Beliefs
Anita Evans
Vilcabamba Ecuador May 2010
You should to listen to the website www.bashar.org
If you haven’t done already. If you have then you a probably ahead of me. Or think
it is a load of hogs waddle and thus I am about as crazy as the rest of them.
In Bashar's talk on Beliefs part 2 he talks of believing in beliefs
about; ‘the point of realization that there can be a belief in other
beliefs and a belief in an ability to change from one belief to another’.
I have the answer to one of my thought problems. My issue has been beliefs. I have
been asking questions about belief. David Ike answered some in his book titled ‘Infinite Love is the Only Truth Everything Else is Illusion’
and ‘Power of Now’ by Eckhart Tolle touched on beliefs too.
I have met people who have read these authors work and don’t like them or what
they say. If you are one of these folks you may want to go read something else as
you may not like what I say either. Or you may.
What Bashar say about beliefs is: "...that there can be a belief in other
beliefs and a belief in an ability to change from one belief to another."
THAT is enlightenment. So if you believe that you don’t like the above authors
or Bashar, for whatever reasons (belief in your reasoning) YOU CAN CHANGE IT (of
course you have to want to change your beliefs). Maybe if you don’t want to change
your beliefs it is because you have become identified with them; they are YOU –
YOU are your beliefs. If you change them then who are YOU – ‘you’ loses its
identity – it loses the identity that is it familiar and safe with. And thus you
find yourself saying such statements as WHY should I change my beliefs, what I think…?
And are probably sitting there now reading this and arguing with me in your head
justifying your beliefs – yourself – who you are – which is my whole point.
Are you really what you say you are? My task to you is to ask yourself in earnest
and a deep deep level. I mean really think about it, mull it over for some time
‘is this belief me?‘ Ask this to yourself about every belief you have as you
become aware of them. Follow it up with the question ‘where did this belief originate
from?’
You can change your beliefs like you can change your religion. You can be a catholic
for part of your life then a Buddhist for another part. It is that you have concisely
shifted beliefs. Some like religion or being a meat eater then a vegan are easier
to change then others. Beliefs installed in us from our childhood, society, fears,
and past lives are the hard ones to change.
Like Bashar says: "...some beliefs are very hard to shift from. It depends
on your ‘attachment’ to the belief."
We all have deep beliefs that govern our actions and thoughts.
Sometimes (still more often than I would consciously like) I get wound up in my
own beliefs. But I am becoming more aware of this. You can too over time. Give yourself
time. It has taken you a lifetime, or lifetimes if are on board with reincarnation,
to get your ‘set ‘ of beliefs so don’t beat yourself up if it takes a few
decades to be consciously aware of them.
I have consciously wanted to understand how to move between beliefs. The combined
works of Ike, Tolle and Bashar has put into words better than I can at this time
about what I have been saying for ages even in my writings about Ecuador (the rubbish
article is a good one about this) that our whole view of the world is in our own
heads, made up of beliefs.
You and I are in our physical situations right now BECAUSE of our
beliefs especially the ones we are NOT concisely aware of yet. If we don’t’
get a deep understanding of these beliefs we repeat life patterns again and again.
This is evident in most people’s lives. It can be evident in generations to the
share the same beliefs. This may be all good if you are fortunate enough to
have what you consider to have been a ‘good’ life. But I challenge even that
and ask have you really had a good life or is it a belief that you have had a good
life? What measures (beliefs) are you using to define ‘a good life’? Money,
not suffering, a stable childhood, never wanting etc
Beliefs compound, one on top of the other one belief reinforcing another. One belief
used to justify another belief.
I for one don’t want a 3rd run of my life and are up for the
challenge of analyzing my beliefs and their origins and asking a 3rd
question ‘does this belief serve me well now and in the life that I want
to lead now and in the future?’ What about you? Do you want to repeat
your mistakes again in your life? Do you want to continue with the same fears and
chains holding you back for the rest of your life? If you choose YES and do so fully aware of your beliefs then you have made conscious choice
and accepted the beliefs you have knowing their impact and influence on you. That
is the subtle difference. Most are unaware of their beliefs therefore their decisions
are not their decisions’.
Be well warned you may choose to stick with the beliefs you have but circumstances
may change them for you regardless. :-)
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I was talking to my friend Kate last night on the phone and tried to explain the
concept of beliefs to her and that you can change your beliefs and some people do
but most people don’t grasp the depth of their beliefs and the concept that they
can change any belief no matter how in grained it is in them.
Anyway during the conversation Kate made a comment “you have
to have a reason to live.”
Now, many reasons to live are totally superficial i.e. one reason could be to acquire
assets, another could be to find ‘true love’ etc. The majority of the world
attaches their ‘reason to live’ to tangible objects and goals
to achieve. Or to other people family, kids, husband wife.
