Posts Tagged ‘Ba’al Shem Tov’
The best things in Life are Forever FREE!
~ Ron’s Memoirs
The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
Introduction to “The best things in Life are Forever FREE!
~ Ron’s Memoirs”
Dear Friends,
At age ninety, I’m updating my memoirs to emphasize my most significant spiritual perspectives and insights learned so far during this precious human lifetime.
Today’s “Forever FREE!” posting was originally inspired by “The Best Things in Life Are Free”, a frequently popular song composed in 1927 for the musical play “Good News” during the economic stock market boom that preceded the 1929 Wall Street stock market crash, which led to a worldwide great economic depression.
In prior postings, I’ve shown how all musical art can communicate deep feelings of instinctive wisdom beyond words, until we gratefully Awaken Spiritually as ONE LOVE beyond time.
And I’ve found these lyrics to be spiritually insightful and inspiring:
Prelude
“There are so many kinds of riches,
And only one of them is gold.
Though wealth you miss,
Remember this :
Worthwhile things cannot be bought or sold.
The best things in Life are FREE!”
Refrain
“The moon belongs to everyone—
The best things in life are free
The stars belong to everyone
They gleam there for you and me
The flowers in spring, the robins that sing
The sunbeams that shine
They’re yours!—They’re mine!
And love can come to everyone—
The best things in life are free!”
My following summary and comments about today’s post will help explain the spiritual prescience of these lyrics; that although we are each unique, we are each dharmically destined to Awaken Spiritually as ONE LOVE beyond time.
Summary
Always remember that our ultimate identity is immortal Cosmic Consciousness as ONE LOVE.
We’ve appeared on Earth to experimentally experience illusionary time, space and duality as ego-embodied supposedly separated forms, but we’ve never really been separate from Mother/Father/God – our Eternal Source.
To be alive is to BE LOVE. Infinite Eternal LOVE is all that exists. As Jesus taught ‘We and our Mother/Father/God are One’.
There is no death. Death is just an energy transition, until we’re formlessly dissolved as ONE LOVE. It is an illusory belief that our lives end when our mortal bodies no longer function.
So we’ve nothing to fear. Nor need we accept as “real” any perceived Earth-life threats to our immortality.
Remembering that our separation from ONE LOVE never happened, we’ve nothing to fear – EVER.
Background
Over forty five years ago, I began seeing Earth-life as an experiment in dense 3D space/time, with each human soul on a unique dharmic path to solving that energy experiment by forever following their Heart.
Recently, I’ve been optimistically predicting that our Earthly experiment in time will soon end, as a “critical mass” of human souls imminently awakens from eons of matrix thralldom. I foresee that Mother/Father/God will (as destined) soon honor Earth-Mother’s Nature to preserve it, rather than allow it to cataclysmically end.
I’m optimistic because our separate 3D Earth-world of mental fears and sufferings was not Divinely planned, but collectively chosen by human souls to experimentally experience illusionary time, space and duality, as an imagined separate reality.
And I’m especially optimistic since I’ve realized that Human souls have nothing to fear – EVER, because our illusionary perceived earth-life separation from Mother/Father/God as Infinite Eternal LOVE never happened.
Ron’s explanations of why The Best Things In Life Are Forever FREE!
1) What Humans call “Life” is an illusory concept in space/time and duality.
“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,
they are modes in which we think.”
“The distinction between past, present, and future
is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
~ Albert Einstein
“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,
they are modes in which we think.”
“The distinction between past, present, and future
is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
~ Albert Einstein
2) Time is an illusion, of every Earthly human soul’s separation from its Eternal Source.
The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
3) The human soul’s fate in space and time is subject to free-will karmic cause and effect.
“Every Cause has its Effect;
Every Effect has its Cause;
Everything happens according to Law;
Chance is but a name for Law not recognized;
There are many planes of causation,
But nothing escapes the Law.”
~ The Kybalion
“Every Cause has its Effect;
Every Effect has its Cause;
Everything happens according to Law;
Chance is but a name for Law not recognized;
There are many planes of causation,
But nothing escapes the Law.”
