Posts Tagged ‘Erich Fromm’
Our Mentality is Our Reality:
~ Quotations and Reflections
“Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else.”
~ George Orwell, “1984”
“Perception is a mirror, not a fact.
And what I look on is my state of mind,
reflected outward.”
~ A Course In Miracles (ACIM)
“We do not see things as they are;
we see things as we are.”
~ Talmud
“Our mentality is our reality.
Our “reality” is what we think it to be.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“All appearances are verily one’s own concepts, self-conceived in the mind, like reflections seen in a mirror. To know whether this be so or not, look within thine own mind.”
~ Padmasambhava (Guru Rinpoche)
“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm
“Reality” isn’t REAL!
“Reality” is an holographic theater of the mind.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“As you grow up, you form a mental image of who you are,
based on your personal and cultural conditioning. We may call this phantom self the ego.
It consists of mind activity and can only be kept going through constant thinking. The term ego means different things to different people, but when I use it … it means a false self, created by unconscious identification with the mind. …..
As long as you are identified with your mind, the ego runs your life.”
~ Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
“If the doors of perception were cleansed
everything would appear to man as it is, infinite.”
~ William Blake
“If you could get rid of yourself just once,
the secret of secrets would open to you.
The face of the unknown, hidden beyond the universe
would appear on the mirror of your perception.”
~ Rumi
“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly.
What is essential is invisible to the eye.”
~ Antoine de Saint Exupery
“Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart.
Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.”
~ Carl Jung
“For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror;
then we shall see face to face.
Now I know in part;
then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”
~ 1 Corinthians 13:12
“True vision is insight, not eyesight.
‘[N]ow we see through a glass darkly’,
but with ever expanding human consciousness and ever deepening insight,
we can and shall ‘see’ more and more –
we can and shall see what we couldn’t see before.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“When your sense of self is no longer tied to thought, is no longer conceptual, there is a depth of feeling, of sensing, of compassion, of loving, that was not there when you were trapped in mental concepts. You are that depth.”
~ Eckhart Tolle
“There are two ways of spreading light –
to be the candle, or the mirror that reflects it.”
~ Edith Wharton
“And we, with our unveiled faces reflecting like mirrors the glory of the Lord, all grow brighter and brighter as we are turned into the image that we reflect.”
~ 2 Corinthians 3:18
“Reality’s essence is Divine luminescence.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Nothing Real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.”
~ A Course In Miracles (ACIM)
Introduction to “Our Mentality is Our Reality”.
Dear Friends,
The foregoing quotations, and following poetic essay and comments, describe and explain how Humankind mistakenly conceive, label and self-identify ourselves as supposedly separate mortal entities in a misperceived space/time “reality”, through persistent ego/mind thought processes.
These writings are dedicated to helping us recognize and reverse those thought processes, which inevitably subject us to karmic-causal sufferings and limit our inconceivably infinite potentialities.
[See e.g. The Way In, Is The Way Out ]
And so may it be!
Our Mentality is Our Reality
Through the ‘mirror of the mind’
we think we see space/time “reality” –
as multiplicity of seemingly separate
beings, objects, forms and phenomena.
But our perceptions and self-identifications
as separate mortal entities is a mere mirage;
“an optical illusion of consciousness” .
What we think see is merely our state of mind
reflected and projected outward.
Such illusory vision is invariably obscured and distorted;
it arises from our personal and cultural mental conditioning – our ego/minds.
Ego/minds distortedly refract, reflect and project
onto the ‘reflective’ screen of human consciousness
the unseen light of Eternal Awareness – our true Self.
As Eternal Awareness, what we really see
are ego-minds’ ever conditioned
misperceptions, reflections, and projections.
As a mirror’s reflection depends not only on its optical transparency and precision , but also on the angle from which it is viewed,
our perception and response to the space/time world,
depends not only on our state of mind,
but on our unique point of view – each from a different place in time and space.
As still, clear water best reflects light –
while permitting perception of its depths,
a still, clear mind best reflects and reveals
the invisible Light of Self-awareness.
The fewer our thoughts,
the clearer and calmer our mind,
and the deeper and more transparent our awareness.
The more we think,
the more conditioned, disturbed and perturbed is the mind,
and the more it refracts, distorts and dims the eternal light of pure Awareness.
The clearer and calmer our mind,
the more skillfully we experience
ever changing quantum energies,
without attachment or reflexively reacting to them.
With meditation and other attentive mind-stilling modes,
we can clear and enlighten our mind –
From opacity to translucency to transparency –
from mental mirror to window of the soul.
Thereby, with ever expanding awareness
and ever deepening insight,
We can and shall ‘see’ and be,
more and more –
what we couldn’t see or be
before.
We can and shall see and BE:
Wholeness, Holiness, SELF –
Infinite Potentiality, Awareness, Bliss;
Eternal Peace, Life, Light – LOVE!
And so it shall be!
Ron Rattner
Ron’s Commentary on Our Mentality as Our Reality.
Dear Friends,
Have you ever wondered why the world seems so insane? Why countless people worldwide fearfully suffer from wars, poverty, illness, lack of basic life-sustaining necessities? Why suffering is everywhere, even in the richest nations on Earth? Why even materially super-rich people are often fearful, depressed, addicted or mentally disturbed?
For millennia mystic teachers and spiritual scriptures have consistently identified ego/mind as the “biggest enemy of humans”. Therefore recognizing and eliminating ego has always been of supreme spiritual importance.
But in current “new normal” times of unprecedented global turmoil, violence and suffering, it is crucial that a “critical mass” of Humankind now realize (at long last) how we are ignorantly and unsustainably creating enormous problems by habitually misidentifying ourselves with our thoughts.
