Perception of Reality

Reality is Not What We Perceive 

Everyone has their own unique perception of reality. Reality is filtered through our ego and it is unique and different for everyone. It depends on the genes we have been given, and the environment we have grown up in. The culture, the circumstances, our family, school, work, etc. This also means that reality is therefore different from how we perceive it. You can change reality by changing yourself. This insight alone changes your reality enormously. 

The Ego

Our ego drives us, because the ego is the essence of what we are: a desire to receive. It is through to the ego that we take action, we want something and we go after it to get it. We always want something better than what we have now. This applies to us as individuals as well as to humanity itself. After the desire is fulfilled, a new and greater desire arises and in this way our ego grows. You can also see this development in humanity throughout the ages. 

The Desire Grows  

You may wonder what the purpose of this ever-growing ego is. I can tell you that the ultimate purpose is to become completely fulfilled. We as humanity are at a point in our evolution where we find that more material things will not give us that ultimate fulfilment. We find that it is never enough and that after one desire is fulfilled, another desire arises. We are now approaching a point where we realise that no material thing can ever fill us. It is a time when we need a different kind of desire that will bring about a great change in us.

Purpose

We begin to ask ourselves what fulfilment really means. Filling ourselves with material things feels increasingly empty. Slowly but surely we discover that giving is more fulfilling than receiving. When we look at nature, we can see that we as humans are different from nature. Nature is abundant and giving, and we are almost exclusively concerned with how to get more for ourselves. Of course we also give to others and we discover more and more that this is much more fulfilling. We come to the second stage in the development of our ego. Instead of only receiving for ourselves, we begin to think about giving back to nature.

We Search for Answers Until the Answer Finds Us.

It is like the awakening of a small point in our heart. Out of all the desire for ourselves, a point of desire for giving arises. This is the beginning of a great change in us. We can only be truly happy when we give to others. This sounds very obvious, but it is much harder than you think, because we are born with a desire to receive. That is our nature, so we have to go against our nature, and the ego is not happy with that. We go through a process of always having to rise above our ego. But like all difficult things, it is worth it!

The Wisdom of Reception

In a nutshell

Two forces; giving and receiving

The wisdom of reception explains that there are two forces, the force of bestowal (love) that created the created being and the force of reception, the opposite, the created being itself. They are like a cup and the filling, feminine and masculine. We, humanity, are the cup, which needs to be filled and this desire makes us do all kinds of things to fill the empty feeling inside. This desire is our engine. The only reason we feel emptiness and darkness in our life is because we are confused and think we can fill it with material things but this filling is always temporary. This cup can only be filled with the light of love because nothing can substitute love itself. 

Overcoming the gap between giving and receiving

So because we are complete opposite to the force of love, we have to overcome the gap between receiving and giving. Because the moment we become love then we are like the force of bestowal, and we will feel whole again. This means that no thing and no other person can fulfill us, only love itself. So only if we can give love, to love others, to love our lives and everything in it, no matter how bad it seems then we can feel whole again. If we can accept the darkness and agree with everything in this world, then and only then, when there is nothing left that I do not love, then the cup is filled. 

Discovering our egoistic nature is key for correcting it 

In speech it is simple but in attainment it is the most difficult thing to do, because we are the will to receive by nature. We have to put all our effort in if we want to succeed. And we will succeed, this is our destiny. But we can accelerate the path towards fulfillment. We can do that by consciously trying to “correct” our egoistic desires into bestowal. By trying we will become aware of us being opposite to love, and that will give us a desire for change. Then we will have the right desire to receive. The desire to change our nature into bestowal and love and that is all we need. 

We don’t have to do it alone

This path will take time because we cannot correct our whole egoism at once, we can only do one bit at a time. Therefore every time, over and over again we will see that we still have some egoism left and we cannot stop improving ourselves yet. But every little bit counts and will become a big desire that eventually will be complete. And most importantly we don’t have to do it alone, we do it together. We cannot correct the whole world by ourselves and we don’t have to. More and more people will become aware that fulfillment doesn’t come from corporeal stuff and that will lead them to the spiritual path. At first from the desire to fulfill themselves and along the way, by understanding more and more, to gain a desire to fulfill others, a desire for bestowal.

The end of correction

Imagine the world we live in when everyone starts wanting to fulfill others. This will inevitably lead to the end of correction, the complete correction and fulfillment of every person and every living being in the world. By keeping this goal in mind, and make it the most important thing in our lives we all will accelerate on the path. 

