If I may share, the purpose of these blog posts are to provoke thought, to engage in dialogue and together work towards a greater understanding of ourselves and our amazing world.
Once again if I may go into it a little, it is not my place to tell anyone what to do, nor to try and convince anyone of anything. This blog is here to share.
One thing I really enjoy doing is engaging in dialogue with others, but more importantly to engage so as to enable a better world for all of us to share.
There is so much to learn. In relationship with others we can discover so much about ourselves. This is the basis upon which I am learning so much on a day to day basis and wish to share with others.
I want at this point to thank those who have been so kind to engage.
The fact is, I can read books about various topics but it is only in dialogue with others that one can see what it actually means in our individual daily lives.
Just by taking some time out and sharing with one another what troubles us, what we have questions about, we can learn so much.
If I may suggest, what’s more important is for you to gain your own understanding, find out the truth of it for yourself. Not follow blindly but question intelligently with an open mind.
On that note lets go over what I mean when I suggested what it means to live simply.
I first want to point out that there are many complex functions and processes in our world. When I was suggesting “living simply” I was referring to our Psyche. In other words the way we think and what we think.
In that respect I was merely pointing out that in our minds we tend to complicate issues that are not so complicated and as a consequence expend a lot of energy unnecessarily.
This can lead to inner conflict, confusion, and individual suffering. I question whether this is necessary and in questioning I am not suggesting that it does not actually happen I merely wish to understand “why” & if it’s necessary.
When I use the word understanding I mean a mind that is not conclusive but one that is learning from moment to moment by listening and observing.
I also wish to point out that when we are consumed with fear & inner conflict that we miss out on so much in our world. A beautiful sky an amazing sunset.
In our daily routines we become consumed in the challenges that we often create for ourselves and thus life can quickly pass us by.
On this blog we can share the very challenges we face and by doing so resolve them through understanding and dialogue. When we share a problem we share it to understand, not to just to repeat it. Just as importantly we can by sharing see it from different perspectives.
None of us as human beings have a monopoly on ideas.
It was incorrect of me to suggest that it’s “just that simple”, for many it may not be. With that said we can together gain perspective and understanding as to why in our own minds we can make life difficult beyond unforeseen events that can cause problems in our day to day life.
What I am getting at here is how we get confused and repeat problems. Problems continue because we continue to repeat them. If we just took timeout to understand the problem we may very well resolve it.
Instead of repeating the problem I feel we could more intelligently resolve it if we begin by asking the question “why” this is a problem and what we can do to end it.
After all a mind that is burdened with problems and repeats them day in and day out limits its potential and expends more energy in repeating the same old problems over that of resolving them.
Many the challenges that arise in life are self created & often times unnecessarily. Again I am referring to the way we think, as in inventing obstacles that may not even be there but only present themselves as problems because we entertain them as such.
If I may say, it is very easy for me to talk or write these things and that’s why I appreciate so much your comments so that we can go into it and discover what is meant.
In terms of addressing the question of effort we could ask this question. When you really enjoy what you do do you have to make an effort to do it? Why do we have to make an effort to do something? Is it generally because we don’t enjoy it.
Let’s go into the word effort so that we can communicate by understanding the meaning of the word therefore communicate meaningfully.
One of the definitions of effort is as follows. The use of physical or mental energy to do something; “exertion”.
A, example. difficult exertion of the strength or will: It was an effort to get up.
4. Something done or produced through exertion;
5. Physics Force applied against inertia.
In physics this would mean – Resistance or disinclination to motion, action, or change:
Here is the meaning of Inertia
Noun
1. a feeling of unwillingness to do anything
2. Physics the tendency of a body to remain still or continue moving unless a force is applied to
Exertion
1. effort or exercise, esp. physical effort: the sudden exertion of running for a bus
From the thesaurus exertion can mean the following.
elbow grease, effort, travail, sweat
toil, labor, labour – productive work
struggle – strenuous effort;
difficulty, trouble
least effort, least resistance – the least effortful way to do something
straining, strain.
Implicit in effort is resistance, strain struggle to do something. When you really enjoy what you do is there strain or struggle?
For example if you enjoy writing a poem, playing music, there is no effort, you simply do it. When you are playing there is no effort, you simply play.
Again the word presents challenges because we think that effort implies action but when you exert effort resistance comes with it. if you make an effort you do so because you feel you have to. On the other hand when you act not having to do so, you do so with ease.
This is why life can become a struggle because growing up we are told that you need to make an effort to become something in this world. If this is the case then we may be moving away from doing the very thing that we love. Just a thought…
When I say no effort there is the difficulty that people may interpret that as meaning doing nothing, unwillingness, laziness. Again we can get caught in an argument over words.
The point being that it is important to understand what the meaning of effort implies. It implies resistance which means conflict, opposing forces, not wanting to do something but feeling you have to in order to achieve something.
Please understand that I am not suggesting that you make no effort. I am merely pointing out what effort means in terms of definition and then by being aware of this you may begin to live differently doing more of the things you enjoy as opposed to making an effort to have to do the things that you may think you have to.
This brings us to the question of intelligence and joy. What does it mean to live intelligently? To approach this question lets look at the very things that detract from intelligence.
A closed mind prevents intelligence, in that I mean a mind that is opinionated, one that repeats constantly. Opinion after all is a repetition of a point of view based on information acquired.
A closed mind is no longer learning as it feels it knows already, it just gathers information that bolsters its opinion and repeats what supports that opinion.
Learning is active, not what I have learned, as in past tense. What you have learned yesterday may not be valid today.
A closed mind is consumed with information and knowledge that it has acquired over that of learning something new and gathers information with the intention of proving its point. Therefore repeats this superficially without understanding the meaning of what it is communicating.
Nothing new can be discovered if you are repeating information without understanding. Understanding what we learn is the very thing that separates the human brain from that of the computer.
The computer obtains information and follows it literally without question. A computer cannot read between the lines and that is why computers cannot communicate effectively with human beings except when asking yes or no questions or in giving a scripted choice.
knowledge by default is limited, otherwise we would know everything there is to know. Where there is knowledge there is a tendency for arrogance as in “I know”
Simplicity is living meaningfully, rather than repeating problems. One is discovering from moment to moment how problems arise and in so doing intelligently dealing with them in a manner that immediately ends them.
Intelligence in this case is listening, learning observing not just gathering information and repeating it. It’s the understanding that no matter what you know it is limited.
Intelligence is understanding problems. For example lets take a math problem. I can give you the answer but if you don’t understand how that answer was arrived at it will continue to be a problem where all you have is a superficial answer.
If the problems arises again that has a different answer you will not know how to resolve the problem to get the correct answer as each will be in context and in relation to any given problem at any given time…
The answer to our problems both in math and within ourselves lies within the problem itself. Once you understand whats involved in the creation of problems then you will intelligently yourself get the correct answer.
Living intelligently is discovering with an open mind, not a mind bound by what it has just learned but understanding that what it has just learned is in context to what has happened at that moment in time.
So its not about repeating the answer but understanding what is involved in a problem and in so doing one sees the answer that is contained within it.
In living intelligently there is joy because ones mind is no longer burdened with problems. It is discovering anew as challenges arise and in so doing is living through discovery over that of jaded repetition.
In discovery there is no effort, just the enjoyment of learning and where there is no effort there is the possibility of simplicity.