~ The Kybalion
4) In illusory space/time and duality, the soul remains in form as a potentially infinitely expanding energy entity, until dissolved as destined into Mother/Father/God, its Source.
5) As each unique soul evolves to ever ascending energy planes, it transcends all ego-mind fears to exist lovingly and dharmically, forever free of unhappiness and disharmony.
“Love is what we were born with.
Fear is what we learned here.
The spiritual journey is the relinquishment – or unlearning – of fear
and the acceptance of love back into our hearts.”
~ Marianne Williamson
“The world is a prison and we are the prisoners:
Dig a hole in the prison and let yourself out!”
~ Rumi
“You have been a prisoner of a little pond,
I am the ocean and its turbulent flood.
Come merge with me, leave this world of ignorance.
Be with me, I will open the gate to your love.”
~ Rumi
“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear,
. . . . and the one who fears is not perfected in love.”
~ 1 John 4:18
“Love is what we were born with.
Fear is what we learned here.
The spiritual journey is the relinquishment – or unlearning – of fear
and the acceptance of love back into our hearts.”
~ Marianne Williamson
“The world is a prison and we are the prisoners:
Dig a hole in the prison and let yourself out!”
~ Rumi
“You have been a prisoner of a little pond,
I am the ocean and its turbulent flood.
Come merge with me, leave this world of ignorance.
Be with me, I will open the gate to your love.”
~ Rumi
“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear,
. . . . and the one who fears is not perfected in love.”
~ 1 John 4:18
6) The unique key for each soul’s transcendence of fear is found within each One’s Sacred Heart.
“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha
“
You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.”
“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”
~ Rumi
“There is a light that shines beyond all things on Earth,
…
beyond the highest, the very highest heavens.
This is the light that shines in your Heart.”
~ Chandogya Upanishad 3.13.7
“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha
“
You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.”
“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”
~ Rumi
“There is a light that shines beyond all things on Earth,
…
beyond the highest, the very highest heavens.
This is the light that shines in your Heart.”
~ Chandogya Upanishad 3.13.7
7) Until dissolved as formless ONENESS, each soul is a multi-dimensional fractal hologram, appearing infinitely in form.
“There is an endless net of threads throughout the universe.
The horizontal threads are in space.
The vertical threads are in time.
At every crossing of the threads, there is an individual.
And every individual is a crystal bead.
And every crystal bead reflects not only the light
from every other crystal in the net,
but also every other reflection throughout the entire universe.”
~ Indra’s Net – from the Vedas of Ancient India, 7000 years old
“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm
“Every particle of the world is a mirror.
In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.”
~ Mahmud Shabestari, Sufi Mystic, 15th century
“There is an endless net of threads throughout the universe.
The horizontal threads are in space.
The vertical threads are in time.
At every crossing of the threads, there is an individual.
And every individual is a crystal bead.
And every crystal bead reflects not only the light
from every other crystal in the net,
but also every other reflection throughout the entire universe.”
~ Indra’s Net – from the Vedas of Ancient India, 7000 years old
“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm
“Every particle of the world is a mirror.
In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.”
~ Mahmud Shabestari, Sufi Mystic, 15th century
8) Ultimately, Humanity’s illusionary perceived earth-life separation from Mother/Father/God – our Eternal Source never happened. So we’ve nothing to fear – EVER.
“Nothing Real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.”
~ A Course In Miracles
“Perception is a mirror not a fact.
And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”
~ A Course In Miracles
“Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen.
In the Absolute there is neither time, space nor causation.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
“Nothing Real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.”
~ A Course In Miracles
“Perception is a mirror not a fact.
And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”
~ A Course In Miracles
“Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen.
In the Absolute there is neither time, space nor causation.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
Conclusion and Dedication
As each unique soul evolves from the illusory space/time duality third dimension [3D] to ever ascending energy planes, it transcends all ego-mind fears to exist lovingly and dharmically, forever free of unhappiness and disharmony.
This “Forever Free” posting is deeply dedicated to inspiring each of us
to lovingly follow our Sacred Heart until it is dissolved as destined into Mother/Father/God,
as ONE LOVE
Invocation
May these writings inspire and encourage
each of us to lovingly follow our unique Sacred Heart
until it is dissolved as destined into Mother/Father/God
as ONE LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Al Jolson, Mario Lanza, and Frank Sinatra Singing The best things in Life are FREE!
