forefinger, "you don't have the intellect with which to comprehend 'cupness'."
Diogenes walked up to the table, examined a cup and, looking inside, asked, "Is it empty?"
Plato nodded.
"Where is the 'emptiness' which precedes this empty cup?" asked Diogenes.
Plato allowed himself a few moments to collect his thoughts, but Diogenes reached over and, tapping Plato's head with his finger, said "I think you will find here is the 'emptiness'."
Diogenes was knee deep in a stream washing vegetables. Coming up to him, Plato said, "My good Diogenes, if you knew how to pay court to kings, you wouldn't have to wash vegetables."
"And," replied Diogenes, "If you knew how to wash vegetables, you wouldn't have to pay court to kings."
Some strangers to Athens once asked Diogenes if he would point out to them the great philosopher [meaning Plato]. Diogenes looked around and then led them to the most deserted part of the city and, gesturing to the empty air as one would in formal introduction, said, "May I present to you the great philosopher Plato."
Diogenes was once invited to dinner by a wealthy man. During the evening, one of the guests became so outraged by Diogenes general behavior that he began to throw bones at him, calling him a "dog". Whereupon Diogenes got up, went to the guest, cocked up his leg and urinated on him.
Often when he was begging, Diogenes would be spat on by the people who passed him. Diogenes would ignore this and simply wipe his face with his sleeve. When ridiculed for his passive behavior, Diogenes said, "Since men endure being wet by the sea in order to net a mere herring, should I not endure being sprinkled to net my dinner?"
Diogenes stood outside a brothel, shouting, "A beautiful whore is like poisoned honey! A beautiful whore is like poisoned honey! A beautiful whore . . . ". Men entering the house threw him a coin or two to shut him up. Eventually Diogenes had collected enough money and he too went into the brothel.
Diogenes was once asked why he took money from people. "To show them how they ought to spend their money," he replied.
Whenever people complimented Diogenes, he would slap himself hard across the face and in self-reproach would cry, "Shame! I must have done something terribly wicked!"
The city was under siege. Everyone was busy fortifying the walls - some were carrying stones, others were patching the walls, yet others were building battlements. Diogenes having nothing to do – of course no one thought of giving him a job – was moved by the sight to gather up his philosopher's cloak and begin rolling his tub energetically up and down the Craneum; an acquaintance asked for, and got, the explanation: "I do not want to be thought the only idler in such a busy multitude; I am rolling my tub to be like the rest."
Asked about his worst nightmare, Diogenes said, "Waking to find myself living in a palace and everyone else in barrels."
Once, Alexander the Great found the philosopher looking attentively at a pile of human bones. Diogenes explained, "I am searching for the bones of your father but cannot distinguish them from those of a slave."
Diogenes was asked, "What is the difference between life and death?
"No difference" he replied.
"Well then, why do you remain in this life?"
"Because there is no difference."
According to a story, Diogenes was captured by pirates while on voyage and sold as a slave in Crete to a Corinthian named Xeniades. Before the end of the trade, he stated that he only knew how to govern men and wished to be sold to a man who needed a master. He was for sure a very uncommon slave and maybe not a very good deal.
Interestingly, Epictetus and Diogenes advocated love for virtue, indifference for wealth and abstract philosophy, and a return to the simplicity of nature, but they never left the city to go living in the nature as for instance the Taoist poet Han Shan did centuries later in the mountains of China. Their philosophy was about a very interesting aspect of life, just how to live correctly without pretension. And apparently, they really did it.
5 / 10 / 2012
Let’s forget the concept of final solution
They all have failed to solve the problems of humanity, everyone without exception. Spirituality or philosophy is not the solution; it’s a personal quest which helps humanity.
The most basic teaching is very simple :
- Stop dreaming.
- My true nature is absolutely perfect.
- I am the only one who can solve my problems.
9 / 27 / 2012
Don’t mix up spiritual liberation and lobotomy
To realize the Self, that is to say that we are the Self and not a body with a brain gifted of mental faculties, doesn’t prevent the body to carry on its life with the same brain and, don’t forget it, with the same nervous system, which knows very well the difference between a sensation of pleasure and another of pain. Self-realization, spiritual liberation, Moksha, Mukti, Sahaja Samadhi, the end of suffering, the state of no-mind, etc. determine the true nature of the Self and of the being we truly incarnate. And in this case, "incarnate" explains very well what we are and are doing:
to embody in human form or
to attribute human nature.
