"Before enlightenment chop wood and carry water, after enlightenment chop wood and carry water" Ancient Eastern adage.
The new black belt is expected to be on the mat the next day, ready to take the first fall.
Cause and Effect, Result and Feedbacks
I remember reading a book written by Jack Welch, he talk about his youth days that he likes playing ice hokey, there was a time when he had a bad season, and were loosing, he would feel bad and frustrated, he would throw the hokey stick or vent out his anger through violent gestures, if my memory do not fail me I remember once he said that his mother came into the locker room concerned about her son’s emotional condition and ask him what is happening, and what is all the commotion and throwing of the hokey stick about, he just answered back that, he was frustrated he that he is loosing, his mother then stood up with both of her hands on her hip and gave him a lecture on winning, what was essentially communicated from Jack Welch’s mother to him was (as I understand it) “If you can’t take the pressure of loosing then don’t play, now be a man and decide if you want to continue playing the game.”
“In this world the concept loosing is really absurd and quite an impossible feat”, because there is always the law of “Cause and Effect”, when you play a game or compete in something, not matter what the result of the competition is, you always gain something.
There is only one ground rule for you to always gain something from the results of your competition and that is “You must authentically compete with your opponent”, cause if you compete authentically and if you humble yourself to experience and learn from the result of the competition, you will always win.
“The result of any action is the effect that you have previously caused”, result is just a result, and the result is not you, nor does it reflect who you are as a person, results exists from a moment to moment basis, it exists in a only in a particular moment of time (usually the past, future results are either called forecast or goals), results are feedback and there are no such things as good or bad results, just like feed back, they are always neutral, they exists solely to tell us where we are on the playing field, so that we are aware, and when aware we are empowered by will and choice. When we are empowered by choice, we can make a decision to continue competing or quit. One person can only truly loose if one is not aware of that the result that he/she is getting is totally attributed by one’s cause. That my friend is the ultimate failure and that is a real way to loosing, because if one is not aware of one’s actions and its causes, then for every instance of an unfavorable result one would be so emotionally involved with it, that one would miss whole point and the learning from the unfavorable result .
What is my purpose in life?
Questioning my Questions of Life?
I was though in a training that we human beings are like answers seeking animals, we never delve around any questions, once given a question we straight away run to get the answer to end the questions, but we must notice it is the questions that drives development, imagine what our world would be like if we stopped at the invention of cars, and never ask the question of flight.
Being with the question is powerful, it opens up new possibilities, it creates new directions, so I figure I mind as well try it, try focusing on my big questions of life, try questioning my questions.
· Why do I need a purpose?
o Because I need a bearing and direction in life.
o Why do you need a bearing and direction in Life ?
· So that I do not waste time.
· Why is not wasting time important?
§ Because time for me is limited, I will die one day, I need all the time I can get to do some thing significant, for my family. I want to die in honor.
§ Why do you need to do something significant for the family?
§ Because I want my life to worth something, because I want my life to be significant.
§ Why do you need your life to be significant?
· Because then I would die in honor, and be in peace, I would be in total peace knowing that I have given out everything I possibly can, I would die in peace if I know that I have tried my best, and outlive to my best potential. I need it to be significant so that I feel at peace.
§ What happens if your life is insignificant?
· I will feel disgrace, and not be in peace, I would feel that I have not done my part in the family and the society, I feel that I have been wrongly given the gift of good brains and good limbs, because I have failed to use them to their maximum potential.
· What does maximum potential look like? What does maximum potential mean?
o Maximum potential means that I have show mastery in one area of life, I have show and contributed to the field of knowledge in one particular area of life, the knowledge that I have contributed was never before discovered, and it was because my diligence and my hard work who had uncover the field of knowledge.
o What area of life do you want to show mastery in?
§ Psychology, mind development,
§ Martial Arts
§ What does significant meant?
·
§ Where are you now in terms of doing something significant?
·
· Why is finding my purpose in life important?
o Because I don’t want to live an ignorant and wasted life, I want it to mean something, I want it to contribute something, because I know my time in this world is transient, and I know I am a small spec of dust in this earth, but I want to have a work that would out live me, I cant be immortal, but I want to contribute something very important to this world and have my work be immortal.
§ Why is it important that my work be immortal?
· Because I cant live forever,
· I want my work to be immortal so that my generations after me can learn from it and improve there on.
o Why do you want your generation to improve there on?
§ Because I know that in life nothing is given, nothing is free, nothing is absolute, if my generations stop learning, stop to train themselves to be better they will fall again, like the floor without sweeping will be littered with dry leaves, the book shelf without wiping will be lined with dust. Gravity is our constant and best teacher.
It is the 3 week now since the passing of my Grand Father, I have no dreams of him, nor did I experience his spirit visiting me, the same goes when my Grand Ma Passed away.
When My grand ma passed away I cried a lot, but it is different now, I didn't cry much for my grand pa, not because I don't love him, but because I know that this is nature and part of life's offer to you, eternal rest. People talk about spirits, Christians and Muslims says that after you die you live on as a spiritual being, and you either go to heaven or hell, Hindu and Buddhist believe that after you die and if you are enlightened enough then you would be heading for Nirvana or else you would just be reincarnated into this world again, to be tested and to learn or to suffer for all the previous bad deeds that you have done. But I say "WHAT IF", what if when you die you just die, "ZAPPPPpppp" there is no spiritual being, there is nothing, not a trace of you left in this world. Nothing left, just dust and asheses. This thought alone would leave me breathless, this thought alone would have me be very afraid and scared to die. This though alone would have me see that life is really precious. It is precious because there is an end to it, as precious as the shelf life of a rose flower. It is beautiful as it is because it must fade and die off one day, anologous to life.
