Ever thought your spiritual journey might be just a joke?

I wonder, i think about spirituality alot, i have become a wiser person then before, but all these ideas about energy and a bigger picture, what if they are all fake? what if there is nothing more then the hard reality? And in the end , what did we gain from all our believes and hard trying to better ourselfs in mind and soul.
Maybe all the believes that there is something more then just what we see , hear, smell and feel are just the hopes that there is something better in this foolish rotten world, something we can escape to if everything is getting to much and forget about our earthly worries?
Since i started opening my mind i have only gotten troubles with society, there are little people open for other ideas, ideas of something better, everyone thinks that we need to fight to survive and that, that is all to it.
Score high at school and get a good proffesion maybe marry someone and live long and happy.. but for me that all seems like a waste of time, i want to shape a better world, but it's impossible if people arn't open to dream about a better world, or even accept the possibility that everything could be better, most people just accept life as it is and try to make the best of it.. but somewhere i don't feel that i can be satisfied with that, there is to much pain in this world, how can we live with the idea that people are suffering all the time while we are having a nice and quiet live, isn't that selfish? I don't know, i think i'm just afraid that if i go along with the flows of society that i will become a imprisoned slave without realizing until my hair has grown all gray and half my life has already passed by.
I would like to believe that there is something above us, but what is the use in the end if finding satisfaction as a individual is the only thing you gain while other people are hiding in their stubborn shells.

 

You may appreciate this, Pellinore, especially since this is your chosen nickname. The following is based on a King Arthur story called The Questing Beast. It's a bit of a long read but it's well worth it... has a good point and all that.

I have to post it in two parts as it's too long for one post.

Part I:

While the Wart is lost in the woods he comes across a knight by the name of King Pellinore. It seems King Pellinore is on a quest...

"Please," said the Wart, "I am a boy whose guardian is Sir Ector."
"Charming fellah," said the Knight. "Never met him in me life."
"Can you tell me the way back to the castle?"
"Faintest idea. Stranger in these parts meself."
"I am lost," said the Wart.
"Funny thing that. Now I have been lost for seventeen years."
"Name of King Pellinore," continued the Knight. "May have heard of me, what?" The visor shut with a pop, like an echo to the What, but was opened again immediately. "Seventeen years ago, come Michaelmas, and been after the Questing Beast ever since. Boring, very."
"I should think it would be," said the Wart, who had never heard of King Pellinore, nor of the Questing Beast, but he felt that this was the safest thing to say in the circumstances.
"It is the Burden of the Pellinores," said the King proudly. "Only a Pellinore can catch it-- that is, of course, or his next of kin. Train all the Pellinores with that idea in mind. Limited eddication, rather. Fewmets and all that."
"I know what fewmets are," said the boy with interest. "They are the droppings of the beast pursued. The harborer keeps them in his horn, to show to his master, and can tell by them whether it is a warrantable beast or otherwise, and what state it is in."
"Intelligent child," remarked the King. "Very. Now I carry fewmets about with me practically all the time."
"Insanitary habit," he added, beginning to look dejected, "and quite pointless. Only one Questing Beast, you know, so there can't be any question whether she is warrantable or not."
Here his visor began to droop so much that the Wart decided he had better forget his own troubles and try to cheer his companion, by asking questions on the one subject about which he seemed qualified to speak. Even talking to a lost royalty was better than being alone in the wood.
"What does the Questing Beast look like?"
"Ah, we call it the Beast Glatisant, you know," replied the monarch, assuming a learned air and beginning to speak quite volubly. "Now the Beast Glatisant, or, as we say in English, the Questing Beast -- you may call it either," he added graciously -- "this Beast has the head of a serpent, ah, and the body of a libbard, the haunches of a lion, and he is footed like a hart. Wherever this beast goes he makes a noise in his belly as it had been the noise of thirty couple of hounds questing.
"Except when he is drinking, of course," added the King.
"It must be a dreadful kind of monster," said the Wart, looking about him anxiously.
"A dreadful monster," repeated the King. "It is the Beast Glatisant."
"And how do you follow it?"
This seemed to be the wrong question, for Pellinore began to look even more depressed.
"I have a brachet," he said sadly. "There she is, over there."
The Wart looked in the direction which had been indicated with a despondent thumb, and saw a lot of rope wound round a tree. The other end of the rope was tied to King Pellinore's saddle.
"I do not see her very well."
"Wound herself round the other side, I dare say. She always goes the opposite way from me."
The Wart went over to the tree and found a large white dog scratching herself for fleas. As soon as she saw the Wart, she began wagging her whole body, grinning vacuously, and panting in her efforts to lick his face, in spite of the cord. She was too tangled up to move.
"It's quite a good brachet," said King Pellinore, "only it pants so, and gets wound round things, and goes the opposite way. What with that and the visor, what, I sometimes don't know which way to turn."
"Why don't you let her loose?" asked the Wart. "She would follow the Beast just as well like that."
"She goes right away then, you see, and I don't see her sometimes for a week."
"Gets a bit lonely without her," added the King, "following the Beast about, and never knowing where one is. Makes a bit of company, you know."
"She seems to have a friendly nature."
"Too friendly. Sometimes I doubt whether she is really chasing the Beast at all."
"What does she do when she sees it?"
"Nothing."
"Oh, well," said the Wart. "I dare say she will get to be interested in it after a time."