After my mid-life awakening, I began deeply reflecting on root causes of our pervasive pathologies, both individually and societally. In the above essay/poem and quotes, I’ve shared my perspectives about how and why our illusionary human projected perceptions and thoughts are causing or allowing extremely psychopathic behaviors which threaten life on earth as we have known it.
If you agree, please consider sharing these insights, to help heal the world.
Conclusion.
In the Bible (1 Corinthians 13:11-12), St. Paul observes that “now we see through a glass darkly”,
but that some day we shall fully know, as we are fully Known now by the Divine. Now, we view our “reality” through the ‘mirror of the mind’, which imperfectly refracts and reflects the unseen light of Eternal Awareness onto the screen of our human consciousness.
But, with meditation and other mind-stilling methods, we can and shall evolve and transform our mind mirror, from opacity to translucency to transparency (as ‘window of the soul’). And thereby, with ever expanding human consciousness and ever deepening insight, we can and shall ‘see’ more and more – what we couldn’t see before.
Ultimately, we shall SEE that Infinite LOVE is the only Reality; that
“Nothing Real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.”
~ A Course In Miracles (ACIM)
Invocation.
As ever more we inwardly SEE
May we ever-more inwardly BE:
Wholeness, Holiness, SELF –
Infinite Potentiality, Awareness, Bliss;
Eternal Peace, Life, Light – LOVE!
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
Problems:
~ Can We Ever BE
Problem-FREE?
“Life is not a problem to be solved,
but a reality to be experienced.”
~ Soren Kierkegaard
Ron’s Introduction to “Problems”
Dear Friends,
This posting asks whether we can ever be problem-free. And it affirmatively answers that question (philosophically and pragmatically) with quotations, poetic verses, and comments defining “problems” as purely mental and explaining why all problems are created and exist in the human mind as ego illusions, and are ended when seen mindfully and transcended with LOVE.
Please enjoy and deeply reflect on these writings.
They are sincerely dedicated to helping us live happily and problem-free.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Problems?
Q.
What causes problems?
And how can we solve them?
A.Ignorance spawns them;
Intelligence solves them;
Wisdom averts them;
Truth transcends them.
Ron’s audio recitation of “Problems?”:
Quotations About Seeing and Solving Problems
“Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve.”
~ Erich Fromm
Ego is the biggest enemy of humans. ”
~ Rig Veda“All problems are [ego] illusions of the mind”
~ Eckhart Tolle“There is not a single problem in life you cannot resolve,
provided you first solve it in your inner world, its place of origin.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda“Whenever you experience unhappiness or depression in daily life, this is caused by the ego, the self-cherishing thought.
Any obstacle to practicing Dharma or even to achieving
happiness and success in this life is caused by the ego.”
~ Lama Zopa Rinpoche“The ego is a monkey catapulting through the jungle:
Totally fascinated by the realm of the senses, it swings from one desire to the next, one conflict to the next, one self-centered idea to the next.
If you threaten it, it actually fears for its life. Let this monkey go. Let the senses go. Let desires go. Let conflicts go. Let ideas go. Let the fiction of life and death go. Just remain in the center, watching. And then forget that you are there.”
~ Lao Tzu“The foundation of the Buddha’s teachings lies in compassion, and the reason for practicing the teachings is to wipe out the persistence of ego, the number-one enemy of compassion.”
~ Dalai Lama“Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence.”
~ Erich Fromm“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries.
Without them humanity cannot survive.”
~ Dalai Lama“All the happiness there is in the world arises from wishing others to be happy.
All the suffering there is in the world arises from wishing oneself to be happy.”
~ Bodhisattva Shantideva“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”
~ Rumi“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”
~ Albert Einstein“Intellectuals solve problems; geniuses prevent them.”
~ Albert Einstein“Freedom from the desire for an answer
is essential to the understanding of a problem.”
~ J. Krishnamurti“If we can really understand the problem,
the answer will come out of it, because
the answer is not separate from the problem.”
~ J. Krishnamurti“The quest is in the question.
The question is the answer.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings“To think or not to think,
that is the question!”
* * *
“Thinking and Being can’t coexist.
So stop thinking and start Being.”
* * *
“Forget who you think you are
to Know what you really are.”
* * *
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Ron’s Comments about seeing and solving “Problems”
Dear Friends,
As sentient beings on planet Earth, we share innate yearning for continuing happiness. But there aren’t yet utopian Earthly societies inhabited by perfectly happy people without problems.
Thus, individually and societally, all humans inevitably experience problems and limitations which interfere with their happiness – no matter who we are, or how we are self-identified or categorized.
Though physically – like snowflakes – each of us is unique (but mortal) with a unique story and history, spiritually we are all inextricably interconnected and interdependent – existentially sharing an Eternal common Divine Source as Universal LOVE.
Problems preclude lasting happiness
So solving our societal and interpersonal problems is crucial to fulfillment of our inborn wish for lasting happiness. And just as curing disease usually requires diagnosis of its cause, to solve Earthly problems we need to see their source.
To help us “diagnose” our problems I have posted the foregoing quotations and enigmatic sutra poem (composed many years ago) about seeing, solving and transcending “problems”.
Seeing and solving psychological problems
The above sutra poem mainly addresses mental – rather than physical – “problems”, since physical pain is inevitable while mental suffering is optional.
As to psychological problems, His Holiness the Dalai Lama teaches that
“The greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion” because “the need for love lies at the very foundation of human existence;” and because without “love and compassion . . .humanity cannot survive”.
Psychological problems and suffering inevitably arise when – ignorant of our true spiritual self-identity as LOVE –we futilely seek happiness from ephemeral worldly satisfactions. So the poem identifies “ignorance” as the source of “problems”.
And Rumi tells us:
“Your task is not to seek for love,
but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself
that you have built against it.”
