Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts

Sunday, 26 February 2012

Post No. 372 - Ethics is not a county in England

The title of this post is not mine: I first heard it from a friend over a decade ago, and I think she got it from somewhere else. I recently used it in frustration when trying to get some people to consider the ethical implications of what they were considering.

Talking about time and communication ... when I was a small kid, learning to speak (yes, I remember back that far*), one day I half-heard my parents use the word water. As I indicated, I didn't hear it clearly, so I tried to find out what the word was. I actually asked "was that wa .. wa ..." (I didn't have the vocabulary to say "what was that word you just used" - I tried to recreate the word, paused, then tried again), and my parents decide I had come up with something cute - "wa-wa" for water ("Yes, you can call it wa-wa if you want"). No, I didn't want to bloody call it wa-wa, I wanted to know what the proper damn word was. So ... if I may suggest, don't underestimate kids - and that includes not underestimating their capacity to be evil.

* I know someone who can remember being a child, being sung to by her mother, who wanted to sing her to sleep. She, however, was thinking along the lines of "if only she'd stop making that noise so I can go to sleep!"

Moving on ... it seems to me that many of the problems in society (e.g., materialism) are present because there is a spiritual vacuum. People want - in fact, need - a sense of purpose,Link and where that would, in other Yugas, be rightfully provided by spirituality, that is lacking in our immature Kali Yuga, where religion has become confused with spirituality. What is the solution? I don't know ... Maybe more emphasis on rigorous work and self discipline rather than trying to appeal to the laziest common denominator ...

I've recently been reading Marco Pallis' book "Peaks and Lamas", first published in 1939, republished in 2004 by Shoemaker & Hoard, ISBN 978-1593760588 (my copy is older, from a lovely, packed-to-the-rafters-with-books second-hand bookshop). This book, which has a chapter titled “the Round of Existence” that happens to be one of the best introductions for Westerners to Buddhist concepts that I have ever read, also describes Tibetan Buddhists as considering "Method" and "Wisdom" as being inextricably linked, with each being as essential as the other: Method, characterised as being male, is symbolised by monks by holding a dorje, and Wisdom, characterised as being female, is symbolised by monks by holding a bell. Their attitude towards these two was so inclusive it struck me as almost being pagan.

The Round of Existence also describes the various classes of beings, including "gods" (Deva realm: God realm) and demi-gods (Asura realm: Demi-god realm), who are seen as above humans but still trapped in illusion: this description is, I consider, better covered by Lobsang Rampa's description of Manus as a sort of hierarchy of deities branching out from the one universal source of all - also a bit like the pagan concept of the Goddess splitting sparks off herself to create other entities, who split sparks off themselves to create others, down to our Oversouls who split sparks off themselves to create parallels (i.e., us) ...

Incidentally, Pallis' book also includes the sort of dismissiveness of the inherent value of this level of reality as a valid purpose of existence in its own right (i.e., not as a stepping stone to something "better") that is one of the reasons I realised I was pagan, not Buddhist.

Post script - Monday 27th February, 2012
I have finished Pallis' book, and have a few more reflections.

Firstly, I consider the Boddhisattva Vow to be foolishness and a vanity. This level of existence will be part of reality until reality ends. The notion of staying behind until everyone is ready to reach enlightenment implies the view that we're just a bunch of miscreants, and the world/physical reality will snuff out of existence when the current batch graduates: not so. The physical level of reality does exist for a reason, which is learning and growth, but one is ALWAYS going to be learning, no matter how evolved one is - and, in fact, one may be better able to help those on this level of reality by continuing to evolve, instead of putting a brake on one's evolution. In the current Kali Yuga, the notion that there may be a limit to the existence of the world may have a somewhat perverse attraction. In, however, the Gold Yuga, this world would actually be quite a pleasant place to be, and it would be inconceivable to wish for it to end. Then there is the issue of assuming that one's presence is necessary for others to evolve. Yes, I know that isn't what is intended by the Boddhisattva Vow, but the reality is, Reality is actually quite well organised. Teachers will always be provided for those who are worthy. Of course, the student may not like what the Teacher teaches ... which brings me to the next point.