Does life has a meaning?
The aim of life is to discover what we are. All the rest is details, but it doesn’t mean without importance. On the contrary, life is only made of details and they all are very important.
The real purpose of spirituality should be to have spiritual experiences, enlightenments and awakenings which reveal the true nature of reality starting by the one we embody. Virtue, respect of others and goodness should only concern social issues. But without virtue, there is no spirituality.
What are we really seeking?
Spirituality, metaphysic and philosophy have always been and will remain a tribute to the unknown. Whether you call it God, Buddha, Tao, the void or by any other names, the unknown will remain what’s beyond understanding. And paradoxically, it will never be a problem as long as we try to understand what it is. For some, the solution to their problem is to seek and not to find. As for those who have found, what did they really discover? An ineffable truth with which they live in peace, but that nobody can truly understand? Again and again, we must know what we are really seeking, the truth or a new lie, because it's of course easier to find it when we know the real purpose of the quest. Spiritual life always has a meaning. It's never absolutely free and that's not a problem if you know what you are truly seeking.
11 / 2 / 2012
"I can’t get no satisfaction"
Pleasure, it’s to feel better when you’re already fine. Do we have to infer that the ego is insatiable? If satisfaction is thus impossible, better to look for something else and to look for it in a true spirituality than to lose one’s time and life for nothing. From any experience that we can live, only the search for liberation proposes in fact to renounce to illusory satisfactions. So do we have to understand that only renunciation could be satisfying? The renunciation to ourself of course, which means to any kind of egocentricity. And it's obviously the expression of a supreme, sublime and divine ego-trip..., but this one won't hurt anybody.
Does a parrot understand what he’s speaking about?
Beyond polite conversation about spirituality, there is the experimental quest for the absolute. Less words and much more interesting! One can get tired of speaking about what one doesn’t know.
1 / 29 / 2013
"If we don’t wake up in ourselves, what can we expect ?" Hiah Park
Spirituality
How are you going to fill this existential emptiness that you know too well and rarely leaves you?
Spirituality, it’s also to stop suffering for nothing.
2 / 11 / 2013
If the purpose of spirituality is not the truth, what is it?
Things are as they are. This is the reality, this is the truth.
And of course nobody wishes to realize such a truth.
3 / 21 / 2013
Never forget the basics
Happiness is a very vague concept. Everybody is looking for happiness, but it certainly doesn’t mean the same for aboriginal people living in the Amazon and a rich businessman of New York. Well being that is to say the highest quality of life possible is the reason of what we are doing. Spirituality on the other hand has nothing to do with well being because it’s a subject beyond body and mind. But you will only be able to live your spiritual life with your body and mind. So well being and spirituality are like the 2 faces of the same coin. Health and sanity are the body of any kind of good spiritual experiences. Health is about food and exercises, and sanity is about truthfulness and righteousness.
4 / 7 / 2013
Better than nothing and everything
If we cannot change our life,
we can at least change the meaning of it.
"The importance is in how you see, not in what you see."
André Gide
4 / 11 / 2013
The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is considered to be the oldest sacred scripture by the Hindus. It tells us:
"He who sees variety in that (i.e. Brahman or God), passes from death to death (i.e. is reborn and dies again)." Liberation, Self-realization and knowledge are all about ignorance in order to be liberated from reincarnation. This liberation is not only about our personal illusions as it’s becoming in the west. This subject concerns spirituality and not psychology or well-being.
Some people think that without illusion, reality is too difficult to bear. That could be called ordinary life in society.
Other people think that illusion will always be disappointing because soon or late, one has to face reality as it is. That could be called spiritual life in society.
4 / 15 / 2013
Spirituality and psychotherapy
Why the Ancients who had developed incredibly sophisticated techniques of meditation in order to alter the functioning of the mind had found a solution in spirituality and not in psychology although both are very close to each other? Probably because they understood that psychotherapy eventually causes a narcissistic personality disorder which does not solve the main problem of the individuality: egocentricity, self-esteem, etc., but makes it worse. Watching the mind and the manifestations of the personality to be free from them and being obsessed with one’s personality to modify it according personal or cultural criteria are 2 very different researches.
