Human thought
June 24th, 2008 by I.C.
When you engage in thinking, no matter how mundane or profound, you must remember that you are engaging in a profound act of creation.
When a human mind thinks, it is doing more than simply transferring electrical impulses through biochemicals across synaptic channels. Perhaps this is the biological explanation, but it is at most a partial explanation.
The act of thinking is more than just the firing of neurons. Our minds are rich pastures that allow for the cultivation of the soul. With thought, it is possible to reach enlightenment; but it is also possible to create Hell on this planet, for oneself and for others.
Every religion documents the advent of human thought in a way that brought shattering consequences and harsh lessons. These tales are documented in allegory. Prometheus brought the gift of Fire from the gods to humanity; and the result was that human beings became civilized and knowledgeable. But the gods were displeased that man had their Fire, and so they sent Pandora amongst them, who unleashed green, envy, pining, lying and hope — symptoms of the evils of mankind, yes, but also products of that same thought which had blessed them with civilization.
In Judeo-Christian thought, it is written that Adam and Eve existed in a state of innocence in the Garden of Eden. Then Eve consumed the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and shared it with Adam, and the “eyes of both of them were opened” — an eloquent expression of the leap in consciousness they must have experienced! And the Bible recounts that the Lord God was concerned that Adam and Eve had “become as one of us, to know good and evil”, and they were forbidden from ever coming back into Eden. Adam and Eve had become like God, because they could now utilize their thought and divide their consciousness into things that were good, and things that were evil; indeed, according to the Bible, at that moment, Adam and Eve shared the same power as God.
And it is here that we in the West can learn lessons from Eastern thought and religious belief, the traditions of which emphasize the responsibility of the thinker in finding happiness. Many Eastern religions speak of karma, which at heart is a doctrine of the power of thought. Karma relates to the Sanskrit word karna which means “to do.” When you do something, you have already put in place the result of that action. Similarly, when you think something, you are creating your everyday reality, condemning or liberating yourself depending on the thought in question.
In either case, you are directly responsible for your present reality; your present thoughts and actions literally create your future. Through your thoughts, you act as God in your own life, at every single moment that you are alive.
There is a type of mind control that is so effective today because it acts on the way that you think. In past times, you had to chain people up and whip them if you wanted them to be slaves. Today, there is no longer any need for physical chains if you wish to enslave someone. Instead, all you have to do is restrict their thoughts. A person who does not utilize their thinking is a slave. It is that simple — such is the power of human thought.
Many people live their entire lives thinking the same things in life. And, as a result, they experience the same things over and over again. This is guaranteed, because when they think the same things, they plant the seeds for the same outcomes later in life. So you see the person who dates the same type of person, and who is always unhappy, or who takes the same types of job and is always complaining about their work, or does the same routine for 50 years and lives the same boring life. And they find themselves always facing the same outcomes — the same dishonest lover, the same horrible boss, the same boring night after work — never learning the lesson that they are in control of their future, that they can change the future at any time, if they would only think differently.
And we cannot ignore the fact that there are many powerful interests in this world today who profit from the dearth of imagination in the world. There are more than 6 billion people on this world today, but perhaps there are 10 or 20 ideas that govern how these 6 billion people think. This is a total travesty of human consciousness, an insult to our minds, and a pathetic and pitiful example of how humans too often choose self-imposed slavery over their natural freedom. Come, count with me on your fingers the defining ideas of our era — free market capitalism, a handful of established religions, “democracy” versus “terrorism”. A handful of incomplete and imperfect ideas, the sum total of hundreds of thousands of years of human development! How unoriginal our great species has become as a result of the brainwashing of the 20th century, to believe that only a handful of ideas are legitimate or can otherwise define our place in this universe.
We are all so unique on this planet, our minds so powerful, that we ought to have 6 billion ideas about happiness, government and God, and not just a handful. All great nations today proclaim their respect for freedom of thought and speech, yet why then are there so few thoughts that are worth expressing? The right is there, it must be used or it will be taken away. Yet who uses it? No, today instead it is the same old story, the same old belief that you must support this candidate, or you must believe this god, or you must follow this path in life.
The diversity of human experience has not given birth to a diversity of human conscious thought. Powerful forces are to blame for this, yes this is true; but it is also true that those powerful forces are only as powerful as the 6 billion individuals on this planet choose to believe.
