The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.
– Alan Watts, The Culture of Counter-Culture: Edited Transcripts
Tag: quote
Byron Katie: The ability to sit in your own pain gives you the ability to sit in ours
The ability to sit in your own pain gives you the ability to sit in ours.
– Byron Katie
Byron Katie: No one has ever judged anyone
You think you’re judging a person, but really you’re judging an image in your mind. No one has ever judged anyone.
– Byron Katie
Adyashanti: To take full responsibility
To take full responsibility for your life (which is not judging yourself) is actually
a key to being free, because it means that no one, and no past experience, can control or determine your current state of being. The keys to your life, and your freedom, are in your hands.
– Adyashanti, from Fierce Love
How can we do this?
A good start is to take responsibility for how I relate to this situation — to myself, others, what’s coming up in me, the situation I find myself in, life.
I cannot blame anything or anyone for how I relate to whatever is here.
I can ask myself: Do I take responsibility for how I relate to this situation? If not, how would it be to take responsibility for it?
And what in me urges me to blame someone or something else? What’s the belief? Identity? Emotional issue?
In this situation, what does it give me? What happens when I do it? How would it be to take responsibility for how I relate to it?
Going one step further, I can see that I am always my own final authority. Even if I tell myself I am not, I am still my own final authority. I cannot blame anyone or anything on my choices.
When I blame someone or something else, I give away my power. I overlook what I have control over and what’s my responsibility. I miss out on the life I can have when I take responsibility for how I relate to what’s here, and for my own choices now and in the past.
Quote: I have decided to stop being self-aware
I have decided to stop being self-aware…. what I do is none of my business
– I’m baby on social media
Although this can seem like a joke, there is more to it. I’ll look at each of the two main parts of the quote.
What I do is none of my business
When we find ourselves as capacity for all content of experience – the world as it appears to us and everything to do with this human self – we also see that it all lives its own life. The world and this human self doesn’t need an additional layer of “I am this human”, “I am doing this”, “I chose to do that” to function. It already functions well independent of it.
In a very real sense, what I do is none of my business.
Of course, as a human being in the world, I am responsible for my actions and how I chose to relate to my thoughts, emotions, and circumstances.
And as capacity for all of it, I find that it’s all living its own life.
The two complement each other and are two sides of the same coin.
I have decided to stop being self-aware
Mindfulness with “shoulds” added to it can become tight and stressful.
Find a lighter touch. See how it is to notice that allowing and noticing is already here. It’s inherent in what we are. No great extra effort is needed.
This easy noticing is, in a sense, the end of trying to be self-aware. It’s just a noticing that it’s already here and inherent in what we are.
Getting to that easy noticing sometimes does involve some effort and struggle. At first, the apparently unnecessary effort and struggle may be just what’s needed.
Byron Katie: The real end has no beginning
The real end has no beginning
– Byron Katie
I don’t know how Byron Katie sees this. For me, the real end means to come home to what I am here now. And that has no beginning since its always here. It’s always what I am.
Byron Katie speaks here from a conscious noticing of what she is. What she is notices itself as all there is. If the recipient is not in this place, Katie’s words may be impossible to understand or require a lot of mental gymnastics to begin making intellectual sense. If the recipient is in a similar place as Katie, then the words make immediate sense and points to what’s here. They are simple and straight forward.
Jean de La Fontaine: You meet your destiny on the road you take to avoid it
You meet your destiny on the road you take to avoid it
– Jean de La Fontaine in Fables
There are several ways to understand this.
If we want to avoid something in ourselves, we take actions to avoid it, and we may meet it anyway. Life has a tendency to bring it up for us no matter which path we take.
What’s hidden in us is always here. Any number of life situations can trigger it and bring it to the surface. And there is also an inherent dynamic in us that brings what’s hidden to the surface. (Of course, we may resist and struggle with it.)
Also, sometimes, by actively trying to avoid something, we make decisions that causes us to meet just what we wanted to avoid.
For instance, if I try to avoid confrontation, I may avoid revealing important information to someone, and that omission may be the cause of a future confrontation.
The quote is sometimes misattributed to Jung, which is understandable. I imagine he could have said something like it in a specific context.
Adyashanti: How would I treat myself right now
How would I treat myself right now if I was someone I deeply care about?
