I'm Never Upset for the Reason I Think!

My experience shows me that my mind divides its allegiance between the ego and spirit and is totally committed to neither. According to the Course, my identification with spirit is totally beyond question except by the ego.

 

I really want to believe this—that I am a spiritual being having an earthly experience. And further, I want to believe that what and who I am, and what and who you are, is not established by perception, nor influenced by it at all.

 

Perceived problems are not problems of fact, the Course says. They are problems of understanding, since their presence implies a belief that who and what we are is up to us to decide—which it is when I ID with the ego. Tho the ego believes this fully and is totally committed to it, it is not true. If my inner decision maker was as committed to spirit’s wholeness as the ego is to separation, I’d be in heaven all the time.

 

That’s good to know! Because, when I’m sad and depressed I can allow myself to remember it’s because I’m committed to the ego instead of spirit and this is not God’s choice, but my own. The truth is I’m never separate from spirit but simply asleep and dreaming I’m separate. So when I, and you, are sad and depressed, we need to know it’s not what’s happening ‘out there’ that’s doing it, it’s the decision I made in here to be with the ego and separate from the Truth. So, a useful thing to do when feeling depressed or sad is to pause and say: ‘I am never upset for the reason I think!’ then chose again.

Parenoia

We missed the time change yesterday. When we woke at our usual time, it was an hour later. My wife found out first when she put the TV news on. She didn’t believe it so she called the time & temp phone #. They confirmed it. Still, I was vaguely uneasy about it.

 

How could we have missed it? We usually know well in advance. It made me feel paranoid. I owned that feeling and let it drift around my consciousness for awhile then realized why I felt that way and this is what I want to share.

 

I was paranoid because I had no way to verify on my own--by my own experience - that the time really did change. It was still dark, there was just no way to know. I had to depend on the external man-made sources and worst of all, the media. I couldn’t know and believe on my own or use my own sense experience to validate. I had to trust and that need to trust what I considered an unreliable source and my inability to verify with my own experience made me paranoid.

 

Wow, having to trust the media! What an eye opener! And for something so basic as the time of day. The news is similar. Like the time change, because I can’t verify the so-called news with my own experience and sense data, I’m paranoid about what is distributed by the media and called ‘news.’ That’s why it’s so important if I’m to keep my paranoia at an ‘acceptable’ level and avoid the severe paranoia infecting so many people, that I, and you too, have many different sources of news and information, stay mindful and use scientific techniques like General Semantics.

I'm grateful

I had surgery yesterday to repair a hernia in my right groin area. It went very well and I’m grateful! The surgeon was simpatico, compassionate and skillful as were all the professionals at Baptist. I am grateful! The actual surgery itself was 40 minutes. The doc found that my appendix was in the hernia so he removed it. Again, I’m grateful, two for one! The prep—paperwork, etc was 2 ½ hours, the actual surgery, 40 minutes….

 

 On a scale of 1 – 10, the pain last night was a 12, made worse by movement and I had to get up to pee every hour. I took a large dose of homeopathic Arnica early in the evening. I’m pretty sure it helped. I should have taken in it the day before and the day of; better late than never. When the pain was most intense, I breathed into it, surrendered to it and gave it over. That let me sleep. Gradually, as the night grew older, the pain eased.

 

Now, I’m a six on the pain scale. Ice before bed and a little while ago helped also; as did the Alleve. I’m grateful. I put the surgery off for approx a year because of fear of the recovery. But as the condition worsened, I had no choice. I’m glad it’s done and I found the courage to get it done. All in all, I’m grateful.

Christopher Columbus: The Map is Not the Territory

Whatever I do, I can do it better by understanding that the map is not the territory--being more objective and clearer about how I’m thinking about things. You, too. Where are our biases, prejudices and other tendencies not to see things as they are but as we expect or want them to be? Do our values and standards work for the general good now, not in the future, and enable us to contribute to a world that works for everyone and everything, not just some special group? If not, am I willing to take responsibility for my thinking, values, biases and prejudices and change them?  Here is another example General Semantics debunking a cherished American myth written by Martin H. Levinson: The Map: Christopher Columbus Discovered America. A review of the territory: A national American holiday and two centuries of school-history lessons have led many to believe as true that Christopher Columbus was the first to reach America. But most scholars thing Columbus actually landed in Cuba, Hispaniola and on an island in the Bahamas during his 1492 voyage. Archaeological evidence suggests that Norse sailors led by Leif Erickson reached North America five hundred years before Columbus, establishing a colony in Newfoundland around 1000 AD.

 

It is interesting to note that Columbus’s bravery, persistence, and seamanship have earned him a prominent place in American history. But many school-books gloss over the fact that in his obsessive quest for gold he enslave the local population. With other Spanish adventurers, as well as later European colonizers, Columbus opened as era of genocide that decimated the Native American population through warfare, forced labor and European diseases to which the Indians, a name Columbus bestowed on Native Americans, had no natural immunities.

 

Considering Columbus’s prominence in our nation’s history, one might ask, why don’t we live in the United States of Columbus? The answer is that Amerigo Vespucci, and Italian who captained four voyages to the ‘New World’ beginning in 1499, recognized that the New World, a term that he coined, was a landmass separate from Asia. To honor his revelation, Vespucci’s give name was placed on the first map of the region. While Columbus may have found the new world first, Vespucci understood that is was a new world. Columbus went to his grave thinking he had reached Asia.

Betsy Ross - The Map is Not the Territory

 

General Semantics involves thinking about thinking—a self-awareness and realization that most of the time we mis-take the map—our words, for the territory—the thing itself. It’s about moments of conscious awareness during which I am aware that my words and language involve selective perception—taking things out of context, isolating them and acting as if, if I could just do this one thing, everything would be OK.  General Semantics helps me take responsibility for this kind of abstracting and enables me, and you, to see the interdependence, interrelatedness and complexity that is really there. It enables us to take responsibility for our over simplifying stinkin’ thinkin’ and change it.

 

 

Here is an example General Semantics debunking a cherished American myth written by Martin H. Levinson: The Map: Betsy Ross Sewed the First American Flag. A review of the territory: The legend of Betsy Ross as the first embroiderer of the American flag was originally brought to light in 1870, when one of her grandson, William J. Canby, reported a story his grandmother had told him. According to Canby, George Washington and several others visited Betsy’s upholstery shop in Philadelphia and showed her a crude drawing of the flag, which she then produced. After Canby’s death, a book called The Evolution of the American Flag, published in 1909, presented the claims for Betsy Ross made by Canby in 1870.

 

While Betsy Ross did make some flags in the late eighteenth century, it is known that she made ‘ship’s colors’ for which she was paid, no one has been able to verify that the Canby story is true. Furthermore, some evidence exist that a Philadelphia poet named Francis Hopkinson designed the Stars and Stripes in 1780. However, Betsy Ross is still thought of by most as the sewer of the first American flag, and her house in Philadelphia has become a historical site. There is even doubt among historians that she even lived in that house.

 

 

 

The Map is Not the Territory

We believe that what we say about things is the Truth about them. That is, that there is a one to one relationship between the words and the phenomena—that a ‘tree’ = a tree. Yet no two trees, even those of the same species, are the same. We know this yet we act as if what we say about things is the Truth about them. Words are symbols of symbols twice removed from reality. Words are maps and the map is not the territory. Again, we know this, but think and act as if our maps DO represent the territory – that Republican is this and Democrat is that. Words are a fine starting place, the ball park if you will. But then if we really want to communicate and get things done we’ve got to know the section, row and seat number.

 

Today I’m beginning a series on words and language inspired by the science of General Semantics, a science that sounds more academic and useless than it is. Here is an example General Semantics debunking a cherished American myth written by Martin H. Levinson: The Map: The Pilgrims Landed on Plymouth Rock. A Review of the Territory: On December 16, 1620, the Pilgrims on the Mayflower reached their new home in America. Nearly all scholars put the Pilgrims’ landing about 10 miles north of the lumpy scrap of stone known as Plymouth Rock. There is no mention in any historical account of that rock, a large boulder located in Plymouth MA, into which, in 1880, the Pilgrim Society carved the year 1620.

 

The legend of Plymouth Rock was started in 1741 by 95 year old man who said his father told him about it. Twenty-eight years later, celebrating the Pilgrims’ landing a Plymouth Rock became an annual event in New England. By 1835, Alexis de Tocqueville reported pieces of the rock were being venerated in different American cities, and it was established as an American icon.

 

Offers for chunks of Plymouth Rock have occasionally popped up on eBay, where asking prices have been as much as $900. However, while it is true that lots of souvenir hunters did carve off parts of the Rock during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, there is no way to differentiate a real hunk of Plymouth Rock from a fake one. For those interested in seeing what is left of Plymouth Rock (it is estimated to be only about one-third to one-half of its original size), it is preserved today in a state park near the mouth of Plymouth harbor.

Friday Funnies

These are kind of retro and sexist, but hey….

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Side of Life 



1. 

Good: Your wife is pregnant. 

Bad: it's triplets. 

Ugly: You had a vasectomy five years ago.

2. 

Good: Your wife's not talking to you. 

Bad: She wants a divorce.

Ugly: She's a lawyer.



3. 

Good: Your youngest son is finally maturing. 

Bad: He's involved with the woman next door. 

Ugly: So are you.



4. 

Good: Your wife and you agree, no more kids. 

Bad: Your wife can't find her birth control pills. 

Ugly: Your 13 year old daughter borrowed them.



5. 

Good: Your oldest son understands fashion. 

Bad: He's a cross-dresser. 

Ugly: He looks better than your wife.



6. 

Good: You give the 'birds and bees' talk to your 10 year old daughter. 

Bad: She keeps interrupting. 

Ugly: With corrections.

7. 

Good: Your son is dating someone new. 

Bad: It's another man.

Ugly: He's your best friend.



8. 

Good: Your 15 year old daughter got a new job 

Bad: As a hooker.

Ugly: Your co-workers are her best clients. 

Very Ugly: She makes more money than you do.