Sometimes we really don't know how to help ourselves. We want to be happy, but we really don't know what would make us happy. Death waits for us all, reminding us that we will lose all this, lose our bodies, lose all our friends, lovers, family. "You can't take it with you." Religion offers us comforting stories, which can often appear to be just as childish and magical as tales of the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus. Faith in such stories is inevitably accompanied by a shadow of doubt, and many of us reject them outright. But what, then, is the meaning of our life and death?
We are not like cats and dogs. We have more imagination, we have our language and our thinking. We need to know why. Animals don't. Our consciousness is different from the consciousness of animals. It is more developed. At the same time, in all honesty, very often the consciousness of animals seems to be more effective than ours. Animals very seldom seem to be at a loss regarding how to help themselves. They might be frustrated by an obstacle, like a fence. Usually they give their best effort to get over, under, around or through, and then give up if it is impossible for them. They don't acquire a mental disorder over it. But we do acquire all kinds of mental disorders, so called, and many people become dependent on "shrinks" and pills. I know, because I am a "shrink" myself.
Human problems are unique to humans. Like all forms of life, we have needs, and we are responsible to help ourselves to get our needs met. For animals and plants, this process is natural. If organisms can help themselves, they will. If they can't, those needs will go unmet for the present. Eventually their needs will be fatally unmet, as with us. For animals, it isn't a problem. For us, it is.
None of us can walk in anyone else's shoes. We cannot observe anyone else's experience, and we certainly can't observe the experience of animals. But we can try to empathize. Animals can't tell us, except by their behavior, that we really don't understand at all, or that we do, but people can, which is one reason why I became a professional counselor.
If it is true, and I think that it obviously is true, that human problems are created by our consciousness because it is more developed than animals, then is it not logical to look to our consciousness in our quest for self help? I think that the condition of our consciousness is extremely chaotic. It is more developed than animals', but the development of our consciousness has gone wrong. Metaphorically, it is like a city where once there was the natural world, a city with skyscrapers, slums, suburban sprawl and all the chaotic activity of our thoughts. Our development has gone wrong, and that is the trouble with us. What to do about it, in one's own consciousness?
Many of us have never considered the condition of our own, personal, individual consciousness. I, on the other hand, have been not only considering this, but also intermittently actively working on my own consciousness, by means of practicing awareness of reality, for more than 40 years. It is evident, if you think about it at all, that our consciousness should be synonymous with awareness of reality. It isn't, and that is the trouble with us. It is the cause of our mental disorders and the source of our human problems. There is no more reason why life should be a problem for a human being than for any other organism. Life is a gift, and to live as a human being, with our talent of consciousness, is an even greater gift. Why do you think that Genesis tells us that we were created in God's image? Do you think that God has a body like ours- male, of course, with a beard? No, Genesis is not suggesting any such ridiculous idea. It is our human consciousness that is our shining silver talent, and woe to us if we fail to develop it. And you aren't developing yours, which is why you have to experience woe. I haven't developed mine sufficiently either, but at least I know how to work, and I am not lazy all the time. I can even be grateful for my suffering at times, because it reminds me that I need to wake up to reality. And this is a great benefit of this practice: it makes sense of our suffering, and offers a readily available method of working for reconciliation with reality. It is the same as reconciliation with God. We are estranged from the reality of God because of the condition of our consciousness. Sure, we will see God when we die. That's no big accomplishment. You won't be able to help it. I hope that great enlightenment will not reveal to you that you have completely wasted your gift of life.
Our consciousness at the present time has two characteristics that cripple our awareness of reality. In the first place it is chaotic. Our attention flits around and it is divided. Sometimes we say that we are "multi-tasking," as if this were a virtue. Who says that we have to do several things at once? Who is our slavemaster? But distraction is a way of life with us, at all times. We don't know how to keep our attention simple.
In the second place, our consciousness is dominated by our thinking. Thinking is a very useful servant to us, but a bad master. Thinking is inseparable from language. Language consists of narratives or stories, which always express only partial aspects of reality. In allowing thinking to rule our consciousness, we give up our possibility of being aware of reality. Plato was talking about this in his Allegory of the Cave. The parable of The Blind Men and the Elephant is also trying to explain our situation- your situation, as a person whose consciousness is under the heel of your own thinking.
And where do our thoughts come from? From our culture, of course. Every person whose consciousness is led around by the nose by thinking is a slave to one's upbringing and culture. This is not a free being, made in God's image.
Practicing real consciousness, awareness of reality, will show you the state of your own consciousness beyond any shadow of doubt. It will also prove to you that real consciousness is possible for you. It will give you a sure means of self help. It doesn't detract from all the other ordinary ways that we need to help ourselves. Your life will go on, you will continue to have your own individual needs, biological, animal, human, and you will continue to try to help yourself to getting them met. Enlightenment will only help you.
As I was taught, I encourage you to practice awareness of reality in your life, rather than thinking of it as taking time off to meditate. There is no such thing as taking time off from life. We live 24 hours every day. We have needs at all times, we behave at all times, we are responsible at all times, and we need awareness at all times. Of course we need to sleep, and you will soon discover if you try that awareness, although theoretically possible at every waking moment, is very often practically impossible. That is because we have no dexterity in practicing awareness of reality. It is like learning to ride a bicycle. Efforts to practice this, if made correctly, are rewarding for a person. This practice will help you. There are indications and instructions in previous posts on this blog of how to begin. Try this, and let me know your results. This is a great opportunity for you. You will not find this kind of guidance on your T.V. or at the supermarket. Your friends and family don't know about it. It will not be mentioned by the so-called liberals, conservatives, or even by the Tea Party. Your psychiatrist or psychologist don't know a damned thing about it, and neither does your minister, pastor or priest, in spite of the fact that Jesus Christ was talking exactly about this.
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