Today, I tell you that the same patterns of human experience, the same patterns of human culture — the very same patterns which have produced countless wars, countless deaths, countless atrocities — are at work once more. They are busy today seeding the future wars, the future deaths, the future atrocities, just as they have done in the past. Nothing is different with those thoughts, so it can be no surprise when the outcomes are no different as well. The outcomes will be the same. Hit your head against the wall, it will bleed. Do it once more, it will bleed once more. It is the same with human thought — there is no difference.
So today the old ways of thinking, which have not changed for millenia, are busily at work. Except now we must be honest with ourselves that the backdrop of human activity has drastically changed. The actors are still acting on the same stage, as they have done for thousands of years, playing the same old play, but now the stage is on fire. This is the effect of overpopulation, overconsumption of natural resources, and runaway climate change — unforeseen consequences of constant spreading, constant war, constant development, the ill-gotten gains of apathy and lack of planning.
And what is the reaction to these problems? It is to deny them, or to ignore them — again, an old and very established pattern of human thinking. So we can guarantee that these problems will all get worse, won’t they? A burning house does not douse itself, but only stops burning when there is no more tinder left. So we see the burning house, but turn our backs. How then can the outcome be anything other than further disaster? Is this not clear?
Humanity needs new ways of thinking. Every person needs a new way of thinking, a way that points towards happiness, and responsibility, and freedom, for all three things are exactly the same thing. Happiness is responsibility, and happiness is freedom as well. People shirk responsibility, they fear it because they would rather be licentious, without any concern, without any worry. They act like children. It is fine if you are a child to not have responsibility, but you commit a great waste to your consciousness when you do not employ it thereafter. Employing one’s mind means becoming an adult, and taking on adult responsibilities. When you were in the womb, no doubt it was very comfortable, and no doubt you feared leaving when it was time to do so — but you had to leave eventually. The fetus becomes the child, and the child, in turn, must become the adult. Adam and Eve had to leave Eden, didn’t they? Millions of people today fear the fact that they must evolve into adults, so they live their whole lives like children. What a great waste this is, and an insult to the consciousness that resides in all our heads. And they do themselves a disservice, for in truth such people are never happy as well. They may be drugged or stimulated by physical pleasure, but that is not the same thing as happiness; such people have never known, and will never know happiness.
If there are 6 billion people on this Earth today, then we ought to have 6 billion ways of living, of conceiving of the world. Let the flowers of human consciousness bloom into a billion different spectacles, a billion different wrinkles of the great consciousness that pervades all life, all creation, the entire universe. What is there to fear in this diversity? We fear it because humanity, to date, has no experience with freedom and genuine human creativity. Humanity’s primary experience and primary way of thinking has revolved around death, and slavery, and tyranny. This is why empires rise and fall, republics crumble, and people go to war. History repeats because humanity’s thinking never changes. We are afraid of freedom because we are so used to slavery.
But freedom there is, and its genesis is the mind. Our minds should be supple like the waves in the water, not rigid and set in stone. A rigid mind loses its imagination and its spontaneity; it becomes dead. I have seen too many religious people, of every religion, who cling to their dogmas, and for what? Such people are totally miserable. One should be Buddhist for a day, Christian the next, Muslim on the third day. It is a wonderful thing for the mind to experiment with religion and see how different people see the world. There is no harm in it, you will be redeemed once you come back to your original beliefs, won’t you? Or at least this is what the priests say.
One should be a Republican one day, a Democrat the next, a Marxist on the third day, a neo-conservative on the fourth. Why bother oneself with these ideologies? They have all produced blood, every single one of them. They have all committed acts of terror and murdered children. None are exempt from their own guilt. Why not see what the big deal is?
In doing all of this, one can learn the falsity of all these ideologies and the errors that come about through the repeated use of old ways of thinking. It is time to get rid of the old. It is time for the new to flourish, for the individual to flourish without any concern for ideology or religiosity or political correctness. This is the only hope for human kind today, because it is the path of freedom. And it is only through the exercise of freedom that human thought — and with it, the entirety of human consciousness — can be activated towards its full and glorious potential.
Never forget that with thought, you are in control of your future, shaping your destiny with every waking moment. This is the responsibility that comes with the gift of freedom, the gift of consciousness. It is the responsibility of God. Respect your thoughts accordingly, for they will create either heaven or hell — whatever it is you choose to do with them.