Mental Problems are Ego Problems
Those mental ‘barriers’ which we have ‘built within’ all arise from ego, to which Buddhist teachings often refer as ‘self-cherishing thought’. Through ego we mistakenly mentally self identify as entities separate from the Whole – as separate perceivers of a supposedly objective world.
But this is an unreal ego illusion – samsara. And our self-cherishing beliefs and behaviors seeking psychological self-preservation and protection of that ego illusion of separateness are ultimately futile.
What never was can never be preserved
To promote lasting happiness and compassion, most spiritual practices have for millennia been aimed at transcending illusionary ego identity. For example this intention has been mentioned in ancient Vedic and Taoist texts such as Rig Veda and Tao Te Ching, as well as in Buddhist scriptures:
Ego is the biggest enemy of humans. ”
~ Rig Veda
“The ego is a monkey catapulting through the jungle:
Totally fascinated by the realm of the senses, it swings from one desire to the next, one conflict to the next, one self-centered idea to the next. If you threaten it, it actually fears for its life. Let this monkey go. Let the senses go. Let desires go. Let conflicts go. Let ideas go. Let the fiction of life and death go. Just remain in the center, watching. And then forget that you are there.”
~ Lao Tzu “
The foundation of the Buddha’s teachings lies in compassion, and the reason for practicing the teachings is to wipe out the persistence of ego, the number-one enemy of compassion.”
~ Dalai Lama
Thus, according to perennial spiritual teachings, ego must be recognized, renounced and transcended.
No thought, no ego.
Ultimate overcoming of ego happens only when thought ceases NOW, and Universal Intelligence which has been mistakenly regarded as a separate experiencer of sensations and emotions, and a separate performer of actions, exists by itself and as itself, and is not mentally divided and projected.
Happiness grows as ego goes
Only very rare ‘awakened’ Buddha-like beings have completed the metamorphosis from Humanity to Infinite Intelligence – from human consciousness to superconsciousness. So the overwhelmingly vast majority of Humankind are incarnate because we are limited by illusionary ego entity-identity, and we inevitably suffer “problems” in space/time causality/duality.
But all of us can gradually evolve and achieve ever growing happiness by seeing and solving our ego problems from ever elevated mental states of consciousness, subtler than those which created them.
Initially we may use our inborn intelligence to “diagnose” and abandon the beliefs and behaviors causing our experience of such problems. Also, with wisdom we may avert problems by observing mistakes of others and not emulating such mistakes. And ultimately we will thoughtlessly BE problem-FREE – as LOVE.
Invocation
May we overcome our sufferings from earthly ‘problems’,
and experience ever growing happiness,
and fulfillment of our deepest aspirations,
by gradually recognizing, renouncing and transcending illusory ego-beliefs and behaviors,
until we become eternally problem-FREE –– as LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Finding Lasting Happiness
~ Ron’s Memoirs
Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life,
the whole aim and end of human existence”
~ Aristotle
“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.”
~ H.H. Dalai Lama
“Happiness is your nature. It is not wrong to desire it.
What is wrong is seeking it outside when it is inside.”
~ Sri Ramana Maharshi
“True happiness cannot be found in things that change and pass away. Pleasure and pain alternate inexorably. Happiness comes from the Self and can be found in the Self only. Find your real Self and all else will come with it.”
~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
“Seek first the kingdom of heaven,
which is within.”
~ Matthew 6:33; Luke 17:20-21
“Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problems of human existence.”
~ Erich Fromm
“Our destiny is Divinity.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Life is a round trip metaphoric journey,
on which we are destined to return to point of origin.
On return, we learn – we never left.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Introduction to “How shall we find lasting happiness?”
Dear Friends,
We are all matriculating as supposed mortal body/minds on the illusory space/time Earth branch of the Great Cosmic University. We’re here to learn lasting happiness from our life experiences, especially from our karmic mistakes, pains and sufferings. We don’t ‘graduate’ until we learn to non-judgmentally accept everyone and everything everywhere in the Universe, (including ourselves and our enemies) with loving-kindness, compassion, and forgiveness. Upon ‘graduation’ we find timeless happiness as LOVE, beyond all pain and suffering. There is no prescribed ‘graduation’ date.
But as we begin the ’second biannual semester’ of year 2021, I greet you with great news! The unprecedented “new normal” post-pandemic era of worldwide sufferings and interruptions of normal human life, has given us an unprecedented “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity to co-create a new and wonderful world of lasting happiness, harmony and health, with peace, liberty, equality, and justice for all.
To explain how and why I optimistically foresee these blessings, I have today amended and posted the foregoing quotations and sutra sayings, and the following Q & A sutra essay about finding lasting happiness, with explanatory memoirs, and an updated “new normal” era addendum.
These wrings explain why unreal 3D linear time is being quickened by unique Aquarian age cosmic energies, and auspicious cyclical and astrological planetary alignments, to awaken a “critical mass” of humanity worldwide to our instinctive caring for one-another, which will impel us to follow our hearts to an unprecedented Earth-life era of Universal LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Q&A Sutra Essay: “How shall we find lasting happiness?”
Q. How shall we find lasting happiness?
A. We shall find lasting happiness upon transcending our illusionary ego-self, and Being our true SELF.
Knowingly or unknowingly, everyone wants lasting happiness.
However, most seek it futilely in outside worldly pleasures which are always impermanent.
But, ever abiding Happiness is our true inner nature – our eternal SELF – and our ultimate destiny.
So to find lasting happiness we must look within, not outside.
There mindfully we shall uncover and abolish all illusory ego-mind ideas which obscure awareness of our true SELF.
And upon so transcending our ego-self to BE our true SELF,
we shall find lasting happiness – as LOVE.
Ron’s memoir comments on “How shall we find lasting happiness?”