After we finished our conversation I didn’t give Kate’s comment a second thought
until the following night.
First up let’s define reason as a tangible thought that we can
contain in our conscious brain that helps us to assign purpose to our existence
on this planet.
Let’s define live in the context of Kate’s question; it was
a purpose, something you are working towards. (Let’s call this LD1)
But live can be defined a alive, breathing, eating, pooping, sleeping
etc. (let’s call this LD2)
Many alternative disciplines put a lot of emphasize on a person finding their purpose
for this lifetime on earth. The reason they are here. The reason they gave themselves
before they came here or the reason that God gave them or whatever. They are pointing
more towards deeper meanings (intrinsic values) like saving the planet, being a
missionary, a healer etc all of this is just another form of ‘you have to have
a reason to live’ belief.
I say, by far, most people believe they need a reason to live, something
that they can grasp in their brain and think about and identify with.
So therefore if I explore the concepts of beliefs and beliefs can be changed at
will, and the reason to live is a belief that most people have, then the reason
to live has no founding, as it is just a belief. So, one could conclude that we don’t actually need a reason to live.
People commit suicide or get depressed because they ‘have no reason to live’.
They do this because they believe they need one and without one
who are they?
Bugger, this is the mother of all beliefs!
Why do we believe we need a tangible reason to live (LD1)?
Last night Kate asked me what my reason to live is (LD1). I was silent. After some
time I came up with ‘my reason to live is to find out who I really am.’ But
I kind of came up with it because well I didn’t have anything, couldn’t think
of anything material or tangible and I felt I had to say something.
But it occurred to me, the light went on in the head tonight that I don’t believe
I need a reason to live in the context of LD1. I live because I live, in this body
for this lifetime, however long it shall be, because I do. Because I am here! And
if I don’t feed, sleep, poop, I will not live in the context of LD2.
Kate’s question really meant and the question some people ask is ‘What
is your purpose in live?’ But again one could throw the same analogy
out there and say people believe they have to have a purpose in life. But again
it is just a belief, it is not real. And again people die or get depressed if they
lose their purpose in life.
So, if I was asked by someone ‘what is your purpose in life?’ I would not have
an answer and I realize I have never had an answer. I have felt
obligated to have an answer because society demands it. But deep down my entire
life I have had no idea what I want to do or be. Not because I don’t know, but
because I don’t need to know that I NEED a purpose to live life. I don’t need
to consciously identify with something to have a purpose, reason, whatever to live.
I am life.
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I will do stuff while on this planet and while I am doing it I will be focused and
do the best I can and fill that role to the best of my abilities but I do not need
it to live. It won’t as such give me purpose as it gives me direction for a period
of time, focus, role …. I don’t need a belief to do something.
Some will argue that you have to believe in what you are doing but isn’t that
a belief in itself? You believe you have to believe in what you are doing in order
to apply yourself 100% to have commitment, faith etc and do it. So, NO you do not
have to have belief in what you are doing. In fact if you wait till you have belief
you may never do it! Some times in life you do a thing because it has to be done
at that point in time, you may only get belief in it after you have don’t it for
you can then see the results of what you did and often until you see the results
you can’t see the belief!
I will call these things we do "journeys", journeys in a life span or as Jane said
we travel in circles, many circles throughout our life and as one comes to an end
another begins. Each circle or journey has something for us to learn. A circle could
be the role you play as the mother to your children. Also the role you played when
you were single looking for a partner in life. Or the role you may play as a grandmother
to your children’s children.
However, I will expand on Jane’s analogy and say that these circles\role are not
our identity. They may help build our ‘personality’ or mold our ego, shift our
beliefs J but it is not who you are. You don’t need belief to move into the next
circle of your life or journey often the ‘world’ will move you whether you are
ready for it or not J
Then it occurred to me; the highly destructive nature of having a belief that you
need a purpose to live, or a reason to live.
You have this belief, this reason to live, let’s say to be a top athlete and you
fail or succeed regardless at some point in time in the future it will come to an
end, then what? I was a top athlete you may think? If you are lucky, you will remodel
the belief into a new version of itself and go on believing.
If the human hangs so much hope and dreams and attachment on such a deep fundamental
belief as a reason to live or a purpose to live and that belief is pulled out from
under them, bugger!!
Or even worse they can’t come up with one in the first place! And society
expects them to have one. Then what do they feel?
No wonder we have so much depression and violence.
Who came up with these beliefs! They really have control of the people on this planet!
These beliefs span every religion, every none religion they are core and they are
simple and very effective for of control.