Pallis writes about the attitude of Tibetans towards "sin", or making errors, along the lines of: if it increases awareness, then such errors should be encouraged - and hence some of the behaviour of gurus towards students that many Westerners would consider appalling - such as Marpa getting Milarepa to build a house and then tear it down. Such "trickery" occurs in other traditions as well. Indeed, if I look back at my life, I can see many "mistakes" I've made, but they've mostly contributed to who I am today, and I think I would only change one or two of them. Incidentally, I include some emotions in that, emotions that I now consider quite self-indulgent, but which were major motivators at the time for me to learn and progress.

And now, this week's readings links. As usual, these have been chosen for a mixture of interest, information, and stimulation of thought: I don't necessarily agree with any or all of these :)


Love, light, hugs and blessings

Gnwmythr
(pronounced "new-MYTH-ear")

Tags: art, boredom, Buddhism, children, communication, discrimination, ethics, materialism, purpose, science, sexism, society,

First published: Sunnudagr, 26th February, 2012

Last edited: Monday, 27th February, 2012
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Thursday, 3 March 2011

Post No. 239 - Random thoughts ...

Just a few more random thoughts - on asceticism, art, getting to know one's parallels/subconscious, forgiveness, the benefits of passing over, change vs. learning, and leavening civilisations ...

Asceticism
One of the things which used to be portrayed about Eastern spirituality when I was growing up was that it allegedly favoured asceticism - "denial of the body" through discipline, and forcing the body to endure rigours such as protracted fasting, and living with very little. Well, I now know better - there are those who choose to practise austerity and a rigorous asceticism (e.g. saddhus) - and possibly that is exactly what they need, but they are not the be-all and end-all of the matter: many Eastern people genuinely practise a spiritual life whilst living their equivalent of a "normal" lifestyle.

Where I think a relative form of asceticism has a place is in the lifestyles of us in the West, in the First World. Many of us seem to want "things", and our houses are now much bigger than those of our grandparents, and all of us consumes the limited resources that the Earth has. My opinion is that, as part of being a spiritual being, we should seek to live as materially simple a life as we can. That shows respect and caring (dare I say "love") for the world we live on.

In the four years I was at University, I moved 33 times. As a result, for some decades I had a rule that I would only own enough to fit into a single trailer so I could move easily and readily. That is a rule which is harder to follow here in Victoria, as in Queensland many places are rented furnished, which is not so in Victoria (so I also have to fit fridge and bed, for example, on the trailer). It is also harder with a family, cats, reference books, and my crystals and other magical tools ... but I still try to follow the principle of not consuming unnecessarily out of love for this planet as a spiritual act.

Also, there is an element of choice here: if asceticism is forced because one is living in poverty, then it will not be of any spiritual value. See Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs, which I have mentioned in previous posts (here, and in here).

Art
This speculation was spurred by watching The L-Word. What is the purpose of art? I've heard in recent years the view that the purpose of art is to provoke a response. I disagree - especially musical art.

I used to think that art is about appreciating beauty more - not in the sense of portraying those who the media claim are beautiful people, but things like being able to portray the beauty in everyday people, or the beauty of spirit inside one who has been disfigured (perhaps by an explosion, for instance).

Now, I tend to phrase it a little more broadly, and say that art is about increasing our appreciation of life. To me, much of that is about being shown a beauty I had not seen before, but it may, from time to time, also include something which is challenging or provocative.