Dear Friends,
Have you ever wondered why the world seems so crazy? Why so many people suffer from wars, poverty, illness, lack of basic life-sustaining necessities? Why in the richest nation on Earth, suffering is everywhere? Why even super-rich people often become lonely, depressed, addicted, or mentally ill?
Growing up in Chicago in the 1930’s and 40’s, I was intuitively inspired by a then very popular “hit parade” song, titled: “Bluebird of Happiness” passionately sung by operatic tenor and Jewish cantor Jan Peerce. But only on now listening to that classic recording, do I appreciate its inspiring ever-relevant lyrics. (To uplift us linked below are an mp3 copy of that recording and a pdf copy of it’s lyrics.)
In the 1950’s I first began thinking that inhumanely materialistic organization of human societies was unnecessarily causing widespread conflicts and suffering; that much individual pathology was being caused by widespread societal insanity.
I was then deeply influenced by “The Sane Society” a brilliant philosophical analysis by author-psychotherapist Erich Fromm, about the pathology of ‘normalcy’ in our materialistic societies. In “The Sane Society” Fromm suggested that materialistic Western society was lacking in sanity; that the iniquities, inequities and disharmonies of entire societies were pathological, not just the seemingly separate mental illnesses of people therein.
But only after my mid-life change of life, did I begin deeply reflecting on root causes of such societal insanity and unhappiness. I began asking many new questions about our true identity and reality, individually and collectively.
Thanks to continuing curiosity, and divine Grace, I have often been synchronistically blessed with simple spiritual answers to mentally complicated questions about crazy behaviors in a crazy world; answers which have brought me ever-increasing happiness.
I’ve discovered that seemingly complicated questions about living a happy life can often be simply answered from elevated heart levels of awareness; that our experience of happiness depends upon our mental attitude, and upon self-identification as eternal spirit rather than as mere mortal bodies and their stories. And that, ultimately, lasting happiness can only be found within, as Love.
So I’ve shared the foregoing quotations, sutras and Q & A essay/poem, to help remind us of perennially profound but simple answers to seemingly complicated questions about happiness and suffering, and to help us discover that lasting happiness as Love is our true nature, and ultimate destiny.
Invocation
May these writings encourage our experience, individually and societally, of ever increasing inner happiness as Love, in a seemingly crazy world. And since ‘everything we think, do or say, changes this world in some way’, may we ‘contagiously’ help heal this crazy world with heartfelt Love as we realize that “Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problems of human existence.”
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
Tenor Jan Peerce singing “Bluebird of Happiness” >
Jan Peerce – Bluebird of Happiness Lyrics
http://www.songlyrics.com/jan-peerce/bluebird-of-happiness-lyrics/
Artist: Jan Peerce
Album: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
The beggar man and the mighty king are only different in name,
For they are treated just the same by fate.
Today a smile and tomorrow a tear, we never know what’s in store.
So learn your lesson before it is too late.
So be like I, hold your head up high ’til you find the bluebird of happiness.
You will find greater peace of mind, knowing there’s a bluebird of happiness.
And when he sings to you, though you’re deep in blue
You will see a ray of light creep through
And so remember this, life is no abyss
Somewhere there’s a bluebird of happiness.
The poet with his pen, the peasant with his plow,
It makes no different who you are, it’s all the same somehow.
The king upon his throne, the jester at his feet,
the artist, the actress, the man on the street.
It’s a life of smiles and a life of tears
It’s a life of hopes and a life of fears.
A blinding torrent of rain and a brilliant burst of sun,
A biting tearing pain and bubbling sparkling fun.
And no matter what you have, don’t envy those you meet.
It’s all the same, it’s in the game, the bitter and the sweet.
And if things don’t look so cheerful, just show a little fight.
For every bit of darkness, there’s a little bit of light.
For every bit of hatred, there’s a little bit of love.
Fore every cloudy morning, there’s a midnight moon above.
So don’t you forget, you must search ’til you find the bluebird.
You will find peace and contentment forever, if you will be like I.
Hold your head up high, ’til you see a ray of light appear.
And so remember this, life is no abyss
Somewhere there’s a bluebird of happiness.
“New normal” era addendum and dedication
Dear Friends,
Today’s posting (which emphasizes the perennial necessity of looking within to find lasting happiness) was first written before the world entered the unprecedented “new normal” post-pandemic era of worldwide stay at home ‘lock-downs’, with anti-assembly, forced masking and anti-viral inoculations, social distancing decrees, and shutting down most normal human social and economic activities, which may cause history’s greatest economic depression.
As I now write to you, billions of suffering people world-wide, while not distracted by their normal activities, are looking within for origins and answers to humanity’s unprecedented outer problems. Thereby, they are now questioning the causes of current crises, and realizing that their governments have utterly failed to protect or serve their fundamental human rights, liberties and needs.
Thus a “critical mass” of humanity is awakening to discover that we’ve become catastrophically endangered by sacrificing our few remaining precious outer freedoms to uncaring autocratic political and corporate entities and “leaders”; that this has brought humankind to the brink of insanely ending Earth-life as we’ve known it.
Paradoxically, our collective awakening is completely opposite to the malefic intent of those who planned and perpetrated the current crisis to fearfully and physically control us in an Orwellian/dystopian world. Instead of being paralyzed by fear and panic, a “critical mass” of humankind are discovering that by following our hearts, rather than “leaders’” unfounded edicts, we have a unique opportunity to co-create a new and wonderful world of peace, happiness, harmony and health, with liberty, equality, and justice for all.
Because of unprecedented Aquarian age cosmic energies, and auspicious cyclical and astrological planetary alignments, exceptionally advantageous to spiritual evolution, the pre-planned post-pandemic “new normal”emergencies have given us this “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity.