Then this evening I was talking to my Aunt and she is sending me some pieces of
china over for me and\or Emily. I could feel she was distressed in her voice as
I showed no enthusiasm for these objects. I bought them for her because she enjoys
them and I enjoyed buying them for her as I knew they would give her pleasure. She
said ‘don’t be like that Anita. They help make you who you are, they
help make your home.’
My take on this is; you should only have these objects because they are pretty to
look at, may trigger a pleasant memory or remind you of someone. However, if you
need an object to remind you of someone they couldn’t have been that important
in your life! Unless of course you have a memory problem then the object would have
a just cause. If you need an object to define who you are then you are insecure
in yourself. You need the object to tell the world this is who I am, this is how
successful you have been. You become identified with them and spawn emotional
attachments to them. If you can identify with this and want to change yourself and
learn more then read The Power of Now and The New Earth
by Eckhart Tolle and get back to me.
I wear my dad’s watch, because it is a nice watch, and I can read the numbers,
and because I like to wear a watch. But I remember my dad in my mind not when I
look at the watch. It would be sad if I lost the watch but it is not my identity.
Another example of this is a friend has been looking after my apartment in NZ while
I am away and she told me via email that she broke my special cup. First up I had
to scratch my head as to which cup in my cups was my special cup. Nothing obvious
jumped to mind. I felt good as I didn’t have any emotional attachments to any
of my cups J. I wanted to explore this further within myself to check on my attachment
level So I asked her to describe the cup she broke. Turned out the cup she broke
was one I designed and decorated myself. Suddenly when I read this in her email
I became aware of a wave of emotions go through me. I stopped and stilled my mind
and reflected on the internal feelings. I discovered I was still attached to a cup
and that I was not consciously aware of this attachment till this exact moment in
time. I was attached to this cup because it represented a moment in my life where
I had had the time to do some artwork. I was able to let these emotions flow through
me without reacting to them and thus the attachment was released. In my mind I thanked
my friend for breaking the cup and thanked my guides for showing me this deeper
level of attachment that lies within us even when we think we are no longer attached.
I didn’t used to be this way. I used to hang onto everything to ‘remind me’
of what I had lost or what had past. I was into the generation thing, the inheriting
the house from the parents thing, I was a full believer in the system. However,
thank god the journeys I have traveled on have changed me and are changing me faster
than my little old brain feels like it can keep up with.
Objects do not make you who you are. If they did and they were
all lost then technically you as you are would be lost too. And this is what happens
when say, someone looses their home they have worked so hard for, they lose their
identity. I watched this with my father and my mother and experienced it myself.
Change your belief and bam ‘the pain is gone’. The house is not YOU. The house
is gone, sold, but you are still here. And there will be another house …
Objects may make the home pretty and more acceptable to people who visit because
your home will fit in to what is expected of a home to look like in the culture
you live in. They may serve a purpose like cooking or warmth, or bring you enjoyment.
But that is it! Nothing more!
Some objects will stay with you longer than other objects. But this business of
handing things down from generation to generation and putting this emotional value
onto some object is bull shit. Yet another belief designed by the belief designers
to keep us trapped in the maze we call reality.
When you hand things down from generation to generation with obligations to ‘keep
it safe’ ‘pass it on to the next generation’ etc you hand down a lot of guilt
and responsibility to the next generation. And then if they break the bloody thing,
they are going to feel really bad (presuming they have bought into the whole generation
thing) knowing great grandma is turning over in her grave because they broke the
150 year old thing. Bugger!
So give some thoughts to your beliefs and how they contribute to your life positive
and negative. How they propel you forward or hold you back. How they cause you pain
or pleasure. There will be obvious ones ‘I am a vegan’. I like rugby’. I need
to be here for my children’. I aren’t bright enough.’ I’m ugly, I’m fat,
I’m scared of flying, I’m scared of spiders ….
But it’s the core ones I want you to go looking inside for. Do you believe you
need a reason to live, and purpose in life? And if you didn’t have a reason or
purpose at all would you die physically or spiritually? Or, would you be truly alive
for the first time in your life?
A tip: When you change a belief you may be able to change it easy enough in your
mind but it may take a while for it to manifest within you and your life. So give
it time. Be easy on yourself. It took you years, lifetimes, to get to this point
and it will take time for you to change.
One of our great fuck ups in our western society is that we want everything now.
We find something out and we want the change to be immediate. We get sick and we
want to get better immediately. We want some object and we want it NOW. Instant
gratification!
Give yourself a break, allow yourself time!
As for me, for now I will hang on to some of those ‘objects’. But I have also
let a lot go and finding it easier to let go as my beliefs shift.
If you want to delve into this further then you could go to www.bashar.org or read the Power of Now or The New Earth
by Eckhart Tolle or Infinite Love is the only Truth, Everything Else is
Illusion by David Icke, or Affluenza by James Oliver.