So if really my version of life is true then really life is important. Cause you only have once chance to live it. And by knowing this, I want to live it with pourpose and meaning. I want to create a meaning to my own existance. I have a dream and my dream is to be free, to be enlightened, to be wise, to be of service to the society and the world.
I want to stand for light, stand for truth, stand for love, stand for peace, I dont want to fall for nothing. To have this life be meaning full you must stand for something, and manifest this stand through every day actions. Actions upon who and what every that comes into your path. I want to be elevated to the highest truth.
The vision of my life is that I live in a community of love, where neighbours could be best of friend and trusting, my house, my home would be the safest place where any one could take shelter, and I would be a big man to give love and show love. I am a big man to elevate the lives of every one I come into contact with, no matter who they are or what they do. No more killing, no more violence, every one would be loving, there would be no race differences, there would be no religion differences.
I have a vision to be a great student and a great teacher.
I have read this book and it is so true about life that at some point some of us will tend to loose our selfs.
"Loosing your self" a great term, cannot be articulated logically what its meaning is, but it can be felt. So the question now here is how do you know if you have lost your self ?
The evidence that you will find if you loose your self is the feeling of emptiness and weariness. Like loosing the passion towards life. Not having any direction in life, that would lead to wasting of time, indulging in things that would give you immediate pleasures (alcohol, drugs, sex, etc.).
So now how do we have bearing over this event of "loosing oneself in life" ? How do we get the compass of life, such that when we know we are lost, we can use it to go back on the right path.
The compass of life is simply your principles of life. One without any principles of life would be like without a compass. The view of life is almost analogous to a journey from the point of one location to another, an expedition, an odyssey if you will, a very long long road, but with a limited time frame for you to travel (you life span).
One must be like a stern guard of his/her own life's compass, because without it how can you find your way back?
But being stern guard of your own compass requires discipline. Discipline to my understanding is simply to do what you say. To act on the principles that you have accepted into your life, or simply in other words "To Walk, The Talk".
In my experience, "To Walk, The Talk" is not as simple as it seems. Although it is the basics of life. So many people wants success, so many people crave for advancement in their life. But logically, how can you even learn the advance stuff of life, if you haven't mastered the basics ?
Always go to the basics of life, and the book "The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari" is a good book about mastering the basics of life.
I went to see this movie with my sister on Saturday 08-03-2008 12.a.m.
I learned many lessons in the story, it is about a boy growing to be a man, and being a man you fear many things, you fear making the wrong decisions and causing you yourself and others around you to suffer.
But there is a wise man in the movie and this is what he said,
"Some men draw a circle around them, and they include their family members in the circle, they provide and guide them,
Other men draw a bigger circle to include their friends so they care for them,
But there are men who draw a big circle around them to include big things, these men have great destinies to be full filed....."
So the question is what type of men do you want to be and choose to be, will determine how you lead your life.
Every one feels fearful, every one feel doubt at times of hardship, it is normal, for what you feel there are many brothers and sisters feeling it with you, because we are all connected as human beings. It shows me that it is ok to be fearful.
There is also one thing about the hunters in this movie that I like, which is the honor and the respect they have for the animal they are hunting (The Great Mammoth). The hunters treated hunting as a game but a very honorable game. If you hunted down the great beast, dosen't meant you will have honor and respect, you will only have honor and respect for who you really are when you hunt down the great beast, who do you occur to be at that time.
Courage can only be recognized in the face of fear, it cannot be recognized if you have no fear. So now I understand, and so now I know.
In the movie there is this leader who loves a woman, and he promises her that she will never fade in his heart and will never be alone, this is the one thing that made him carry on to pursue his enemy in spite of his fear.
The thing that made him face his fear is love, his love for this woman (he was indeed very much in love with her), in which his love later grew as his heart grew, and "The circle that he draw around him self grew to cover his fellow brothers, the freedom of other nations who's skin color was different from his.", his heart was now bigger than the fear, and that is how he became a hero, for he had concurred fear for he had all the love for the people.
I am reading a book "Written by Einstine"
http://www.amazon.com/World-As-I-See/dp/080650711X/ref=si3_rdr_bb_product/102-2016436-6036100
There is a very meaningful quote :
"What is the meaning of human life, or of organic life altogether? To answer
this question at all implies a religion. Is there any sense then, you ask, in
putting it? I answer, the man who regards his own life and that of his
fellow-creatures as meaningless is not merely unfortunate but almost
disqualified for life."
A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors
of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in
the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.
These above two quotes are from Einstein, these two quotes I understand, but what do with Schopenhauer when he say "A man can do as he will but not will as he will !" There is absolutely no tough English vocabulary in this quote but what does this simple sentence mean ?
Reading this book make me ashame of my self of the violent behavior that I may sometimes adhere to when I am angered. Martial Arts learned is not merely to fight, but to cultivate the body and in that effort to cultivate the body so should the mind be cultivated as such.
The book is all about anti-violence about anti-war. Autocratic governmental systems wont last for long because it attracts people with low morale, It is true and it is proven in history. Why do you want power, when it is not to serve people ? What is it for ? If it is for respect, then what do you mean by respect ? Respect because of your merit and your being or because of the fake mask you are wearing ?
Who is Herr Gumbel? Einstein mentioned that every one should read his book.
Upon Reading I found another very meaningfull phrase :-
"It is not the fruits of scientific research that elevate a man and enrich his nature, but the urge to understand, the intellectual work, creative or receptive."
It is the urge to understand, not the fruits of science, the fruits of science are as a result of the understanding the intellectual work of creative and receptive people.
The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure
and the sense in which he has attained to liberation from the self.
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