Meditation: Being content

I think back to who I once was...
Through recent events I remember the critical piece of myself which I've lost.

My ability to simply not care.

Some might see such a charectaristic as a henderance in a person, but I see it as a necessity.

In life, to often we want to control that which is beyond our control, we want the sun to rise and set at our will...
and when we don't have things just the way we want them, we lash out, we allow ourselves to become hurt, this is what perpetuates cycles of negativity.

Fear in itself is always related to a loss of control.
The inability to accept the impermanence of life.

The secret to life is understanding where you have the ability to control things and where you do not.
The secret of life is being content with the things which you are able to control.

Happyness is the rare moments when something outside of our control is given to us in a positive way.
Sadness is the more common experience in which we are unable to have things the way we wish them.

So again I say... the secret of life is being content with the things which you can control.

 

I can't control things like the Iraq war, global climatic meltdown, social injustice etc. Do you think we should be content with that? If so, how are things ever to change?
It seems that a balance is needed between personal wishes and responsibility as a human being. Simply sitting cross legged with a big smile won't change a thing in the wider world.

 

Yes I agree up to a point - But it's also true that things which some years ago we just had to accept. we can now control - eg. things like infectious diseases.
So the scientist who discovers a new cure has to worry about what is beyond control, precisely in order to bring it under control. And this applies in many areas.


Really, all I'm doing here is arguing against 'quietism' and 'fatalism'.

 

What are you accomplishing by promoting your view?

 

Not necessarily. It could be, for instance, that someone else might be provoked to think about these things. I agree it's perhaps not that likely that anyone's world is going to be turned upside down by reading something in an internet forum, but it could have some effect.

Even though it's only a small thing, just by posting anything you are changing reality. What wasn't there before is now. Who can say what effect any of this has in the end.

A fatalist 100 years ago would have said that instant communications of this type between people on different sides of the planet would be nothing but an idle pipedream or speculation, but here we are.
A quietist just wouldn't be bothered.

 

Any other way would be the way of a theif.