7a Fears - UnSafe

Ch.7a. Fears – Unsafe

Introduction to the 2nd half of Part II.

In chapters 5 and 6 we have looked at how Spirit's ideas affect what we do and how we think and how we label this. But Spirit is afraid of life and doesn't know what it is for. All of its ideas are 'getting away or control' ideas, none of which actually address our real fears. We think life would be so much easier if we didn't have a body.

What I hope I have established is that Spirit has no idea of Soul, hence we need to look at what the Soul actually wants.

Our primary fears are the fears of the soul which is the part of us that wants to be safe, fed, and wanted; this is true for all life. So some of our biggest wants are to get rid of our fears, ie, our wants are coming out of our fears.

Also, there still don't seem to be any rewards built-in to being on earth. Does Soul have desires as well as fears? Any sensible psychologist knows that rewards are crucial to any 'learning/mastering' system; not to mention, the reward had better be for the body if you're training animals; it's no good telling them about heaven 'later'. Well, we still have something inside us about wanting to 'grow bigger', so I will discuss this in Chapter 8 titled Desires.

OUR FEARS.

They're all awful and we don't like them, and would much prefer that they were not there.

Hence, it seems much better not to look at them, but when we do this we look like an ostrich.

But looking at our fears is the 1st step in addressing them. If you don't know what they are you cannot address them.

The first thing we can do is to group them into themes that look like this - Un-Safe, Un-Fed, and Un-Wanted. Unsafe is first because it is so important.

UN-SAFE (7A)

Introduction.

We feel terribly unsafe in Life. Look what it can do to us! So many things out to get us! We are so fragile; forever at risk while we are alive, and really 'How can God do this to us?' is the underlying question we attempt to answer with our religions. We are really cross about being unsafe and also very resentful that He has done this to us.

But, we are unable to notice that SBRs cannot deal with our issues of 'safe' because they are built on ideas of 'unsafe'.

Unsafe is the primary difference between having awareness as spirit 'in Heaven', and our awareness once on earth. Heaven is safe, by definition, and we don't have to do anything, and are able to think as we please. So, we want to be protected, and from Life, basically.

We are a mixture of very afraid of what it can do to us, as well as expecting to be able to do as we wish, and when we wish, which is what spirit is used to.

We have almost a war- (well at least a defense-) mentality with Life/Nature. And we yearn for Heaven and would nick off if we could if it were not so fraught getting back, and if we knew 'for sure' we would get there.

But, most animals have to face 'Nature raw in tooth and claw', so why not us? In fact, Nature suffers greatly from our depredations on Her.

Neither is our safety dependent on simply the weather and the natural world; we are actually very dependent on other people in an enormous network of ways. Larger examples would be countries and their peoples being affected by the decisions of foreign governments without being able to do anything about it. 'Smaller' examples would be the internal networks of dependency that countries have, eg, some countries allow or are unable to contain its citizenry running round with any kind of weaponry under the sun, so they can 'defend themselves'. Not a good formula for feeling secure. In our current society women are not safe from men, and there are plenty of places that are a great deal worse.

We Look for How to be Safe.  (7A1)

Any way we can; control, power and might, hide, attack, defend, look for pity and the other's protection; but always, life is seen as a threat, and always we are looking for safety from out there, from 'the other'. We are wanting it, but never really seem to be able to find it. We greatly fear not having it.

Our fears make many turn to the 'spiritual' but it can't help - we just end up kidding ourselves. We try using our minds with judgement and comparison, but that makes us more split than ever.

We try to stuff these fears down, but end up with all that sewage in the basement, a 'dead'ened/unaware body and bored witless, but if that isn't bad enough, if we are not aware of that 'sewage' internally, we get to meet it externally as well (ML). Life sure likes to hammer these things home.

But, we do have an ideal of Safe.