I also consider that the opinion of what is art to be subjective, not objective. That means something may be considered by most of the billions of other people on this planet but not by me, and we are both right :)

Getting to know one's parallels/unconscious
It might be useful to describe how to go about this from the point of view of being a totally raw novice, with little experience or development of skill. If I found myself back in that situation, I would probably do something along the lines of the following:
  1. Ask, every night before going to sleep for at least a month, to practise in sleep state for the exercises I was about to try (this request goes to your Guides/Higher Self (Overself)/Patron Deities).
  2. For the last week of that month, add to the request by also lighting a candle where it will not cause a fire (make sure there are no candles, that it is on/in fireproof containers, is a small candle, etc).
  3. In the first fortnight after the month of preparation, begin by focusing my attention on all the sensations, emotions and thoughts I was encountering, with a view to developing my awareness and sensitivity (see this post). I would increase this from an initial 5 minutes to an hour, gradually.
  4. During the second fortnight, I would set up a protective circle before doing this, and open the circle at the end. In the second week, I would also add doing a ritual to invoke the energies of the Qabbalistic Sphere of Yesod.
  5. During the third fortnight, I would add to the ritual, invocation of Yesod and a shortened check of awareness (say 10 to 20 minutes) by then playing various guided meditation tapes (that I had pre-listened to in a normal state of consciousness so I knew what they contained, to make sure there were no suggestion that were disharmonious to me or my principles), again aiming to get this up to around an hour long session. In the second week of this fortnight, I would also experiment with various incenses to see which ones seemed to me to be giving a heightened state of awareness or increased sensitivity. (All the while during these fortnights I would be continuing the request and candle when going to bed.)
  6. Finally, I would aim to either meditate, or pre-tape a guided meditation, with a view to changing my awareness and becoming aware of influences and interactions from my subconscious/my parallels.
Of course, for that to be meaningful I also need to post more about the invocation rituals and guided meditation - which doesn't fit into this post. The Qabbalistic ritual is an adaptation of the fuller version of the "Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram" which I posted here (for simplicity, I left out the visualisation of the Archangels).

Finding out more about your parallels can be useful, as many past lives that we look at may actually be of our parallels, who are, effectively, another part of us and, via our shared unconscious, influence us as we influence them.

Lobsang Rampa has some good comments on the unconscious in "Candlelight".

Forgiveness
Further to my recent post on this, the film "Red Dust", which covers the Truth and Reconcialiation Commission in South Africa, is worth looking at.

Dying can lead to resolution of mysteries ...
One of the things about dying is that one views one's life. In the course of this, and by dint of the greater psychic awareness one has inherently as a result of being in the astral, it may be quite possible for one to find out what is behind mysteries that one was plagued by in the physical. Say, for instance, someone lost their child to a violent crime and the criminal was never found, nor the body found (as has happened in one case here in the 80s): when the grieving parents die, they will be reunited with the child, and they will have a chance to resolve the mystery (unless they have some truly extraordinarily bad karmic debt).

So .. if you find yourself thinking "it's a shame so-and-so didn't find out about X before she/he/ze died", don't - they will find out :)

Is change a better word than learning?
In the field of spirituality, one often is told that one's purpose here is to learn: could a better word be "change" - as in, "change for the better"?

If I think about something such as ... say, helping to organise an LGBTIQ spirituality conference (as I have done in the past, and hope to do so again for MidSumma 2013), I can say that I guess I have learned things like trusting myself more, I have acquired more experience, etc - but if I was to try writing a list of what I had learned, I would struggle. If, on the other hand, I was to try writing a list of how I had changed, I would fly through it - I am stronger, I am more experienced at X, Y and Z, I know more about A, B and C, etc, etc, etc.

So ... is "change for the better" more appropriate than "learning"?

I think it is for me - how about you, dear Reader? :)

One other thought comes to mind here: the issue of balance. Often this is thought of in terms of karmic balance, but there is also the issue of seeing "both sides of the coin", so to speak. You MUST have lives as male and female, for example, to enable you to evolve; you must also have lives of poverty and riches, before you can evolve.

There are other personal sequences where people often try to seek a balance by, more or less, going from one form of extremism to another. Hence, for instance, I have read (and don't actually agree with) a suggestion that Hitler would come back as a vehement preacher in the next life ...

