Thus have I heard...
The Problem of Thinking
"Before I played Hades, I had a small wiener, no friends, no girlfriend, depression, and absolutely no life. These things haven't changed, but the game is pretty good." -Logzybeats
I once listened to an anecdote, which I will now woefully paraphrase, that was spoken by a learned gentleman, who, by so doing conveyed a most valuable insight. This man was well travelled and had gone hither and thither spending "a lot of whiles," as my daughter once defined a long time, in the pursuit of learning. This fellow had attended a public dialogue with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. And the subject matter in deliberation here is based on a question that was asked by a westerner during the discourse. This person brought up the notion of negative self-talk, and so His Holiness began conversing in Tibetan with his translators.
The Dalai Lama speaks incredibly good English but had to spend more than "a lot of whiles" talking with his translators about this. There was an apparent difficulty. The process seemingly demanded a wisdom that surpasseth understanding to examine and ascertain what exactly had gone wrong. And the problem was, neither His Holiness nor his translators had an experiential basis to understand what negative self-talk is, because they simply do not encounter phenomenon such as this. This problem is essentially a western disease, as it were. And upon consideration of the gravity of the dilemma, His Holiness promptly turned to the enquirer and remarked concernedly, “Why would you ever let your mind get like that?”
A pretty good question for Homo Sapiens, incidentally, meaning “Wise Man.” The self-proclaimed intelligentsia superiorae, supposedly endowed with the divine faculties of reason and thought, and yet, cannot produce anything that even resembles a reasonable thought. The featherless biped instead holds up a plucked chicken, looks at it, and then declares, “I Am!” Genus: Human. Species: Wise? Contradiction: Absolute. Ironically, wisdom is perfectly costless, infinite in supply, forever in need, but never in demand. Huh? Behold! The free Universal Panacea! Um, that, does not stimulate a hair of inducement, anywhere, to utilize it with, anything? And, with a flattering false modesty, we say publicly that the best things in life are free, then, in private, sulk and grovel about our overarching lacking-ness. It is, as a true wise man once said, “Easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.” There is no doubt, science will one day find a way to fit that dromedary through with plenty of room to spare, and further, have many hundreds dancing on the tip simultaneously.
There are three problems, maybe more, that have plagued us since the dawn of humankind. The first, placing concern where we should not, and having no care at all when we should. The second is the problem of discipline and its application, or transmuting potentials into potencies. And the third, hmm, I am sure I can create more than two problems at once. Of course! Finding some kindly way to let the ego discover that it does not know, then allowing it to know something true without injuring it so badly. That is a real stopper. Due to Man’s incredible logic and irresistible urge to live beyond the looking glass, confused and lost in our own Blunderland, we profess unqualifiedly that we are the helpless victims of an unjust cosmic retribution. The confession that we cannot think straight, and that we do not know what justice is, this never crossed our mind, and, if elicited, would occasion nothing more than an ardent denial of the possibility.
Plato made the following assertions: "For I plainly declare that evils as they are termed are goods to the unjust, and only evils to the just, and that goods are truly good to the good, but evils to the evil." And, furthermore, "That just and unjust are shadows only, and that injustice, which seems opposed to justice, when contemplated by the unjust and evil man appears pleasant and the just most unpleasant; but that from the just man’s point of view, the very opposite is the appearance of both of them." And lastly, "That the greatest ignorance is when a man hates that which he nevertheless thinks to be good and noble and loves and embraces that which he knows to be unrighteous and evil. This disagreement between the sense of pleasure and the judgment of reason in the soul is, in my opinion, the worst ignorance."
What makes this challenging is not that it is hard to understand, or to correct, but that first one must learn what good is in order to know it, and second, learn to value good in order to uphold it. I will not attempt to define the Good because that would place a terrible dishonor and tragedy upon millions of innocent words, so I shall instead exhort every individual to discover it for themselves. The beginning, however, of wise discernment is to recognize where and when the mind has been poorly conditioned. The untrained mind sees only what it wants to see, exactly how it wants to see it. Although, in the long run, perchance, one may get the sneaking suspicion that what he thought was so, is not so. The man who is always right, is also the man who is always in the greatest amount of trouble. On the horns of eternal dilemma, he makes a fetish of his own nugatoriness by the futile and irrevocable endeavor to constantly disprove that he is wrong.