 

Part II:

"It is eight months, anyway, since we saw the Beast at all."
The poor fellow's voice had grown sadder and sadder since the beginning of the conversation, and now he definitely began to snuffle. "It is the curse of the Pellinores," he exclaimed. "Always mollocking about after that beastly Beast. What on earth use is she, anyway? First you have to stop to unwind the brachet, then your visor falls down, then you can't see through your spectacles. Nowhere to sleep, never know where you are. Rheumatism in the winter, sunstroke in the summer. All this horrid armour takes hours to put on. When it is on it's either frying or freezing, and it gets rusty. You have to sit up all night polishing the stuff. Oh, how I do wish I had a nice house of my own to live in, a house with beds in it and real pillows and sheets. If I was rich that's what I would buy. A nice bed with a nice pillow and a nice sheet that you could lie in, and then I would put this beastly horse in a meadow and tell that beastly brachet to run away and play, and throw all this beastly armour out of the window, and let the beastly Beast go and chase himself-- that I would."
"If you could show me the way home," said the Wart craftily, "I am sure Sir Ector would put you up in a bed for the night."
"Do you really mean it?" cried the King. "In a bed?"
"A feather bed."
King Pellinore's eyes grew round as saucers. "A feather bed!" he repeated slowly. "Would it have pillows?"
"Down pillows."
"Down pillows!" whispered the King, holding his breath. And then, letting it out in one rush, "What a lovely house your gentleman must have!"
"I do not think it is more than two hours away," said the Wart, following up his advantage.
"And did this gentleman really send you out to invite me?" (He had forgotten about the Wart being lost.) "How nice of him, how very nice of him, I do think, what?"
"He will be pleased to see us," said the Wart truthfully.
"Oh, how nice of him," exclaimed the King again, beginning to bustle about with his various trappings. "And what a lovely gentleman he must be, to have a feather bed!"
"I suppose I should have to share it with somebody?" he added doubtfully.
"You could have one of your own."
"A feather bed of one's very own, with sheets and a pillow-- perhaps even two pillows, or a pillow and a bolster-- and no need to get up in time for breakfast! Does your guardian get up in time for breakfast?"
"Never," said the Wart.
"Fleas in the bed?"
"Not one."
"Well!" said King Pellinore. "It does sound too nice for words, I must say. A feather bed and none of those fewmets for ever so long. How long did you say it would take us to get there?"
"Two hours," said the Wart-- but he had to shout the second of these words, for the sounds were drowned in his mouth by a noise which had that moment arisen close beside them.
"What was that?" exclaimed the Wart.
"Hark!" cried the King.
"Mercy!"
"It is the Beast!"
And immediately the loving huntsman had forgotten everything else, but was busied about his task. He wiped his spectacles upon the seat of his trousers, the only accessible piece of cloth about him, while the belling and bloody cry arose all round. He balanced them on the end of his long nose, just before the visor automatically clapped to. He clutched his jousting lance in his right hand, and galloped off in the direction of the noise. He was brought up short by the rope which was wound round the tree-- the vacuous brachet meanwhile giving a melancholy yelp-- and fell of his horse with a tremendous clang. In a second he was up again-- the Wart was convinced that the spectacles must be broken-- and hopping round the white horse with one foot in the stirrup. The girths stood the test and he was in the saddle somehow, with the jousting lance between his legs, and then he was galloping round and round the tree, in the opposite direction to the one in which the brachet had wound herself up. He went round three times too often, the brachet meanwhile running and yelping the other way, and then, after four or five back casts, they were both free of the obstruction. "Yoicks, what!" cried King Pellinore, waving his lance in the air, and swaying excitedly in the saddle. Then he disappeared into the gloom of the forest, with the unfortunate hound trailing behind him at the other end of the cord.