Accordingly, I urge our joining billions of others worldwide as an awakened “critical mass” of humanity which will, at long last, peacefully end the insane and unsustainable pillaging, poisoning and plundering our precious planet, and of immorally exploiting all vulnerable people and other life forms thereon.
Dedication
May our “new normal” era sufferings
prove an immense disguised blessing.
May they awaken our instinctive caring for one-another,
and impel us to follow our hearts
to a unique Earth-life era of Universal LOVE.
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
Certainty ~ by Sant Tukaram*
“Certainty can become an illness
that creates hate and greed.”
~ Sant Tukaram
“The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning.
Uncertainty is the very condition
to impel man to unfold his powers.”
~ Erich Fromm
“Since no one really knows anything about God,
those who think they do are just troublemakers.”
~ Rabia of Basra (first female Sufi saint)
“Never lose a holy curiosity” . . . .
“The important thing is not to stop questioning”.
~ Albert Einstein
“The whole problem with the world is that
fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves,
and wiser people so full of doubts.”
~ Bertrand Russell
When questioning begins, certainty ends.
When certainty ends, wisdom begins.
The fewer our certainties, the greater our possibilities.
With complete uncertainty, we have infinite possibility.
Everything is possible when nothing is inevitable.
We are shackled by illusory bonds of belief.
Freedom is beyond belief.
So, we seek relief from belief.~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Certainty
Certainty undermines one’s power, and turns happiness
into a long shot. Certainty confines.
Dears, there is nothing in your life that will
not change – especially your ideas of God.
Look what the insanity of righteous knowledge can do:
crusade and maim thousands
in wanting to convert that which
is already gold
into gold.
Certainty can become an illness
that creates hate and
greed.
God once said to Tuka,
“Even I am ever changing –
I am ever beyond
Myself,
what I may have once put my seal upon,
may no longer be
the greatest
Truth.”
~ Tukaram*
Source: “Love Poems From God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West”, with interpretation by Daniel Ladinsky
Footnote: *Sant Tukaram was a 16th century Indian devotional poet-saint, still widely regarded as one of India’s greatest and most influential poet-saints.
Ron’s Comments About “Certainty”:
Dear Friends,
Are you absolutely certain about anything in your life?
Have you ever been absolutely certain about something or someone, and later learned that your certainty was mistaken?
If so, please consider the foregoing quotations and wonderfully translated poem by 16th century devotional poet-saint Tukaram, one of India’s greatest and still most influential poet-saints.
These wisdom writings remind us that nothing is “certain” in this world of permanent impermanence; that inflexible certainty – even about God – “can become an illness that creates hate and greed”.
Throughout recorded human history, individuals and societies have been compelled to abandon previously cherished inflexible beliefs about religion, science, philosophy etc. which limited learning, impeded progress, and motivated evil and harmful behaviors.
How could we have advanced believing that the earth was flat, or that it was the center of our solar system, or that intuitive women should be burned as witches?
Thanks to quantum science ‘uncertainty’ theory, we have learned from physicists that what we’ve believed to be physical ‘reality’ isn’t really real; that ultimate “Reality” is indescribable consciousness.
“Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.”
~ Niels Bohr, quantum physicist
“I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
~ Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist
After an unforgettable midlife spiritual awakening, I have learned that open-minded curiosity and awareness are crucial for life-long learning and spiritual advancement. My awakening epiphany completely and irreversibly changed prior paradigms of Self-identity and Reality, and began a new life-phase of previously unimagined new discoveries.
One of my greatest joys has been in continuously learning from life itself, especially from inevitable difficulties and challenges. Thus I’ve found that we don’t need college or post graduate academic degrees to learn our most important lessons.
In recent years, many people worldwide have been experiencing and behaving from polarized fearful and reactive states of mind directed to others with conflicting political perspectives. To address this disturbing divisiveness, and consequent turmoil, we can follow principles of ageless wisdom revealed by Sant Tukaram’s critique of “Certainty”.
Although purported world “leaders” may seem insanely “certain” of themselves, Earth’s suffering citizens can best address crucial interpersonal and international political challenges, by compassionately honoring the spiritual essence and divine equality of everyone everywhere, without mistaken certainty about them.
Invocation
May Sant Tukaram’s wisdom inspire us
to transcend mistaken certainty
“that creates hate and greed”.
With quiet minds and open hearts
may we compassionately honor
the spiritual essence and equality of everyone everywhere.
Thereby let us overcome exploitation and discrimination
against the world’s most vulnerable sentient beings,
and the iniquity of inequity in our societies.
May Sant Tukaram’s wisdom inspire us
to transcend mistaken certainty
“that creates hate and greed”.
With quiet minds and open hearts
may we compassionately honor
the spiritual essence and equality of everyone everywhere.
Thereby let us overcome exploitation and discrimination
against the world’s most vulnerable sentient beings,
and the iniquity of inequity in our societies.
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
The Truth That Sets Us Free
“You will know the truth,
and the truth will set you free.”
~ John 8:32
“Free at last, free at last.
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last”
~ Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr
“A human being is a part of a whole, called by us ‘universe’, a part limited in time and space.
He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest… a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us.
Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is, in itself, a part of the liberation, and a foundation for inner security.”
~ Albert Einstein ( N. Y. Times , March 29, 1972)
Introduction to “The Truth That Sets Us Free”
Dear Friends,
The following SillySutras poem reveals that Spiritual freedom is Humanity’s fundamental evolutionary goal and inevitable destiny.
The poem’s title and subject were inspired by Jesus’ teaching
“You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free”.
Comments and quotations explaining the poem, include an esoteric interpretation of the biblical Exodus Passover story, that was inspired by Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.’s legendary “I Have a Dream” speech conclusion: “Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”
Please deeply reflect upon and enjoy these writings. May they hasten realization of “The Truth That Sets Us Free”.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
The Truth That Sets Us Free
Trapped in earthly domain
of fear, death and pain,
we long for liberty.