– Adyashanti on Twitter
Adyashanti: The most important element in overcoming a regressive life pattern is starting to focus more on the heart center
Almost always, the most important element in overcoming a regressive life pattern is starting to focus more on the heart center than on the head. Allowing your heart to be vulnerable, open, and connected, even if it feels scary, is an unavoidable step. Start by opening to sensing the presence in your heart center. Hold whatever arises in the presence of the heart. And from the heart center, inquire into the underlying nature of patterns of resistance and avoidance. But do it from the sense of presence in the heart. That will make all the difference.
– Adyashanti in A Revolution of Being: Embracing the Challenge of Awakened Living, 2018 Online Retreat
Adyashanti: How would truth and love view this situation?
How would Truth and Love view this situation?
– Adyashanti on Twitter
Elizabeth Gilbert: The world is like a dropped pie
The world is like a dropped pie most of the time. Don’t kill yourself trying to put it back together. Just grab a fork and eat some of it off the floor. Then carry on.
– Elizabeth Gilbert
Adyashanti: Every story… is a painful story
Every story, in relation to pain, is a painful story.
~ Adyashanti, Silent Retreat Vol. 57 ~ Q&A
I don’t know the context of this quote, but I have found the same.
Any story – when it’s held as true – is a painful story.
Why is it painful? Because holding it as true means to identify with it and the viewpoint created by the story, and it’s just one of many viewpoints all with some validity and none with any absolute truth. Holding onto a story – any story – creates discomfort and pain because it’s out of alignment with reality. Somewhere in us, we know that. And life will remind us.
Life will create situations that rub up against the story so we feel we need to defend it (it seems like defending ourselves since we identify with it) and that, in itself, is stressful. Life will also remind us that the story is just one of many that are valid about the same topic and none hold any absolute or final truth, and we may not want to see it since holding onto the story can feel safe.
When we hold any story as true – no matter how innocent or apparently helpful and beautiful – we create stress for ourselves. We create struggle within ourselves. And that’s the inherent mechanism in that dynamic that invites and motivate us to examine what’s going on.
It invites us to examine the particular stressful story we have, see what happens when we hold it as true, find the validity in the other stories about the same topic, and hold it a little lighter. And it invites us to recognize this dynamic in all stories, no matter what they are about.
This doesn’t mean that it’s wrong to hold stories as true. We all do, to different extent, and often without even knowing it. It’s often first when life rubs up against one that we notice it. It’s natural and innocent, although it also creates stress and pain for us, and may lead us to act in ways that creates more stress and pain.
It also doesn’t mean that we need to somehow drop all beliefs in all stories at once. We can’t even if we wanted.
It’s more a process of examining the currently stressful story and find what’s more true for us, and then examine the next. It’s a gradual process, it goes over time, and it’s ongoing. There is no particular endpoint – at least not in this life – and doesn’t have to be.
Werner Heisenberg: Only a few know, how much one must know to know how little one knows
Only a few know, how much one must know to know how little one knows.
– Werner Heisenberg (1901 – 1976)
In one sense, we don’t need to know much to know how little we know.
We just need to know that our thoughts are questions about the world, educated guesses at most. They are practical tools to help us orient and navigate in the world. Their role is not to give us any final or absolute answers to anything.
And yet, to know that, we often need to wade through a great deal of worldly knowledge. We need to know a lot about different things and see that what we know is a tiny drop in the ocean of all there is to know, and also that what we think we know often isn’t as certain or valid as we thought. Even our most basic assumptions are up for question.
At a social level, this is especially clear when we learn about the history of thought, science, and worldviews, and we see how different it is across cultures and how much all of it changes over time. What we take as a given today – about specifics and our worldview as a whole – will be seen as obsolete by future generations.
There is a shortcut to realizing how litte we know, and that is to examine our thoughts more directly. We can see how our mental “field” creates an overlay of images on the world and makes up what we think we know about ourselves, others, and the world. It’s all created in our own mind. None of it is “out there” inherent in anything. It’s all just questions about the world. None of it contains any final or absolute truth.
If we rely on knowing things to feel safe or loved or good about ourselves, then this can seem distressing. But, in reality, this realization and noticing is immensely freeing.
We get to see thoughts more as they are, and we get to see their role and function and what they can do – which is to provide some provisional and practical orientation and guidance, and what they cannot do – which is to provide any truths or final answers.
