Thursday, October 30, 2008


The first step in the awakening process is to question yourself. If you can't question yourself and your world view you're lost. What if you have fooled yourself? Maybe your Liberal agenda is just a mental construction, a castle in the air, like Fascism, Communism or Catholicism? Could it be that you have mixed up the map with territory? Could it be that you see the world through colored and distorting lenses? Could it be that you're not an enlightened and superior westerner? Could it be that you're just a human being, like all the rest here on this planet? Could it be that you're not broadminded? What if you are, really, a narrow minded philistine bourgeois? Maybe you're not waking up. Maybe your meditations and affirmations are just mind games.

The mind is constantly producing words, ideas and fantasies about the world. Nothing is wrong with that. It is something it has evolved to do and it has proved to be very useful. Planning for different future outcomes is a normal process and so is brooding on the past. "What went wrong? Can I learn something from my mistakes?" It is not a problem if you leave the now, the reality, also for lengthy periods of time, the problems appear if you don't come back, if you settle down in your castle in the air. The problems appear when you pick out one idea and stick to it like a religious fundamentalist. Then you are in trouble. You might say to yourself: “Hitler was a great man and he did what he could to clean up Europe from filth.” or “Ronald Reagan did a good job in Central America to stop Communism.” or "Life has no meaning until you invent one." Whatever you believe, know that it is a mental construct, a map, not the truth. Good maps and useless maps are both maps, not the territory.

However, you will probably not begin to question your self and your misperceptions until some disaster happens to you, a divorce, the death of someone near, a bankruptcy, whatever. Why would you question yourself if everything is fine? In that way afflictions can really be blessings. But core beliefs and misunderstandings are so extremely strong and tenacious that afflictions are usually not sufficient. Many people experience horrible things but are not waking up anyway. Something else is necessary. Here the synchronicities can be very helpful. When everything is fine the synchronicities usually don’t mean much to you, if you notice them at all. When you are vulnerable and more open, however, they can sometimes show you a glimpse of a greater scheme of things. Life is so much bigger than you, and far more mysterious than your narrow minded misperceptions of it. However, afflictions and synchronicities aren't necessarily sufficient either. Something more is needed. Grace, maybe. I don't know.

Anyway, alcohol, drugs, positive thinking or weird religions makes,of course, also the awakening impossible. It is lost in a fog, the same old fog where you have already spent so many years of your life.