It is clear to me that human beings are mostly ignorant of the fact that all we believe has an effect. What we do also does but it starts with what we believe. It also seems that many of us really believe that what we believe and do is of no consequence either to ourselves or others.
This may seem, on the surface, to be a fatuous example – until one examines it.
I am speaking of the advertisements aimed at women for hair or make up products with the by line ’because you’re worth it’. These adverts are based on lies, and the participants know this. The actresses who are part of this con KNOW that they do not look like that in real life! They KNOW that any woman who buys the product will not look like they do at all. They have no chance to because only computers make a person look like these actresses do.
They make money out of lying to the public. They make money out of helping to make women feel badly about themselves. They make money out of presenting a false image as real.
Clearly they do not see the immorality of what they are doing nor do they see the harm they are doing. They do not see that they are contributing to the atmosphere that encourages women to hate themselves. Self hate leads to terrible pain for the self hater and for others they affect.
Truly nothing we do or believe is without effect.
If we are think of people who are different from us as being wroth less from us, it has an effect and this effect is for ill, not for good. The Holocaust is a glaring example of the effects belief can have. The reason we hate Hitler is because we cannot accept that people like you and I actually did the evil work. Hitler just spoke. Ordinary people did the killing.
If you are one who considers yourself not racist but still would prefer your neighbourhood to be all white, you are responsible when a person of colour is beaten up or killed but because YOUR belief helped to create the atmosphere that allows such evil.
It is not a moral defence to hide behind ‘religious belief’ to justify the condemnation of gay people. Thos who hold such a belief are as responsible for the death of gay people as if they did the act themselves. By holding such beliefs YOU create the atmosphere that allowed Matthew Shepherd to be murdered. YOU created the atmosphere that allowed an effete 10 year old boy to be bullied to the point he hanged himself. Hiding behind Christ does NOT absolve you. Lying to yourself does not make it so. And there is no escaping the consequences of YOUR belief and action.
Life is, to a very large extent, the result of what WE believe. We act according to what we believe. Much of what we believe we are not even aware of!
The exhortation to KNOW THYSELF is of the utmost importance. Without self knowledge we cause untold suffering to ourselves and to others.
Juts think of the power within YOU! The world can change and will change if only you believe it so. I am NOT talking about Magical Thinking here, the ludicrous belief that we can alter the world by wishing or imagining! No I am talking about the fundamental beliefs we hold inside us that hold us back and cause harm to ourselves and to others.
No amount of belief will prevent people getting sick and dying. It will not prevent tsumanis, earthquakes, flood, famine or plague. Belief WILL alter how we experience LIFE. It will mean the difference between an enjoyable experience and a terrible one.
The only reason my life went from darkness to light was because I changed my belief system. It wasn't easy. It was extremely painful and I nearly lost my life and mind in the process but I DID come out the other side in to light.
My major work was undoing the damage done to me by religion and it’s crippling belief system. This combined with abuse gave me a belief system that could only result in evil. There was no chance it could result in anything else. Undoing the damage of religion is probably the most painful and difficult and frightening thing to embark upon for at the very root of such thinking is that to question your religious teaching is evil in and of itself! Oh what a clever, manipulative and evil thing to do. This is WHY religionists cling to the right to indoctrinate children because they KNOW that most of us will never take the journey I did to break their evil hold upon my spirit and mind and body.
Are YOU prepared to be responsible for you beliefs?
3 comments:
So very true! Examining our beliefs is probably the hardest thing we can do in life. Until then, we never really take responsibility. We never really grow up at all. I know that you understand this too, once we do so, it can become a habit as we continually weed out the negative, unhappy, and shameful parts of our beliefs, we begin to change our behavior.
Wow - a lot to think about! Colin, what really fascinates me is that there are people, yourself included, who choose not to march to that drum. They step outside of the meanness, the cruelty, the need to be 'like everyone else' and they listen to the spirit within and follow it.
THOSE are the people I want to study. Those are the people I want to emulate. They are poetry and sainthood to me.
I agree with you, with one caveat: Hitler didn't just "speak", he ordered and he used his considerable charisma for evil. This does not excuse the people who did the torture and killing, but let's not understate HIS role either.
Celebrate diversity! If we were all the same, there would be only one flavor of ice cream (vanilla, probably).
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