Perceiving Reality: Free Will

Free will, determinism, and predetermination are encountered by Perceiving Reality. The structure of our ״I״ is explained as embedded within four factors that determine our characteristics and behavior from within our genes and from our environment.

Transcript

Perceiving Reality: Free Will

We don’t know which of our actions are actually free and which we just have an illusion of freedom. Because we’re blind to the laws and forces that manage us we assume that there is no management at all - and this gap in our perception is what we feel as free will.

But we have no freedom of will at all except in one thing, other than that everything we do is dictated to us by inner and outer nature and defined by four factors.

In order to discover where our freedom really lies we need to look at a level of life below ours to catch these four factors at work.

Let’s look at a seed of wheat

1. The First Factor: the Bed, the First Matter

You can take that seed and bury it in the ground, it will decompose and the body of the seed disappears but the information about the qualities that are going to develop doesn’t die with the old form, it gets transferred into a new one – and that information is the primary cause of everything that follows.

Likewise a drop of semen contains the abstract force from our ancestors. And we come into the world with their accumulated knowledge, physical and mental qualities that we feel as our own subconscious tendencies. But they aren’t ours, they’re installed in us and we can’t choose or change them in any way.

2. The Second Factor: the Cause and Effect that Stem from Itself

So now the information in the seed receives a new form, but the form doesn’t change the information. It will never become an apple tree or a squash. It only develops the qualities it carries from the seed. The only change that happens is in quality or quantity but it can only grow as a stalk of wheat.

Geneticists tell us that there is a gene for everything, even what we consider our deepest personal wishes. They’ve identified which genes predispose a person to good or criminal behavior, to addiction, to sexual response, The inner system we think of as our I is a fixed set of qualities controlled by a program that switches them either to the positive or negative. We have no direct influence on that program.

3. The Third Factor: the Inner Cause and Effect

How well the stalk of wheat grows depends on specific external factors that work directly on its essence and programming for better or worse; the amount of sunlight, rain and minerals in the soil. A different set of minerals won’t provide the right nourishment to make good quality wheat. All these forces must be there and no others.

Our inherited program of desires thoughts and attitudes develop positively or negatively depending on our family, which we don’t choose, and the way they bring us up and on how and where we’re educated. We’re helpless as children so all this is done for us by them, which compels us to be influenced by a constant chain of interactions with their characters, ideas and values. So what ever we are will be the result of agreeing with or reacting against these forces but we can’t change the laws that transform our essence or how they do that, and there’s no free will here either.

4. Cause and Effect through Alien Forces

These are environmental forces that unlike rain and minerals don’t have any direct relationship to the wheat. Forces like hail, wind and other plants influence all of the other er 3 factors as a whole.

Obviously a plant can’t get up and move but for us regardless of the fact that we don’t determine any of the first three factors in our development, we can influence all of them only by the choosing our surroundings. It is our single point of freedom in the physical world, and it’s from this point that we can harness these laws, to sling us in the direction of our goal. A person can have negative or weak first and second factors, and just by placing those factors and the system of development in the proper environment, the quality of development can be enhanced and its speed accelerated enormously. The worth of our life is judged only by this, because once having chosen the environment all of these laws again kick in and that environment then shapes all our future conditions. 

Do you know this tale of Tolstoy's?

"Do you know this tale of Tolstoy's?

A king was walking across his land one day, when he picked up a

grain the size of a hazelnut. This surprised him, and he called

on the knowledge of all the sages at his court, but not one of

them was able to tell him its name or its origin. He heard,

however, that in his kingdom there lived a very old man who could

perhaps enlighten him, so he sent for him. The man, who was

nearly blind, came leaning on two crutches. After examining the

grain for a long time, he had to admit he didn't know what it

was. 'But I shall call my father,' he said. 'He may remember

having seen others like it.' His father arrived, leaning on just

one crutch. He couldn't identify the grain either but, in turn,

suggested calling his own father.