The mind is responsible for determining what is right and what is wrong, while the emotions decide what is good and bad. The problem with this is that what is right is always what is good, but the evaluation of what is good is usually what is wrong. When emotions are given jurisdiction to govern the mind’s ability to reason, the inevitable end is negative thought patterns producing an erroneous set of concepts and beliefs. What remains is a value system that is forever left begging the question, in which case, one assumes he is constantly right and cannot find Reason to explain the cause of his consternations. The Devil stands proud on one shoulder, with the humble Saint on the other, arguing the relevancy of self-rectitude. And we all know who wins the argument. This one has trapped himself: In contact with that for which one feels aversion and separated from that for which one feels attraction.
False values urge one to the accomplishment of new actions; either to induce wanted sensations, or to prevent repetition of disagreeable sensations. This false action, or vice, in its turn, produces sensations which give rise to new desires. And the concatenation of actions, sensations, and desires, giving rise to new actions, etc., this continues to infinity, so long as ignorance exists. Ignorance, and its correlative life pattern, leaves little if anything to think positively or constructively about. Now possessing more ammunition for negative thought than was expended in terms of bullets during the Great War, this one, he makes Space itself tremble. He thinks to constrain himself, “Keep calm,” and then carries on like a pork chop. It is a hopeless unavailing-ness; "Let's have a game with happy and sad music. When you hear the happy music, play your rhythm sticks, or clap, just as you did before, like this."
Life is forever a problem primarily in terms of values. Not how good do I look but how good do I live? Not why should I help but why should I not? Not what is my net worth, but what is my soul worth? Not where are my profits, where are my principles? Not when will I have it, when will I understand it? Not, who do you think you are, but rather, who am I? The absurdity in this mental incongruity is that the remedy is free, in abundant supply the world over, and readily available to all. That is, a little wisdom and a great nerve. And this is the gōdspel. But nobody harnesses this veracity and puts it to work in their life. For the beginning of wisdom is to first concede that one is ignorant, and the start of real nerve is to acknowledge that one is in himself illusory. Left unacknowledged, this is how he creates troubles he can never fix. He does not see that agent, action, and event, are identical. So, he continues clutching at smoke with phantom hands.
This is precisely why he cannot stop thinking, he cannot transmute adverse thinking, cannot eliminate his intemperance, basically, why he cannot learn to conquer himself. A man who is determined to control others is a despot, but a man who is determined to control himself is wise, and he is virtuous only to the degree that he achieves this. But this self he must control is not an entity or essence, it is a process. If he fails in seeing this, he has become a desperate proverbial one ended stick—an effect with no cause. He must instead work with causes that are real. What are these causes? Discipline, contemplation, integrity, humility, and value. He must go back to school and learn to apply these qualities, as attributes of the true Self, to his daily conduct. To say that it cannot be done is simply ridiculous. It is these kinds of indolent and wasteful mentalities which are exactly what prevents him from achieving anything. What he calls himself has nothing to do with it.
There is not a single case in history where a person has become depressed when he did not deserve to be. Nature does not work that way. Enough time spent cultivating vast patterns of negative thinking is enough to cripple anyone, even someone who does not think about it. If one desires an easy solution, then he can simply sweep the darkness out of the room with a broom, and then attempt to imbibe the whole ocean with an oyster fork. I would offer free platitudes for the sake of comfort, they are dime a dozen and of vast supply, but these come with a terrible unforeseen caveat—complete semantic collapse. Which, as a result, will then land him on the horns of a further dilemma: Because he does not do anything he says he believes, forsooth, then he cannot believe anything he says or does.
The inner conflict arises merely because he chooses to do that which is less than himself, by smoothly talking himself into it and not out of it. He assumes his negative thought to be a positive one, and the rational consequences to be perfect injustice. But the moment he dares to ask how or why, if he were capable of such bravery, it becomes a philosophical question—whether he realizes it or not. Philosophy is the science of character and the code of conduct we study, cultivate, and apply, by means of which we shall live a meaningful, purposeful, and joyful life. Its purpose is, through self-enquiry, to reveal shortcomings, resolve internal contentions, and reform the inner life of man. If we spent our thoughts on ourselves instead of splurging words on other people, the statement, “Do as I say and not as I do" may prove itself finally to be an exhibition of intimately personal and extremely valuable common-sense.
So eventually the man musters up the courage to say something like, "I think therefore I am," or "No, I am, therefore I think." And here, absolute rightness is not so important, providing he has worked to a conclusion and not from one, and chosen to verify a proposition which by its very nature cannot lead him into trouble. Then, at least hypothetically, no amount of mental strain could create anything negative out of it. Unless, of course, he has truly mastered his art in how to transform a philosophical enquiry into a prevailing mental wind. But this he cannot afford. The mind can no longer be considered a tumbling ground for whimsies.
