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I Killed Myself

Dead, gone and forgotten. My "self" is dead. I no longer have to defend it. I no longer have to worry if it is going to heaven or hell or what karma or sin it has or if it will reincarnate into a bat. It is dead, I killed it.

Boy, what a difference a dead self makes. Of course, it does not mean that there is not worry for this piece of carcass known as Jim, but the carcass is just a tool, a vehicle, a toy to be played with until it is worn out then thrown away. "I" don't have to worry about it anymore because "I" am dead.
You might ask, "How did you kill yourself if you are still here?" Well, “I” am not here, the body is. “I” am dead. At least the part of Jim that thinks of himself as a body or a separate being with beginning and end.

I killed myself by looking for the self. Eventually I saw that the self is just a thought, an electro-magnetic impulse traveling around the brain/body mechanism. When I fully let go of focusing on anything, particularly the sensations in the body/brain, then the instrument relaxed, let go and stop creating any more impulses, including the impulse known as ‘self’.

Or course, acknowledging that this happened was another impulse which brought back the original impulse of self. BUT, the power of the idea or thought known as self had been broken and has diminished ever since.

It is wonderful being free from the grip that my ‘self’ had on me. No longer is there worry about ‘my’ career. Karma and sin have no meaning. Since “I” am no longer important then ‘my’ world is no longer important. Hell, I can now see that nothing in the manifested universe is important so why worry about anything. It is all here just for the fun of it. All is meaningless (unless I want to play with meaning and create meaning for it). All is vanity.

Even writing this is vanity, but it is also a lot of fun.
Now I am free to enjoy and love ALL that life has to offer.
Yet, habits die hard and the habit of thinking about my ‘self’ is strong. Sometimes there is forgetting that the self is not real and I go back to worrying about it. Usually I wake back up by myself but sometimes it take a true friend, one who really cares about me, to stun me back awake by confronting my silly idea that I am real or important or that I matter or that anything I could ever do mattered or that anything anyone could do or has ever done could really matter.

Sometimes a go a long time before I wake back up. In those times I wish I had more friends who really cared about me enough to jolt me back awake. So I have dedicated my life (Opps, there I go again, like it is ‘my’ life in the first place, silly me) to waking up others so that they can wake me up when I fall asleep. AND, so they can also fully enjoy and love ALL that life has to offer.

Wait, OTHERS???? There I go again, thinking there are ‘others’ in the universe. How can that be if “I” have no beginning or end, I therefore must be infinite and all inclusive. In infinity there can be no ‘other’ so there are no others. Ah, then I am not waking up ‘others’ so they can fully enjoy and love ALL that life has to offer; I am waking the REST of me up to fully enjoy and love ALL that life has to offer.

Phew, that was a lot of work. Ah, but it is worth it. What greater gift can I give to myself (and all there other ‘selves’ of me out there) that to wake up to enjoy this perfect world and universe?

Does anybody want to join me?

Unnecessary Suffering

I am really sad to see people abusing themselves emotionally just over something someone said to them. It is a sad world that programs us to abuse ourselves just so others can control and manipulate us. I am really glad I took the time and effort to overcome the world's ability to stimulate my self abusive behavior. ... I would really like to find a way to share this ability/skill with others.

We can all overcome the world's ability to stimulate our self-abusive behavior IF we are willing to take the time and effort to develop the skills necessary.

It is pretty obvious that the skill of controlling our bowels and bladder improves the quality of our life experience, for we no longer need to wear diapers. But most people have no idea that they can learn to control their emotional self-abusive behavior with just a little bit of awareness and effort. Anger, fear, guilt, shame, doubt, pessimism and all forms of negative or unattractive emotional and mental states and with consciousness we can choose to experience these or not. We can also choose happiness, joy, love, peace, freedom and we can choose to see beauty in all that life offers.

But all this takes skill and practice just as it took awareness and effort to develop the skills of walking, controlling our bowels and bladder, riding a bike, driving a car or most anything else.

There is no greater gift we can give ourselves or others than the gift of UNCONDITIONAL happiness, joy, love, peace and freedom.

Religion & Believing

The value of religion is to keep the gullible masses in check. Unfortunately the apposing forces of domination, the trouble makers like Jesus or myself have not been doing our job in stimulating the masses to question the authority of the religions or wake them up from their unconscious gullibility.

Religions are not like educational systems that have a program in which if you follow it you will eventually graduate from the system. Instead religions want to keep you bond to them indefinitely: perpetual bondage.