Our Ideal of Safe.  (7A2)

Our ideal of Safe is Heaven, and we yearn for it. 'Heaven' means…

·         The end of our fears and worries; whew! Peace at last! No nasty surprises or 'things that go "bump" in the night'

·         We can relax and rest; ease; no watching out, or hard work

·         We are loved, wanted and protected,

·         And provided for, we are fed without having to do anything, (although we don't have to be 'fed' physically in Heaven)

·         It's beautiful and comfortable, ie ease.

Heaven is what we are taught as the alpha and omega of what we desire, and most of the impetus to take any notice of the directives about how to get to Heaven comes from hating the fears. We look for any way we can to escape these fears and except for the problem of having to be dead to get to Heaven, more people would try to leave life on earth.

Shopping Centres.   (7A2b)

A shopping mall is another example of what most humans think they need and want and how life should be. 

·         It is a controlled environment, with no sun, rain or rotten weather. It’s likely to be clean and the right temperature.

·         We can eat whatever we like, whenever we like, without much effort or cost; all those nice things full of sugars and ‘crook’ fats.

·         We can get to the loo easily.

·         There’s plenty of noise and music to deafen us to the natural world and our internal ability to sense that natural world.

·         There’s plenty of glitter, colours and lights to distract us from our boredom (or fear) with what we have in life, and with all those people around us, maybe we won’t feel so alone than if we were at home just watching TV.

·         Complete disconnection from the natural environment.

But there's a Problem. (7A3)

The problem here is that our definition of Heaven is the child’s version of safety/security; someone else is providing it, not the child.

It has NO…

·         Explore and Express Self in the physical world of Energy (without which we will get bored eventually)

·         Growth in Self-Esteem (SE) which is another thing that we really want! It's a way of feeling bigger. See below

Thus and so, we cannot ‘grow’ in SE when we are in Heaven; we simply cannot find out about our own powers for ourself without being alive on Earth; that is the gift.

And this is the problem with thinking that Heaven is where we’re supposed to be, or that there is no positive point in being alive on Earth, which is just a punishment for we know not what.

The difference between the child’s and the Adult’s version of safety/security is the Adult is able to provide their own for themself as well as others to the best of their ability.

We also Have another Ideal of Safe.  (7A4)

We forget that we have another ideal of safe which is ON earth, and that is the Garden of Eden, but we consider it a fairy story, and therefore suppress it as 'non-sense'.

But we do yearn for it, and it is part of our 'dreams'.

See below in 'Desires'.

What happens if we Feel Safe? (7A5)

We start looking for unsafe. (7A5a)

We would like to be safe, but the problem with always being safe is we start looking for unsafe, because we need the contrast, and we do this in all sorts of ways by pushing the boundaries.

And then, if we're safe, blow me down, we get bored, and unable to be grateful for being safe. We start behaving like a brat, and trying to dominate life. But if we are dominating life 'successfully' according to the social 'norm', we begin to consider ourselves invincible, and refuse to look in the Mirror, and therefore will not find out who's inside, which is why you are here in the first place. So that misses the point somewhat.

However, this is all part of our Explore. All Life Explores. We are actually meant to 'throw our weight around’ and push our boundaries/limits because this is how we find out what our 'weight' and boundaries/limits are.

The cost of 'safe'.  (7A5b)

We want 'safe' so much that we are prepared to compromise our freedoms for the sake of surveilling everyone to check whether they might be a terrorist. This is an enormous fear of death if ever there was one. How much money do we spend on this? And how secret is this surveillance? Very, and secrecy breeds injustice. But what sort of life do we end up living? Is the tiger safer in a cage? It still looks like a tiger, but it can only be 'tigerish' in a very limited way. Is that what we want? What would the tiger choose? Yes, it's at greater risk in its natural environment, as are we. Surveillance cages all of us, but in fact the cages that are built for us by the industrial/military complex are far more likely to limit all of us, but these cages are rather more subtle than a terrorist bomb. What do we want?

We can't be Certain of Safe. (7A5c)

Once again, this problem in life is about needing to look at your own internal attitude to life, because life is reflecting that back to you. Mirror Laws say that if you consider life to be attacking you, you will attack life in some form or other. Your response may be 'I need to defend myself' but in all of this you are making 'the other' unsafe. You are blaming 'out there' for your fears. This attitude on your part will stress you even more anyway. It also ruins relationships; no-one is safe with you.

