ARE WE PERMANENTLY THE SAME?
OR HAVE WE GOT IT WRONG?
tba
"We are not fixed, permanent, or stuck in any way. To belief so is preposterous. It is based on ignorance of what a human being is. And, please know, that we can create, in a very doable way, a higher level of living life - one of happiness and peace. Just follow the program!"
The BuddhaKahuna
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CONTENTS
An erroneous belief to be re-examined
What is the truth?
Can't we use the same "mechanical" process?
This is the mechanical process
I have a friend...if only she would... (Too "busy", repeating distraction?)
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AN ERRONEOUS BELIEF TO BE RE-EXAMINED
Somehow many of us have come to believe that we are just the way we are, as if we are a fixed, permanent being. This is not at all true. It is one of the great fictions.
Of course, it would be a "so what" if it were not for it being a major cause of suffering, as the Buddha points out as a major tenet of Buddhism - and a realization that one must have if one is to relieve or eliminate suffering from one's life. A MAJOR tenet, not a small point. For it is what suffering is based on!
Heed this as it is the assertion of all the great thinkers of all time. Don't you think you should at least consider this, examine it and determine for yourself?????!!!!!
WHAT IS THE TRUTH?
A person is just a vessel (a brain that has a remarkable capacity, a body that is somewhat fixed) into which inputs are inputted and habits are installed.
The mistake is when we believe, in some massively illogical way, that we are fixed, stuck with being those inputs and those habits, instead of seeing the vessel is the vessel and the inputs/habits are just additions which we have the ability to not hold in place and continue.
A permanent way of being: That is a preposterous assertion when you look at it.
Sometimes we believe a movie is real, as its frames go by and creating an ongoing picture and scene. And, if a frame is repeated over and over, it seems as if it is "always there" and then we illogically conclude that "therefore it will always be there". No, they are just repeated frames and we can "film" new ones by choice and then play the new ones, to have the truly desired experience of life that we can create.
CAN'T WE USE THE SAME "MECHANICAL" PROCESS?
Indeed, if the contents of our mind was formed by the inputs and if our habits were formed by repetition in the first place, then it seems eminently logical that we could on purpose put in desirable inputs and repeat desirable behaviors to form desirable habits of action and positive inputs to create positive thoughts.
Is that a deniable truth????
You would best make a decision now, for the quality of your life will depend on it.
If you decide that you are not a fixed being (other than physicality) and if you understand you are not the inputs and you are not the habits, then and only then can you give yourself permission and direction to create new and better inputs and new and better habits.
THIS IS THE MECHANICAL PROCESS
Since you have the ability to select and collect and input desirable inputs and to repeat desirable behaviors, you then logically have the ability to create a better quality life. Yes, it will be gradual and there will be some fallbacks due to what you haven't yet learned, but it will result in a building-up of a strong foundation of correct thinking and more desirable habits.
The better inputs cause you to see the world more the way it is and to see the positiveness of it all.
The better inputs plus desirable habits create a "Positivity Ratio" that will guarantee happiness. You have control over that Positivity Ratio, since you have control over the new inputs and the new behaviors to practice. (Read Positivity Ratio.)
What you have to do
The inputting of good data requires the finding and collection of what is good and desirable - and then the repeating of those inputs so that they are available. This is a bit of a "duh, really?" statement, so obvious, yet still worth saying, for clarification, definiteness, and certainty.
Yes, it takes some effort and time, but, after all, this is about creating the quality of your life - is that not more than worth the relatively small price?!!!!
Making the choice to not do this or to just do a bit here and there is a choice to live one's life at a much lower level than what is actually available to us. Making the choice to do this is making the choice to have the result of it: happiness and peace.
Those don't somehow come upon us, by chance. They do not come upon us by depending on outside circumstances to make us happy or by other people causing it. The hyper beautiful feelings from a true lover coming into your life will create those for a bit, but they are not of ongoing quality and value; it is foolish to depend on that.
Hoping for these things to make you happy is wishful thinking or what I call unrealistic hope, as the hoped for ingredients are not under your control. That path is a sure-fire formula for creating unhappiness or having not that great a life.
Doing the inputs and practicing the behaviors are all doables, all within your control - and therefore part of the hope that doesn't disappoint and is not contingent: read Realistic Hope, which is the kind of hope to base a life on.
It is up to you. It is doable. You can create a happier life, for sure.
Will you do it? Or let the opportunity go by?
A SPECIFIC MEANS
The suggested approach is strictly a "mechanical" one, not needing to deal with the nuances and indefiniteness of psychological problem solving. The approach is just based on doables. Surely a person can put together a notebook, following a table of contents, gather items that are good to review, and then review them and use them as positive inputs to help produce the right Positivity Ratio. Surely a person can benefit from the daily grounding that is available from creating a referenceable "extra brain" one can access easily. The method is used in The Grounding Reminders Notebook. I recommend you use it as a means for daily grounding and for putting together the pieces to form a new super-strong philosophy and reservoir from which to draw positive thoughts from - for a whole new life.
Read Inputs Determine Outputs.
"Insanity: Keeping on doing the same things but expecting different results."
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I HAVE A FRIEND...IF ONLY SHE WOULD...
I have a friend whom I have great compassion for and wish the best for. But she is "too busy" to do all that is required here.
She creates distractions that take up much time:
She gets upset for a few days at a time about some issue strictly caused by her
erroneous inputs which are kept "top of the mind", immediately accessible and
therefore accessed easily.
Sometimes she devotes her energies to things that don't have a logical payoff,
such as "getting even" - at a huge emotional and time cost.
She seeks relief very often from the anxieties in her mind, all created by her via
her erroneous beliefs. She'll seek it from a pill because she doesn't know
and/or hasn't practiced a way to handle it when it occurs.
She is constantly dealing with the symptoms in her life and not investing the time
to cure the problem. So she ends up repeating the problem and having to
cope with the symptoms. The way out is to cure the problem.
Surely, she has 15 minutes a day that she can use on putting together the desirable inputs and forming a structure to install them from. She can certainly let some so-called "must" item go, so that she can do this more vital task. (She needs to be convinced of the fact that the tyranny of the urgent should not rule over the vital; read Importance Vs. Urgency. This is where one gets the beginning idea for living a graceful, easy, fullfilling life by Living The 80/20 Way, where one actually throws away the bottom 40% of one's activities. If she would begin practicing the remedies to Parkinson's Law, she would see that inserting what is important somehow works out even if one seems fully busy, as the less important just doesn't get done - and one gradually rises to a higher level of capability and gets rid of those things that took the time in the first place: the anxieties and the improper handling of them.)
I am not making her wrong for these, as she can do no better than the inputs which dominate her mind. It is not any fault in her, but the lack of good inputs being available "top of the mind".
The suggested approach is strictly a "mechanical" one, not needing to deal with the nuances and indefiniteness of psychological problem solving. The approach is just based on doables. Surely a person can put together a notebook, following a table of contents, gather items that are good to review, and then review them and use them as positive inputs to help produce the right Positivity Ratio.
It is her choice. To let things repeat as they do or to go this definite path that is doable and totally achievable (or to pick another one that is doable and then commit to it, but not go on repeating what doesn't need to be repeated, doing what doesn't work, for indeed it is within her power to change that).