As there are some dogs that seem too stupid to understand the dangers of life in a city where there are cars on the road, there are people who are too stupid to understand the dangers of life in a world where there are unscrupulous people who will injury or harm them. Many of those unscrupulous people work in churches and states, religion and government, but they are not always as unscrupulous as some other people who could do greater harm.

BUT, this is how nature works to get rid of stupid people and stupid creatures; it allows them to get run over by cars. Hence, because of religions and governments we have a world over populated by stupid people who are destroying their own planet.

Why People Believe

People choose to believe something because they do not have actual knowledge of something but the THOUGHT of that something is emotionally attractive. They want that which they believe to be true.

For instance, they believe that an airplane they are about to fly on is going to function appropriately and that they pilot is competent. They don’t know this to be a fact but want it to be true. The belief calms their mind somewhat.

The same thing happens in religious beliefs. A religious believer have some beliefs that are creating discomfort for them so they choose other beliefs to give them comfort from the first set of belief.

If they would just question their original assumptions till they can see that those are not real then they would have no need to lie to themselves about the other beliefs.

The Value of Sloth & Apathy

When I think of sloth I am reminded of something that Jesus said, “Come unto me all ye who labor and are heavy burdened and I shall give you rest” (Matt 11:29). Then I think about the “Protestant Work Ethic and how Protestant Christianity teaches people to work harder and be slaves who are “good servants to their masters” (Paul’s language). Christians are taught to believe, obey and submit to the ruling classes. Yet this is NOT what Jesus taught or did…it was NOT Jesus’ way or truth.
Sloth is called one of the Seven Deadly Sins and is defined at disinclination toward work or effort. I don’t remember any stories of Jesus or Siddhartha (Buddha) working really hard.

If you were an owner of slaves would you want somebody like Jesus to hang around your slaves or would you rather have somebody like Paul who would teach them to be good servants to their masters? It does not take a genius to see that Paul and his minions (Christians) would be more valuable to the slave owners than Jesus and other Christs.

Apathy is defined as a lack of feeling, emotion, interest or concern. It can also be seen and detachment, being above the world, contentment, equanimity, indifference and peace.
If people want peace then they have to let go of caring, quit storing your treasures here on earth where anything can attack them. This means not caring even out your “self”, your body, mind and/or soul.
This does not mean that you NEVER care or have emotion, feeling, interest or concern, only that when you are tired and need rest that you stop caring while you rest. This is like breathing in and breathing out, both are necessary for you to be healthy, both have their time.

My Contention with Christianity

I like Jesus. I have been and am inspired by Jesus. As a young man when I came to my midlife crisis I was inspired by Jesus to seek a way out of my feelings of being trapped in a meaningless world. I realized I wanted what Jesus had. I did not know what that was at the time, I just knew that I wanted whatever it was that he had had.

I also knew from previous experience that I could not go to Christians for help in this regard. I say this because my experience of Christians and Christianity was perfectly reflected by Gandhi when he said, “I like your Christ but I don’t care for your Christians; for your Christians are so unlike their Christ.”

Here is the crux, Christians don’t follow Jesus’ way, truth or life, they follow the apostles, particularly Paul. In the bible Paul admits that when he started out his mission was to turn people away from Jesus’ way and, as he puts it, bring that back to sound doctrine.

I sought to find what Jesus found and found it. I did not follow the Christian way; I pretty much followed Jesus’ way. When I went to share this with the Christians all I got was resistance and rejection. As I looked into why Christians resisted my way (and Jesus’ way) I found several particular points that Christianity teaches AGAINST Jesus’ way.

First, Jesus did not think of himself as a sinner and taught that neither should we (Matt 5:48, “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.”) Being perfect means to be whole and complete, lacking nothing, without flaw. Perfection, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. If we actually try to do what the bible tells us then we will NOT take of the tree of knowledge of good and evil; in other words, we will not think we know what is good and what is evil, what is righteous and what is sinful. Or, to put it as Jesus did, we would be innocent as children to enter the kingdom of heaven. I also feel he was saying the same thing when he said, “Great is the God that reveals the truth unto babes but hides it from the wise and learned one (Mt 11:25).” The learned ones are those who think they know what is righteous and what is sinful.

The one who called himself the Apostle Paul taught that “all have sinned.” Christians who follow Paul’s faithless doctrine think that no one can perfect as Jesus was perfect. This is NOT true. Paul’s statement is obviously false (to me) for if ALL have sinned then that all must include Jesus. Yet most, if not all Christians than confess that Jesus was without sin. Therefore that proves that ALL have not sinned. But because Christians have been taught to treasure scriptures as inerrant they get trapped in a bind when shown that this is not true, so they cannot talk about it further.

