Life’s Complex
Ever take the time to think about why you do what you do? What motivates you? Pleasure, pain, ideals? In the journey of life, people are drawn toward some shores and distressed by others. To make the most of their circumstances and time in this world, they make choices—both conscious and unconscious—that they believe are for the best. And as you know, the results vary. At times folks have fun and feel satisfied, at others, they cringe and wince from all the pain and stress. Regardless of your current philosophy, religion or beliefs, perhaps you’d agree that life can be both very beautiful and very ugly? And that happiness is desirable but misery is not? So, according to human standards, life has got half of the story right. Unfortunately there is no easy escape from the other half, the demons of misfortune and sorrow, even though this is and has always been the favorite pastime of all humans—including now, you.
Everyone wants fun and good times; no one really wants pain and destitution. Yet if you were asked, “How come? Why all the heartbreak in this world?” what would you say? No doubt you’d have a good answer. It might be a religious one. It might be a scientific one. It might be something entirely different. But no doubt you would find some way to complete the task even if it were just to say, “I don’t know.” Although confronted with one of the most pressing and fundamental questions around, you probably didn’t have a major life changing experience formulating a reply. That’s it! That’s the first contextual clue we all need to understand: Life in the modern world is so bewilderingly complex. Its pace is insane and demands many. Other than philosophers and mystics, who’s got time to fully ponder such a fundamental question, much less act upon it? No one. We all have answers to the big questions in life but they are usually a little too tidy. That is, they may reflect our concern and thoughtfulness but are a compromise between the need to get on with life—pick up the groceries, drop off the kids, get away for the weekend—and the need to make sense of the whole of life itself—why am I here, why all the suffering?
In essence, people are bound by their culture. Kept too busy to fully appreciate the mystery of life and their own fundamental nature, they settle for the more conventional solutions that society offers them—solutions that reward conformity and stability but which mostly deny them access to the essence of their soul and spirit. Fortunately though, the frenzy of modern society is a human fabrication. Nature and the deeper reality of Spirit speak a different language. They constantly woo us and whisper to us. However, mostly they are altogether too much right in our faces for our liking. They speak the truth. Do we listen much? Pain, the miracle of birth, the mystery of death, the vastness of eternity, the contrasts of great and small, the colors, tastes and smells of life—what to make of such things?
This is puzzling but understandable. You have lived in the world for a number of years and now have some set of experiences, beliefs and habits. Meanwhile, both the human and natural worlds are throwing demands and distractions at you nonstop. And what do you do? Most people simply opt for what rocks the boat the least. If there is no major catastrophe looming, they continue on with their lifestyle. The puzzle is that life constantly informs folks about real disasters and real opportunities—current and coming—about which they do nothing. The earlier question on heartbreak is one example. You were informed that lots of it goes around and yet managed to fit that into your current set of beliefs and actions without the need for much soul searching.
The same thing would happen if you were pressed about any other topic, difficult or otherwise. For instance, ever hear of poverty? Sure you have. Maybe you’ve even seen some or had the luxury of experiencing it yourself for a while. Guess what? Some poor adults die from malnutrition and hunger. Guess what? Poor little kids do too. Guess how many? Try this: one child under the age of five dies from malnutrition or lack of safe water and sanitation every six seconds. That comes to about 14, 500 kids every day. When considering other poverty-related causes like disease and marginalization, the total doubles. You know, that means that about eleven million little ones go missing each year. Eleven million. And we weep buckets for the loss of one family member. What would you say if asked why you don’t shed more tears for those eleven million other cute little kids? Are they somehow less precious than the ones you know? How much more motivated would you be to do something if it were your own kid on the line?
Again, of course you probably will come up with a good answer of some sort. Perhaps you’re saying, “I know all that. I am doing all I can to help others and the world. And that’s that.” Whatever your response, why is it that you’re back in your cozy world reading a book again? What happened to the incredible reality of immense and needless human suffering? It seems to be scoring low on your motivation scale at the moment.
Life is like this. Some things matter a lot and others don’t. What’s important when, changes too. You might be very passionate about human rights and giving a hand up to those less fortunate than you but right now you’re set on reading the book. Later, you will have different priorities. The fundamental challenge with this way of doing business is that much of what motivates us comes from levels of our being that we generally do not have ready access to. So, consciously a person may choose to act one way yet end up acting totally at odds to her supposed goal. “I’m going to lose some weight.” And the next moment, “Yum, that chocolate sure looks good. A bite or two won’t hurt!” But, of course, it does. Fortunately, scientists and spiritual teachers have told us all about the details of why this happens. It turns out that there are psychological, social and spiritual factors that affect our every choice. For instance, consciously you think one thing but the social pressure to fit in forces you to change your tune and say something else. Or, you follow a cook-book recipe to the letter and still the cake flops. Or, you win the lotto, fall in love and make some great new friends all on the same day. How’d that happen? The complexity of all these conscious and unconscious forces is what makes life interesting and a challenge.
So, the first barebones fact relates to complexity: nature is multidimensional and operates at both seen and unseen levels. Quantum physics and the other sciences help cover the waterfront for the seen levels and many of the unseen levels, for instance dynamics at both quantum and cosmological scales impact on humans. Yet other unseen levels still unexplored by conventional science are largely documented in the spiritual literature and by spiritual masters. These levels relate to our nature as souls or spiritual beings. Because humans are part of life, we too are multidimensional and affected across all these levels which can be taken as a triune spectrum spanning body, heart-mind and spirit.
People generally have a very limited window on this triune spectrum so they often fail to make their life the masterpiece it was meant to be. By acting from such a restricted vantage, folks in effect allow other animate and inanimate forces too much impact on the results of their efforts. Furthermore, because of its maddening pace, modern society greatly amplifies the challenges and stresses ordinarily bestowed upon mankind by nature. This serves to keep people stuck in even narrower confines of wakefulness. Society and nature both reward stability so any time dissonant information accosts people they usually manage to filter it out in some way. This inbuilt cognitive adaptation helps preserve their sense of well-being and the status quo but curtails the ability to adapt to new demands. Fortunately nature also endows each person with a drive to learn and grow. Personal growth occurs when one moves beyond the comfort of the known and familiar to learn more about all levels of triune nature.
So, in the game of life, the problem is awareness. By getting more in touch with your body, heart, mind and spirit, you can begin to access a larger window on the triune spectrum of nature. By doing this, you have access to greater authority and control. You have more of a say in how your life plays out. This simply follows from the dynamics of nature: each moment is a vote cast by countless factors both seen and unseen. For humans, the major factors are conscious intention, unconscious psychological processes and both personal and transpersonal spiritual patterns. Other pages on this website have explored each of these factors in depth to provide you the essential barebones techniques needed to harness them. This will enable you to achieve greater well-being and realize all your wished for outcomes.
Summary
1. Consciously we want good and avoid bad but get mixed results
2. Life is complex (multidimensional) so we are too
3. We act from a limited vantage (mostly conscious level) so other forces impact the results of our efforts
4. Common sense says that we should access these other levels and use them to help achieve our goals
5. We are programmed by nature to learn about them but nature also rewards stability so folks disregard experiences that are out of align with their beliefs and expectations; personal growth occurs when one moves beyond the comfort of the known and familiar to learn more about all levels of triune nature
6. The knowledge about the what and how of these other levels is available