That goes for what we collective think we know and understand about the world. It applies to our personal lives and what we think we know about others, situations, and ourselves. And it applies to our most basic assumptions about existence.
John Fire Lame Deer: A medicine man should not be a saint
I am no wino but I am no saint either. A medicine man should not be a saint. He should experience and feel all the ups and downs, the despair and joy, the magic and the reality, the courage and the fear. He should be able to sink as low as a bug, or soar as high as an eagle. Unless he can experience both, he is no good as a medicine man.
You cannot be so stuck up, so inhuman that you want to be pure, your soul wrapped up in a plastic bag, all the time. You have to be God and the devil, both of them.
Being a good medicine man means being right in the midst of the turmoil, not shielding yourself from it. It means experiencing life in all its phases. It means not being afraid of cutting up and playing the fool now and then. That is sacred too.
– John Fire Lame Deer
Rabindranath Tagore: The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit in their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life
The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit in their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life.
– Rabindranath Tagore
Adyashanti: To be bestows infinite worth upon you
You don’t have to be someone to be of infinite worth. To be bestows infinite worth upon you.
– Adyashanti, The Inherent Meaning in Being
This can sound like a well-meaning platitude, but it’s far more than that.
One the one hand, the idea of value comes from culture and what’s seen as having value varies between culture and over time. Assigning value to something has a function, and it can be helpful to examine how we assign value and if there is another way of doing it that makes more sense.
At an ordinary human level, we all agree that babies have infinite worth. Growing up, many of us are taught that our value comes through our actions and that erodes our sense of having infinite value just by being. This is a means of control and it creates a lot of suffering and judgment of ourselves and others.
So why not recover the sense of infinite value of each human being? This can easily co-exist with accountability, responsibility for our own life and so on. Seeing the infinite value in each of us, independent of personal characteristics and roles, provides a sense of basic worth that allows for a more healthy life and a more healthy society.
In our western culture, we see nature as a commodity and having value from the value it has to us – and this is often limited to short-term commercial value. This leads to destruction of ecosystems, eradication of whole species, and systematic abuse of non-human beings. Not valuing all life threatens all life, including our own.
Why wouldn’t all life have infinite value? Why not see all life as having infinite value? This would lead to a more careful approach in how we relate to and make use of nature and non-human beings. We would be far more concerned about their welfare. It doesn’t mean we can’t eat or live or grow food but we would do it with more concern for the lives we are impacting and we would look for ways to make up for it and support a more thriving Earth.
When we take a big picture and deep time view, we see that the universe has unfolded from energy to matter to suns to solar systems to this living planet and all that’s currently part of this living planet. We are all expressions of the universe exploring itself and bringing itself into consciousness. We are all expressions of this living planet and ways for it to bring itself into consciousness. As this, we and all life has infinite worth just by being as we are.
In a more immediate sense, independent of assigning value to anything, we are capacity for the world as it appears to us. This human self, all other beings, and everything happens within and as what I am. In this oneness, ideas of value is not needed in order to live with reverence for life.
How can we explore this in our own life? How can we deepen into this and live more from it? In a sense, this whole website is about just this. We can identify and examine beliefs. We can explore how our minds creates its experience of value and lack of it, and see through it. We can engage in Practices to Reconnect. We can use heart-centered practices to find a more loving relationship with ourselves, others, and all life. We can find ourselves as capacity for the world as it appears to us. We can discover that this human self, others, and the world happen within and as what we are. And we can explore how to live from that in our life.
Ursula Le Guin: You must go somewhere else, you must have another goal
To oppose something is to maintain it. … You must go somewhere else; you must have another goal; then you walk a different road
– Ursula Le Guin
This is true in ourselves and in the world.
Sometimes, it is important to oppose something in order to avoid harm. These are what Joanna Macy call holding actions. But in general, if all we do is opposing something, it tends to be maintained and even grow stronger.
It’s important to create, envision, and live what we want to see more of – in our own life and in the world.
And it’s also important to question our more deeply held assumptions and find another way of looking at ourselves and the world that’s more aligned with reality and more life centered.
It also helps to understand where the problems come from and how they are created. In our world, it’s often systemic problems, world views, and trauma. And behind that, fear. In ourselves, it’s often the same.
Byron Katie: Happiness may look entirely different from the way you imagine it
Happiness may look entirely different from the way you imagine it.