The funny thing about the Questing Beast, as the story continues later in the book, is that when King Pellinore is no longer chasing it, it begins to die. And King Pellinore actually finds it a few times, and nurses it back to health so that he can continue chasing it again.

LOL!

Now.... who does King Pellinore remind you of? And what does the Questing Beast remind you of?

The spiritual quest is a goosechase. Life happens now, in the ordinariness of THIS moment. And when we pay attention to it fully, it's not ordinary at all.

 

Cewl, i think i found the answer, i'm probably thinking to much about finding answers, and how harder i think how more i feel like the answers come closer, but the harder i try to think the more i get blinded for truth, the more the answers become untouchable and unreachable. I should probably take life as it comes, and when the time is ripe i will find my answers.

I guess, there is little i can do to better society, but atleast i can try, our society and the individuals who are part of it also need time to grow, our minds are still blinded by our instincts, maybe in the future, when people start to realiseze things, maybe we do need another war or something catastrophic to make these realisations and become more open for the truth and wisdom that lies above us, i don't know, i guess, trying to share our individual wisdom to others is all what we can do, and maybe one can find satisfaction in doing so.

 

As Michael Jackson said in one of his songs... start with the man in the mirror. We can still do things in the outer world, if we're so inspired, but the primary focus should be on how we ourselves are BEING in any given moment.

 

Indeed, someone told me the same today, i always tried to destroy my ego (i thought that destroying it would lead to clearer answers), but it seems that the ego is a essential part of our being, you can use your ego self-aware so that it can be used to do good things, instead if use your ego unware, in wich occasion it might harm your surroundings.

 

The ego is identification with form. Form can be anything, including those things of a material, psychological, or emotional nature. The roles we play, the things we own, the emotions that we become aware of, the ideas we hold in our minds... all those are "forms" of one sort or another and most people are identified with them so much so that they have forgotten what is beneath the form, which is our "true" self. We can honor the forms without losing our selves in them.

Without identification there is no ego. But we don't have to try to kill the ego. In fact TRYING to kill it will only lead us through another goosechase. There's nothing to kill. We only need to recognize the difference between Essence (the formless realm) and Form (surface expression of essence). Recognizing the difference and realizing that we are not all those forms is the way to be free of the ego. Without identifying with it, it begins to diminish and disappear on its own.

 

Damn, seems i still have a long way ahead of me, but i wonder, this woman whom i spoke with today, she knows alot about spirituality, she told me that without a ego one cannot set goals in life, that we need to use the ego as a power to bring down the wisdom from "the source or the essence, or whatever it is called" to the earth and by that enlightent the earth with it's wisdom. The ego helps us to orientate in this reality, to undertake things. But it's all a bit vague, i don't know anymore if it is good to have a ego or not, i know people with alot of ego, and i don't like them at all, but i guess they are being led by their ego, instead of using their ego in function of their mind and soul. Don't know, seems like i still have alot to learn, but well, i guess i'll find out the truth of this world eventually!

 

Just like with the word "God", sometimes when people use a certain term they're defining it in different ways. What she refers to as the ego, I call simply your mind, your mental capacities. When we are in tune with our essence we are in touch with true wisdom, and then the mind becomes the servant of this wisdom in order to manifest it as form in the world. This is the doing that arises out of Being.

When the ego is in charge (dominant in our awareness), then the mind becomes servant to the ego. Then what gets manifested in the world is basically insane, full of strife and suffering.

It is for us to learn how to be in this world but not of it. We come to know the balance of being rooted within, in our Essence, while being in the world and taking action.