The Man That was Always Tired

A farytail

Once upon a time, long ago in a land far away from here, a land of mountains and forests, there was a man who was always tired. The man was a lumberjack and he worked very hard and made long days, so it was not surprising that the man was tired.

In the valley was a small village and the villagers held a feast every night. The land was fertile and the farmers had all kinds of delicacies and there was a cook who cooked and a baker who baked and everyone had a task. Together they shared the food and after dinner there was merry singing and everyone enjoyed being together.

But the lumberjack was never at the feast even though he cut all the wood for the kitchen and the campfire for everyone. He was simply too tired. The lumberjack never managed to walk to the village. Every night he made himself something to eat and then went to bed. Every day he imagined going to the village to be with the others, but every time he got home he was so tired and then always fell asleep like a log.

The Wake Up

Until one time the man had just lit the fire to make soup he couldn’t keep his eyes open and thought, I’ll take a nap until the soup is ready. He lay down for a while and promptly fell asleep. Until the man was startled awake by smoke creeping up his nose and he saw to his dismay that his cottage was on fire.

All at once he was wide awake and ran outside in the direction of the water pump. Men approached him with buckets of water. The lumberjack had no time to think and formed a line with the others and the buckets of water were passed from the pump to the front one by one, and the man threw the water into his burning house.

An hour later the fire was out, but not much was left of the cottage. The men took the lumberjack to the village where the meal was still in full swing. The lumberjack had never been happier. At last he had managed to at the feast. The fire had made him wide awake and he understood that being together had to be just as important to him as saving his life from the fire.

Invisible connection

Life evolves in two directions, which are both opposite and parallel; cooperation and self-fulfillment. In all of reality, self-fulfillment is possible only through cooperation with others. In minerals, for example, several atoms work together to form the molecules of that mineral. If one of the atoms were to separate, the mineral would disintegrate. At a higher level of complexity in plants and animals, including humans, there is a calibration of different molecules, cells and organs, that unite to create a separate being and again, if even one of the molecules in the cells of that being were missing, it would become ill or even die.

Ingnorance

Although we have long known this law of nature, we behave as if we are not part of the ecosystem called planet Earth.  Worse, among ourselves, we believe that one society can be superior to another. Yet nature clearly demonstrates that nothing is superfluous and that no part of any element in nature is superior to another. So why do we think we have a privilege that no other part of nature has to patronize and oppress other people and species? Where does this arrogance come from, if not from ignorance?

Because we are ignorant of the desire to give, which gives us our strength and wisdom, we relate them to ourselves. If we were aware that we too are a product of the two desires that constitute life, we would know how to thrive in this world, along with all of nature. Imagine if we all knew that we were united with all other human beings, that we were supported by all other human beings in the world, and that all they wanted was for us to maximize our potential. How wonderful life would be if every person contributed all his or her talents to society, and in return received the support and appreciation of society. 

A Chance to Move Toward Connection

Connection can happen only when all the parties involved want to connect. And if they agree on wanting to connect they must do what needs to be done in order to connect.

Wanting to connect

The first step, wanting to connect, is actually the hardest. It requires reviewing where we are, realizing how disconnected we are. We have to shift from blaming others for our woes to admitting that we are not contributing to mending the situation. If everyone participates in this process, this will already change things for the better. However, it will lead us to a conclusion that we not really want to connect at all and that will make us feel helpless.

Yet, our sense of helplessness is exactly what we need this is the beginning of the next step, to do all what is necessary to connect. The beauty about this process is that at that moment of crisis, when we feel as though we aren’t doing anything to connect nor can we do anything about it, this is all that is required—to want connection to happen and to realize that we cannot make it happen. When all of us, or at least enough of us, want it badly enough, it will happen seemingly by itself; our hearts will open toward each other and a new feeling will come in.

From enemies to lovers

We think that we determine reality through actions, but we actually determine it through our desires. When we want to do others harm, we create a terrible world and when we want to bring others joy, we produce a beautiful world. When we hate but want to love, we change ourselves from enemies to lovers, and the world around us changes with us.

Our Influence on the Climate Crisis

As the climate crisis escalates and extreme weather becomes more frequent, experts are seriously asking how close we are to the “point of no return.” But the question we should be asking is not whether the earth is doomed and we are therefore doomed, but rather why we are here. 

Humans became rulers of the planet

The universe in which we live has existed for about fourteen billion years. The earth has existed for about 4.5 billion years, and life on earth began a few hundred million years after the earth formed. We evolved from atoms to molecules, from molecules to single-celled organisms, and from single-celled organisms to the myriad life forms on Earth in the water, on land, and in the air. Finally, in the last few hundred thousand years, humanity has emerged. 