– Byron Katie
We have ideas of how a happy life looks. We have ideas about what life situations we need to be happy. Perhaps it’s health, money, a loving relationship or something else.
And yet, life may surprise us.
We may find ourselves in a very different situation than we imagined and find happiness there. We may live in a different place than we imagined. Do different type of work. Be in a relationship with someone we didn’t imagine. And find that we are very happy in that situation.
We may also find that happiness is less dependent on specific circumstances than we thoughts. We may find ourselves with an illness and perhaps without money or a partner. And still find happiness. We may find happiness in situations we imagined would be terrible and didn’t want at all, and perhaps still wish were different.
How is that possible? It’s possible through questioning our stressful beliefs about what is and what should be. Through questioning our stressful beliefs about anything in our life. And through questioning our most basic assumptions about ourselves and life.
Sometimes, this questioning is a natural and organic process and happens as part of our life. Sometimes, we can fuel it a bit through more structured inquiry and perhaps with the assistance of others who know the process.
The Work of Byron Katie is one way to do this.
Stephen Porges: If you want to improve the world
If you want to improve the world, start by making people feel safer.
– Stephen Porges
What happens when we feel unsafe? We go into survival mode and tend to think mostly about ourselves or a small circle of family and friends. It may fuel us vs. them thinking, blame, radicalism, and even violence.
What happens when people feel safer? In general, we relax, can function better, and have a larger circle of concern. It tends to encourage we-thinking and a bigger picture view.
What are some things that will help people feel safer?
What can we do at a social level? A good start may be universal healthcare. Good social safety nets. Trauma informed teachers, doctors, and parents. Reduced economic inequality. Reduced poverty.
And what can we do as individuals, for ourselves? A good start is to explore how to be a safe place for the parts of us that don’t feel safe. Give love to the parts of us that feel unloved or unlovable. Listen to the parts that has not been listened to. Be there for the parts we have run away from.
David Attenborough: We have no greater right to be here than any other animal
I think sometimes we need to take a step back and just remember we have no greater right to be here than any other animal.
– David Attenborough
CG Jung: Where your fear is, there is your task
Where your fear is, there is your task.
– C.G. Jung
Painting from Jung’s Red Book.
Adyashanti: The more honest and authentic we are, the more deeply we go into the mystery of our own being
The more honest and authentic we are, the more deeply we go into the mystery of our own being.
– Adyashanti
Adyashanti: Transformation doesn’t come through struggle
Transformation doesn’t come through struggle. Transformation comes through awareness.
– Adyashanti in Letting Go of Struggle
Adyashanti: You are the recipient, not the creator, of experiences
You are the recipient, not the creator, of experiences
– Adyashanti
Everything happens on its own. And then there may be a thought saying “I did that”.
This is an ongoing exploration and noticing for me.
Within stories, I see that everything – including feelings, thoughts, actions, identification and so on – has innumerable causes. I take one thing, find a cause, and can find one more, and one more. Everything that happens is a local expression of movements within the whole. Everything that happens has causes stretching back to the beginning of the universe (if there is one) and to the greatest extent of the universe.
In immediacy, I notice a thought happen, an emotion happen, an action happen. They happen within and as awakeness. (The normal awakeness everyone experiences.) They happen on their own.
I may also notice a thought saying “I did it” and a sensation that seems connected with it. And that happens on its own too.
I can pay attention to one sense field at a time – physical sensations, sounds, sight, smell, taste, thought – and notice how things appear in each one. They appear and vanish without a trace. (Apart from perhaps reflected in thought.)
With Living Inquiries (based on traditional Buddhist inquiry), I explore identities – the thinker, the doer, the observer, and so on.
With The Work of Byron Katie, I can explore thoughts – I did that, I am the one creating this feeling, I am the one creating this thought, I am the one who created this action.
I can also explore the thought that “everything happens on its own” and see what I find. Is there something in me that want to hold onto the thought? Rehearse it? That get more attached to the thought than noticing what it refers to? Does that thought too happen on its own?
Adyashanti: How are you going to move
How are you going to move in a world where everything is God?
– Adyashanti in Full Circle Enlightenment
Adyashanti: Our minds aren’t conditioned to recognize the clearly obvious
Our minds aren’t conditioned to recognize the clearly obvious.
– Adyashanti
What are some of the obvious things Adya may refer to?