Paulo Coelho:
"At every moment of our lives, we all have one foot in a fairy tale and the other in the abyss."
And spiritual life is maybe to have both in the same place, not in the fairy tale, not in the abyss, but in the reality as it truly is.
4 / 29 / 2013
"For someone who doesn’t understand what death is, life is very confusing." Ajahn Chah
If life has a meaning, what is it? Life can only make sense if our existence doesn’t stop after death. But the belief in heaven and hell is not only immoral and insane but stupid, immoral and insane because one has to be mentally sick to think that some may have fun in heaven for the eternity knowing that others will burn in hell until the end of time, and it’s stupid because this belief doesn’t explain why some people are born under ideal conditions in order to have a good life while others discover even before to be born an environment that already looks like hell. So we come to the conclusion that only the theory of karma as a law of cause and effect, and reincarnation which is its most logical consequence give a meaning to life because it’s the only concept that can explain the differences between people and what happens to them during their life.
6 / 16 / 2013
And after, what?
Death is the end of our physical aspect.
Then…
6 / 23 / 2013
Mad or not mad
In the world we live today, the question is not anymore to know who is mad and who is not, but to know who hurts the others and who doesn’t.
And if the truth is painful, it doesn’t matter.
The truth is always better than a lie which is doing good now and harms even more later on.
8 / 8 / 2013
We like it or not, life is a teaching
Everything that we do and say will come back to us in order to learn compassion, love, respect, truthfulness and many other qualities that everybody knows to be good without the need of any explanation. Therefore while we are in this world, let us learn to be correct and alleviate the suffering of others..., if we can. This is the highest thing we can do while we are living in this world. This is bliss and true happiness. And it makes life much more interesting. There is nothing more boring than navel-gazing.
"The irrational gives birth to the rational"
Philip K. Dick In "Rare 1979 Philip K. Dick interview" available at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXqHJYz8NXo
8 / 30 / 2013
Choice
If it’s impossible to choose anything because there is no one to make this choice, who chooses this idea and the words to express it? No one? Do they come out of the blue for no intelligent reasons? So if there is no other choice than to express this idea because there is in fact no other, the idea itself becomes perfectly stupid and will never be able to express the truth.
The freedom of thinking and so of acting is at the origin of every philosophy and if one of them claims that everything is predetermined, it can only be wrong because it denies the possibility to think as we wish and thus to philosophize. Everybody knows that we can simply react or choose our thoughts and actions. But we certainly won’t choose their consequences because it’s impossible to know all of them in advance.
10 / 3 / 2013
Cre-action
A negative mind will never be able to appreciate reality as it is
while a positive mind will be able to do it without difficulty.
If it was not true, the entire universe would have destroyed itself a long time ago.
There are always more positive forces than negative ones at every moment.
Our job is to be aware of it and also to express it.
De-scription
What we see depends of what we think.
And what we think depends of how we see it.
Is it about philosophy and knowledge?
No need to believe in hell and paradise to understand what it means.
"The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Famous proverb
"Hell is full of good meanings, but heaven is full of good works." Idem
"Hell is full of good wishes and desires." Saint Bernard of Clairvaux
"Facilis descensus Averno (It is easy to go to hell)". Virgil's Aeneid
10 / 8 / 2013
Born for a purpose
Yes or no?
It’s up to you!
In any case we live with our beliefs,
the ones which are painful and the ones which make us happy.
10 / 24 / 2013
Egomaniac or simply insane
The idea of "chosen people" or similar concepts in the context of a creation entirely divine is without any doubt absolutely unbelievable. But is this idea about God or the people, some people? I don't really get it.
Humanity and consciousness
Life brings us to our humanity
and enlightenment of consciousness even more,
otherwise it’s nothing more than a dream.
12 / 8 / 2013
In any case, spirituality is a challenge.
It defies reason.
You take it up or you go back to your herd instinct.
12 / 19 / 2013
"The field is the sole governing agency of the particle" Albert Einstein
If the field is pure consciousness and the particle a bit of information, only the power of imagination determines the limits of the Creation. But the imagination of whom or of what?
In Vedanta, it is said that "Brahman is pure and perfect intelligence". And I would add that Maya is an infinite quantity of informations, nothing less, nothing more, that is to say everything.