Forever Ending Our Experiment With Time ~ Ron’s Memoirs
“The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master“What is life?
It is the flash of a firefly in the night.
It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime.
It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”
~ Crowfoot, 1890“Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.”
~ Buddha“In the end these things matter most:
How well did you love?
How fully did you love?
How deeply did you learn to let go?”
~ Buddha“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha “
Forever Ending Our Experiment With Time ~ Ron’s Memoirs
Introduction
Dear Friends,
This memoirs chapter gratefully celebrates my ninetieth and most spiritually significant year. Because I’m still learning from ever-changing life experiences, as an elder seeker of Self-Realization I’m updating my memoirs (while still physically incarnate) to emphasize and explain my most crucial spiritual insights learned so far from this precious human lifetime.
Background
I was born in Chicago IL on election day November 8, 1932, when Franklin D Roosevelt was first elected 32nd US president, during a great economic depression era, when most Americans were suffering extremely hard times.
My parents were first cousins (both surnamed Rattner) from Ukrainian families living near Kiev. Their families had emigrated to the USA to escape hatred and persecution for their Jewish religious customs and beliefs. And I’m the last and longest surviving male from this unusual Rattner lineage.
We’re now living at an historically unprecedented time when survival of all humans – not just Jews – appears threatened by a Ukrainian war. After eons of territorial earth wars, technological advances now seemingly threaten us with planetary nuclear, biological, or ecological catastrophe, arising from worldwide hatred, exploitation, and insanity directed at people with differing appearances, customs, or beliefs.
Until now all my most auspicious spiritual experiences have happened since my spiritual awakening over forty five years ago from Newtonian reality, and previously presumed mortal self-identity as a physical body-form. Since then, I’ve been experiencing an ongoing inner evolutionary process that is opening my intuitive Heart to formerly unimagined loving realizations about our eternal Self-identity and Reality.
Optimistic Predictions
Thus I now optimistically foresee that we’ve reached an unprecedented turning point in human history, when our species is awakening to a prophesied enlightened Earth age with elevated energies, transcending eons of previous fears and sufferings as perceived energy thought-forms in time and space in which Humans have mistakenly believed ourselves separate from Eternal God-given Love.
For the first time in our recorded history we are now forced to realize that, because of advanced technologies, any more war could trigger an omnicidal nuclear, ecological, biological, or radiological catastrophe insanely ending earth-life as we’ve known it.
In my most recent memoirs chapters, I’ve optimistically predicted that our Earthly experiment in time will soon end, as a “critical mass” of human souls imminently awakens from eons of matrix thralldom by evil entities, which cannot survive in energies beyond illusionary fearful lower realm space/time separation. I foresee that Mother/Father/God will soon honor Nature to preserve it, rather than cataclysmically end Earth-life as we’ve known it.
I’m optimistic because our separate 3D Earth-world of fears and sufferings is not chosen by Human free-will, nor Divinely planned. And I’m especially optimistic because I’ve realized that Human souls have nothing to fear – EVER; that our perceived earth-life separation from ONE LOVE is a mental illusion that never happened.
Therefore, this memoirs chapter is intended and dedicated to encouraging us to live unselfishly and compassionately, beyond all fear, blame, or judgment as demonstrated by rare mystic masters and avatars, and especially by the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, who in this Christmas season inspires many souls as the paragon exemplar of Universal LOVE and forgiveness.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
My conclusions about forever ending our “experiment with time”
1) What Humans call “Life” is a mentally created concept in space and time.
“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,
they are modes in which we think.”
“The distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
~ Albert Einstein
2) Time is a karmic illusion, of every incarnate human soul’s separation from its Source. Each human soul is an eternal being of LIGHT, which appears unique in time as a polarized and mentally created energy-entity:
The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land – “I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
3) The human soul’s future in space and time is always subject to free-will karmic cause and effect.