Jailed in cages we’ve wrought,
with hoary thought
that mere body/minds are we,
We’re deceived by perceptions,
and caught by conceptions,
of supposed mortality.
But prison’s illusion,
and we suffer confusion
of our true identity.
For we’re beings of Light,
Eternal and bright,
and so shall ever be.
We shall know this Truth,
and it shall forsooth,
release and set us Free.
Ron’s audio recitation of “The Truth That Sets Us Free”
Ron’s explanation of “Truth That Set’s Us Free”
Dear Friends,
Today’s “The Truth That Sets Us Free” posting of a sutra poem (with voice recitation and quotations) is about Spiritual freedom as our fundamental evolutionary goal. The poem’s title and subject were inspired by Jesus’ teaching “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free”.
For millennia mystical teachings of all perennial wisdom paths have identified spiritual Freedom or Self realization as our ultimately destined evolutionary objective.
Most people associate “freedom” with personal, political, and economic liberty. But spiritual freedom is an extraordinarily rare state of (freedom from) mind which only can be attained inwardly, even by those who do not enjoy external freedoms, like felons imprisoned for life. Knowingly or unknowingly everyone/everywhere longs for Freedom as our divine birthright and ultimate destiny.
I first deeply reflected on philosophical concepts of “freedom” during the 1950’s when I read “Escape From Freedom” by then prominent author-psychotherapist Erich Fromm. But after becoming a San Francisco civil litigation lawyer I rarely thought about about inner freedom, until after a memorable exchange with my beloved Guruji, Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas.
While residing in my apartment (just prior to his 1980 return to India), Guruji told me:
“Rasik, a yogi’s body is like a baby’s body.
Your body is like a prison.
I am like a jailer with the prison key.
I come and go as I please.”
Thereupon, I became extremely curious about Guruji’s revelation that my body was like a prison. And I wondered how and why ‘I’ was ‘imprisoned’, and how ‘I’ could get out of ‘jail’ – free like Guruji. (See https://sillysutras.com/human-body-a-precious-prison-rons-memoirs/)
So I began exploration of “spiritual freedom”, as distinguished from personal, political, and economic freedoms.
Whereupon, I was reminded of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.’s legendary “I Have a Dream” speech’s concluding words “Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last”, and wondered why they were so deeply powerful.
I realized that those words were rooted in the biblical Exodus Passover story; and intuited that spiritual “freedom” is the esoteric essence and mythical message of that story. And I concluded that the Passover story symbolizes escape from outer bondage to a Divinely ‘promised land’ within – viz. escape from enslavement by mistaken beliefs in false external Gods or goals to an inner ‘promised land’ of ONE indescribable eternal Divinity immanent in each of us. viz.
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is ONE!”
~ Deuteronomy 6:4
Also I felt that Jesus prophetically alluded to such spiritual freedom by teaching:
“You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
~ John 8:32
Thus, Jesus was teaching that we find freedom (from mentally self-imposed imprisonment) only when we transcend entity-identity, and self-identify as ONE Divine spirit – the kingdom of heaven within – rather than as supposedly separate embodied personalities.
Ultimately, I concluded that our limited and limiting ego-mind ideas about self-identity and reality confine each of us within a sort of psychological prison in which suffering is inevitable, and which restricts realization of our infinite potentialities.
However, the mystic masters teach and demonstrate that we can psychologically transcend that mental “prison” and emerge “free at last” from our self-woven karmic cocoons, no matter our outer circumstances.
Thus, Rumi reminded us:
“Be empty of worrying,
Think of Who Created Thought!
Why do you stay in prison
when the door is so wide open?”
~ Rumi
Invocation
May the above verses and writings
encourage and advance our spiritual evolution
to realization of inner Freedom –
Our precious Divine destiny.
And so may we gratefully and joyously BE –
FREE at last, FREE at last!
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Seekers Beware!
“Seek first the kingdom of heaven,
which is within.”
~ Matthew 6:33; Luke 17:20-21
“Follow your heart – even if it contradicts my words.”
~ Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
”We are shackled by illusory bonds of belief.
Freedom is beyond belief.”
“It’s better to be a seeker with many questions,
than a Guru with all the answers.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Love is the only sane and satisfactory
answer to the problem of human existence.”
~ Erich Fromm
“Honor your Heart, over your rational mind;
use your mind to serve and follow your Heart..”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Path of devotion:
“Adoration of the Infinite,
not adulation of the incarnate.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Introduction
The following poem, which cautions about cults, was composed after I’d begun questioning rigid religious belief systems and dogma, and certain hierarchic spiritual or religious organizations. As explained in comments following the poem, this disillusionment led to my mostly looking within for life guidance, and to regard myself as an “Uncertain Undo” seeking relief from belief, rather than as a “Born-again Hindu”.
Seekers Beware!
Do not seek wisdom
of the occult
in a cult,
Lest cult inculcation
into cult culture
leaves you a cult captive.
Seek liberation, not cult approbation.
Seek illumination, not cultivation.
So seek and pursue
the one path that’s true;
Seek and follow
your Heart.
Ron’s audio recitation of “Seekers Beware!”
Ron’s Explanation of “Seekers Beware”:
Background
After my beloved Guruji, Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas, returned to India in 1980, I met and learned from other spiritual teachers, in addition to Guruji’s successor, Shri Anandi Ma. But I always maintained my heartfelt inner relationship with Guruji – above all other teachers.
For many years I considered myself a “born-again Hindu” and was mostly attracted to Indian spiritual teachers. But gradually I began questioning rigid religious belief systems and dogma, and certain hierarchic spiritual or religious organizations.