Gradually, we have become the rulers of the planet, exploiting the soil, flora and fauna, polluting the air, soil and water, and depleting the earth’s resources as fast as we can to gain power and wealth. Is this why we are here, to do all this evil? Perhaps, if we knew the answer, we would not be doing the unimaginable damage we do to the planet every second. 

why are we here?

Therefore, the question of our purpose for being here is the key question we must answer. If we know the answer to it, we will solve all our problems and save the planet. Once we make our social environment friendly and caring, our nature will become friendly and caring. When we become friendly and caring, we will stop exploiting. And when we stop exploiting, we will stop abusing each other, other living beings and the planet as a whole. 

It turns out that to save ourselves and our planet, our only focus should be on changing our social environment from hostile to friendly, from abusive to helpful. Everything else will then quickly follow. Only when we start thinking about each other will we stop thinking about ourselves, and only when we stop thinking about ourselves will we start perceiving the world around us as it really is. Therefore, the only question we need to ask to secure our lives, the well-being of the planet, and even our happiness is, “Why are we here?”

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This World is Just a Replica of the Spiritual World

We have forgotten, or never knew, that this world is only a replica of the spiritual world, we perceive the world as an “imprint” of the spiritual world.

The purpose of life is to be fulfilled and feel good, which can be achieved by becoming equal to the giving power of nature. All that is needed to achieve this is a correction of our heart.

Our heart is entirely made up of desire and tends to want receive for itself. If we correct it to a desire to give to others, we can become truly fulfilled. Because receiving for ourselves will never give fulfillment.

We just cannot immediately correct our heart from the intention to receive for myself to the intention for giving to others. This correction takes place in steps. These steps can again be divided into smaller steps, where we start by “avoiding” harming others.

Not to want to harm others sounds obvious, but if you start working with it you will discover that the ego wants to get things at all costs, even if it harms others or the world. This stubborn ego will try anything to escape this correction.

Now the idea is not to avoid the ego. Rather, it leads us to recognize this, unconscious behavior. Each time a new piece is revealed. By facing how the ego works, we can choose each time to connect more lovingly with others. In that way we correct it step by step.

Perception of Reality

What is reality? What is a person, a human being? Our perception of our reality causes concealment to us. A person is like a closed box with five openings, our five senses. Around that person, that box, is a complete reality, also called spiritual reality. From this reality things come to us. Through the five senses we determine what that thing is, in other words what reality consists of according to my senses.

When this object outside the box comes to us, something strange happens. It does not really enter the box. The box is a closed system and before the object can come in, it touches a barrier, a kind of transmitter, something like the eardrum or retina or a nerve of the skin surface, or a taste bud. The object is reduced and goes through a program and it is interpreted by us into something that we can understand according to certain principles in the program. Once it has gone through this program, it leaves the box, this machine, and this produces our reality.

It doesn’t matter how sensitive this sensor is. It can be an eye or a space telescope, or you can be completely nearsighted, it doesn’t matter. What matters is the programming. What happens in the program, this subjective system. It can only be what the system says it is. Not what it really is, but a reduction that can be understood by the program. 

As a result of selfishness i am trapped inside the five senses

Why is this program limited? It is the objective reality and the limited part we can perceive of it. This program is called selfishness. “What is in it for me?”, “How is it going to influence me?” As a result of this selfishness I am trapped in it. The person is locked in a subjective view of all these things. Only in relation to how it feels inside the box. So we have a problem, because each of our five senses works with exactly the same program. 

So in order to know what surrounds us, what the big reality is, we have to develop an extra sense. A sense which can actually make contact with what exists outside the five senses. To do so, you must have a desire for it. It is not possible to work outside the box, to build something outside that box, as long as we are satisfied with what we have. There is a motivating force within us that enables us to get to the point where we need to get out of the box. 

We understand that we are ‘a will to receive’, that we are built as egoists, and we must also understand that this is okay. We need the ego to achieve fulfilment, there is nothing wrong with it. We just need to learn how to use it, how to handle it and how to use it for this spiritual purpose. 

The power of desire for something better is what motivates everything in reality

What moves things in reality? What makes things happen? Nobody does anything in this world without getting better from it. Maybe you move in your chair, your gaze wanders, maybe you have grabbed something to drink. Every movement you are involved in, happens only as a result of a calculation: that you feel uncomfortable where you are and that a need has arisen in you. And you have moved to a new position or a new situation that you think will make you feel better. 

