Dear friends,
The world is enticing. The ups, the downs, the thrills, the spills. The ultimate soap opera to keep us engaged, whether joyous or sad. This is what has us come back over and over, tweaking the details in hopes of the perfect result. But that desire obscures what we are doing here. This planet is a school (and not a PhD program, mind you — it’s more of an elementary school!). The odd thing is that we keep trying to change the school itself rather than to learn the subject matter.
We come in with certain major life lessons. Are you too self-involved? Too anxious? Too unkind? Too self-critical? Not loving enough? We draw experiences to us that help us learn how to change these embedded states of mind of ours. On a certain level the entire process is quite impersonal. If you touch a hot stove and burn your hand, it is good to keep in mind that the stove is not mad at you, it is not judging you, and it is not out to get you. It is a hot stove. There are laws of life and consciousness that are no less exacting than the laws of physics. When you touch a hot stove the pain is immediate. It’s a good thing! If the pain were six hours later we’d never know what was going on and would burn ourselves over and over.
Life is unfortunately not as clear. The pain that results from a harmful quality in us or attitude may not be obvious. And, to compound the issue, we do not actually want to see it. No one would say, "Sure, I often touch hot stoves. But what does that have to do with the pain in my hand?” With life qualities I see a more subtle form of this said often.
This is why it is important to have a teaching that explains the non-material physics of this world. There are many true teachings and ways to describe how this game works, so the specific “flavor” is up to us. But climbing a dangerous mountain without a guide is just fool-hardy. You need to do the climbing yourself, but a guide is strongly recommended.
The other aspect of this is that we usually try to change the school rather than opening to the lesson. “Wow. That was rough. I need to work harder to avoid that situation in the future” rather than, “Wow, that was rough. I wonder what I can learn from this so I do not draw it to myself again?” A great woman saint and follower of Yogananda said, “Change not one whit of my circumstances. Change only me.” To the best of my knowledge she never applied for a transfer to a different school while here on Earth!
Blessings,
David G., manager
For the Gang at East West