 

Yes, that is exactly what she ment, the problem i had been dealing with for a while was that since my first drug experiences and since i became more aware of things and also more aware of all this negative things in my mind wich i usually refer to as instincts, i wanted to get rid of them all, i wanted to destroy them and so i tried my best to do so, i began using more and more drugs just to escape from my own mind and become one with the essence. I'm 18 at the moment, and still don't have a high school diploma, atm i'm not doing school anymore, because since my drug use all these strives to be something in this society became meaningless, everything became meaningless and vague, i just wanted to become one with this wisdom that was above me. I guess, that was wrong of me, i hope it's not to late to pick up life again and start setting goals again. Anyways thanks bluesafire, i think i'm slowly beginning to understand things better as they are.

I now understand why many people say that it's not good to start with pot and psychedelics when your are still developping your conscioness (when you are still at a young age), i guess, it will only lead to radical thoughts when you don't yet have walked the spiritual path far enough.

 

Well alot of the ego is being addicted to your thoughts, the constant mental stream that never stops. Drugs allow us to get out of that stream, but in a sense we go BELOW thought. This is more like the vegetable realm, which is in tune with Essence, but is a lower state of development.

Humanity has gone beyond the vegetable realm and you could say the ego is a necessary step in our development. While caught in this ego phase we aren't as closely in touch with Essence (which is why taking drugs is so enticing), but it is our destiny to evolve BEYOND the ego and that of being fully identified with the thinking mind.

So as tempting as taking drugs can be, that's really a step backward. We must move beyond the ego into awareness that is not drug-induced. Begin by simply observing your mind. Pay attention to the incessant mental noise, recognize it all the time in yourself. That is all you need to do, that is enough. While observing, recognize that which is the observer within you. What is that in the background that allows you to be AWARE of your thoughts?

 

I guess you are right, drugs helped me to become more aware of the things in my mind so that i could live more awarely, but now that i am awarely of those things alot of questions arise. When i was i kid i always wanted to contain the idea that the universe was endless, how much i tried to do, my head seemed to small to contain such a idea, and i just ended up in frustration. This is the same, once you see that there are other things, but only in the form of vague understandings wich lack the words to explain, i constantly try to find those words but it seems like impossible, and all this gives alot of frustration. It's like, once you begin walking the path of spirituality, you can't go back to you're ignorant self that you were before, how much i sometimes want to because that would all be alot easier, i just want to rush to the end of my spiritual path and grab the answers that lay there so that i can finaly live with something clear and understandable... might sound a bit weird, i don't know.. but it's just really frustrating when you can almost touch the answers but your brain seems to small to contain those answers. Maybe, the only way to contain those answers is by gaining more and more knowledge.

btw, you know any good books to read about the things you have been explaining, about "the essence" and all? THe only book that i've so far that has a bit to do with spirituality is "the doors of perception : heaven or hell" :/

 

See if you can notice that desire to know things through the mind. The mind desperately wants to know, to figure things out. But it runs around in circles. You can't KNOW through the mind. But there is something within you that can and does KNOW. As the mind reads these words it may be confusing... what the hell does she mean? lol! See if you can observe the silent background that rests behind the thoughts... the seemingly empty space from which thoughts arise.

Like your breath. There is the stillness, followed by the inhale, then a brief pause of stillness, then the exhale, then more stillness, and then repeat.

Like space. Do you ever look at the vastness of space.... a background upon which things (stars, planets) appear? Space is that realm, both externally and within yourself, that is your Essence, upon which forms (thoughts, emotions, objects) appear.

See if you can notice this space as often as you can. Space between objects. Silence between sounds. A pause between words. The blank spaces between the pixels on the screen.

The more that you notice space and silence, the deeper this awareness will grow within you. And then you will begin to KNOW, a knowing that a mind can't comprehend, can't ever figure out. More knowledge isn't going to get you there. Anything in the future won't get you there. This realm of space is within you NOW. That's why spirituality is such a goosechase.... there's nothing to find in the future. It is already there within you, beneath the outer forms, beneath the ripples of your external life.