Negative thinking is the continual nursing of the difficulty, while positive thinking is nothing more or less than a set of attitudes that finally cooperates with necessity. Attitudes based not on Panglossian and his platitudes, but upon a personal jurisprudence which complements the simple operations of a Universal Lawfulness. We must so live to cause this good in ourselves. We must so convict ourselves that in our relations with other persons we are only causing good. And neither the responses, reactions, nor tantrums of other people, ornery or otherwise, can affect the inevitable fact that the good which is caused will come about in due course.
If we want to have good mental health then we must cause it, and we cause health by eradicating the asinine waste of mental, emotional, and physical resources. Karma cannot be used in defense to exonerate us from the fact that we are responsible for everything that happens to us. If we are prone to weakness, laziness, or idiocy, unless we want to continue to be miserable, we must gradually relinquish the ignorance which is the cause of delinquency within ourselves. If we want to achieve just and happy relations with other people, then we must end these unhappy and unjust relationships we have in our own thinking. The beginning of a constructive attitude starts with enrollment into apprenticeship in values for life. A life in which the desirability and utility of integrity and wisdom will become, please pardon me, the New Normal in our Brave New World.
It is sad that the best inducement we usually find to achieve normalcy as individuals is a tremendous case of the blues. For rarely can sorrow evoke much besides an honorary neurosis. We know we cannot rely on anyone else, to be either good or bad, therefore, if we are unhappy then this is irrefutable proof of personal insufficiency. It is also proof that we must learn to solve our own problems, while concurrently preventing problems that we do not have. But no matter how deficient we may be; we never lose the ability to choose. As nature endows us with two divine gifts, namely, choice and responsibility. This is in order that we shall ultimately educate ourselves in making wiser decisions, creating better prospects, and constructing a more purposeful way of life.
If we know this theoretically, we must also know that the person who knows has the responsibility of leading himself and others as correctly as possible towards Truth. If we have the power to know this too, we must also have the power to use best what we know to be right and just. Alas, everyone’s a thinker but no one is a doer. So, tragedy strikes again. And the one who pities himself has no intrinsic sense of justice. A brilliant egoism has us then sternly believe we are so important that Nature singles us out to heap infirmities upon. The moment we are sorry for ourselves, we become a slave of self-pity, and soon become a legitimate object of pity on the part of intelligent people. Realization is the source of graciousness. Therefore, knowing, what goes around comes around, the next time we reap what we have sewn we avoid wailing despondently, “Smite me! O Mighty Smiter!” Because now we understand.
Obviously, good and bad karma aside, we have no control over the actions of others. Thus, if we have not taken out of our consciousness the cause of this unkindliness, or our integrities are inadequate to meet the need for understanding, then other people’s actions will naturally react upon us. But if our own consciousness is right then the cruelty of the other person will not touch us. We will be able to transmute it according to our own insight. So the fact that another person is cruel to us does not mean that we must suffer for it. We only need to suffer for it if our own consciousness on the level of karma has not relieved us from the need of that experience.
Unprovoked and inexplicable karmic events happen not because of something we once did, but because of those somethings that we keep right on doing. These things occur simply because we have not completed our understanding regarding such matters. It is then inevitable that that particular area of ignorance, will cause us to conduct our affairs in a way that will invariably result in the manifestation of those experiences. By necessity, these events will provide opportunity which allows us to learn and to grow, that is, if we are so inclined. And when the basis of an act has no power left to continue that act, then this will necessitate the end of that particular karmic impulse.
Therefore, the only thing that a rational individual can fear is himself. For the purpose of fear is not to raise concern about what others may do, but to protect us from our own stupidity and ignorance. Nature decrees that nothing superior can be influenced or in any way harmed by that which is inferior. Might does not outrank right, nor does ingenuity outrank integrity. Thus no one can be injured by anyone else, he can only injure himself in the name of that other person. So we get ourselves ironed out, building upon the bedrock of values for life, we come finally to appreciate and embrace the great philosophic tradition of Natural Law.
To realize, in this is our opportunity to attain mental liberation. To be totally free of all adverse thought, emotional intemperance, sorrow, or in other words, the tyranny of our own egoism. Like children we are churning through difficulties, but only because we are just going through the motions of attempting to understand and apply Laws. What we are all trying to do, all in our own way, is to discover Law to be what it really is—the grace of Divine Wisdom. This universe in which we live has the kindly determination of loving parents, trying to bring its children to the state of proper mindfulness and maturity. The so-called negative aspects of Law are simply the necessary chastisements that must come to the individual who is wandering away from the true standards of value.