Beginning in 1987, I was especially attracted to the devotional path of Amritanandamayi (Ammachi) of calling and crying to the Divine. And for seven years I attended many of her US darshans and regular programs at her San Ramon ashram.
At first I experienced an exceptionally powerful devotional ambience around Ammachi. And I was much moved by her soulful singing of bhajans calling to the Divine. However, my experience of devotional blessings around Ammachi, and my enthusiasm for her darshans, gradually diminished and eventually ended in distressing disillusionment.
( See https://sillysutras.com/other-teachers-mata-amritanandamayi-ammachi-rons-memoirs/; and https://sillysutras.com/from-mata-amritanandamayi-to-amma-shri-karunamayi-rons-memoirs/ )
I was especially distressed on learning facts about Ammachi’s organization revealed in a spiritual memoir published by Gail Tredwell (aka “Gayatri”) entitled “Holy Hell, A Memoir of Faith, Devotion and Pure Madness” containing many shocking but truthful revelations.
On learning those facts, I realized that I’d been naively projecting purported perfection and infallibility, upon Ammachi and a few other Eastern teachers, rather than seeing them as limited humans, though perhaps further evolved in spiritual awareness. That realization was an important learning experience, which motivated me to emphasize following my heart for life guidance, and to regard myself as an “Uncertain Undo” seeking relief from belief, rather than as a “Born-again Hindu”.
Moral of the Story
Some of us may be blessed to meet inspiring spiritual teachers, gurus or saintly people on whom we may project and, accordingly, in whom we may perceive perfection. I have done this with my beloved and venerable Hindu guru, Sri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas, and with a few other “enlightened” spiritual teachers. But Guruji humbly taught:
“Follow your heart – even if it contradicts my words.”
~ Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
And I have realized the wisdom of Albert Einstein’s observation that
“The cult of individual personalities is always . . unjustified.”
~ Albert Einstein
So my devotional path has been:
“Adoration of the Infinite,
not adulation of the incarnate.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Thus, ultimately, I’ve learned from inner and outer experience that “incarnation is limitation”, and that however evolved an incarnate being may be s/he is fallible. Here on Earth, where we experience eternal life via mortal physical bodies, it seems that human fallibility ‘goes with the territory’ – that “to err is human”.
I’ve realized that we need to rely vigilantly both on our powers of discrimination and on our divine intuitive insights. But, that whenever in doubt, it is wise for us to to honor intuition over intellect, and to find guidance in our heart – not our head.
If a spiritual teacher (or other expert authority or pundit) speaks or behaves in ways that don’t make sense to us, we should listen to our heart, and not the pundit. We should act without fear or concern for opinions of others, who may disagree.
Also I’ve learned that we must still our ego-mind to hear our heart, instead of heeding the ‘voice in our head’. Thereby, accessing our inner wisdom helps us transcend many earthly limitations and so resolve problems created by astral entities or lower levels of human consciousness.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Crazy World
“‘But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ said Alice.
‘Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the cat.
‘We’re all mad here.’”
~ Lewis Carroll
“I have lived on the lip of insanity,
wanting to know reasons,
knocking on a door.
It opens.
I’ve been knocking from the inside.”
~ Rumi
Show me a sane man and I will cure him for you.
~ Carl Jung
“When the world goes mad,
one must accept madness as sanity;
since sanity is, in the last analysis,
nothing but the madness on which the whole world happens to agree.”
~ George Bernard Shaw
“The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be most normal. —– They are normal not in what may be called the absolute sense of the word; they are normal only in relation to a profoundly abnormal society. Their perfect adjustment to that abnormal society is a measure of their mental sickness. These millions of abnormally normal people, living without fuss in a society to which, if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted.”
~ Aldous Huxley, Brave New World Revisited
“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority,
but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.”
~ Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
“Sanity and happiness are an impossible combination” ….
“When we remember that we are all mad,
the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.”
~ Mark Twain
“To recognize one’s own insanity is, of course, the arising of sanity, the beginning of healing and transcendence.”
~ Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose
“It’s no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”
~ J Krishnamurti
In this crazy world normality’s insanity,
and silliness is sanity.
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Ron’s Introduction
The following four-line whimsical poem was composed during a brief midlife period when I felt I didn’t belong here. After you consider it, I’ll hereafter try to explain it.
Crazy World
I feel like a stranger in a strange world.
This crazy world has driven me sane!
I seek refuge from this crazy world;
I seek a sane asylum.
Ron’s 2020 explanation and dedication of “Crazy World”
Dear Friends,
During childhood my life seemed like a waking dream, most of which I forgot.
Then during adulthood I became a social justice seeker in a perceived unjust and insane society. But now (at age 87), as I prepare to bid Bye-Bye to the 21st century, I’m again often experiencing this life as an illusory waking dream of an insane world. Yet I still deeply aspire to help those who are suffering in this dream world.
During the 1950’s, I was deeply influenced on reading “The Sane Society” a best-selling book by then prominent German-born psychotherapist Erich Fromm. In it Fromm analyzed the pathology of ‘normalcy’ in Western materialistic societies. He proposed that inequities and disharmonies inherent in entire industrial societies were pathological and lacking in sanity. That they thereby cause alienation, stress and mental illnesses of people comprising such societies. Fromm’s essay synchronistically confirmed my long-time views of the insanity of materialistic society, with its inevitable injustices.
Long before my spiritual awakening, I had a deep inner instinct to pursue social justice causes, with considerable sensitivity to the “insanity and iniquity of inequity in our society”. So, in becoming a lawyer and throughout my professional career, my main motivation was to help others; not to become rich or famous.
Then, following my midlife spiritual awakening, I began feeling like Moses in Egypt – like a stranger in a strange land. [Exodus 2:22] For a short time, I felt like I no longer belonged in this crazy world.