If we consider that the information is a projection of the universal consciousness or in other words Brahman who is of course aware of it, as a dream is the projection of the mind which contemplates it, we can say that Maya and the dream are illusions compared to what creates them.
Does it make sense? With the example of the dream, it's in fact pretty simple to understand the why and how of the Creation because every night, we do as Brahman, but at an infinitely smaller scale. We create a world in order to contemplate us and knowing that this world indeed will never be what we really are. It can only be an illusion where we have the impression to live an adventure, sometimes comic, sometimes tragic. This adventure will be everything that is possible to imagine and it seems without any possible doubt that Brahman doesn't like to get bored. So life is probably never easy for us, but if we watch it attentively, it is at least always very interesting. Don't you think? And "interesting", not to say captivating, is what we truly want before anything else. Just ponder over the satisfaction of your desires to be absolutely sure about it.
So we already have what we really wish for.
Absence of judgment or sanity
Don’t be stupid, be critical and stop thinking for nothing.
Spirituality is about silent mind and intelligence, practice and knowledge.
12 / 23 / 2013
Problems
We cannot avoid problematic situations, the "undesirable" to summarize this peculiar aspect of life, because it is the very nature of duality and a world in perpetual transformation. Everything change and what seemed for a while perfect doesn’t last. But what can be done on the other hand is seeking a new way of reacting, a different perspective on life, an art of living if you will that allows us to welcome various kind of situations and not only the best, that is to say the ones we really like and suit our mood of the moment.
Spiritual life teaches how to live correctly with others, but also with oneself, with the mind and all its thoughts, emotions and fantasy. It’s not just a search for enlightenment. And assuming that we reach this so-called enlightenment that every seeker of truth naturally looks for in one way or another, we'll still have to live in this world of duality, of problems and conflicts.
Unless we leave this world by dying physically and not only spiritually, the body will never allow us to forget it.
Inextricable
When we are in an impossible situation, we better understand the need for having a spiritual life and the pleasure of remembering that we all are mortals. Life has only a time; here is one of the greatest truths than we forget so easily. Death cannot be considered as the best solutions to our problems, but it’s also a fact soon or late inevitable that it’s impossible to ignore. So what can we really be afraid of since it will come one day to deliver us of all our problems? Which situation is so painful that we cannot confront it when we pertinently know that it will teach us in one way or another a highly spiritual truth, or in other words a virtue which will enable us to stand it with more understanding?
Spirituality is for the living so that they can of course live better.
The path of wisdom is not an option.
1 / 5 / 2014
Don’t you think that
If you don’t like Buddhism because it’s a religion, just be a Buddha on the Dharma.
If you don’t like Hinduism because it’s also a religion which doesn’t concern you and your culture, just be a Yogi on the path of Self-realization.
If you don’t like Christianity because it’s still a religion that maybe you already know too much about, just be a saint with an open heart in action.
But take the right knowledge, the right practice and the right means in order to get to the point.
Oh yes, I forgot the best; what's the point of your life?
That's it, no choice
God is neither the question nor the answer.
Consciousness and the universe are a mystery.
That’s why they are called God and Its Creation.
But if we discover the true nature of the being we embody,
God reveals its existence because they are not different.
Are they one and the same?
Nobody truly knows.
The mystery is eternal and we can only take it as it is.
Anyway, do we have the choice?
1 / 9 / 2014
The bliss of death or to be as we are
People want enlightenment, liberation, a permanent state of bliss, whatever they dream for. Somehow they want to be in a state where they have the impression to be glorified as a god; they want to be blessed by God; they want to be one with the entire universe. But they certainly don’t want to be what they already are.
That’s the problem in a spiritual quest because the truth cannot be about something that we are not already. Does it mean that the revelation of the truth is like a huge disappointment which makes us totally indifferent to everything? The end of the dream, of every possible dreams because dream and truth cannot go together?
Is it true that we have a body? A brain? A nervous system? Sensations, perceptions, impressions, states of mind, thoughts? Everything necessary to be human and bound to suffer because it’s just the normal condition of every human being?