Jesus started his ministry by telling people to “repent” or completely change their ways of thinking. It is in our ways of thinking that effects the quality of our life experience. If we think like Jesus thought and how he suggested we think than we can experience that Kingdom of Heaven that is AT HAND, here, now, today.

I will try to point out more examples of the differences between Jesus' way and the apostles way (Christian way) in the future.

10 Things Science Says Will Make You Happy

by Jen Angel
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=3022#2

In the last few years, psychologists and researchers have been digging up hard data on a question previously left to philosophers: What makes us happy? Researchers like the father-son team Ed Diener and Robert Biswas-Diener, Stanford psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky, and ethicist Stephen Post have studied people all over the world to find out how things like money, attitude, culture, memory, health, altruism, and our day-to-day habits affect our well-being. The emerging field of positive psychology is bursting with new findings that suggest your actions can have a significant effect on your happiness and satisfaction with life. Here are 10 scientifically proven strategies for getting happy.

1) Savor Everyday Moments

Pause now and then to smell a rose or watch children at play. Study participants who took time to “savor” ordinary events that they normally hurried through, or to think back on pleasant moments from their day, “showed significant increases in happiness and reductions in depression,” says psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky.

2) Avoid Comparisons

While keeping up with the Joneses is part of American culture, comparing ourselves with others can be damaging to happiness and self-esteem. Instead of comparing ourselves to others, focusing on our own personal achievement leads to greater satisfaction, according to Lyubomirsky.

3) Put Money Low on the List

People who put money high on their priority list are more at risk for depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem, according to researchers Tim Kasser and Richard Ryan. Their findings hold true across nations and cultures. “The more we seek satisfactions in material goods, the less we find them there,” Ryan says. “The satisfaction has a short half-life—it’s very fleeting.” Money-seekers also score lower on tests of vitality and self-actualization.

4) Have Meaningful Goals

“People who strive for something significant, whether it’s learning a new craft or raising moral children, are far happier than those who don’t have strong dreams or aspirations,” say Ed Diener and Robert Biswas-Diener. “As humans, we actually require a sense of meaning to thrive.” Harvard’s resident happiness professor, Tal Ben-Shahar, agrees, “Happiness lies at the intersection between pleasure and meaning. Whether at work or at home, the goal is to engage in activities that are both personally significant and enjoyable.”

5) Take Initiative at Work

How happy you are at work depends in part on how much initiative you take. Researcher Amy Wrzesniewski says that when we express creativity, help others, suggest improvements, or do additional tasks on the job, we make our work more rewarding and feel more in control.

6) Make Friends, Treasure Family

Happier people tend to have good families, friends, and supportive relationships, say Diener and Biswas-Diener. But it’s not enough to be the life of the party if you’re surrounded by shallow acquaintances. “We don’t just need relationships, we need close ones” that involve understanding and caring.

7) Smile Even When You Don’t Feel Like It

It sounds simple, but it works. “Happy people…see possibilities, opportunities, and success. When they think of the future, they are optimistic, and when they review the past, they tend to savor the high points,” say Diener and Biswas-Diener. Even if you weren’t born looking at the glass as half-full, with practice, a positive outlook can become a habit.

8) Say Thank You Like You Mean It

People who keep gratitude journals on a weekly basis are healthier, more optimistic, and more likely to make progress toward achieving personal goals, according to author Robert Emmons. Research by Martin Seligman, founder of positive psychology, revealed that people who write “gratitude letters” to someone who made a difference in their lives score higher on happiness, and lower on depression—and the effect lasts for weeks.

9) Get Out and Exercise

A Duke University study shows that exercise may be just as effective as drugs in treating depression, without all the side effects and expense. Other research shows that in addition to health benefits, regular exercise offers a sense of accomplishment and opportunity for social interaction, releases feel-good endorphins, and boosts self-esteem.

10) Give It Away, Give It Away Now!

Make altruism and giving part of your life, and be purposeful about it. Researcher Stephen Post says helping a neighbor, volunteering, or donating goods and services results in a “helper’s high,” and you get more health benefits than you would from exercise or quitting smoking. Listening to a friend, passing on your skills, celebrating others’ successes, and forgiveness also contribute to happiness, he says. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn found that those who spend money on others reported much greater happiness than those who spend it on themselves.