The point here is that safety is not a certainty, nor can it be, and neither is it useful to you to expect it. You are here to learn what safe is actually about, which is quite something to achieve too.

How to be Safer in Life.  (7A6)

The Answer to How to go about being as Safe as possible for yourself is actually the same as that which animals have to do all the time, (and they are generally able to figure it out, lots, except when humans are on their tail).

You use all your senses and take care - all the time. You also have senses other than VAKOG; intuition, gut feelings and even clairsentience (those psychic abilities) which are very useful. This does not include wearing earphones while on a bicycle in traffic, or texting while driving a car. In fact, living in the natural world is a good idea too, actually - what's left of it.

There was a time not long ago when we didn't have fast communications at all, with all its advantages and disadvantages, but I suspect that many people had to rely on their gut feelings to survive, and knew how to do so; I suspect that mobile phones do not help us to develop our gut feelings.

Notice also that animals in their natural environment do not expect to be safe, although it is also true that sometimes they do not know if there is something 'new' that they need to be aware of, eg, the little Australian ground-loving birds in my garden did not evolve to take cats into consideration.

We need our awareness of life out there, and we need our great minds to think about what we meet out there, and what we learn and how we can use what we find.

Life is a challenge for which we are amply equipped, and an exploration. The challenge is to find out more about who is within, and the results can be a great surprise - to you and to others. But, until you look, you will not find. 

The Real Question is, Is the Other Safe from You?  (7A7)

We think that we should be safe from Life, so we ask how come we've been chucked into it and what for, but the question is actually, 'Is Life Safe from You?' (As we want to be safe, so we must give it to 'the other'. Those Mirror Laws, as ever. )

So, how much is Life or 'the other' safe from us? Let me count the ways... (in no particular order) pesticides, herbicides, chemicals 'from hell to breakfast-time', antibiotics, processing, pollution, mining, manufacturing, waste disposal, faecal matter from billions of humans and animals, nuclear plants and their waste, war, armaments (always for defense of course) development, technology, and on the personal level,  judgement, blame, criticism, trolling, etc. etc. and etc.

We make Life/Nature/Earth deal with our toxic waste and pollution, and we take it for granted. This is an abuse on our part; animals don't do this; humans do. It is another way in which we fail to take any responsibility for ourselves. This is not on, and we need to think about what we are doing. Deal with it ourselves, or maybe even don't produce it in the first place.  This is an enormous topic, and one we will have to address sooner rather than later, although we put it off…..

So, how safe do you feel in the present, and how safe from all this are our children going to be?

The more we exploit Life/Nature and kill it for fear or money or whatever, the more Life is unsafe from us, and therefore we will feel unsafe from Life. This is how Mirror Laws work. It is our thinking/beliefs about Life that are killing us, not the actuality.

So, the next step is to work out how to protect 'the other', as in, you are specifically attempting to protect life and give it a chance to grow, explore and express. In this you are giving some form of 'safety' to other life, and that will help you grow to feel safer internally as well.

Looking Out for the 'Other'. (7A8)

How do we look after 'the Other' which includes Looking After Your Own Body.  (7A8a)

In how many ways can this be done? One of the more important ways you can do this is to look after your own body correctly for its sake and keep it safe; your body is part of your 'other'. This (safe) means well-cared for, physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. The 'spiritual' domain includes your motives, dreams and aspirations; do you keep them safe from others' judgements and denigration? In fact, the question is 'How do you actually give TISP to your body?'

Hopefully you are able to look after your body as a child in a well-cared for environment; attractive, clean and relatively peaceful with few dramas and emotional upsets which are emotionally stressful. How much effort do you put into achieving these things? If we believe that the body is not important (SBRs) why bother to look after it?