“Every Cause has its Effect;
Every Effect has its Cause;
Everything happens according to Law;
Chance is but a name for Law not recognized;
There are many planes of causation,
But nothing escapes the Law.”
~ The Kybalion
4) In space and time, the soul persists Forever in form as an infinitely expanding energy entity, until dissolved as formless into the Source Light of the Whole – of Mother/Father/God.
5) Psychological fear is the greatest impediment and deterrent to each soul’s evolution to ever ascending energy planes. Such inner fear subjects souls to thralldom by evil entities, which cannot survive in energies beyond illusionary fearful lower realm space/time separation from Source.
“Love is what we were born with.
Fear is what we learned here.
The spiritual journey is the relinquishment – or unlearning – of fear and the acceptance of love back into our hearts.”
~ Marianne Williamson“The world is a prison and we are the prisoners:
Dig a hole in the prison and let yourself out!”
~ Rumi“You have been a prisoner of a little pond,
I am the ocean and its turbulent flood.
Come merge with me, leave this world of ignorance.
Be with me, I will open the gate to your love.”
~ Rumi“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, . . . .
and the one who fears is not perfected in love.”
~ 1 John 4:18“[D]eep down, at our cores, there are only two emotions:
love and fear.
All positive emotions come from love,
all negative emotions from fear.
From love flows happiness, contentment, peace, and joy.
From fear comes anger, hate, anxiety and guilt.”
~ Elisabeth Kubler-Ross & David Kessler
6) The unique key for each soul’s transcendence of fear is found only Within each One’s Heart – within the One Creator.
“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha “You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.”
“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”
~ Rumi“There is a light that shines beyond all things on Earth,
… beyond the highest, the very highest heavens.
This is the light that shines in your Heart.”
~ Chandogya Upanishad 3.13.7
7) Until dissolved as formless ONENESS, each soul is a multi-dimensional fractal hologram, appearing infinitely in form.
“There is an endless net of threads throughout the universe.
The horizontal threads are in space.
The vertical threads are in time.
At every crossing of the threads, there is an individual.
And every individual is a crystal bead.
And every crystal bead reflects not only the light from every other crystal in the net,
but also every other reflection throughout the entire universe.”
~ Indra’s Net – from the Vedas of Ancient India, 7000 years old“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm“Every particle of the world is a mirror.
In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.”
~ Mahmud Shabestari, Sufi Mystic, 15th century
8) Ultimately, Humanity’s illusionary perceived earth-life separation from ONE LOVE never happened. So we’ve nothing to fear – EVER.
“Nothing Real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.”
~ A Course In Miracles“Perception is a mirror not a fact.
And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”
~ A Course In Miracles“Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen.
In the Absolute there is neither time, space nor causation.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
Dedication
These memoirs are dedicated to
encouraging and inspiring us
to more and more behave lovingly,
on our precious blue planet Earth.May we increasingly live lovingly,
unselfishly and compassionately,
beyond all fears, blame, or judgments
as demonstrated by the life and teachings of Jesus Christ,
who especially in this holiday season
we remember as the paragon exemplar of
Universal LOVE and forgiveness.Therefore may we ever remember that
“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha “
And so may it FOREVER be!
Ron Rattner
“Sunrise, Sunset”
~ a Modern Melody With Ancient Meaning
“The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
“Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years
One season following another
Laden with happiness and tears”
~ Sheldon Harnick, Jerry Bock – “Fiddler on the Roof”
“What is life?
It is the flash of a firefly in the night.
It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime.
It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”
~ Crowfoot, 1890
“Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.”
~ Buddha: Diamond Sutra
“In the end these things matter most:
How well did you love?
How fully did you love?
How deeply did you learn to let go?”
~ Buddha
“Sunrise, Sunset” ~ a Modern Melody With Ancient Meaning
Introduction
Dear Friends,
In recent postings I’ve explained verbally and demonstrated with recorded musical performances how the hauntingly beautiful melody of the ancient Kol Nidré prayer which begins Yom Kippur, the highest of Jewish High Holy Days, communicates deep feelings of instinctive perennial wisdom beyond words.
