Karma, Ethics, Human Activities and the 'Pursuit of Happiness'

There are very few instances in today's world of totally ethical doings. Ultimately almost everything is tainted with activities that make the whole of human bustling unacceptable at higher levels. No one is innocent and safe.

Knowing or not knowing about that will ultimately have an impact on you. This is the most difficult aspect of life in the material world, especially now. The complexity of the societies we've created is such that even though one may not be aware of it or unwilling to dig deeper into the knowledge of whatever it is one is doing, the end result is the same. If it doesn't comply with the requirements at higher levels of the spiritual world, one will end up stuck at lower levels if one doesn't want to care about that. If one does wishes to care about the end result of one's activity, acts AND thoughts to the best of one's knowledge and ability, it will eventually be possible to move on to higher levels because corruptions of all sorts linger all over the material world.

It is almost impossible to escape the realities we've created: the base is rotten. Why is it do we exist and who are we serving? In the pursuit of one's own 'happiness', one is having an impact on others' pursuit of 'happiness', whether positive or negative. It's an endless chain reaction and has a tremendous impact on the Other Side. The Tables of Moses or if you prefer the Ten Commandments are like a spiritual framework to assist humans in their pursuit of 'happiness'. It is not complete but it is a good start to act solely for the purpose of the betterment of the Universe let alone one's betterment. It is quite simple. It doesn't require a PhD in anything to understand them. And yet...

Transcriptions and translations purposefully or not may have altered the wording throughout history. For instance, whether it is considered the fourth of the fifth Commandment 'Honour thy father and thy mother' has been wrongly transcribed and should read: 'Honour fatherhood and motherhood' This is crucial. It places the burden on those having children instead of the children. It means you are not to take lightly the purpose of being a parent, for you bring into this world another being and it is your responsibility to respect this being and teach, educate this individual without exercising undue authority. For many centuries this has been quite a mistake to place the burden on the kids instead of putting it on the parents. Parents have to act as guides towards the child without any sort of abuse.

The difference of perspective is total and has had an impact on everything else. Authoritarian attitude towards one another shows a lack of respect towards one another. Such a situation does not occured on higher levels because there is no necessity to use authority on higher levels because if you have reached higher levels you are at a point of cooperation with one another. The abuse of power, authoritarian power throughout history is tremendous and makes the whole base of being here rotten. We can see it in everything on a daily basis, everywhere. Of course there are some sorts of hierarchies on higher levels of the spiritual world, but they are more like the wiseman or woman of the village. So it's more like a guidance. If you don't like it maybe you shouldn't be there... Anyway you wouldn't be there if you didn't want to follow some rules...

Revolution & Spirituality

The spiritual revolution starts between our two ears. Nowhere else. We have first to establish what type of revolution and what type of society we want to live in. Not in groups at first. Between the ears. There are things to solve which are not easy.

Most revolution have failed on the long run because they were not established on solid grounds. It is not necessary at all to take up arms to build a revolution. And if one is talking about a spiritual revolution, arms of any kind are strictkly prohibited, otherwise it is anything but a spiritual revolution which can only be achieved by like-minded people. No need either to demonstrate in the streets. It is in silence a spiritual revolution must happen first. To build a collective that lasts the rules must be the same for every participant. The rules for a spiritual revolution are very simple. So simple in fact that so far they've been the hardest to follow for a few thousands years or some hundreds of generations. Sadly there are not much followed. Courthouses are filled with people not following the rules and lawyers are ever busy streamlining the process.

In the end it is useless to try to change coercively others' viewpoints or behaviours. It ain't workin' and it's not the way a spiritual revolution ought to work. For the better or the worse I might add. One has to be a model. That is all there it because the rewards of a spiritual revolution don't come through like Air Miles of financial benefits (though they could). The rewards are from other dimensions, readily available here in the material world and throughout the known and unknown universe.

I know it feels almost frustrating but we are so much conditioned by what capitalism and the industrial revolution has brought that we can't think straight anymore because we want our rewards even before we've started working on ourselves.