Buddha makes this point very clear in the 4 noble truths 2500 years ago. Everything is suffering or everything at the very least will cause soon or late dissatisfactions and disappointments. Did we understand the lesson? Life causes a lot of suffering. And we are looking for an exit. But do we realize what we really are asking for? Death or bliss? If bliss, it has to include every state of mind, every sensation and every impression, including those which express suffering, because the purpose of enlightenment is not about losing the faculty to be human, but quite the contrary.
The point of spirituality is to be true human being and to do with it as far as we can experience its potential, free from every illusory suffering, and as long as we are alive because death, for sure, will come nevertheless soon or late.
3 / 18 / 2014
Oneness
Come on!
Who would really like to be one with the people that we decently cannot stand?
The concept of oneness is somehow like the concept of reincarnation. One can remember for instance to have been a pharaoh, but no one would remember to have been a street cleaner or a farm worker. And yet on millions of past lives, the probability to have been many times a simple worker is much higher than to be an emperor.
So I guess that it’s alright to be one with what we like and not with what we don’t like which means that oneness separates very clearly what good and bad are.
This concept is really bizarre. How oneness, the "one without a second", could reject a part of itself? It just doesn’t make sense, but "oneness" is nevertheless very trendy in spiritual teaching today. Do people feel so lonely that they want to blend in with everybody and everything? Such a concept should have one or even many psychological reasons in order to be so popular because it goes against the most basic responses of self-consciousness.
To the personal identity that is the "I" or "me" which function among other things is to differentiate itself from others, oneness, to be at one with, is a nonsense. And if it's not this personal identity suffering from an existential loneliness who wishes it, who could it be?
4 / 20 / 2014
Everything is sacred or nothing is
If everything is sacred, can we consider murder, rape, torture and all the other crimes that humans are able to carry out with their amazing genius as sacred acts?
If everything is in fact sacred or empty, as some gurus pretend today without really understanding the meaning of it, the sacred and emptiness will lead soon or late to horror.
The Dharma is absolutely necessary to discover the sacred.
But it's not new!
The Dharma is the eternal path.
Space as supreme manifestation and anti manifestation
Space pervades everything, even emptiness.
Who needs a concept as oneness in the middle of diversity?
What for when everything, even space itself, always appears in the same and unique consciousness?
Perfection is not in the manifestation or out of it either.
6 / 23 / 2014
Choice
There is no doubt that the time we live in is not funny.
It’s a time of complete degeneration of the civilization and its values.
That’s what is called the Kali Yuga.
But it’s not a reason to get lost on the Dharma and stop "celebrating the Gods".
There is no need to be a seer or a superior intelligence in order to understand the value of a noble and correct path even in a culture which is not anymore very noble and correct.
But it’s also important to understand the difference between being correct and sometimes taking some distance when it’s necessary.
Spiritual life is learning without anything really gained.
We always have to choose and if possible with full knowledge of the facts,
and so to accept the consequences of our actions,
the Karma.
Is it about life or only beyond?
Your true nature is divine.
But you are not God.
Your true nature is pure consciousness.
But you are not the universal consciousness.
Your true nature is the Self.
But you are not this presence beyond any kind of possible manifestation.
Otherwise what would be the point of living and especially suffering?
Anyhow if you truly were the Self that is to say pure bliss, you would even not be able to suffer.
So many misunderstandings in spirituality today,
Don’t you think?
Let’s be sincere
The so-called evidences for life after death are at least contradictions in terms.
Life is maybe not the right word.
But what happens after death is certainly the most interesting subject as long as we are still alive.
We never know!
"If there was no death, there won’t be much to philosophize about."
Arthur Schopenhauer
Puzzled
If you feel like to complain about what’s going on in the world today,
just think, according to its evolution, what it will be in 50 years.
You may really scratch your head
and start to ask serious questions about the law of Karma.
If you think that spiritual life is only about superstitions,
you may soon change your mind.
As you sow as you reap
Money is the norm.
Sure!
But Karma is forever the law.
And this is not going to change too.
7 / 13 / 2014
Don’t mix up everything
It’s quite natural to look for well-being, psychological balance in the mind, positive thinking in order to meet the realities of our modern life, or in other terms, to feel good and pretty much happy. But this has no relation with spirituality and spiritual life which go far beyond right from the beginning.