Spiritually, Kol Nidré melodies have for centuries communicated innate human awareness of our unavoidable fallibility and inability to live without inevitable life-long ‘ups and downs’ and mistakes, from which we learn Love on the Earth branch of an infinitely expanding Cosmic University.
Shortly after my 1976 spiritual awakening I experienced a melody from the play and movie Fiddler on the Roof – “Sunrise, Sunset” – as a modern analogue to Kol Nidré which to me communicated similar ancient instinctive wisdom beyond words.
During an amazing February 1977 week in New York (a time for me of great spiritual sensitivity and curiosity) after I was scheduled to return home I attended a Broadway revival performance of the play.
I was extremely interested in the fictional story because all my maternal and paternal Rattner surname ancestors over a century ago had emigrated to the USA from Western Ukraine near Kiev to escape hatred and persecution for their Jewish religious customs, and my father and his extended family had fled an actual village just like the fictional village portrayed in Fiddler on the Roof.
Now, at an historically unprecedented time, when survival of all humans – not just Jews – appears threatened globally by war and hatred in Ukraine “Sunrise, Sunset” is for me more important than ever before. So I’ve decided to explain and demonstrate it with this posting.
Although “Sunrise, Sunset” was composed to be sung by different fictional characters and a chorus i’m hereafter singing it as a cantor, for all humans at this unprecedented time of Ukrainian war world jeopardy. Also to demonstrate the power of the melody alone I will cantorially hum it in the mystical Jewish wordless song tradition of the nigun.
Please listen, enjoy and open your heart to the contemporary importance of these timeless melodies.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
“Sunrise, Sunset” Lyrics [*excerpted]
Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years
One season following another
Laden with happiness and tears.
Is this the little girl I carried?
Is this the little boy at play?
I don’t remember growing older
When did they?
When did she get to be a beauty?
When did he grow to be so tall?
Wasn’t it yesterday
When they were small?
Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly flow the days
Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers
Blossoming even as we gaze.
Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years
One season following another
Laden with happiness and tears.
*Lyrics excerpted from Fiddler On The Roof – Broadway Musical 1964
Melody composed By Jerry Bock, Lyrics By Sheldon Harnick
“Sunrise, Sunset” ~ Lyric Excerpts and Melody Cantorially sung by Ron Rattner
Dear Friends,
Although “Sunrise, Sunset” was composed to be sung by different fictional characters and a chorus I’m hereafter singing lyric excerpts as a cantor, for all humans at this unprecedented time of Ukrainian war world jeopardy.
Also to demonstrate the power of the melody alone I will cantorially hum it in the mystical Jewish wordless song tradition of the nigun.
Please listen, enjoy and open your heart to the contemporary importance of these timeless melodies.
May they invoke Divine Grace, and soon fulfill our soul’s deepest aspirations!
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Fiddler On The Roof – “Sunrise sunset” Scene from film
Why Does Everyone Want Happiness?
“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life,
the whole aim and end of human existence.”
~ Aristotle
“The purpose of our lives is to be happy.”
~ Dalai Lama
“From the moment of birth every human being wants happiness and does not want suffering. Neither social conditioning nor education nor ideology affects this. From the very core of our being, we simply desire contentment. Therefore, it is important to discover what will bring about the greatest degree of happiness.”
~ Dalai Lama
“The world is so unhappy because it is ignorant of the true Self. Man’s real nature is happiness. Happiness is inborn in the true Self. Man’s search for happiness is an unconscious search for his true Self. The true Self is imperishable; therefore, when a man finds it, he finds a happiness which does not come to an end.”
~ Sri Ramana Maharshi.
“The purpose of religious lectures and sermons is to awaken in you that irresistible soul-longing for Him.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
“The desire to be one with God is the greatest of all.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
“The soul of man has been separated from its source, wandering in exile in a strange land – “I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) – ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang, and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master
“O God, you are my God – for you I long! For you my body yearns; for you my soul thirsts, like a land parched, lifeless and without water.”
~ Psalm 63:1
“The longing to go back to the source is present in each being from the very time that it is separated from the source by the veil of ignorance.”
~ Meyer Baba
Why Does Everyone Want Happiness?