This society is based on fulfilling needs. And there are literarally thousands of artificial needs to fulfill. We have to think in terms of scarcity, not in terms of abundance. This is obviously "unAmerican". I am not here to rub your ego. I am here to tell you something different. If one is frustrated because one has no car one should start thinking about that. I am 57 and have had no cars in my life. I lived in many cities and even in the countryside from 2005 to 2007 in a real small 8 x 8 feet cabin I built myself with recycled material: cost 5$. I bought one acre of land for it. I had no water no electricity, only an oil lamp and a trek to the river for the water. After the two-year experience I eventually sold the piece of land at the same cost I paid for 10 years before. No speculation. It served its purpose and ended up paying nothing to house myself for two years. In fact I made a profit because I sold it. It's all in the mind.

Life is not about working 9 t0 5 every weekday for 40 years.and then retiring. This is nonsense. I retired slowly from age 19 and did not work full time very long. I wanted to enjoy life and most jobs are far from being an enjoyment unless one is to be resilient with that.

Everything has to change in order to achieve a spiritual revolution. E.V.E.R.Y;T.H.I.N.G. Since I cannot argue with anyone about this, I do it in silence on my own.

In North American terms I am very poor, earning and capping a yearly revenue of about 15 000 $. Yet I live like a millionaire having much free time on my hand every day of the year. That is the way I envisioned my 'retirement' a long time ago after I saw people just retiring at 65 and dying soon afterwards. It's insane. I live in a two-storeys townhouse of more than 1200 sq feet in the city with a great backyard with many kids playing in it after school. My landowner are very nice people and we exchange services and goodies all the time. Those are my rewards.

This is my revolution since I cannot convinced anyone of the true nature of spiritual revolution. Start on yourself. Things will happen. I experimented it. It is in no way wishful thinking. Just remember to thank the Lord (or the Cosmos if you wish so) for the good life you are having. Don't get into useless hassles, be humble and respect others.

The World Stage and Us

From the standpoint we have the situation of the world is more or less good. If one lives in wealth and insouciance, it goes without saying that the world goes relatively well. On the other hand if one is poor, indebted, sick or handicapped, one is more likely to find the world not working well. It is even getting worse if one watches the news. There is enough evidence in there to be at least worry about the world. One has the feeling that we will never free ourselves of this mess.

This "revolt" is healthy but it got to make sense because one has barely any control on the world affairs, except by contributing to them in a positive way. Obviously, one might say it will have no effect on things which is not the purpose here on a macro level but rather on a micro level: ours. Each positive thought, each positive gesture one does is like a point of acupuncture one administers on the surface of Earth as if it were a skin, to ease the pain and heal.

Like many people I am horrified by what is going on in Syria, among other places. How have we ended up in this situation and what can be done to remedy this endless and senseless war in a country that not long ago seemed peaceful, economically stable with beautiful cities, etc. No need to give me a lesson in the geopolitics of the Middle East. I am pretty well aware of it with its share of colonialism, imperialism, petroleum, etc. Yet if one wants to bring back peace in this part of the world (or any for that matter) one has to look at the geopolitical history and from there conceive a plan to rewind toward a modus vivendi and a modus operandi; a return to peace if that is what we want.

The same questioning goes on for anything else I guess. What to do? One can choose to participate in activities which goals serve to alleviate the worst aspects of one's life, hence of this society, whichever the cause. One has to remember though that one is more or less responsible about what is going on. Everything is linked one way or the other. At one's level the way one thinks and acts might trigger misfortune and hardship elsewhere, something we often wish to ignore.

The list of acts one can do at one's level is quite long to make things better. In our consuming society, we buy many things which origins might have a great deal of mishaps before arriving on a store shelves, etc. We thus all contribute to the world affairs as they are.

And always one must remember that we are here in transit. The existence on the Other Side can resemble what it is here only in the lowest levels of spirituality. Higher one is climbing the steps of spirituality, farther are the types of absurd situations that makes the daily life down here sometimes excruciating. Situations of conflicts are limited to the lowest part of spirituality. That makes one being a detainee to wish to stay here. Yet we must make the best of it, being the best we can if we don't want to go through the process of being caught in fights of all kinds going on also in the lowest levels of spirituality.

Listen to:
CBC Radio One
Tapestry
Sunday April 3, 2016
Religion doesn't cause religious violence
With Rabbi Sacks
A program by Mary Hynes