So if we truly want to study spirituality, we will have to start from the beginning : the "Dharma", a just and correct life as much in our thoughts as in the world we all live in because it has always been the foundation of spirituality up to the rise of New Age and Neo Advaita. And our daily life will already be much smoother. As for the study of traditional teachings, the only ones we can really trust such as Ramana Maharshi, and the practice of spiritual disciplines, it’s in fact pure pleasure…, but a little bit more sophisticated than watching TV.
Different words
If someone thinks that spirituality and wisdom are without importance, ask to this clever person if death doesn’t concern him or her either.
9 / 6 / 2014
Future here and now
"The future depends on what you do today."
Mahatma Gandhi
10 / 25 / 2014
Free will and fate, same same !
Free will and fate are like the Möbius band. You can look at it anywhere, there is two sides. But if you examine it closely, there is only one.
12 / 3 / 2014
One or the other
The challenge that spirituality proposes is quite simple :
"automatic reaction" or "conscious life".
2 / 5 / 2015
99% and only 1 really matters
Suffering is the common point between everybody.
What else ?
I don’t know !
Does it make us equal ?
I’m pretty skeptical.
But on a very metaphysical level, why not ?
And the question remains :
Who lives on the metaphysical level of existence
and not in the physical reality at the very origin of suffering ?
Knowing that matter is made of 99% pure empty space doesn’t really help me to walk through a wall.
Is science a new metaphysics ?
I don’t know.
But when I bang on a wall, I know it really hurts.
Without spirituality
The brain degenerates,
the mind atrophies,
and self-consciousness suffocates.
Result : "inner hell" !
5 / 1 / 2015
Infinite is the only limit
"Is not limited the one who is conscious of one’s own limits."
Valeriu Butulescu
Yin and Yang
Even in the absolute negativity, the root of goodness is still present.
Could Western spiritualization happen without a totally corrupted Neo Advaita ? Obviously not because Advaita Vedanta has been introduced in the West since the beginning of the XX century et for cultural and intellectual reasons, this philosophical system based on non-duality did and still concerns only very few people compared the popularity of Neo Advaita.
But will the spiritualization of the West be better than the dogmatism of religions ?
Only the future will tell, and still the Yin Yang principle will be a fact. Somehow it seems that quest for truth concerns a tiny minority and only the opium of the people is truly a necessity.
A point in the middle of a necessary vastness
that will become a necessary vastness for a point.
Everything is fine, I guess !
Karma
"To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction."
Isaac Newton
6 / 2 / 2015
Not perfect but almost
If you are searching for a perfect spirituality, be sure to never find it.
Spirituality and tradition have been elaborated in a cultural context that is not perfect, and for that reason, needed a spiritual system to improve it. Therefore it’s better to search for the most perfect spirituality for you at your level of understanding and necessity, and be happy with it because it obviously won’t be so perfect for someone else.
This is not about tolerance and compassion, but only about understanding.
7 / 5 / 2015
Simple means simple
Respect everybody as you would like to be respected.
That could spiritualize the West… more than any spiritual awakening or so-called shift of consciousness.
But it's probably too simple for so advanced Westerners like us.
The problem is that kind of reasoning is that it's far better to understand this simple évidence before having no other choice and being forced to respect others in a way that won't really be anything like real respect.
Respect obviously suggests kind of freedom and free will.
9 / 11 / 2015
Ignorance
Sincerely speaking, we just want in fact to feel good in our body and mind without knowing what it means. Who really cares when everything is fine ?
The sheer idea of happiness is not even the point when we feel at ease without physical or mental tensions.
That’s the power of the mind and it leads systematically to a path of liberation.
No doubt about it !
No philosophy will prevent people from searching for enlightenment whatever Neo gurus say and do about it.
Traditional and sacred knowledge is immortal because it’s at the very origin of the mind and its perpetual feeling of dissatisfaction.
No one can feel good for very long.
No one will change the natural order of life fully lived.
Correct spirituality can only go away from the people to come back.
It’s only a question of time, and that one is not an illusion !
6 / 14 / 2016
Just as it is !
The world is as it is !
Your and my personal reality are as they are !
No one is going to save the world and make out of it a paradise.
Nobody has the power to free you from anything
already existing as it is and since the beginning of time.
The question is to find out how we can live the better we can
in a dualistic world that is not going to change anyway.
It’s not pessimistic, but realist and more spiritual than dreaming !
