The Spiritual Teachings

If we read enough spiritual books, we will find that all spiritual teachings lead us ultimately down to one path: surrender.  They tell us to take the path of surrender if we want to achieve enlightenment.  What do they mean by surrender? And why do we want to achieve enlightenment?  When they say surrender, they mean to drop the ritual: the past, the known, the learned, and the beliefs.  They mean to detached or let go.  Surrender means surrendering the false identity.  That’s what letting go is.  That’s what detachment is.  We want to achieve enlightment because we are discontent with life.  We want to end our pain and suffering.   And to end our pain and suffering, we must let go; we must detached; we must surrender.  This is why sometimes, the enlightened person has a second name.  Their name change is a symbol that says that they are no longer a part of their past.  All that are connected with the past is gone. They begin a new way about their beings. 

These teachings have one goal and it is to lead us down the path of surrender.  They will tell us that our current identity is not ours.  Our name is False.  Our form is False. All is False.  We are not our names.  We are not our forms. We are something beyond both, but we don’t know who you are until we surrender and face life as it comes with the new consciousness.  They tell us to allow the wind to carry us to our destination.  We must allow existing itself to take us to our destiny.  

The teachings say that in order for surrender to happen, we must allow ourselves to be one with the universe.   To die before we die.  To allow for the death of our individualities.  Why?  So that we can get to the essential.   When we surrender, the non essentials disappear and the essential appears.  Other terms for non essentials include:  ego, trappings, onion layers, masks, personalities, garbage, shits, and many more.  They said that about 99% of who we are is the non essentials and 1% percent is essential.  Other terms for essential include: the real you, an inner voice, the core, the center, the Self, no-thing-ness, diamond, and so on.   But first we have to strip off the non essentials to discover the essential; we have to discard all the garbage to discover our diamond. 

What do you think about these spiritual teachings?  Do these teachings make sense to you in the head or in the heart?  Are they a hindrance for your spiritual journey because they set the musts and the shoulds? 

It is so hard to let go of the things that cause us pain and sadness.  Perhaps we are not convinced that these things are causing us pain.  If we look hard, we will see the investments in the pain and sadness.  When we talk about our pain and sadness to others, we get sympathy.  Everybody is sympathetic to the person who is in pain.  If we love getting sympathy from people we cannot drop our pain and sadness; this is our investment.

I noticed that when I am in pain and feeling sad, I get more sympathy and attention from my family and friends (that is as long as they are not the cause of my pain, otherwise they would call me names and accuse me of manipulating, controlling, and playing the victim role J.)  Everybody takes care of me.  My spouse becomes more loving.  The kids behave extra well.  Friends call to see if I am okay.  But most of the time, I am a pleasurable person to be with.  Of course, in this stage, the family and friends withdraw their sympathy and attention.  It is as if everybody becomes hard and frozen.  If I want attention, I have to ask, beg, or sometimes demand. And if I am lucky, I get five minutes of undivided attention.  It is like the happier I am, the more I find that nobody cares.  How can anyone drop any pain and sadness this way? 

As long as I desire attention and sympathy, it will be hard to let go of the things that cause me pain and sadness because that very things also bring me attention and sympathy.

Why do we give attention to those that are generating pain and sadness and neglecting those that are generating pleasure and happiness?  Do we want to perpetuate a society that rewards unhappiness and punish happiness? 

Why is it so hard to let go of the things that are causing us pain? 

If we look deeply, we’ll see that the things that are causing us pain also give us pleasures.  We will find that they give us something we would like to have.  Maybe it is only a hope or a promise for tomorrow.  We cling on with the hope that what we desired from them is going to happen.    If they are only pure pain, then we’d dropped them without asking this very question. 

Take jealousy for example.  For centuries we have been told that lovers are jealous.  Jealousy becomes an intrinsic part of love.  If we want to love, we have to accept our jealousy and the pain that created by it, especially when our lover leaves us for another person.  And our cunning mind is very clever in finding rationalization.  It will say, “It is natural to feel jealous.”  And it appears natural because everybody else is doing the same. It will say, “It is natural to feel hurt when my lover leaves me because I have loved so much!  I have the right to feel hurt.  How can I avoid the hurt, the wound, when my lover leaves me?”  While we don’t like experiencing the pain that this wound has causes, we are also enjoying our wound too, in a very subtle and unconscious way.  Our wound is giving us an idea that we are a great lover and that we have sacrificed our lives for this person, that we love so much, so deeply.  And because our love was so profound, that is why we are shattered when our lover left us for another person. 

Just watch every kind of pain and we will see either it has some pleasure in it which we are not ready to lose or it has some hope in it which goes on dangling like a carrot on a stick in front of us.   And we’ll find some rationalization in it.  It looks so close!  Why drop it?   

Why is it so hard to let go of the things that are causing you pain?