This is very profound. I in-courage you to read the following slowly and carefully, and perhaps come back in a day or two to read again.
Comments/thoughts invited.
Namaste
Atma
Written by Tiger Singleton on fakebook
We see people through a filter, a filter of how we see ourselves. Until the self-filter disappears, we won't actually see our fellow man or even Life itself.
Naturally, this is the spiritual journey, to surrender the self-filter and see what's actually there. To let die who we think we are, to sacrifice our self-idea, to surrender the ego.
In all the social drama that seems to create conflict and an unharmonious world (all varying degrees of war and violence), they are ALL reflective of this error in perception. Religiously speaking, this is a more accurate representation of the world "Sin," an error in perception.
It's so simple, yet, unimaginably terrifying for the self-idea that thinks it's a real self.
For the one who truly desires to look in this direction, to see the unshakable truth of life, the heaven that's been pointed to since the beginning, here is my gentle and direct encouragement...
See how violent you are, and let it bend your knees until you drop to the floor.
See how much you struggle to protect who you think you are and the subsequent pain this creates in your life.
See how you blamed others for getting in your way. See... how you judged them as if you knew their path; as if you knew what was best for life, but secretly you thought was best for your imagined sense of separate self-importance.
See how this is violent, see how this violence tries to protect something that is only imaginary, something that has never actually existed and never will. See how you perpetuate the drama because you're afraid to let go, afraid to disappear into the vast unknown.
Look behind your facade of being a good person, or being a kind person, and see that it's all an act that's afraid of being rejected, that's afraid of losing everything; afraid of being seen by others in a way that doesn't match the self-idea you hide behind.
Look, and see, just how terrified you really are and ask yourself... "what am I so afraid of?" Then, see that what you're afraid of... is the Truth of Life.
You're afraid that who you think you are doesn't exist. You're afraid that who you think you are isn't enough. You're afraid that there's nothing to hold onto in this life, you're afraid of losing who you think you are, not realizing it's already been lost.
In this fear, you, understandably, fight for your ego's survival while mistakenly thinking it's 'your' survival. You oppose and reject what IS, refusing to even look at what IS, because it threatens your self-idea. You fight against the real so that the unreal can be real; it's exhausting and has never been sustained. You've only left a trail of violence masquerading as care and morality.
See how deeply rooted this self-idea is, and... see how you can't seem to do anything about it. Everything you've tried to do has only masked it or given it a new name; temporarily. Sooner or later it raged on once again.
Can you see how there is nowhere for this self-idea to run? Nowhere for it to hide? Is it obvious yet, that this self-idea is the thorn in your side, and it's not the world or others at all? It's your own confusion, it's your own shadow of a self that haunts you.
If you can see this...
Now, forgive everyone. See that it's not them, it's not the world that disturbs you. What disturbs you is your own determination to be something you are not, to capture something that's impossible. What disturbs you is that you, your self-idea, wants to be God rather than letting God be God.
Forgive everyone. See that no one and nothing has gotten in your way, because 'your way' was an impossible way; trying to survive something that was only imaginary. See that you pretend to know others, especially those you blame. You pretend to know what they should or should not do in order to protect your own imagined world.
Forgive everyone. Admit to yourself, deeply, that your whole life you've been "trying to find yourself" while using other people as ponds; loving those who seemed to help you and withholding love from those who seem not to. Is this not a violence that using love as a weapon?
Forgive. See that what wasn't forgiven, was because of a misunderstanding. See that unforgiveness can only happen because the truth of what's happening isn't being seen. See that if you saw the truth of what was happening, forgiveness would have been automatic.
Forgive Yourself. See that you didn't know, and if you did know, there would have been no violence. See, deeply, you cannot know what you do not know, and... what is known now, only comes by way of what was not known. This is innocence. "Father, forgiven them, for they know not what they do." If they knew, then they would not do; so no worries.
Forgive Yourself. See how easy it is to be blinded by this illusion of a self-idea, see that everyone who has ever lived has been lost in this illusion. Also, see how you will again be lost and will confuse yourself as something you are not. It will happen again, and there's nothing you can do about it. See as well, this applies to everyone else.
We are all doing the best we can, given the level of confusion we are working through; we are all innocent. Whatever the confusion is that's being worked through, ultimately, and totally, it serves the purpose of the Truth of Life being seen.
The point of life is not you completing or satisfying some imaginary self-idea. The point of life is to see the Truth of Life.
As you see the truth of Life from beyond the filter of a self-idea, that nothing real can be destroyed and everything is already forgiven, you will touch upon a Heaven that is already here, already present and very much alive"*