But I needed to support my young children, and gradually realized that maybe I might continue helping others better than ever before, because of my discovery of happiness and sanity beyond space/time “reality” normality. As the bible says, eternal happiness or “the Kingdom of Heaven” is beyond this world. [e.g. John 15:19]
The foregoing four-line whimsical poem was composed during the brief midlife period when I felt I didn’t belong here. I’ve shared it aspiring to help expand our experience of inner happiness.
Invocation
May the foregoing whimsical poem and serious quotations encourage and inspire each of us to seek and find refuge from this crazy world in an Eternally “sane asylum”.
Thereby may we irreversibly realize that our precious lives here, are like waking dreams – fleeting episodes in an endless play of ever joyous Universal Awareness, our ultimate shared eternal Self–identity.
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
Ron’s oral explanation and recitation of “Crazy World”
Transcending Transcendence?
~ Ron’s Memoirs
“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
“Cosmic consciousness is
infinite evolutionary impetus in each of us.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“As we experience our universality,
we transform our reality.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Maitreya Bodhisattva
Transcending Transcendence
My miraculous “sight seeing” trip with Dhyanyogi, and subsequent experiences, inspired ever increasing faith in his saintly good will and yogic powers. But questions arose for me about his Hindu path.
In writings introducing his path to Americans, Guruji said that Kundalini Maha Yoga was not a religion but a spiritual practice bringing “lasting inner peace and happiness to individuals of any belief or religious affiliation.” But his prescribed spiritual practices mostly included Sanskrit prayers and mantras associated with Hinduism, in addition to daily meditations.
At first I was uncomfortable reciting Sanskrit prayers and mantras which I didn’t understand, except for the Ram mantra with which I have always felt deep affinity. But intuitively I relied on Guruji’s extraordinary being and benevolence, and on his assurances that initiates would enjoy “a happy life”. So gradually I became more and more engaged in these practices, trusting that they would help me live a happy life.
Then, during a public meditation program, Guruji said these sanskrit practices would lead us to “the spiritual goal”. And I wondered: “what spiritual goal?” Amazingly, though I was still then an ‘uptight’ skeptical lawyer, I had taken an initiation from an unknown Hindu guru and was repeating his esoteric Sanskrit prayers and mantras not knowing what they meant or that their purpose was to achieve some “spiritual goal”.
So, after the meditation program, I asked others about this “spiritual goal”. I was told that the object of Hindu practices was to achieve “mukti” or “moksha” or “self-realization”; that the kundalini purification process, viz. the “evolutionary process taking place in [my] nervous system”, would some day in some lifetime lead to a state of Divine illumination where the Self, soul, or “Atman” would experience its Oneness with “Brahman” [Supreme Reality] – the pinnacle of human experience. Only then did I begin considering these ideas of “self realization”.
Though Guruji’s assurance of our finding lasting peace and happiness was appealing, I hadn’t consciously been drawn to him by this assurance but by a deep intuitive heartfelt connection. Before meeting Guruji I was not ‘goal oriented’. Instinctively hesitant to pursue materialistic societal goals, I was mostly inner – not outer – directed. But never before had I considered any inner ‘goals’.
In the late 1950’s I had been deeply influenced on reading “The Sane Society” by then prominent psychotherapist Erich Fromm, about the pathology of ‘normalcy’ in our materialistic society. Fromm suggested that Western society as a whole was lacking in sanity; that the inequities and disharmonies of the entire society were pathological, not just the mental illnesses of people therein. Fromm’s essay had confirmed and enhanced my instinctive reluctance to selfishly follow materialistic societal goals.
So, in becoming a lawyer and throughout my professional career, my main motivation was to help others; it was not to become rich or famous. Long before my spiritual awakening, I had a deep inner instinct to pursue social justice causes, with considerable sensitivity to the “insanity and iniquity of inequity in our society”.
But, with the Yosemite inner experience of “ten thousand suns” I realized that beyond my instinct for social justice was an extraordinarily intense longing for the Divine – to return from this crazy world back to God, back to Ram. However, not until hearing Dhyanyogi’s teachings about a spiritual “goal”, did I consider pro-actively seeking such an inner goal.
Though initially it seemed desirable to aspire to “self realization” or “enlightenment”, I was unable to relate experientially to those illumined states as ascribed to rare beings like Gautama Buddha. So, I was never clear about what to “seek” until, ultimately, I stopped seeking it, whatever it was.
After considerable reflection, I abandoned goal oriented spiritual seeking, and intuitively began with more and more heartfelt faith to surrender to the Infinite – “to let go, and go with the flow” – and to “leave it to the Lone Arranger.” * Perhaps, I transcended transcendence aspirations.
Inspired by the Buddhist Bodhisattva ideal of altruistically helping all beings end their sufferings, I stopped trying to be beyond this world, but rather to be in it in a way which might help all life everywhere. And I ceased regarding “enlightenment” as a “goal” but rather as an endless evolutionary process.
Experientially, I had realized that ‘the Kingdom of Heaven’, Buddha nature, and Love, were the Essence of everything in our phenomenal “reality”. And my core spiritual motivation became and remains:
“Infuse us, enthuse us, and use us, to bless all Life as LOVE.”
But paradoxically I have learned from experience that we cannot change others, only ourselves; that by furthering our own evolution we help elevate humanity’s common consciousness and thereby subtly help others. So, I consider it my responsibility to aspire to be the change I wish to see in the world, with the intention and dedication of so helping everyone everywhere.
And in this process, as Guruji promised, with unspeakable gratitude I am now enjoying “a happy life” beyond anything that I could have imagined when I received a shaktipat initiation in 1978.
*Footnote
Many ideas about “enlightenment” are in articles posted elsewhere on SillySutras.com. E.g. see https://sillysutras.com/?p=2925 and https://sillysutras.com/?p=1180
