Sunday, August 12, 2007

Sunday Morning Brain Dump

Sentimental Journey

We are all on a journey between first breath and last breath. Where we breathe now is the only living we have.

The world I see through my eyes reflects me. Reaching wisdom is seeing Self as all.

When you realize that you no more need a guru, or teach or therapist, you will be your own guru, or teach or therapist.

Mental Disorders

There are those who believe that the medical profession create mental disorders. That, by giving the patient a list of symptoms allows the patient to re-write his symptomatic history, to search for an interpretation, of events, emotions, feelings and physical discomforts to give the doctor what he needs to make the required diagnosis. The patient at some level of consciousness conforms to the subjective diagnosis. Sometimes a pill is so much easier to take than a good dose of reality. A pill does not require the patient to admit responsibility for his thoughts and attitude and behavior.

The unasked question is "How do you know when to be depressed or anxious or whatever?" The patient must know when to be happy. Emotional states are relative. Emotional states are in the mind. You need to compare it to something you already know. It is all illusion. All within our minds. And if we do not control our minds, who does?

By defining a mental disorder as a medical illness, did the medical profession create more of the same?

Positive Thinking and the other

I do not see that that Positive Thinking - Negative Thinking is a useful way of life. What I prefer is to set a goal that I want to reach and to relate my thinking to that goal. My actions and thoughts are either useful or not useful in reaching that goal.

Everyone needs a mission in life. Even if it is only as simple as understanding Self. A mission is not the same as a goal. Setting a goal is budgeting time.  A mission is a named purpose that guides your every task, thought and action.

Positive and negative are only distractions along your journey, distractions from your guided mission.

Connecting the dots

You connect the dots in you mind as you falter through your journey. You mark the time. And in this illusion you may reach the pinnacles of fame and wealth. You may be prince or pauper, a writer or a reader.

But what are we in relation to the cosmos but mere specks of dust. And when time has long overtaken us, in the billion years ahead, what will we be but an accident of nature.

We must empty our selves of any feelings of superiority, of any self adulation, to learn that we are alone. To learn that Self is all there is. We must create in our souls a wonder for life. We are alone in our illusions. We cannot insist that our illusions are the only right illusions, or that they are better than someone else's. They are just illusions. If we must each live in a dream of our own making that we share,  not impose.

And as I have heard so many critically ill persons say, people with kidney failure and on dialysis, people with terminal and inoperable diseases, people in wheel chairs, people recovering from horrendous accidents, all have said  "I am happy just to be alive."

When will I know

The therapy patient will know that he no longer needs the therapist anymore when he realizes that he is his own therapist and always has been. The same can be said of the teacher or yogi or guru.

It is, after all, your illusion. It is your mind. The mind only you can control. And, in that illusion is your search for meaning.

The meaning is that I breathe.

Friday, July 20, 2007

Are You Rational or Human?

I read somewhere that all rational people are not emotional.

That is like saying that all oranges do not rely on their skin. If you separate the skin from the orange what you have is two separate things. A peal and the pulp. Most people just eat the pulp.

Let us say you are a very objective and rational person. You decide to make a decision. You gather all the facts about whatever you are deciding on. Are you sure you have all the information? Are you sure you need to have all the information? Can you afford to wait for all the information?

At some point you will need to find the confidence to make that decision. And, if you are confident you have enough information you make the decision.

What is that? Did I hear you say you FEEL confident?

No matter how you cut and slice the orange, you will at some point rely on your feelings. Feelings, good or bad, are emotions. And even a rational person cannot escape them.

Rational and emotional are separated in our language but in fact the human being is a whole. We cannot separate Physical, Rational, Emotional and Spiritual. This is simply a construct of the language. A way of talking about something.

There are those who, because the words are spoken as though they are separate things, convince themselves that they are separate.

You can pretend you do not have emotions., but you cannot escape them.

Do You Have Common Sense?

Another related issue is that of common sense. In language we tend to equate this with having native intelligence.  To sense though, is to use our five senses (six if you include our sense of balance).

I also object to the use of the word common. I often hear this used by employers speaking of job applicants. As in, "He didn't have the common sense to be a clerk!" The implication is that without any training, you can hire anyone off the street who will do the job.

If that is the case, let's hire someone off the street who has some of this common sense to replace all company presidents.

Some employers will use any excuse not to train their new hires. Are we to believe then that all company presidents are rational people?

You cannot expect an untrained person to do a job, even with common sense. If you have never been exposed to a particular discipline, no matter how simple or common, you may never understand what you are expected to do.

In what sense do we mean sense? If what we actually mean is to use the senses to arrive at somewhat rational decisions, then I'd like to see the school that teaches common sense. Do we really expect everyone will have gone to that particular school?

Perhaps it can be said that the rational also lack common sense.

For more feature articles go to http://www.themeaningisyou.com
The author has many years experience, writing and reading for self development.

Copyright Gilles Hamann 2007
Permission is granted to publish this article providing Gilles Hamann is identified as the author and a link back to http://pitterpatterblog.blogspot.com is displayed with the article.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Conversations with Who?

In the vein of Neale Donald Walsh's book, Conversations with God I present here a Conversation with Me? Let me warn that this is an irreverent take on an already irreverent topic. You may choose to believe that I am having a conversation with Me! or with my imagination. Either way, please do not take any of this seriously. I'm not  trying to start any more new cults.

 

Little me:  You may not believe this but  I hear a voice in my head. I think it is God speaking to me. No, wait a minute...it's..it's....Me!

Me: You're  really not that funny. After all you are an accountant.

Little me:  What you're answering me! Who are you? What to you want?

Me: I am here to guide you on your journey.

Little me:  Journey?  I didn't buy any tickets!

Me: Your Life Journey you silly moron!

Little me: Ok! If You are so smart. You tell me when you created the world.

Me: I create it every second. Every moment of your waking life is your first. I create the world and you and everyone else with all their memories intact, with every book, every piece of knowledge every mountain, every river, every blade of grass, every living being each moment you see and hear and feel and taste and smell. And you can spend a million years trying to prove otherwise. You will never disprove this fact.

Little me:  How can you say this? You're only the voice I hear when I write. In fact I was just listening to you a moment ago when I asked the question, "Do I have writers block?"

Me: And what did I tell you? I said I am thinking of writing a course called Conversations with Me. That's because I wake up every morning (I often do that) hearing a voice in my head with a lot of questions.

Little Me: Hey! Were going to confuse the reader aren't we? Shouldn't I be saying that?

Me: Like I was saying, I was wondering how I could write about the Law of Attraction with a new twist.

Little Me: I already did that. Just have a look at what I posted at http://www.themeaningisyou.com.

 And, I was too lazy to write something else so I posted at  http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Gilles_Hamann.

Me: Stop interrupting!  You're supposed to just listen. Now where was I? Then I just start to write whatever comes to mind. It flows easily. Are you getting this?

Little me: I can keep up with you any time.

Me: That's what gets put down as quickly as possible with only slight editing. Oh, you can tell, can you? Well, that's me always slightly unedited.

Little me: This question and answer reminds me of an interview. I'm interviewing the great Me! This could turn out to be a great revelation.

Me: Oh stop that! You aren't listening to me. Take a lot of writing, a lot of streaming thoughts, many questions and you  could have an inspired work.

Little me: Why have you been so quiet all these many years? Why is this happening to me only now?

Me: Keep asking those questions and I'll answer them in time. I'll talk, you write. But for now this enough.

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