Q. Why do all people want to be happy?
A. In seeking happiness, everyone is really seeking Self.
Knowingly or unknowingly, consciously or subconsciously, no matter who or where we are, no matter our age, gender or culture, all humans share a universal and irresistible instinct and desire to return to a soul-remembered original state of Divine Love, Peace and Oneness – a transcendent state beyond words or thoughts so marvelous that its subliminal memory magnetically attracts every sentient being to merge and be At-One with It.
No matter how spiritually evolved we may become, all incarnate human life-forms experience limitation and separation from Source. Though rare beings in deep meditation may transcend this state of seeming separation and limitation, it recurs when they are impelled to return to physicality or subtle form.
Thus great devotional beings like Rumi and Hafiz constantly yearned to return to the Beloved; ever longed for eternal transcendence of the inevitable limitations and sufferings of physical existence.
Rumi said:
From my first breath I have longed for Him –
This longing has become my life.
This longing has seen me grow old. . . .
Hafiz expressed his endless longing thusly:
“My soul endures a magnificent longing. … My pen does not have the ability to describe my condition of intense longing due to separation.”
Sri Ramana Maharshi, renowned twentieth century non-dualist sage, even after attaining self realization, reported regularly shedding tears of longing and devotion during visits to the ancient Meenakshi temple in Madurai. In recounting his experience, Maharshi explained that:
“The spirit therefore longed to have a fresh hold and hence the frequent visits to the temple and the overflow of the soul in profuse tears.”
This phenomenon of infinite longing of even “enlightened” beings was explained by Mother Meera in dialogue with spiritual author and teacher Andrew Harvey, and recounted as follows:
“Even avatars have to desire to be in God in every moment. And when avatars die, they desire with all their being to be united with God. ….. Look at Ramakrishna. How much he wept and prayed for the Divine Mother.”
~ Mother Meera to Andrew Harvey, “Hidden Journey”, Page 236
Thus, incarnation is limitation, and knowingly or unknowingly all beings – even sages – long for transcendence of that limitation. For most humans longing for transcendence is subliminal and experienced as wanting worldly contentment. But what we really seek is return to a soul-remembered state of timeless Oneness beyond any state of mind, beyond conception or imagination.
So, in seeking happiness, what we really seek is Source or Self.
Ron’s Explanation of “Why Does Everyone Want Happiness?”
Dear Friends,
The foregoing quotations and essay help explain why (knowingly or unknowingly) everyone wants lasting happiness.
For millennia wisdom teachers have counseled that
“The purpose of our lives is to be happy” (Dalai Lama).
And to find timeless happiness they tell us e.g. to
“Seek first the kingdom of heaven, which is within.” (Matthew 6:33; Luke 17:20-21)
Most incarnate humans perceive and project their self-identity reality only as impermanent mortal beings supposedly separate from Nature and eternally indivisible inner Self-awareness. And thus we futilely seek – but cannot find – lasting happiness through ever passing worldly pleasures and satisfactions, rather than through inner Self-identity as immortal spirit.
“Why Does Everyone Want Happiness?” suggests that all beings at least subliminally long for eternal happiness and transcendence of inevitable earthly limitations; that knowingly or unknowingly what we all really seek is return to a soul-remembered state of timeless Oneness as LOVE – beyond mental description, conception or imagination.
Thus, even elevated mystics like supreme Sufi poet masters Rumi and Hafiz reveal (in above quotations) their life-long tearful yearnings and longings for return to God.
Perhaps such life-long yearnings, by even the most elevated mystics or sages, can help us understand why inevitably incarnation is limitation.
And, perhaps our inevitable longings will inspire a new earthly era, as envisioned by Indian Sage Sri Aurobindo, who said:
“The goal is not to lose oneself in the Divine Consciousness. The goal is to let the Divine Consciousness penetrate into Matter and transform it.”
~ Sri Aurobindo – The Mother 15: p.191
Invocation
As each of us is drawn by irresistible inner longing toward Oneness with Eternal Light,
may we become instruments of Divine Consciousness on Earth.
And, let us thereby envision and exemplify an era of lasting peace of mind and happiness
for everyone everywhere.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner