The Cave is Getting Very Smokey

The Cave is Getting Very Smokey

You know that curse: May you live in interesting times. Well, here we are. We live in interesting times. And, the cave is getting pretty, pretty smokey. 

It's the height of the political season with the November 2020 Presidential election just around the corner. Plenty of smoke being blown into our collective arses. Still the sharp black and white divide: each side attempting to frame the case for the opponent(s) being the worst ever. Even Noam Chomsky has weighed in to the effect that this will be the most important election ever and the stakes are nothing less than the survival of the human race.

Which brings me to the point of doership. Those who Truly know say that you are not the doer. The Philosopher said that the only true thing we can rightly say is that we don't know. Yet, look at all the flapping jaws vying for credibility. I'm really surprised there aren't a lot of literally exploding heads with all the complexities our so called leaders are juggling in between their ears. I know, it would be political suicide to say, "I don't know". But, who's even saying that to themselves? 

The world is suffering. It's a problem not meant to be solved. Those who try to sell you on solving it, there's a book title you may want to look up: "Priests and politicians: The Mafia of the Soul." The really good news is that the seeds of our enlightenment and liberation are sown into the very fabric of creation. Grist to form and polish the pearl of the soul.

Even in his own time Bertrand Russell observed: "The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts."

I wonder if the human condition really advances. The progress in technology notwithstanding. We know more, but understand less. We're "connected", but more dissociated. Have more, are less satisfied.

In The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats: 

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

That cave. You know. Plato's Cave. It's smoke filled these days. As it should be. Attempts to clear the air only make more smoke. Note to all you do-gooders: first make sure you are yourself beyond the need for help before you go about trying the fix the world. Otherwise you're just make things worse.


THE SUFFERING OF NOT GETTING WHAT ONE WANTS

Longchenpa says ...

You would like to stay with family and loved ones
Forever, but you are certain to leave them.

You would like to keep your beautiful home
Forever, but you are certain to leave it behind.

You would like to enjoy happiness, wealth and comfort forever, but you are certain to lose them.

You would like to keep this excellent human life with its freedoms and advantages forever, but you are certain to die.

You would like to study Dharma with your wonderful teacher forever, but you are certain to part.

You would like to be with your good spiritual friends
Forever, but you are certain to separate.

Oh my friends who feel deep disillusionment with samsara, I, the Dharmaless beggar, exhort you:
From today put on the armour of effort, for the time has come to cross to the land of great bliss whence there is no separation.