In my case, I have tended to try to balance a life in the military by a life in a religious order. I have tried to balance out a hedonistic lifestyles in one century and piratical life the century before with a disciplined British navy life in the 1800s (I was no-one known or famous, by the way). I tried to balance some lives where I was a compliant, obediant female in the 1700s with a more wilful life in the early 1900s - a bit like teenagers as they are stereotypically thought of today, perhaps :) Unfortunately, going against my father's wishes led to a path that I regret and am still paying for to this day [1] ... so, there is a time, a place and a way to seek to ba;ance things out: better yet, do not fall into the trap of being extremist in the first place :)

Leavening civilisations
Something I am thinking about at the moment is Rampa's comments (in "The Hermit" and "Tibetan Sage") that the "Gardeners of the Earth" (i.e. benevolent aliens seeking to help the evolution of spiritual life on Earth - see the notes in this post) occasionally try to "leaven" the quality of sentient life on the Earth by introducing new civilisations. I have not reached any conclusions about this yet, just mentioning that it is something I am cogitating upon - especially when I see people like an ex's son have six kids, who he is raising in an alcoholic, criminal (well, formerly criminal - I don't know if he still is), violent (again - formerly) environment. The last time I had contact with him, he had a new girlfriend who appeared to be sorting him out ...

but then I compare this with the people who are wonderful parents, and note that they inevitably have fewer kids. Will the world evolve to be a better place under these circumstances? Maybe that depends on whether or not the education system will pick up the slack ...

As I said, I don't know one way or the other ... it is just one of the things currently occupying my mind and my meditations - along with things such as should I try to improve my ability to channel names, which I tend to block because of the expectations that get put on mediums to channel such details instead of the person being helped getting metaphorically off their backside and sharing the responsibility for a good reading by doing their part (such as preparing ... ).

Greed = glamour
One of the main ills of the world, in my opinion, is greed - wanting more than one needs. This is something I also refer to as materialism or being materialistic (probably the more precise reference!), or consumerism. One aspect of this is being sucked in by advertising (including the portrayal of lifestyles on TV), which Alice Bailey refers to as "glamour", being caught like a moth to the glitzy lights of what appears glamorous. (Bailey even wrote a book about the problem ... )

Control through phone messages
Something which struck me as my partner and I continued watching the L Word (which I posted some initial impressions of - not changed as yet! - here) was the control exerted over people by leaving short, useless messages.

A couple of times towards the end of Season One Tina left messages for Bette where she was clearly upset asking here to call, but not saying what could have happened. That left Bette the potential to think Tina could have miscarried, which could have caused Bette to panic or have unnecessary stress. A better approach would have been to say something along the lines of "I have been threatened by a sperm donor's current girlfriend" - which is something Tina didn't do even when Bette did ring. It is important to get emotions out and expressed, yes, but it is also important to have consideration for partners. Did Tina fear Bette would not interrupt her work to call her? Given the unbalanced attitudes Bette had, that could have been the case - but better to know that and deal with it, than to try to exert a form of control over one's partner.

This sort of consideration applies more broadly: I detest getting short, useless messages "call me" from work colleagues, when if they said something useful such as "call me about a potential bid X", I can assess that against my other work priorities, and call it in the order that is best for the company - which is not necessarily best for the ego of the person leaving the message. They think that, by being vague, I will call to find out what it is all about, whereas I generally choose to ignore such messages or put them down at the bottom of the pile. It doesn't take much effort to have some basic manners and consideration.

Love, light, hugs and blessings

Gnwmythr

Notes:
  1. An ex-partner and my current partner were on the opposite side to me in the Second World War, by the way: there are some interesting dynamics in these situations, as well some - in these cases - karmic balancing, as well as love and continuation of relationships from past lives.

This post's photo is yet to be posted.

Tags: lifestyles, asceticism, art, Qabbalah, Yesod, unconscious, forgiveness, death, growth, evolution, greed, glamour, materialism, consumerism, Alice A Bailey, Maslow,

First published: Thorsdagr, 3rd March, 2011

Last edited: Sunday, 6th March, 2011
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