One is what we are. We are that which our experience happens within and as. It’s obvious. It can’t be any other way. It’s part of our daily experience. And yet, for most of us, our mind doesn’t recognize it. Or if it does, it dismisses it as not important – as something weird, outside of how society tells us it is, and perhaps not practical. (It may be a bit weird and outside of how others tells us it is, but recognizing it and taking it seriously can profoundly transform our perception, life, and how we relate to ourselves and the world.)
Another obvious thing is that our thoughts don’t tell us the truth. They are questions about the world. They may be practically useful as a guide. And yet, they do not hold any final or absolute or complete truth. Reality is always different from and more than our thoughts about it. And that goes for our “big” thoughts about who we are and how the world is (“I am ultimately a human being in the world”), and the “smaller” thoughts in daily life (“she doesn’t like me”, “he shouldn’t have cut me off in traffic”).
Adyashanti: Enlightenment is being able to simultaneously experience unity and individuality
Enlightenment is being able to simultaneously experience unity and individuality without experiencing any conflict.
– Adyashanti, Mt. Madonna Silent Retreat February 2019
Yes, this fits my experience as well. I notice I balk a bit at the word enlightenment because of it’s baggage and the associations some have about it. But it is appropriate in some situations and it’s also appropriate in that there is a sense of illumination – metaphorically because reality is illuminated and literally since the energy system tends to light up within an awakening and experiencing light may be a side-effect of the initial awakening.
And there are many ways to talk about the unity and individuality. When oneness notices itself, it also notices itself as this unique individual human being functioning in the world. It notices this human self as local and temporary part of itself.
When there is no experience of conflict between oneness and who we are, it’s because there are – generally speaking – no identifications as one or the other preventing the mind from fluidly noticing itself as both and both as one. It may be that there actually are identifications here but they are more in the background or dormant, or it may be that they have been seen through or have worn out.
I suspect I know why Adya felt he needed to address this topic. Sometimes, we can experience a conflict between the two, between who and what we are. And that always comes from identifications as one or the other, and ideas that they are somehow separate or in conflict with each other. That too can be part of the process. The wrestling helps us get more familiar with the dynamics of being both oneness and a human being in the world.
Although I have rarely experienced a conflict between what and who I am, I have gone through a few phases in this dynamic of being oneness and a human being in the world.
In the initial awakening phase – which didn’t feel like an awakening at all – “I” was absorbed into a witness. I was fifteen and what I experienced myself to be was absorbed into witnessing – witnessing all content of experience equally, whether it was the outer world or this human self or what happened within this human self. This happened without any forewarning and felt like something had gone terribly wrong. I visited several doctors and specialists to try to figure out what was going on. The whole world, including this human self, felt very far away.
After a year in this weird state, a more full blown oneness revealed itself. Again, it happened suddenly and without any forewarning. All without exception was revealed as God. This human self was revealed as a local part of God and any identification as this human self was revealed as the play of God. The ultimate and real identity of everything, including this guy here, was the divine. Everything is part of the oneness.
There was a long honeymoon phase, followed by a phase where my attention went mostly to sustainability and social justice work (informed by oneness), and the last several years have been a process of deeper work for aligning more parts of my human self more consciously with the oneness. Parts of me that were still living in separation consciousness have come to the surface so they can realign, wake up in their own way, and be included in my human self and the oneness more consciously.
When I look back, I see that each of these phases have lasted about a decade. I sometimes feel my process is very slow, but it’s all not only guided by the divine, but it is part of the divine, and it is the divine.
Note: It’s sometimes fun to write about something from different angles. When I say “it’s guided by the divine” it’s the divine as second or third person. When I say it’s “part of the divine” it’s closer to oneness and it highlights that the divine is far more than this speck of a human self. And when I say it IS the divine, that’s accurate as well. Each one gives a slightly different angle to it and together they create a more rich and full image.
Adyashanti: As soon as you move out of truth
As soon as you move out of truth, you feel it, kinesthetically; you feel it in your body when you’ve disconnected.
– Adyashanti, Resurrecting Jesus: Embodying the Spirit of a Revolutionary Mystic, chapter 6
One of my current favorite ways of exploring this is the “I can if I want” test.
I can […] if I want, and I want. I can […[ if I want, and I don’t want.
Say each one to yourself and see how your body responds. Does it tense? Does it relax? (Tension is a “no”, relaxation and relief is a “yes”.)
