The Emotional Distortion of Reality

How do you view the today’s political landscape?

Well, if you are a Democrat your view is very bleak, very dark. 

You feel like the biblical end of the world has arrived, and the Antichrist is taking over.

You feel like the hope has died and a great sense of despair is covering the nation.

You feel like inevitably a great disaster is about to happen.

On the other hand, if you are a Republican, things are looking pretty rosy.

Finally, it looks like we are coming out of the darkness and the long promised changes are here.

Hope is on the rise and finally, commonsense and order is coming back to the nation.

You feel like inevitably great things are about to happen.

I may not be 100% percent in my perception but no matter how you phrase it one thing is for sure.

At this moment there is a great divide splitting the nation into two opposite fractions.

One question probably has popped in your head. I know it did to me.

How come these two different, antagonistic views of the political landscape can coexist?

The answer is very simple. The other guys have lost their minds.

People have lost their common sense, their moral compass and are acting like a herd of lemurs heading for the precipice under the spell of a corrupt political system and a corrupt media.

They are just a bunch of lunatics, ignorant mental retards that have completely lost touch with reality and are about to have a rude awakening.

Right?

Maybe not. The irony is just too thick.

Maybe we should stop and ask again, this time very impartial, objective without any bias.

How can two people look at the same picture and see two different things?

Here is one explanation: They are wearing colored glasses.  That’s right.

If you are wearing dark, smoky colored glasses, everything you look at will be dark and gloomy.

If you are wearing pink colored glasses, everything will look pink and perky.

Emotions are colored glasses for our brains.

Whatever we look at is colored by what we feel at the moment.

Have you ever been in love?

When you are in love you can wake up in a rain storm, have a flat tire on your way to work, be late and have your boss yell at you and when your love calls you feel like you had the best day of your life.

Take the same scenario and run it without the feeling of love. Not as rosy anymore, right?

Now take that a notch down. Play that scenario when you are depressed.

Feeling like committing suicide at the end of the day, right?

That is the power our emotions have on how we see our reality.

Reality is the only truth and in order to see the truth, we have to remove our emotional colored glasses.

Yes, it is easier said than done, but not impossible.

It all starts with being aware of our emotions at the time we are trying to define the reality of an actual state or event.

Are you emotionally charged? Then your reasoning and your conclusion are distorted.

If your charge is positive you are seeing the reality better than it actually is.

If your emotions are negative, you are seeing the reality worse than it is.

The only way to know what the reality is to look at the world non-judgmentally, to look at the world without emotions.

Steady practice of meditation and mindfulness is the only way to see the truth.

Liberated from the prison of reason we can witness reality as it unfolds.

When we drop off our Ego we can start realizing the truth.

What the world needs is not a better political system or better technology or more money.

What the world needs is better people and we can start by becoming better ourselves.

The Meaningful Principle

What is the meaning of life?

There is no definitive answer to that question.

If you are a Christian the meaning of life should be Love as the Christ teaching professes.

If you are a Buddhist the meaning of life should be enlightenment.

If you are not very spiritual the meaning of life would be success.

But all of these answers are not very practical they do not tell you what you should do, how should you live your life.

Let’s look at some real people and what the meaning their life had.

Mother Theresa. Her life meaning was helping the poor.

Gandhi, his name is synonymous with non-violence. He dedicated his life to freedom.

Einstein dedicated his life to finding the laws of time and space

Mozart, music, Michelangelo, art Hillary politics, Warren Buffet, money and so on and so forth.

We define the meaning our lives by the things we do, by the aspirations we have.

We may not have very high expectations, maybe we are just trying to give our kids a good education or planning to travel and explore the world. We may want to better ourselves through spiritual practice or by reading and learning constantly new things.

Whatever we do gives meaning to our life.

We do not spend much time thinking about the meaning of our lives.

We are almost on an automatic pilot. Going to work, paying the bills, doing what is necessary to survive.

But life should be more than that. We should strive to make a difference to live a mark in this world.

Besides surviving we should all have a dream.