The latter soon arrived; he looked like a young man, robust and

cheerful. He took hold of the grain and exclaimed, 'But it's a

grain from the wheat that grew when I was a child! In those days

grains of wheat were very big, but as human beings became

dishonest and wicked so the grains kept decreasing in size. And

if I look so robust and younger than my son and grandson, it is

because I am still living according to the rules of honesty and

kindness that prevailed in the days of my childhood.'"

Omraam Mikhaël Aïvanhov

The Boundless Leaf

What is a leaf? A leaf is boundlessness compressed within a boundless context.

It is boundless because its very existence is an act of a Creator who knows no bounds, who can extrude an endless number of leaves in endless variety out of the nothingness.

It is boundless in design, containing a wisdom that may be studied for endless lifetimes and yet never depleted.

It is boundless in form, for there is nothing about it that can ever be measured and stored with perfect accuracy, nothing of its future that can be predicted with precision.

And it lies within a context that is boundless, the boundless destiny of all creation: that the Unknowable should be made known from its hiding place within a single leaf.

T.freeman

The King Alone

 A parable , of a king who on a day of joy proclaimed that anyone who would ask anything of him would be granted his request.

Some requested power and honor, others wealth and riches. To each the king gave according to his request.

Until there was one wise person who stated that his desire was nothing more than to speak with the king personally three times a day.

The king was very pleased with this request, seeing that this person cherished the king's conversation more than wealth and honor. Therefore, he granted this request, permitting this wise person entry to the palace to speak with the king and instructed that the treasures be opened to him so that he may partake also of wealth and honor.

And so, David sang in his psalms, "A prayer of a pauper…when he will pour out his dialog before God." The dialog itself, that is his request.

What is the wisdom of this pauper? It is that others chose greatness for themselves, while the pauper chose to stand as a nothingness before the greatness of the king. By doing so, he chose the King Himself, along with all the greatness.

T.Freeman

Inner Voice

There is an outer world and there is an inner world. As deep as you penetrate, as high as you reach, there is always something breathing inside.

The outer world is made of things. Breathing inside the things are words.

Words are external. Inside the words are stories.

The story is outer. The thought is inner.

Thoughts are outer. Inside lies a spark.

Within all lies the beginning that cannot be known.

The outer we can touch and come to know.

The inner, we must wait still, so that it may speak to us.

T.Freeman
(adapted)

If you are being swept into some current that is not comfortable

If you are being swept into some current that is not comfortable, or not in harmony with your desire, you must remember that couldn't happen if you weren't offering a vibration that matched it in some way. If you're vibrating differently from that, you're not having that experience

--- Abraham

Excerpted from the workshop in San Diego, CA on Sunday, August 3rd, 1997 #445

The Western world puts extreme emphasis upon the human mind

The Western world puts extreme emphasis upon the human mind without balancing the development of the mind with a similar development of the heart. When the mind is unduly developed, it slays the real purpose of life. It works against itself and creates separatism, antagonism, pollution, crimes, and wars.
But if the heart is developed, it can balance the mind and lead the mind toward actualizing the visions and the revelations of the heart. The heart is in contact with the source of Cosmic principles, and it is the only guidance in our life. The mind at its best is the servant of the heart.

(Thought and the Glory of Thinking, p.66)

Torkom Saraydarian

A Game: Stepping Into The Unknown

Moving into a new unexplored state that we have yet to discover, create, and select the correct actions, is called a game. Playing, nonetheless, is a serious activity, which carries the element of the unknown. While playing, we study our capacities, inclinations, and goals, along with their outcomes. With each iteration, a person moves forward to an unknown state.

How does one advance into the unknown? If we know the beginning and the final states, it means that the program is already within us and we are merely implementing it as we move from state to state. However, in this way we are not growing. Moving toward a known state doesn’t translate into acquiring a new one, but is only an accumulation of experience. If a person knows what the next state should be, then it is within him, he is already in it.

“Growth” on the other hand, means that one acquires a totally new state and becomes the person they are not yet today. How can we accomplish this in the most rational, mature, and correct way if not with the help of a game, a simulation? Nature itself pushes us relentlessly to learn by playing.

The same process can be observed at the still, vegetative, and animate levels. In order to continuously advance, a plant employs similar processes within itself, just like a game. If we study the plant during its growth ,it appears identical to ours on the animate and human levels.