7 / 5 / 2016
Big dream
A true "Shift or Evolution of Consciousness" at the level of the whole humanity would mean at the very least that people are not anymore addicted to sex and ready to do anything for survival.
And that is not going to happen very soon or maybe when human beings would not be human anymore at all.
Neo spirituality is becoming a dream that would even make children laughing.
How people can really believe such stupidities ?
But they do !
3 / 4 / 2017
Spirituality or spectacle
Since spirituality concerns and speaks primarily to the soul,
the soul being unfortunately nowadays in Neo spiritual circles
a word not very trendy, undefined or too religious to truly have any meaning,
it should be crystal clear, that is to say for everybody.
If it is complicated and becomes a kind of metaphysics
based on incomprehensible paradoxes very appreciated in Neo Advaita
and unrelated to the reality in which we all live,
it is only good for the intellect, the prestige, lounge discussions and Internet Satsang,
and therefore can no longer be considered spiritual.
It is nothing more than a middle class entertainment for a society of spectacle.
There is no spirituality without daily practice and a truly spiritual and social life,
and there is no spiritual life without living it 24/7 with oneself
but also with the others and the world in which we find ourselves,
and which obviously does not look like a dream or an illusion.
5 / 5 / 2017
Spiritual pleasure
We have to learn ..., i.e. to teach the mind, how to experience pleasure,
but I mean real pleasure, a pleasure that we obviously don't know or very little,
so little that in reality, we pay no attention to it.
The practice of meditation is one of these great spiritual pleasures.
It is always somehow sitting down in a peaceful place, then sitting inside ourselves,
and ultimately enjoying silence, the simplicity of being as such
and watching carefully, more and more precisely,
and so always discovering more accurately.
But watching and discovering what ?
Just watching whatever happens !
Isn't it what we are always doing anyway ?
There is always something happening in silence and stillness,
that's the point of practicing meditation.
If we could definitively or just at will establish pure silence
and perfect stillness in the mind, the practice of meditation
would be useless and truly speaking, impossible to enjoy.
And like any other pleasures, we get quickly fed up of it. So what ?
No one would imagine spending a whole life sitting
or without thinking and feeling anything.
Spiritual life is a path and to go through, it takes a vehicle, but not just any one.
We need the most comfortable and best vehicle adapted to our own needs and desires.
And on this topic, there are quite enough traditional paths to please
every style of personality and character existing in the world.
But I would not say the same about the rebirth of spirituality in the West
since people seem to go from one teacher to another,
or more rightly from one Satsang to another,
and never follow any path and teaching if there is any,
which is usually not the case in order, of course, to disturb no one.
We can seek to transcend sometimes all our desires and suffering
because they become overwhelming,
but to deny our constant quest for pleasure until its extreme theoretical end,
which would be enlightenment, Self-realization and the end of all suffering,
is in my opinion the best way to go wrong and experience a true spiritual quest.
Spiritual life or everyday life, there is no difference between the two
when we understand that spirituality is not about something absolutely exceptional,
transcendental, out of the ordinary, incredible and totally out of any basic reality.
Spirituality and even spiritual liberation are nothing more
than our ordinary life with a tiny difference radically transforming it
entirely and beyond imagination, and so becoming quite extraordinary.
So to speak, we start very small and then we find ourselves gigantic
without ever leaving the lowness of being what we are.
That's what I would call with some humor real pleasure.
Searching for something exceptional is a trap.
6 / 5 / 2017
Clarity
Spirituality is for the soul.
It should be cristal clear.
If it becomes complicated,
It’s for the intellect.
9 / 1 / 2018
Context and teaching
We may wonder why Lao Tzu’s Tao fits so well with Buddha's teaching that the terms Tao and Buddha are interchangeable in some philosophical commentaries on these two teachings. Is it due to the fact that some Chinese think as they say sometimes : "One religion is good, but two is even better", or because the fundamental principle of these two teachings is, in fact, exactly the same ?
There are probably different reasons, especially cultural ones, for such a strange phenomenon to us with our very different Western culture. It would be very difficult, as a matter of fact, to imagine a Christian or Jew using the name Allah while speaking about his own religion or a Muslim taking a vocabulary specifically Christian or Israelite to comment on his own.