Well. Some of us do and most of the time that dream becomes a frustrating thing in our life.

We would like to live the dream but the reality is forcing us to do otherwise.

We are constantly in a time or money crisis, not to mention the other problems life throws in our paths.

So how do we deal with that, how do we keep focused on the dream?

One method I found out it works for me is the “Meaning” principle.

The meaning principle states that if you do meaningful things, your life will automatically have meaning.

If you do things that have no meaning your existence is meaningless.

How does it work?

Whenever you are ready to start something, or whenever you are doing or not doing something you have to stop and ask a simple question: What is the meaning of my action?

Let’s say you are playing a game on your computer – I choose this example because I found myself quite often in the situation J

You have to stop and ask yourself: What is the meaning of my action? What is the purpose of playing this game?

Of course playing a game has no purpose and therefore no meaning, it is simply a waste of time.

You will hate doing this kind of enquiring into your actions but eventually, you will come to the realization that you can achieve your dreams only by doing meaningful actions.

And if you keep on looking for meaning in every moment of your life, your actions will focus on the path of accomplishing your dreams.

Go ahead give it a try and let me know how it works for you.

The Tao of Humor

“Don’t take life too seriously.

You’ll never get out of it alive”

-          Elbert Hubbard

I was born with a funny bone.

Since I can remember I was the clown, the joker and the troublemaker of the group.

In my youth that special talent landed me in trouble many times and I spent countless hours in the principal’s office because of it.

Being a funny guy made me very popular among my peers but not very popular with the authorities.

They tried in vain to make me renounce my funny ways and in the end, they all gave up.

It was in my genes… Or was it?

My mother was probably one of the most intelligent human beings I have ever encountered.

Her mind was closer to a Vulcan mind than a human, just to give you a reference point.

She had the reasoning power and speed I imagine super-computers have.

A truly analytical mind, but Z-E-R-O sense of humor.

I would come from school, run into the kitchen, and shout;

-          Mom, I got a joke for you!

-          Well, what is it?

-          Why do blind people hate to skydive?

She would pause and think about it. Really think about it.

-          I don’t know. Why do blind people hate to skydive?

-          It scares the hell of the dogs! HA!

She will ponder for another minute. I could hear her brain buzzing.

-          I don’t get it. Why is that funny?

-          Well you know blind people have service dogs and they have to drag them out of the planes… get it?

-          No, I don’t… That is not funny, that is just plain mean... Please don’t tell that joke anymore. We love animals…

DISCLAIMER: No dogs or blind people were harmed during this joke.

Why do we laugh when a person falls down on a flat of stairs?

Why is that even funnier if the person is a little old lady?

Why are pain, violence, disaster, prejudice, racism, chauvinism, stupidity, absurdity and ignorance funny?

Is God trying to tell us something and we don’t get it?

Let’s summarize human life in two opposite and extreme examples:

1)      You are born in most favorable circumstances, you are well raised and educate, you accomplish success, power, fame, and fortune, you have everything you have dreamed of including perfect health and then YOU DIE!

2)      You are born in most unfavorable circumstances, you are badly raised and educate, you are a total failure in everything you try, never acquiring any power, fame or fortune, you have nothing you have dreamed of, you have rotten health and then YOU DIE!

So now let’s contemplate the two scenarios:

Do you think life is funny or do you think life is serious business?

If you think life is funny then you got the TAO of humor and no explanation is needed.

If you think life is serious business, then you don’t get the TAO of humor and no explanation is possible.

Life is hilarious. Why? Because it is and you can’t explain a joke.

Actually, you can but it will not make the joke any funnier. AU contraire!

OK, I’ll leave you with another story. Maybe this will help you understand the TAO of humor.

I love camping and one Memorial Day I took my family camping in the Yosemite Mountains.

We found a perfect spot to set our tent. A sandy wash that had no rocks and it was perfectly flat.

Outdoor people will understand why a flat spot is so important when you setup a tent.

As for the rest, just trust me; it was a perfect spot.

