Life and Spirituality

Developed from picture by Svendsgaard Kurt, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service E very so often it happens to us that we receive something precious, good and great in life that in the final analysis a gift from the Lord and the Universe. However, equally frequently, instead of honoring and cherishing these gifts and being grateful to the Lord for them, we tend to take it for granted as our birth right and misuse them. The result is that soon the same gift becomes a curse. It vanishes, pushing us into misery in the process. My mind went to a childhood friend who was born in a rich elite family. She grew up to be a beautiful and charming lady. At heart, she was a simple and gentle lady with malice for none. It is perhaps because of this that the Lord had showered her with so many gifts in life. But she developed a serious fault. She let herself drown in carelessness and sensual pleasures of the world. As a result she did not end up in the best possible way in later life. One

W hen one bases one’s life on greed, lies, hate and other forms of evil, then extent of punishment of such persons and when it should begin is decided by Universal Consciousness in keeping with the personality and deeds of such persons.   W hen one bases one’s life on love, truth and simplicity and other forms of goodness then the extent of reward of such persons and when it should begin is decided by Universal consciousness in keeping with the personality and deeds of such persons. H owever, the punishment is one of love like that from a loving parent to a child, for reform and education, never for retribution as human ones at times tend to be. T here is a gullible and foolish person who looks at evil ones and thinks, “look they are enjoying great wealth and power, let me also become like them and enjoy what this world has to offer, this talk of God and goodness is stupid talk designed by clever humans to enslave and exploit the rest,” for it is from among evil o

Wars are fun, you crazy un ? It helps us sell a gun. T here are many problems around the world arising from sickness, poverty, homelessness, refugees, wars etc. It does not take much analysis to deduce that uncontrolled and excessive greed is at the root of it. Take for example rising economic inequalities around the world over the last three decades. At the root of this is the greed of corporations for huge profits and their managers for huge compensations. If one considers wars, at the root of many are the greed of arms industries to sell arms or greed of some countries or individuals to maintain greedy advantage. The growth of large unmanageable cities with poor quality of life is because of greed too. Homelessness is because of the greed of the rich not to release more in taxes to create shelters and the hell that earth may soon be converted into by global warming is because of the greed to cut down  trees that God planted on Earth.  The use of violence by humans to meet

Starving from famine   And on the suffering of the sweetest, most innocent, most vulnerable of humans - Children, often caused by other humans W hile there is peace and happiness for some in the world some of the time, there is also deep suffering for others elsewhere from time to time. Most everyone encounters pain and suffering some time or the other in life, one also suffers when a loved one is in distress and when one becomes sensitive one is also touched by the suffering of others in far away places. There are humans suffering because of wars, homelessness, hunger, over eating and obesity, disease, corrupt or brutal governments and much else at this very moment and some are little children less than the age of five, an age of innocence, an age when a child deserves to experience only love and joy of play, in no way responsible for the suffering that has been thrust upon them by the world they happen to be born in. Not picked up to hug and kiss but just an In

T he devil of this note is not that guy with horns but mere symbolism for all those things in the universe that keeps our souls, our inner selves, from growing but rather pulls it down into miserable and less evolved states. God on the other hand is also not a guy with a spotless and shining white robe (or cute pretty colors) surrounded by angels singing - holy, holy, holy,  but as in the rest of this blog is recognized as the Almighty universal consciousness and power of infinite extent of which everything in the universe is a part (including the less evolved parts). However, for convenience if one wished to give a picture to these things, one may do so. Developed from image at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:VonSatanicBloodAngel.jpg Whereas it seems that the Almighty wishes all beings to evolve and become just as evolved as the most evolved part of the universe, the job of the devil is to do precisely the reverse. The lure the devil uses is sex, money, power, fam

S ome of the most highly revered spiritual personalities such as Buddha and Jesus have recommended in their teachings that it is better for humans to work for their liberation and eternal salvation rather than focus much on transient and temporary worldly gains such as wealth, power and fame. However they have made no bones about the fact that the journey is a long one and there are only a very small number of humans who reach that goal in any given lifetime. Why is it then that they recommend striving for that goal for all humans? Failing in that goal, would they also not miss worldly gains? This has been explained further in spiritual texts that it is not so; that when one works for liberation one has a greater chance even for worldly peace and joy in that journey. A mark of great evolved souls is that they feel the pain of others just as much as their own pain. They feel a deep sense of compassion for all life. Gautama Buddha was so moved with the pain of other humans a