In the last few days, I have had a slight dilemma on whether to use antibiotics or not. I try to avoid it as much as possible, but I have had an infection over several days that didn’t get better. So I said to myself I can take antibiotics if I want, and I want and noticed how my body responded, and then checked I can take antibiotics if I want, and I don’t want. The first one felt like a relief in my body, and the second tension and stress. So I went with my body, got the antibiotics, took it and it felt like a relief. (Of course, my doctor’s advice is primary in this case, but he had left it open for me to decide so I did.)
This is obviously a much bigger topic. It’s not just about everyday or life decisions. It’s also – and perhaps mainly – about the stories we tell ourselves and how we take them. Whenever we tell ourselves an untrue story – a stressful or painful story – our body tenses up. And when we find what’s truer for us, our body relaxes and it’s a relief.
And yes, I know that can sound a bit naive. Most of us would say that some true stories are stressful. And yet, this is what I have found over and over through – for instance – inquiry. The more true stories and interpretations feel like a relief. Something falls into place. My body can relax.
I have written a lot about this in other articles so I won’t go into it much here. But I’ll say that one relief-giving insight is that no story reflects an absolute or final truth. I can hold all of them lightly, as a question. And there is always some validity in the reversals of any story, and seeing that is also a relief. And we have to discover this for ourselves, by examining one specific stressful story at a time.
Why does the body respond in this way? My take on it is that somewhere, we always know when we tell ourselves something not (entirely) true, and when we take it as more true and final than it is, and that is reflected in the body. Our mind tenses up, and so does the body.
We know what we tell ourselves is not true in the way we tell it to ourselves, the seamless whole of our mind-body tenses up, and that’s a sign we are telling an untruth to ourselves and an invitation to find what’s genuinely more true for us.
Adyashanti: One of the primary reasons for meditation
One of the primary reasons for meditation – if we do it correctly – is it helps us honestly confront whatever our condition is at the moment.
– Adyashanti, Silent Retreat Vol. 66, U.K. August 2018
CG Jung: I shall not commit the fashionable stupidity
I shall not commit the fashionable stupidity of regarding everything I cannot explain as a fraud.
– Carl Jung
“…. she enjoyed reading bad books as much as she did masterpieces”
Gertrude Stein found late in life that she had read every great book, or nearly every one. She began to fear there was nothing left for her to read. Then a neighbor of hers in the French countryside died, and she bought his library, which contained many mediocre books. Stein discovered that she enjoyed reading bad books as much as she did masterpieces.
Sparrow in My Book Life, Sun Magazine May 2019
I suspect this is a common part of maturing. It certainly has been for me (although I don’t consider myself that mature!). I was much more concerned with high and low, good and bad and so on in my teens and twenties. Now, I am happy to find enjoyment, insights, and value anywhere – whatever labels people may give it.
Aldous Huxley: The best advice I can give is to be a little kinder
It’s a little embarrassing that after 45 years of research and study, the best advice I can give people is to be a little kinder to each other.
Aldous Huxley
I think this is what it boils down to for most of us, perhaps especially as we get more life experience. Sometimes, the question is how, and that’s really what this website is about.
Byron Katie: You think you want your plan
You think you want your plan. You don’t. You want what is.
– Byron Katie
Byron Katie, saying it as it is since 1986.
Why do we want what is? One answer is that we get so much out of what is, often more than we would get out what we think we want, and what specifically that is depends on the specific situation. The more basic answer is because we are what everything is. Our identity is the same.
Byron Katie: When you free yourself
When you free yourself, you free us.
– Byron Katie
In the context of The Work of Byron Katie: When I free myself from a particular belief, I free others from me perceiving, acting, and living from that belief.
Belief here means taking a story, any story, as solid, true, and final. When we do so, we inevitably create suffering for ourselves, and we tend to become a nuisance to others. Most of us have learned – from parents and culture – to do so, and undoing it takes time. It’s an ongoing process, one belief at a time.
Also, these beliefs operate at different levels. Some, we may take as real and final in our conscious view and we may not be motivated to question them until life clearly and painfully pushes up against these beliefs. In other cases, our conscious view may be quite different from a deeper belief that still color our perceptions, actions, and life. And there are combinations of these. Read More
CG Jung: Evil is – psychologically speaking – terribly real
Evil is – psychologically speaking – terribly real. It is a fatal mistake to diminish its power and reality even merely metaphysically.