But the reason, which seems the most obvious, is simply found in the fact that the fundamental intention of these two teachings is identical. Buddha and Lao Tzu teach exactly the same path and endeavor at the heart of their teaching : a quest for readjustment to the cosmic and natural order of all things that the first will call Dharma and the other, Tao.
Buddha teaches what is known as "The Middle Way", the Dharma with its eight precepts that can be summed up in two words : "right and correct... in everything." And Lao Tzu on his side strongly recommends always seeking a balance between Yin and Yang, the two great principles of the whole Chinese culture found in medicine, martial arts, Sun Tzu’s art of war and other traditional knowledge.
And even better, the country that is called China in English is named in Chinese Zhong Guo, "The Middle Kingdom", Zhong meaning middle or center, and Guo, country. It would be frankly difficult to better express this notion of constant quest for a balance centered between different polarities we find in these 2 teachings and traditional Chinese culture in general.
On our way to understanding what we are really talking about, it would also be very interesting to notice that, at their origin, these 2 teachings based on a kind of balance in everything in order to readjust and so adapt ourselves to the natural order of all things in the intention of ending suffering and dissatisfaction make no reference to or mention in any ways what captivates so much the imagination in our present spirituality, namely kind of illumination or non-ordinary experience that is humbly called in the West "spiritual awakening" or "awakening of consciousness", which would be supposed to solve instantly and without any effort all our personal problems, and moreover for unknown reasons, able to also save humanity if not the whole world. One should really be naive to believe that such a miracle could really happen, that’s nevertheless what is told today in about every lounge discussion called Satsang and spiritual teaching.
But what about Jesus’ teaching we also consider at least as a great initiate or master ? If we take the sermon on the mountain, we can sometimes really think that’s the work of a fanatic or completely unbalanced mind. As a matter of fact, some of his words won’t fail to shock in our time such as, for instance :
"Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account."
"If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away."
"And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away."
"Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who insult you and persecute you."
Such words can indeed seem crazy or at the very least excessive. But if we really want to understand their meaning, we have to take into account the cultural context in which they were told, and a context that can hardly be imagined nowdays. However according to some accounts of that time, we know that the iron grip of the Roman Empire, which maintained power in Judea, was purely and simply insane.
Just imagine, for instance, that all along the road leading to your capital city there were crucified people hanging on crosses and they had been carefully tortured beforehand to make them bloodier, and also the population of some surrounding villages has been slaughtered, including, of course, the women, children and newborns, because those villagers for some reasons difficult to justify were disturbing the ruling power, it’s quite possible that the people living in this city introduce in their speech expressions and way of speaking that could frankly be shocking to you.
And what about the old Law of Retaliation of which we don’t know at all the context where it has been established ? It was probably not a particularly sophisticated time for justice and human rights, which only came a few thousands years later as we know them today. But in any cases, this law doesn’t say "For one eye, the two eyes. And for a tooth, the whole jaw", which, in fact, would be a lot more effective to be respected by others, the obvious intention of such a law. We can still see somehow in it kind of quest for balance and middle way, if we may say so.
It’s difficult to judge what is shocking us today when we don’t know the context of another era and culture, and especially if we have never kived in it. When we see some old photographs of people trapped like animals in a wooden yoke particularly massive and heavy, which doesn’t ties up only their head, but also their hands, in cities like Lhasa in Tibet or others in China, we can ask ourselves a few questions about the meaning of "compassion", one of the most important principles of Buddhism we found in those 2 country not long ago. But we will not take into account with our Western human rights or sense of humanity and justice we consider a lot more humanitarian what is really happening in our penitentiary institutions because, unless to have journeyed in them, we don’t know and don’t especially want to hear anything about.
Whether it's a word in a sentence or a quest for balance and middle way seemingly outrageous in the domain of justice and human rights, we have to consider the context. Only the context could explain what we cannot a priori understand. And it's the same with concepts such as enlightenment or spiritual liberation, which are supposed to solve instantly all our personal problems.
And if…, in fact, this enlightenment or spiritual liberation instead of being an amazing, dazzling, non-ordinary, incredible and transcendantal experience were nothing but only a readjustment to the cosmic and natural order of all things we wouldn’t fail to call good or bad, what would we really search for in our spiritual life instead of running after crazy dreams in order to end suffering ?
As usual, it’s only a question…, no suggestion whatsoever intended for the general public !