A person has to imagine correctly the next state within oneself, so much so as to receive the force of growth from within it. Therefore, the Creator’s presence in each creature is mandatory. One can make a step forward only if it already exists in him. A person must consciously and purposefully draw the Creator’s Light, which comes from his hidden higher “half.”

Therefore, a person constructs a model of a more advanced state using the group, which is a simulator of the World of Infinity, spiritual states, and mutual bestowal. When a person performs various actions, one expects the Light to act upon him and to let him know that the most correct possible state has been found. When does it occur? When the Light clothes in it.

The Light remains in absolute rest. We only need to find our similarity to it. Out of all possible forms, as soon as we pick the form similar to the Creator, He immediately fills us and we become united with one another. This is called the next state. In this way, we advance.

Michael Laitman, PHD

Our Mandate

Each generation has its role in history.

From all the generations before us we inherited a wealth of dreams: philosophy, truths, wisdom and purpose. We are tiny midgets standing on the shoulders of their ideas and their noble deeds.

Our generation's mandate - and destiny - is to make the dream real.

T.Freeman

the 10 sefirot

Hermes~> messager des dieux.messenger of the gods

le message d'hermes

Ce qui est en haut est commme ce qui est en bas
Ce qui est en bas est comme ce qui est en haut
pour faire le miracle d'une seule 
chose

the tree of life

creation [or something]

Down to Earth

When it all began, Heaven was here on Earth.

The physical plane, more than any of the higher spiritual worlds, was the place where the Divine Presence yearned to be.

But Man, step by step, banished the Divine Presence from its home, with a tree of knowledge, with a man who murdered his brother, with all those things that human beings do...

Since Man chased it away, only Man can bring it back. And this began with Abraham, who proclaimed Oneness for all the world.

And it ends with us.

Our generation will bring Heaven back down to Earth.

T.Freeman

Les civilisations se succèdent poursuivant un but précis

Les civilisations se succèdent poursuivant un but précis. Au début de toute nouvelle culture se manifeste l'harmonie d'un ordre céleste. Puis la Lumière se retire pour laisser l'homme libre et celui-ci finit par céder aux influences sombres qui produisent une décomposition et engendrent des forces de destruction. C'est ainsi que les civilisations les plus glorieuses ont fini par disparaître dans des guerres et des cataclysmes qu'elles avaient elles-mêmes engendrés. Sur les décombres se sont élevées de nouvelles cultures. Le sens de la vie de l'homme ne peut apparaître qu'à partir du moment où cet homme est en accord avec le sens de l'histoire. Or la vraie histoire est avant tout inscrite dans les étoiles et le pays de la Lumière éternelle.

O. Manitara

The Bridge

Animals do not gaze at the stars and angels are confined to the realm of the spirit, but Man is God’s bridge between heaven and earth.

Our bodies are formed from the dust, our souls are of the essence of God. We alone can look at a physical world and see spiritual life and beauty.

We who are beyond both heaven and earth, form and matter, spirit and body -- we alone can fuse the two.

T. Freeman

All these dangerous experiments

All these dangerous experiments -like drugs for example- that today tempt young people as well as adults, are expressions of something they are lacking, a call of the soul hungry for the infinite and demanding to be nourished. Since we deprive the soul of the spiritual foods it needs to be able to soar into space, it looks for these elements in the material realm, in substances such as tobacco, alcohol and drugs.

Omraam Mikhaël Aïvanhov

Child of mine, I will never do for you that which I know you can do for yourself.

Child of mine, I will never do for you that which I know you can do for yourself. I will never rob you of an opportunity to show yourself your ability and talent. I will see you at all times as the capable, effective, powerful creator that you've come forth to be. And I will stand back as your most avid cheerleading section. But I will not do for you that which you have intended to do for yourself. Anything you need from me, ask. I'm always here to compliment or assist. I am here to encourage your growth, not to justify my experience through you.

--- Abraham

Excerpted from the workshop in Seattle, WA on Sunday, July 4th, 1999 #453