We did all the fun stuff you do when camping; hiking, lighting a camp fire, cooking some camp classic food, roasting marshmallows, telling jokes and stories, playing games around the camp fire late into the night and finally going to bed under a spectacular starry sky.

It was towards the first hour of the dawn when the sound of raindrops on the canopy of the tent woke us up. I look out at the sky and it didn’t look that bad. The forecast for that day was sunny weather but in the mountain, weather can be unpredictable. I decided we can make it and went back to sleep.

When I woke up our tent was flooded. The perfect spot we choose for our tent was a water wash path (that explained the flat sandy spot on the top of the mountain)

The rain had subsided to a drizzle but the water coming down the slope was filling up our tent.

We grabbed some pots and pans and frantically started scooping up the water, needless to say, very unsuccessfully.

A park ranger stopped his Jeep in front of our camp site. He approached us with a big green on his face. Obviously, for him the situation was funny.

-          Good morning folks, how’s it going?

I was a bit irritated by his attitude and said to him:

-          Why don’t you stop laughing and give us a hand instead?

-          Sure thing. I will as soon you move the tent out of the water wash to a higher ground.

You know that Homer Simpson face “Oh duh?” That was me after realizing how stupid I was.

We picked up the tent and moved it out of the wash to higher ground and voila, the water just naturally drained out of the tent. Reluctantly I thanked the ranger and he drove in his merry way.

So do you think that was funny or do you think that was unfortunate?

This is the Tao of humor: At the time I thought it was a disaster but now I think it was damn funny.

So do you think your life is pretty serious stuff, hard, stressful or even depressing?

Well, you know what I think? I think life is hilarious!

And then you die 😊

The Amnesia Conspiracy

What is your earliest memory?

I cannot remember any of my early years of life and neither can you.

All I can recall of that time are random images or incidents, fragments of memories that seem lost forever.

If it was just me I would say I am just one of the people with bad memory, but this strange occurrence is common to all human beings.

It is a grand conspiracy against our memories.

Why is that?

It doesn’t make any sense.

Like a brand-new computer, a child mind doesn’t contain much information.

The memory space is wide open and like a sponge ready to learn and absorb all new information.

But all the new experiences of my childhood are lost.

My first Spring. The smell of a flower for the first time. My first rain, my first rainbow. My first summer my first snow. My first walk or the test of my first strawberry.

All of this amazing new experiences I once had, all of these mind-blowing firsts, are gone.

Why and how?

I have these vivid memories from when I was about 5 or 6 of me playing scenarios of naval battles.

Not just any battles but War World II Pacific Air Carrier battles.

There are many occasions of me playing by myself.

I was in my living room, on the rug arranging random objects in complicated battle formations and playing out loud intense aerial attacks and maneuvers.

I didn’t have any boat toys so instead, I used everyday objects, ashtrays, boxes of crayons, plates and kitchen utensils.

It may seem strange to you that I didn’t have any toys but I wasn’t an American boy this happened in Eastern Europe in the late 50’s early 60’s. While America was experiencing the after the war boom Europe and Especially Eastern Europe – the Communist part – was still recovering from the ravages of war. For Christmas, I would get clothes and new shoes, maybe one toy and if lucky chocolate and oranges.

What was really odd is that the Pacific War was unknown in the Eastern Europe.

All the propaganda, all the newspapers, books, and films were about the heroic Red Army victory against the Nazi Germany. America was seldom mentioned and the Pacific war never happened.

I found out about that part of WW II history in 1983 after defecting to the US.

I remember buying a $40 small black and white TV. The one with the rabbit ears antenna on the top.

That TV was my first English teacher and my introduction to the American society, culture, and History.

It was on that small TV I first saw the Pacific War unfolding and it was at that time I first remembered my naval battles in my living room.

Until then all those memories were locked in my brain and my access to them was restricted.

This happens to every person in the world and if you ever had this strange feeling that somebody or something is censoring your brain, you were right.

The Amnesia Conspiracy is not a myth, a wacky conspiracy theory, it is a fact.