As far as books, I would suggest you check out A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle. You could probably find it on the front racks at Walmart as Oprah recently listed it on her book club. Also, if you have access to iTunes, there was a free A New Earth web classroom done recently that you can download. Also you can access it on oprah.com, for free as well.

 

P.S. You may wish to change your Location, on the User CP, to "Inner Space"

 

Spirituality equals spacious reference;
Materiality equals finite reference.
What is your frame of reference?
What does one do if they have a spacious
but specific frame of reference?
That should be what a yogic life
will seem like.

 

Ok thanks, you seem to have a point, i'll give it a try.
I'll try to find that book, however we don't have walmarts here in belgium ^^, but i'll try to find it anyway.

 

LOL! I didn't know you were in Belgium. cool. You're not missing much with Walmart... I don't care for that store myself and try to avoid it. The book should be easy to find though. I don't know about your library system there, but they might have it, and sometimes you can find it as an audio book.

 

I was thinking about doing yoga lessons.. but i don't know.. seems a bit akward for a guy to do yoga.. i mean.. well..you know what i mean ^^. But i think i could use some meditation techniques to find some rest in my mind and to stop the constant thinking, sometimes the constant thinking gets to much, seems like i get to much input via my senses.. well.. this woman of who i spoke earlier said that it's called multidimensional thinking, where people get more input then normal people.. and well.. i sometimes have those moment that i can't handle them anymore and that i get aggresive outbursts when it all gets to much.. well.. i hate it when that happens since i'm not a aggresive person in nature.. well.. sounds a bit akward i guess.. if it makes any sense in the first place. :/

 

Hi Pellinore,

Yes I understand what you're saying and it makes sense. It sometimes feels like a mind overload, like suddenly you become aware of this huge stream of mental noise. What you've noticed is something that is happening already to most people, except it's under the radar. They don't realize it's happening because they're so unconscious of it. But what's pretty cool is that now you ARE aware of it. And that right there is a huge step in consciousness. Now it's just a matter of deepening and expanding, and it will happen gradually.

LOL... I totally understand that feeling of OMG.. there's so much NOISE in my head, where did it all come from? And why can't I stop it??? We can't really stop it, because suppressing it won't make it go away, just come out stronger when we least expect it. But we can watch it as an observer and allow it to be... give it space to be as it is. That right there has a very powerful effect on subsiding it, even if it's not evident how that works.

The increased sensitivity is normal during this process, actually. It really helps to hone our attention and to decrease our level of tolerance for the mindstream. And don't worry too much about the outbursts... they're just one way of sloughing off the excess energy when it feels like too much.

I understand that you feel self conscious about doing Yoga, but I've known men, masculine men, who've done it and enjoyed it. But if that's just not something that you feel is right for you then find something else... Tai Chi maybe?

As far as meditation techniques, I can tell you a few that are extremely easy, powerful, and best of all... FREE. One is a breath meditation. It doesn't have to be very formal at all... you can do it anywhere anytime. Simply put all your conscious attention on your breath. Notice the inhale, the pause, and the exhale. Become aware of any mental noise there. Don't shut it up, just observe. Repeat the conscious breathing as often as you can, all throughout the day.

Another one is to put all your conscious attention on feeling your body from within. If that sounds odd, start with your hands. Close your eyes and feel the energy in your hands, the tingling sensation... feel them pulsing with life. Start with one hand if you have to. That is enough. Then see if you can expand that feeling into other parts of the body.

Another one is sense perception. Become aware of the vivid colors, sounds, smells of the scenery around you. This is great to do out in nature, or to focus on anything of the natural world. Touch something and pay full attention to how it feels. Taste something and do the same. This is an incredibly powerful way to bring your attention to the present moment.

It just takes a moment to tune in and do any one of these techniques that I listed. Then see if you can sense the stillness within yourself. If you practice and do these often, the stillness will grow quite a bit and soon life for you will be a very different experience.

 

Wow, those meditation techniques are awesome. Tried the breathing thing, and by foccusing my mind on the "inhalting, exhalting and the short pause", my mind becomes calmer and calmer till i can embrace this joyfull emptyness wich really feels purifing.
But i cannot hold it for long, this goofy state of mind, at the moment it occures my mind wants to explain it.. and well.. once the thinking starts it takes alot of effort to get back in this iddle state.