Priorities

If you don't have time and energy for thinking, then you must change your lifestyle.  There are countless ways to make it possible to enter the spritual life.  But it needs courage foremost.

There are many myths that people use to avoid becoming wise.   The following is a selection of such myths.   It is neither difficult nor easy to stop bowing to them.

 

 

Myths about Life

Demolished by thinking, passion for truth, and courage

 

• I need to have a job to earn money to support myself.

  You need more to consider the biggest context: do you know what you are, in relation to the Infinite?   Is this not wisdom?  Is this not most important?  Thus, wisdom is your job.  If society prevents you from fulfilling your job, then you cannot pay any attention to what society demands of you.  It is your business to be wise, and to encourage all to have faith in reason - which is most reasonable!

  There are many options to support one's true job.  For example, if there is a welfare system in your country, use it with no shame, since you have chosen the highest: demolishing ignorance wherever it is encountered.   If you choose this option, you must be resolute and bear-up under much suffering, for many will try to coerce you to work like everyone else.

  If there is no welfare system at all in your country, neither disability support pensions nor jobsearch allowances, then you could:
  

  • ask your parents, relatives and friends if they will fund you;
  • form a small group of like-minded individuals to create a thinker's co-operative to pool your resources;
  • join a monastery (not recommended);
  • camp outside the office of the Minister for health, education, culture, housing, or justice, to educate him or her about your situation and to show your life-commitment;
  • busk in public malls if you are a musician, or read essays, aphorisms, scriptures, poetry, and other intellectually-stimulating material;
  • scavenge in dumpsters and rubbish tips and sell at internet auctions;
  • create small, cheap, good computer programs to sell on the internet;

  However you choose, it must allow you to overcome all attachments.   If you sense a conflict somewhere with your true thoughts, like developing a cherished talent perhaps, or keeping the respect of a friend, then count the cost. It is better to give it up now, than suffer for eternity.

 

• I have a girlfriend. I think I love her. We're thinking of marrying and having children.

  Does the world need more children? Is love wise? Does your girlfriend want you to become perfectly wise as soon as possible, without compromise? If not, it is better to give it up now.

  Love and happiness are both myths about life, and are not necessary.   In fact, life is better without them. Have you not noticed how insanely repetitive love-songs are?   One moment the lover is in heaven, the next in hell.  Ditto for happiness: it is an endless rollercoaster going up and down, pulled about by the nose by the emotions.

  Do you want to live in a vicious cycle? Reach the age of forty, find you no longer love, and feel cheated?

 

• I have huge debts to pay off - a mortgage, credit card, education, children, etc. I can't afford to live on a chickenfeed pension.

So young, and already a slave? At least make others aware of your mistake, and help them avoid repeating your blunder.

Yet all is not lost. You can rent your house, and live in a caravan on a small block of land. You can stop buying luxuries, and live frugally, then cancel your credit cards as soon as possible. You can apply for bankruptcy. Children can live more simply than you, because they haven't had the time to develop as many attachments - and thoroughly enjoy it.

 

• Our economy will collapse if everyone takes your advice. How can we afford to fund a nation of dole-bludging freaks?

  An economy should be based on a long-lasting, reliable system, not on slavery and coercion. Our economy relies on greed, and a serious lack of thought about consequences. That is a very unstable sort of economy. So, on the contrary, as more people live thinkingly and efficiently, by reversing debt and pollution, the economy becomes much more stable.

  The main reason people bludge on others is because they have been demoralised. They have no aim in life, no respect for reason, no sense of destiny, no trust in their own minds. Such people are consequences of an aimless, irrational, fatalistic, clone-creating society such as ours. We create the conditions for them, and then punish them by forcing them to work - further demoralising them and others! Can you not see this cycle? So, we cannot afford all the money wasted by not taking my advice.

  The wise man lives efficiently, not wasting anything. Instead of anxiously over-compensating when resources run low, creating further conditions for poverty and pollution, the wise man calmly tightens his belt and patiently follows Nature. How frugally and simply he lives! He drinks directly from a stream, throwing away his cup.

 

• What if I get sick? How will I afford health insurance, medicine, or a hospital fee?

  Thinking is not worrying. Most injuries are created by unthinking, and most illnesses by stresses on the body caused by worry. So, by entering the spiritual path, you are less likely to need medicines.  Moreover, the psychological effect of health insurance, medicine, and hospitals, is far more powerful than any real good they do. As such, they are mostly wasting money.

  However, if the lottery of life hands you cancer, a deadly serious virus, a car-collision, or the like, then you still have many options. There is usually a adequate if rough public health system to provide assistance; if not, you should use the warning to hurry up your progress towards meeting your spiritual goals. Weigh up the pros and cons: how much is your life worth to the Universe, vs. your wisdom? How likely are you to need medical assistance - and how much time and energy can you really spare to pay for it?