Clear Thinking.  (7A8b)

Mentally, we need good clear thinking to learn about making our own way in life and able to provide more safety for the other. Some of the more difficult problems with lack of education in countries with little money, is the great restriction in possibilities for their people as well as the narrow-mindedness that comes with superstitions and taboos. The ability to read and hopefully to access books (or the Internet) can be a great 'equalizing' factor. The importance of publishing was that information was made affordable and available for most. Most of us take this for granted; we also use all our marvelous resources for entertainment now, rather than for thinking. But this is sort of like eating dessert or sweets all the time, rather than any meat and potatoes or having to 'chew' anything. Sweet things alone cannot sustain you. Clear observing and actual thinking will. By this I mean that you are able to arrive at considered conclusions after careful observation and informed deductions. 

So, part of looking after yourself is to educate yourself, as in, find out and keep enquiring, so that you can continue to explore life and develop your dreams and aspirations. A good education equips you to find out where to look or who to ask and not just be told. And then, even better, you may be able to teach others what you have found (this is a form of Expression for you after your exploring). Education is a door to giving people tools to help themselves, and to learn to think clearly and carefully. Hence, a good education is part of Protecting yourself. Interestingly, the powerful are not that keen on people educating themselves; they like it much better if people just do as they're told, or the government pays for 'factory-fodder' type training. They don't like being queried. See also, Feudalism, which below.

Other even more primary forms of Protect include Housing, as are clean food and clean water and air (and, proper sewage and facilities, and so on…).  All our utilities are/were social protections.

Other forms of looking out for the other include no emotional attacks, eg, blame, trolling etc. quite apart from the fact that you are always doing these things to yourself as well (ML). In fact, our manners are a form of keeping the other safe from our self.

Protecting 'the other' is what Adults do. It is part of TISPing Life which is a service. Wanting to be looked after by any 'other' is being a child.

Understanding that Life is not out to get you.  (7A9)

The ultimate safety/security is to consider that Life is not out to get you at all. (As you think life is out to get you, so part of you will be out to get back at life.)

Life is there to mirror your InSelf so that you can find out who is actually there inside you; your Real Self, and in this, Life is serving you. This does not mean that all at once you have nothing to worry about and everything becomes all ‘lovey-dovey’. All of us have tonnes of things to learn, some of them not necessarily pleasant, and life can and will bop us on the nose, or provide a stick to the bottom if we need to move. You still need to respect that life is fragile and that it can be all over in a blink.

What it does mean is that Life has purpose and point for our benefit. Once again, it is your own attitude to life that is making or breaking your life. What do you want?

To return to the metaphor of the Horse and the Rider. In the end, we want to ride the 'horse' of Energy. That's why we are here. No amount of 'there is no horse', 'we all fall off', 'there's nothing to get back onto', 'you're here because you were 'bad'', or you're here for anything other than 'horse-riding', makes any difference.

Also, you can't learn it in theory, and spirit only knows about theory; you have to get on the horse, and then it does things! Not to mention - it's not Safe! Oh no!

An Aside on Those who Help to Protect us. (7A10)

It is really quite ironic that generally those people who are the most necessary and useful within our society, and who are usually paid for and organized by government, eg, firemen, nurses, the police, ambulance, teachers, and others are paid as little as we/society think we can get away with. The contrast in salary with those of sportspeople and other entertainers is quite amazing. What are we valuing, because that is what we will get? (In Victoria, Australia, our State Emergency Services people are volunteers, as is our Country Fire Authority, yet we rely on them greatly in an emergency.) As we value entertainment over protection, guess what we'll get?

Conclusion.

And it’s Back to ML, as always.

If you consider Life to be attacking you, you will attack life in some form or other. Your response may be ‘I need to defend myself’, but you are blaming ‘out there’ for your fears. This attitude on your part will stress you even more anyway. It also ruins real relationships; no-one is safe with you.

Wanting to feel safe and protected is a whopping issue for all of us. The answer to all wants is to give them. If we want to feel safe, we need to give protection PEMS, however and whenever we can within our own world of our awareness, and to our InSelf first. This protection is the 'P' part of TISP, (= Love in Action). Well, fancy that!

The next fear that I wish to deal with is that of Hunger/Thirst.