--- In [email protected], "Rick Archer" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > DOES EVERYONE REALLY CREATE THEIR OWN REALITY? > William Bloom - Cygnus Magazine > > Over the years it has been an honor for me to advance and defend new age > and holistic spirituality. I love its open-mindedness, its embrace of > metaphysics and the way it combines spiritual work with healthcare. But I > have also despaired at times about its apparent lack of morality and > compassion when faced with the realities of people's suffering. > > This coldness is often explained away with half-baked ideas about how > energies, karma and the laws of attraction work. This often reach a peak > of disturbing smugness when a new age 'philosopher' faced with cruel > suffering says authoritatively: 'People create their own reality' or > 'Their soul chose it - its their karma' or 'Everything is perfect in God's > Plan - you just need to perceive it differently'. People who say such > things seem to have no idea how smug and nasty they sound. Nor of the hurt > they cause.
When people discuss such things, yes, it can most certainly come off as smug and nasty...to paraphrase Steve Martin: karma is not pretty. But the realities of karma may very well be that people do, indeed, create their own reality. However, in discussing such subjects, how can one NOT come off as cold and uncaring, especially if the listener is not of the same mind. I think the author has more problems with the way it is discussed than with the reality of the subject. > > Fourteen years ago I had a lower back crisis in which three disks > herniated and a tendon tore. The pain was as high on the scale as it can > go. I was bed-ridden, then on sticks and it took seven years to recover. > Early on, as I hobbled awkwardly on sticks, a new age woman came up to me, > poked her face in mine and loudly stated, 'You know what Louise Hay says > about lower back crises, don't you!' She was typical of many. > > A friend recently had a severe heart crisis, was suddenly taken to > hospital and told that his life was at risk. He told me that what really > frightened him was the thought of informing his spiritual friends, because > they would use it as an opportunity to be self-righteous and tell him what > he was getting wrong in his life. Well, then, they're pricks...insensitive pricks. > > Of course in both my and his case there were good lessons to be learned, > but our life or mobility were threatened and we deserved compassionate > friendliness. Isn't spiritual development about increasing compassion and > love? It does not help to have someone chiming, 'You asked for it. Told > you so.' Even if we did create those illnesses, kindness and support are > needed so that we can begin to understand the process.. > > These minor examples of personal distress are nothing compared to the more > dramatic tragedies being endured on the world stage. What follows is > recent testimony from a woman at the centre of the Darfur crisis (New > Internationalist, June 2007): > > 'My baby boy was thrown on the fire in front of me. My daughter was older. > They thought she was a boy so they slaughtered her too - they snapped her > neck like a chicken. Some of the children they threw down a well â`. After > they raped the women they cut off their breasts to make them suffer. They > used those of us who were left as donkeys.' > > Her experience is not unique. Recently too there has been the incident of > the little girl kidnapped in Portugal, the tip of an iceberg of the sexual > abuse faced by hundreds of thousands of children every day, not to mention > the thirty thousand children who daily die of starvation. > > In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at > heart. Anne Frank. > > Surely all this suffering can only be approached with stillness, humility > and wisdom of the heart. Not with half-baked metaphysics and denial. It is > pure ignorance, shameful and cold-hearted emotional cruelty to suggest > that these women and children asked for this destiny, deserved it, chose > it or created their own reality. It completely misunderstands karma and > the laws of attraction. I don't think it is a case of either understanding or misunderstanding the laws of karma but of tactlessness in the art of speaking. > > There is a frequent error of assuming that souls have complete control and > choice over their incarnations. New souls entering for the first time, for > example, may simply be drawn to where there is a newly conceived fetus. And on what authority does Mr. Bloom say this? It sounds like the same unnamed or unproven authority that those that he complains about relies upon. In other words: conjecture on all of their parts. > They may have no choice but to participate in the collective rhythm and > cycle. There are more dynamics in incarnation than simple choice. > > Equally we do not create our lives in isolation. We pass through > collective historical and karmic events over which we may have little > individual power. We are participants as souls and as biological creatures > in a constellation of relationships that includes our species, our gender, > our family, our ancestors, our ethnicity and faith. Our parents and > children, for example, are within us, as we are also within them. We are > not just individual souls creating our own individual lives and futures. > We are also subjects of the group soul and our histories and futures are > entwined. As a species we have created a shared karma of suffering, and it > is as a collective that we experience, redeem and heal it. The collective > affects even the most forceful individual. > > The redemption of all this lies in the fact that each of us has the > freedom and power to adopt our own inner attitude regardless of > circumstances. I am inspired, for example, by the Catholic priests who > chose the way of self-sacrifice and walked with their Jewish parishioners > into the Nazi gas chambers. I think that that's the most uninspirational, horrible thing I've ever heard. Take a fucking shovel, at the very least, and wack a guard across the side of the head. Sorry, but if you're inspired by that, you deserve to...well, I better not say. > > âThe only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do > nothing.â° Edmund Burke Huh????? The Edmund Burke quote is the complete OPPOSITE of what that idiot priest did, as far as I'm concerned. > > It is also completely banal and naïve to suggest that everything in God's > world is good and that it is all a matter of perception. Faced with the > reality of a three-year old child being sexually abused, it is simply not > possible to make such a statement and be moral. It is in facing reality, > not denying it, being in our hearts, that we grow and become wiser. > > At the same time I fully appreciate how difficult it is to be fully > present to suffering. For some people it is overwhelming because it > triggers their own pain. But sooner or later on the spiritual path we have > to develop the courage and strength to stay stable and loving when faced > with these horrors. In the words of Carl Jung: âOne does not become > enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness > conscious.â° > > All my love Well, not ALL your love, William. You seem to hold great contempt and anger for members of certain quarters of the New Age community. So, "SOME of my love" you should have written. > William > > www.williambloom.com > > > William Bloom is one of the UKâs most experienced teachers, healers and > authors in the field of holistic development. His work has helped > thousands of people. > > His mainstream career includes a doctorate in psychology from the LSE > where he lectured in Psychological Problems in International Politics, ten > years working with adults and adolescents with special needs, and > delivering hundreds of trainings, many in the NHS. > > His holistic background includes a two-year spiritual retreat living > amongst the Saharan Berbers in the High Atlas Mountains, 30 years on the > faculty of the Findhorn Foundation, co-founder and director for 10 years > of the St. Jamesâs Church Alternatives Programme in London. > > He is a meditation master and his books include the seminal âThe Endorphin > Effectâ°, âFeeling Safe and Psychic Protectionâ° Ë and most recently > âSoulution: The Holistic Manifestoâ°. > > He is director of The Holism Network and well known for his clear, > practical and friendly style of teaching. > > No virus found in this outgoing message. > Checked by AVG Free Edition. > Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.9.14/880 - Release Date: 6/29/2007 2:15 PM >
