Do you think that life on earth is poor?

Originally Posted by inavalan

Me too, love and appreciate animal and plant life.

That depends on how one cooks them.

Originally Posted by Honza

Do ever feel sorry for 'life on earth'? Do you think that it is poor and unfortunate?

I sometimes feel so sorry for us. I see a stray cat or a hurt person or animal and I feel great sympathy or sorrow. I think 'poor God'....if only they knew how to help themselves. If only they could.

Animals are particularly unfortunate because they are not even the masters of their own destiny. So lost.

Well, we are animals as well, and if we are "masters of our own destiny", then most don't seem to know it. I have to admit, I sometimes prefer the way the food web looks at the grocery store to how it looks on the discovery channel. On the one hand I have studied ecology, understand how it works, and can look at it from a scientific viewpoint. On the other hand, I can't seem to shake that compassionate sympathetic view when something is suffering, particularly the young, who in nature are often the first to be eaten or even just succumb. It seems I have at least three faces here, the scientist, the Buddha, and the cook.

[Altair]

Originally Posted by Honza

Animals are particularly unfortunate because they are not even the masters of their own destiny. So lost.

How can they be unfortunate when they simply lack the means to consider themselves unfortunate? If we have pity for them for lacking what we have ((our capacity to conceptualize our pain)) it's a bit patronizing, isn't it? Same way if we were to suggest they are ''lesser life forms''. I think other lifeforms can get the better deal in a way, because they can't conceptualize their pain.

And are we really the master of our own destiny? We're also limited by our environment and genetics.

Originally Posted by ketzer

That depends on how one cooks them.

Lololol..... (Sorry.. I Do love animals and nature but that was funny!)

Originally Posted by Elfin

Lololol..... (Sorry.. I Do love animals and nature but that was funny!)

I am glad someone enjoyed it.
I suppose one can love, honor, and appreciate nature and the food web while being a part of it. That last part however, is the only part required by life.

[guthrio]

Originally Posted by Honza

Do ever feel sorry for 'life on earth'? Do you think that it is poor and unfortunate?

I sometimes feel so sorry for us. I see a stray cat or a hurt person or animal and I feel great sympathy or sorrow. I think 'poor God'....if only they knew how to help themselves. If only they could.

Animals are particularly unfortunate because they are not even the masters of their own destiny. So lost.

Honza,

While thinking about your excellent question, "Do you think that life on earth is poor?", a variation of Busby's signature message from Hamlet strangely came to mind, "What dreams may come before we have shuffled off this mortal coil?...as a perspective through which to answer.

I think the answer to your question has much ado about whether the dreams we set for ourselves come to fruition or failure...and if to failure, did we leave our dreams that way or choose to persist until we have reached fruition?

Another strange confluence of "fruition / failure" perspectives came to mind while reading a portion of Neville Goddard's lecture entitled "Your Supreme Dominion"...in a way I'd never considered before: Fruition or Failure is determined by the seed-thought that is "planted within the Garden of one's self" ......

"The meek of the earth seek righteousness and it is to the meek of the earth that the earth is given. As you are told the meek shall inherit the earth. You might have been taught to believe it meant the beaten man, the man who falls and grovels like the grasshopper; it doesn't. The word "meek" if translated actually means to be tamed as a wild animal is tamed. To the man who tames the mind, the man who tames his being that he can set it any task and have it execute that task, that man is meek and the meek inherit the earth. And the meek always seek righteousness, so if I today began to subdue this earth, I must make righteousness my watchword, and so if I were righteous I would now single out the nature of the trees I would plant, the nature of the flowers I would plant, the nature of the animals I would cultivate, the nature of the fish that I would catch, and I would name them as desirable states, called in the Bible beauty instead of ashes, called in the Bible the spirit of joy instead of mourning, called by all these lovely things. As you are told, all the things that are good, dwell on these things. To every good thing, for He called it very good. Everything that I would call the good, which is a righteous judgment, will be the right judgment. I, in spite of the evidence of my senses that would deny it, in spite of reason that would tell me that it was impossible of realization, having discovered that I am the one planting my garden, that this is the only garden to cultivate, that this is the only earth to subdue..."

To me, what dreams may come before we have shuffled off this mortal coil...depend upon whether we learn to subdue our own selves...to leave the world Spiritually poorer, or richer for ourselves and others, including animals, who the Creator has placed among us to share their brief Soul-journs upon the Earth with us. How?

With an answer to your post's question from your own excellent signature message: The Humility, The Pride and The Humiliation. Because thereupon, do we also learn that the only value of "The Pride and The Humiliation" is The Humility to choose aright."

....Spiritually, richer or poorer, before we have shuffled off this mortal coil.


Reference: http://realneville.com/txt/your_supreme_dominion.htm

[Honza]

Interesting post. Thank you Guthrio.

[guthrio]

.... My pleasure, Honza.