– Carl Jung, Letters Vol. I, Pages 539-541.
Evil is real, psychologically speaking. It’s what happens when we react to our own pain by lashing out instead of meeting it with kindness, patience, and curiosity. That lashing out can be very damaging to ourselves and those around us. And when it’s acted on by political leaders, it can harm a whole society. Trump is an unfortunate current example of this. I assume he is reacting to his own pain in the way he behaves, and those who enthusiastically support him do the same. Adyashanti talks about this in the discussion on Judas in Resurrecting Jesus.
Note: I am not sure why three pages are listed in the Jung reference, and the second part of the quote does seem a bit mangled.
CG Jung: One should be willing to make mistakes cheerfully
One should be willing to make mistakes cheerfully. The most perfect analysis cannot prevent error.
– Carl Jung, 1925 Seminar, Page 13
That’s certainly been my experience. And one way to find more peace with this, and perhaps even clarity, is to examine my fears and beliefs about my own mistakes.
This quote also reminds me that however much I admire and love Jung “should” statements still seem a bit old-fashioned and less helpful. I tend to prefer cause and effect statements, perhaps with clear and practical pointers. Even if they are brief.
Gospel of Thomas: If you bring forth what is within you
If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.
– Gospel of Thomas, verse 70
Here is one way of understanding this.
What’s within me includes both wounds and gifts. And the saying applies to both.
If I don’t bring my wounds forth, into the light of awareness, it will destroy me. They will continue to operate in me, and influence how I perceive and act in the world. And if I do – if I bring awareness, love, kindness, gentle curiosity to my wounds – it will save me. The wounds are not only OK, but become gifts.
If I bring my gifts forth, if I develop and apply them, they will save me. They will benefit me and others. (If done with kindness and skill.) If I don’t bring my gifts forth, it may destroy me. It may remain as a gnawing discomfort in me.
In both cases, not bringing it forth tends to come from unquestioned fear. Continuing to not bring it forth means I am reinforcing those unquestioned fears. So those fears may be among the first I bring forth. I can bring them into awareness, meet them with kindness and love, and question the stories creating the fears.
I should also mention that the labels “wounds” and “gifts” are used in a conventional sense here, and it’s worth questioning these labels. Can I find a particular wound, or wounds in general? Can I find a particular gift, or gifts in general? When I look, can I find it outside of my own images, words, and sensations? And are those it?
Read MoreMark Vonnegut: It is no measure of health
It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a sick society.
– Mark Vonnegut in The Eden Express, often (mis)attributed to Jiddu Krishnamurti
I too initially misattributed it to J. Krishnamurti. Since the quote felt slightly off to me, I was surprised he apparently had said it.
It turns out, he did not. The earliest source seems to be The Eden Express by Mark Vonnegut. For more details, see Regarding the Quote ‘It Is No Measure of Health…’ by the Krishnamurti Foundation Trust.
This verified quote from Krishnamurti sounds more like him:
Is society healthy, that an individual should return to it? Has not society itself helped to make the individual unhealthy? Of course, the unhealthy must be made healthy, that goes without saying; but why should the individual adjust himself to an unhealthy society? If he is healthy, he will not be a part of it. Without first questioning the health of society, what is the good of helping misfits to conform to society?
I agree with this more, although the essence of the quote is similar.
Yes, what’s unhealthy in us seems to largely come from society – from collective and intergenerational trauma and the larger scale domination culture that was formed after the agricultural revolution.
As we find more health and recognize the unhealthy dynamics and where they come from, we are not keen on rejoining these dynamics in society. It doesn’t mean we become hermits, and how this looks will be different for each of us.
Healing includes recognizing the world as my mirror and finding in myself what I see “out there” in others and society. This reduces reactivity and brings a visceral sense of universality and being in the same boat as others.
And, as mentioned above, it doesn’t mean that we are drawn to actively participating in all of what society offers…! Some may no longer resonate as much.
I am still very much in the middle of own healing process. Maybe partly for that reason, I am often drawn to nature and solitude. I am very selective in terms of what I participate in. I have a small circle of friends I resonate with. And I am engaged in some projects to help society more in a more life-centered direction.
Updated July 1, 2026. See the original from 2014 below.
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