We are born without an Ego. We are all born with a primordial mind, a clear mind untainted by evil and vice.

It is our original self, the original and you, unaltered perfect consciousness.

As we start growing we are taught new skills like walking and talking and also Reasoning.

The Reasoning is supposed to be a tool in the service of our higher self.

Around  6-7 years old our Reasoning undergoes a transformation aself-realizationn.

The Reason proclaims “I think therefore I am” I am,  I the “Ego” not you, the “Primordial” mind.

It is a coup d’état. The Ego takes over, the servant becomes the master.

The original mind gets thrown in the prison of reason destined to be forgotten

You are now “John” or “Mary” or whatever your Ego calls itself, not what you were before that.

Everything that happened before the rise of the Ego gets censored, blocked from your consciousness.

You will live now forever as Ego, as “John” or “Mary”

But all those memories are not lost, your primordial self never dies. It is after all the immortal part of you.

All those memories are still in your mind and it just takes an incident, like the one that happened to me, to resurface into the consciousness.

And there is another proof. People under hypnosis can also access those “forgotten” memories.

So if you want to know who you really are or just to relieve the old good days before the Ego took over just start digging.

The truth is out there!

The Creation of Wealth

There is only one way to create wealth: CREATIVITY

There are only two ways to amass very large amounts of money:

One – Create Wealth

Two – Steal it

The rest of us who are not creators or thieves are just tools for the ones that are.

We’re the workers making it all possible, keeping the system running.

There are thousands of ways of making a living, too many to mention and too unimportant to analyze.

Working for a living will not make you rich.

The richest man in the world (at some point in time) was Bill Gates.

He and others like him, Steve Forbes, Henry Ford, Mark Zuckerberg, Ellan Musk and many more like them are CREATORS.

Creators create wealth by offering to society necessary products or services.

There are also other people with very large bank accounts, people like J P Morgan, Charles Schwab or Warren Buffet.

They make money by taking it from the wealth creators.

They have created a system that forces people in debt by making it almost impossible to function in the society, unless you are extremely rich, without using their system.

You have to know all this in order to understand the “Golden Rule”

“He who has the Gold makes the rules”

This society was not been built for your benefit but for the benefit of the rich.

The notion of democracy and the myth of the American dream were fabricated to keep the people hoping and somehow believing in a future they will never have.

The best you can do is make a living, maybe save some money for retirement and hope not to die before your savings run out.

My advice to you. Stop making a living it will only have you killed.

The easiest way to make a lot of money is to steal it.

The problem with that is that if you were not born rich, you are not allowed to steal and if you do you will end up in jail. Not a very good way to spend your life.

The second-best way to become financially independent is to employ your creativity.

What people do not understand is that you can do that right here and now.

If you want to build personal computers in your garage and sell them to millions of people or if you can make a painting and sell thousands of copies online, the principle is the same.

The scope and size of your enterprise may be different but the principle is the same:

You have to offer other people a product or service they want.

Do you have a passion, a talent something unique to offer to the society?

Then you have it. You are in business.

Have you ever heard of “Famous Amos” who became a millionaire by selling chocolate chip cookies?

Well, that’s the way you do it.

People believe you must have the next greatest invention, a revolutionary new product nobody has ever made. WRONG

People believe you must have a large amount of money and time to invest. WRONG.

People believe that you must have the business knowledge to run a business. WRONG again.

I used to work with a fellow named Mike. He started selling homemade candles as a side business.

I watched him starting from nothing.

He started by selling candles to his coworkers on special occasions like Valentine’s Day or Christmas.

I helped him setup his first online website.

He had no business plans, no ambition no grand expectations.

He just loved what he was doing and he kept on doing it.

He started by making a few dollars profit here and there and then a couple of hundreds every month.

He developed relationships with people and his little side business grew and grew.

Eventually, he had to cut his regular working hours in half to tend to his online business and then to quit his employment entirely and become self-employed.

I’m not saying that he is making a fortune in his new business but he is making a living doing what he loves. And that should be what all of us and our children should strive for.