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We have not only moved spiritually backwards for several thousand years,
but we have covered, lost, or destroyed much of the wisdom of the past.
Thus if we want truth, we are left having to rediscover it based on what
fragments remain, combined with the voice of our innate self-direction
when we are untainted by modernity, social expectations, media, and the
needs of others.
But who can face this daunting task? Consider how few people today
remain unpoisoned and stable given the broken lives they choose.
Most people give in and give up, faking happiness, feeling compelled to
lie in accordance with custom, taking on popular beliefs, caring for
social praise more than authenticity, and then suffering inertia as
they immobilize themselves and let life's possibilities pass them by.
They call this progress, but it is really their disguised nihilism and
self-destruction.
We are not separate from them, so when they are destroyed, it damages
our spirit as well. It is right for us to offer what we can, even if
our offers are misunderstood, ignored, or mocked. Yet we are not their
shepards, nor their servants, nor their physicians, nor their mothers,
nor their bosses, nor their dogs. If we come with a pure heart we
are treated with skepticism. If we offer our best they think we hold
handcuffs and a missionary's self-serving tricks. If we come with faith
they doubt the reality we offer. Still we must try, for the fate of the
future rests upon our ability to resist joining them in resignation from
life's potential.
Those of us who are hermits remain withdrawn from the draining cycle of
boredom, thrill-seeking, and oversocialization that this entertainment
based society promotes as it strives to "kill time" just as it has
attempted to kill all meaning. Instead of endlessly reacting, we have
time to reflect. In doing so, we are connected to the past where we can
rediscover ancient knowledge and find that which fulfills our lives in
a way that is lacking in the mindless ready-made solutions that society
offers us under its stick and carrot of social approval.
Our actions determine our future. We hold all the possibilities in our
hands by what we choose or shrink from choosing. Thus we must be brave,
thoughtful, enduring, dynamic, and decisive so we do not squander our
vast opportunities.
-Jesus |