Part of A Series: The 12 Things I know now

“God has no religion” Gandhi

“Out beyond our ideas of rightdoing and wrongdoing - there is a field. I’ll meet you there” Jal-al-Adin Rumi

“Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.” Andre Gide

“When you forget the good and the non-good, the worldly life and the religious life, and all other dharmas, and permit no thoughts relating to them to arise, and you abandon body and mind—then there is complete freedom. When the mind is like wood or stone, there is nothing to be discriminated.” Pai-chang Huai-hai

When we create schism we exercise power. The counter to our position no longer becomes one of mediation but the opposite to our values. Questioning the need for war becomes not about protecting human values but about propagating un-American or unpatriotic belief systems.

Schisms are not political but psychological. Society requires that we believe in schism. The battle between good & evil, the forces of light versus the dark are no creation of Hollywood but as old as mankind first could evoke language and document the overpowering of the nighttime by the rising of the Sun.

Our days are filled with schism. We complain about the traffic, immigration, crime, the price of petrol and the queues at the checkout. Our schismatic thinking is at odds with reality. We complain because we seek to make the other person wrong. The traffic is wrong, the government is wrong and the checkout attendant is stupid. Each schism elevates our own moral code to a higher level. We feel better about ourselves.

No tags