The Eternal Primogenitor will bear witness to the salvation and illumination of all its progeny, whether we think we like it or not. There can be no lost souls, no individual who becomes so hopelessly immersed in the impossible that he cannot extricate himself. A perfect Lawfulness, with its inexorable processes of contrast, compensation, metempsychosis, and growth, protect this without fail. All beings shall come in the fullness of time into the light of truth, and into the ability to regulate and manage their own affairs with honor, integrity, and dignity.
If a man is decorated by some honorable institution for a noble deed, he does not have to, nor can he, buy the medal that is pinned upon his chest. The same rule applies with respect to an ever-present enlightenment. Nirvana is here always, it is just concealed by man by his own impurities, taints, and defilements. If he musters the strength, concentrating himself enough to “Lift the Veil,” it reveals itself dressed as reward for spiritual, moral, and intellectual valor. Cloaked incognito, simply because, “He’s not the Messiah he’s a very naughty boy.”
Hence, we live within a pattern which is constantly challenging us to insight, understanding, and the living of a proper code. If we get hold of these principles, then we have no longer the problem of false thinking. There is only one kind of thinking if we really want to think straight and that is to think in terms of growth. To think in terms of the simple fact that we live in order to learn. A positive mental attitude is one that believes in growth under Law. A constructive mental attitude is one that enjoys growing. A useful mental attitude is one that chooses to grow, above and beyond all conditions, circumstances, limitations and restrictions. And the individual who begins to understand these things will not have any doubts and fears, as these cannot exist in a universe that is divinely regulated by immutable processes. If we are sincere and want to free ourselves from the bondage of doubt, insecurity, unhappiness, and worry, the only real problem we have to worry about is making certain we are keeping these rules.
The law of karma exists only for Man because he is the one creature that has been so endowed that he can choose between right and wrong, semantic confusion notwithstanding. It is therefore only where this exists that the law of karma operates. For the purpose of this law is that all individuals shall finally learn what right is, plus learn to choose right emphatically. And nature, in her divine consistency and devout regularity, will continue teaching until this end has been ultimately achieved. The moment we begin to operate in harmony with this, we soon realize the importance of kindly, honorable, honest thinking. We begin to realize the significance of unselfishness and self-sacrifice, being no longer bound and dominated by chronic egoism. No longer ruthless in our actions, childish in our thinking, or vivacious with our own frustrations. Once we realize the fact, that if we are miserable then we must be wrong, then we can proceed—living a reasonable and practical life.
We can have patience for other people knowing that they are struggling along too, trying to understand better the same things we are. We will help when and where we can, eliminating all the false ideas and beliefs. It is completely foolish to think we can build our happiness over the domination of other people. This is not the answer. Our own happiness is built through the directing and simplifying of our thinking and our conduct, bringing it into harmony with universal principles. When we operate according to these principles then we have nothing to fear, nothing to worry about, and no valid reason to be unhappy.
And if we do not operate in harmony with those principles, fearing the consequences achieves naught. We are supposed to be wise enough to fear the ramifications of our actions before we become foolish enough to perform such actions. Fear is not designed to produce mental departure from normalcy, it is meant to prevent such mental aberrations in the first place. A truly God-fearing individual does not fear the wrath of God, he fears committing wrongs because he fervently believes and totally understands that there is no greater danger to him than his own ignorance. A little humility goes a long way, and if we do not know, then we must give the time and effort and thoughtfulness to learning to know. If we follow these procedures, in time we shall become sufficient to make right decisions clearly and live them honorably. Then there can be no negative thinking, because there will be nothing left to be negative about.
Beyond the last analysis, outside the boundaries of thought, we live in a world of merits, principles, and values. If we cooperate with value, it is a good world, if we do not, then we suffer with it. Sloppy thinking leads all things to Mara, Lord of the Senses. Fettered, we become slaves to our thoughts and desires. Craving, clinging, grasping. And, hence, chronically attached, there is your suffering. We must be prudent with which thoughts we originate. As these lead to ideas, ideas lead to beliefs, beliefs lead to tendencies, tendencies lead to actions, and erroneous actions become your destiny. Thinking means building the entire mental pattern upon the immutable foundations of justice, integrity, virtue, beauty, love, and truth. By constructing our thoughts and attitudes with equanimity, earnestness, and steadfastness, we attain placidity with Mind. This powerful Soul, poised, sees problems naturally solve themselves—gently, but inevitably.
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