This lack and its fulfillment, the power of desire for something better, is what motivates everything in reality. And thanks to this longing, it will eventually take a person out of the physical world, out of the perception of the physical world. We will leave the limitations we experience and the suffering that goes with it. If we learn to use our desire in a good way, we can enter the spiritual world beyond the barrier. 

The desire to receive evolves within each of us and within us as humanity. We feel desires and we feel how they change. It starts with a desire for food, sex and shelter. Our efforts, our work, the whole purpose of our lives has to do with finding and getting these things, just like animals. Once we have fulfilled this, we realize that life is about much more than that, and we can no longer be satisfied with it. Then a second category of desires appears.

These desires – one, two, three, four – all have to do with the physical world

Next is a longing for wealth. Wealth is an addition to the first category, so that I never have to worry about it again. And once we have fulfilled this longing for wealth, we come to the feeling “is this all there is? Then something else grows in us. It is not only the desire that grows, it is a desire that encompasses the previous desire. Now a longing for power arises. This has happened on an individual level, but also to the whole of humanity. The whole scope of history has been the evolution of these desires. 

Power is the ability to control both the first and second category of desires. And also this longing is no longer enough at a certain moment and then a longing for knowledge arises. Knowledge is essentially the barrier of what we define as the physical world. These desires – one, two, three, four – all have to do with what we experience as pleasure, what we want, what satisfies us. Well, knowledge is science, it is religion, it is art, it is the pinnacle of what we consider to be something humanity could possibly achieve. 

Yet anyone who seriously delves into this very great desire and tries to fulfill it, eventually discovers that it is also empty, that in science there are no answers for the real causes of things. So, because there are no meaningful answers, there are only mechanical answers. And those answers only have to do with these desires. Religion does give us convictions, but cannot give us access to what we really want: a direct knowledge. 

A new (spiritual) desire appears in our hearts

So, once a human becomes empty as a result of having fulfilled all this, something completely different, something very special, a new longing arises. But, this desire is not a desire from this world. It is a desire which is placed in our heart and which is the sum of all the desires we have, both for this world and for what lies beyond it. 

This longing is placed within us from a very different level of development, from the higher reality. And what appears in our hearts is a “point in the heart”. This point is a part of the greater reality. It has an aspect of spirituality, as this longing is fulfilled, it constantly grows until it fills our whole experience, our whole existence, and it can bring us into the spiritual world. 

What is a higher reality? We are created in exactly the opposite stage to the quality that exists in the higher worlds. Therefore, we cannot perceive what is there. It seems as if there is nothing at all. Man consists of a desire to receive. That is what is in the box. And this desire to receive makes us experience a limited existence, makes us suffer, experience isolation and all the things we find difficult in life.

In the spiritual world there is no time and space and therefore there is nothing mechanical there.

What exists outside is an objective reality. This is the will to bestow, an unconditional altruism. In other words, the experience here is unlimited, unlimited existence, unlimited joy. We cannot feel this, because we have no means to get there, we only have our five senses. Or do we? 

In the spiritual world there is no time and space and therefore there is nothing mechanical there. The spiritual world consists only of states of feeling, which have to do with certain qualities, inner qualities. All movement in spirituality consists of equality or inequality between two states of feeling or qualities.

We can see this, for instance, in friendship. If my friend enjoys comedy and I do not care about comedy, I am just a serious person, then it is not very likely that we will be very good friends. If I hate comedy, it is clear that there is distance between us. But if I love comedy and I love the same comedians, the same movies as him, then my friend and I, in terms of the love of comedy, are close to each other in that feeling.

There are only two things, the quality of giving and the quality of receiving

In other words, in spirituality, if two attributes, two feelings, are equal, they are considered close, if they are different, they are considered distant. But the beautiful thing is that what can actually move us from the physical to the spiritual, is if they have exactly the same quality, purpose and intention, then they are the same, then they are connected.

And it is this law, the law of equivalence of form, which can take us out of our selfish state of separation, so that we are able to build an extra sense that can feel what is outside of us. What we can do is to build within us a similar frequency, a similar quality, which has the same quality as this altruistic quality of bestowal. 

Actually there are only two things, the quality of giving, bestowal, and the quality of receiving. This is all there is. And to get out of the box, we have to move to the spiritual space. This means that this quality, the will to receive, has to change step by step to the quality of giving, in order to become more and more equal to the altruistic, giving nature. 

THERE IS A LADDER TOWARDS THE STATE OF LOVE

It is like a ladder, with each step of the ladder representing the states as increasing amounts of the will to bestow beyond the will to receive. Through the increase in equivalence of form with the giving nature, we will begin to feel what giving actually is, what it means to love and support everything that exists and to build this similarity within myself.