Did you ever notice that people who focus on the body to the exclusion of the spirit wind up becoming disillusioned and miserable? Have you ever noticed the fleeting pleasure that the body provides only to become satiated and then anxious again for another fix for whatever it is craving? Does it seem that nothing is ever good enough and there is a greedy belief that more and more is better? Have you noticed that this chasing after bodily pleasures deprives us from any lasting peace?
There is something perverse and sad about the preoccupation and obsessions and compulsions that drive our physical attempts to soothe our troubled cravings. We have misplaced our focus on the expected source of our desired peace and joy on the body instead of the mind.
It is written in A Course In Miracles:
"The body can bring you neither peace nor turmoil; neither joy nor pain. 5 It is a means, and not an end. 6 It has no purpose of itself, but only what is given to it. 7 The body will seem to be whatever is the means for reaching the goal that you assign to it. 8 Only the mind can set a purpose, and only the mind can see the means for its accomplishment, and justify its use. " T-18.B.i.10:4-10
The tendency to objectify the body and submit to lust rather than take interest in and appreciate the spirit is a mistake. This mistake, while momentarily can give us pleasure, robs us of longer term joy and well being. The mature person who has achieved a degree of wisdom knows this.
The idea of the Perennial Philosophy of Aldous Huxley leads one to the idea that God is too big for any one religion. How is it that sometimes people outgrow their religion of childhood? James Fowler, among others, has mapped out a model of spiritual development. Osho says that a person cannot enter into a spiritual life until he/she rebels against childish religious beliefs. Notes On A Spiritual Life intends to explore deeper understandings of an authentic spiritual life.
Saturday, October 21, 2017
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