Who Are You?

That story just came to me when I was taking a shower and pondering some others posts I had just read so I would not expect too much from it. A lot of this stuff seems like channeling to me. The first part appeared to me, the core ideas or truths at the beginning, based on various things I've experienced understanding wise but then I think when I was writing it towards the middle and end my "ego" got mixed in with what I "channeled" or what appeared to my conscious awareness from something outside myself.

The first part is about human created reality. Like the names, religions, and names of land. It's amazing how many very popular religions of the past have disappeared. The ones we know today are the ones that survived. The naming of land is a pretty amazing thing if one ponders it deeply. How it becomes the name through cooperative conditioning.

To be aware of the difference between human (thought/idea) created reality and the reality that would be here even if no humans were here is a nice interesting thing to contemplate. But then it's a subtle thing I am writing about as obviously even the way light and sound waves appear is a "human" created reality but then many other life forms, animals and such, seem to have a similar perception. But then the thing translating those waves into perception is similar, animal brains. But then how do we know! We can't look through a dogs eyes for example. We assume a dog looking at us sees something similar to us, (though dogs have a very limited color range compared to us they can see, but a higher sound range - and researchers have various experiments and tests to learn) but the same shapes and what not. I was not talking about that (brain created reality or perception) but about thought/idea created or altered reality. Like naming land for example. Drawing a line in the dirt and saying this side is this country and that side is that one for example. No animal experiences that thought/idea human created reality through they may encounter fences and stuff built on the dirt.

As others posted the end part, the judgement part, does seems close to religion but then I saw all of that as metaphors when I was writing it. For example, there is no being determining who goes where. Not in the literal sense presented in the story anyway. I don't see God as a person though God does have an individual identity to me. But God to me is so advanced, so beyond something as mundane as one human life. (but within everyone and everything at the same time) To me, where we go is determined by our state of being, our accumulated karma, our state of self understanding, awareness etc. And then beings do have an input, more advanced beings, but these are far below something one would call God or the highest to me.

Then the last few lines, to me what matters in the end is how we treated others and ourselves. How much love we had and gave. What we did basically with other living things including this planet.

Originally Posted by AbodhiSky

We are defined by what we perceive and project, if it's of a higher nature or a lower one.

Your reality is defined by your perceptions, your perceptions are defined by your beliefs and your beliefs are defined by your definitions. You are defined by your definitions, and if you define yourself as a Spiritual being then in your reality you are, and will act according to your definition of 'Spiritual being'.

God didn't make you what you are, you did.

[sky]

Originally Posted by Greenslade

God didn't make you what you are, you did.

That's a pity, I could have asked to exchange a few items

[HITESH SHAH]

Originally Posted by AbodhiSky

"If I owe a a debt to you, you move forward, to higher realms to collect your reward, if you owe a debt to me, you move lower to lower realms, to pay what you owe."

What our bodies names are, what religion we follow or don't follow, what the area of land we live on is called, does not define who or what we are.

Nice view and indeed its a spiritual reality . We are nothing but sum of our deeds and that's what takes us forward / backward in this life and after life.

Originally Posted by Greenslade

Your reality is defined by your perceptions, your perceptions are defined by your beliefs and your beliefs are defined by your definitions. God didn't make you what you are, you did.

There is no doubt we control and create a great deal in our lives but what others create affects us too. Both are true.

A small child born to abusive parents, their reality is not defined/created by that child's perceptions. That child's reality is determined by the actions of others, the parents in this case. Beliefs are also instilled by others. Where do our ideas and beliefs come from? Almost always from others, from books, religions, teachers. We don't make them up, we just choose which ones to accept or reject. But even there, things like peer pressure, conditioning, indoctrination, the beliefs of family, friends, our society, culture, and authorities determine which we accept or reject.

Simple examples, why do women wear high heals or wear lipstick? Some anthropologists would tell you high heals make the movement of those who wear them mimic a wounded animal, which would be attractive to a predator, (or males in this case) It presents an image of exaggerated biological difference to illicit an unconscious response. No one today would say I am buying and wearing these high heals to mimic the movement of a wounded animal, they say, they look good, make me look sexy etc. It's now a universal sign of beauty or elegance in some cultures. Same deal with something like red lipstick. It used to have a purpose, in some cultures it was a symbol of royalty or wealth, some cultures used to to define those doing the worlds oldest profession, but today, a survey said 98% of women wore it, some daily, so the why now is simply to fit in, to look good, because everyone else is doing it. To look attractive or "better" according to how cultural conditioning defines such things. Now days, many feel they can not be in public without some make-up. It is expected by the culture. In some jobs, it is required.

External pressures and forces determine a lot of our reality. Internal ones as well such as our conditioning and programming. Why do we get mad if somebody insults us? If somebody has a negative opinion of us? It's our natural response.

But a large goal of spirituality and religion is to be the lord and master of our experience. To take charge of it. But in religion and spirituality, how is this accomplished? Usually, through some form of either controlling our environment, so what we encounter, or by controlling what our attention is on, controlling what we perceive from what is there or here (external and internal)

The whole movement of Eastern Religion is about controlling through awareness, choosing good mental activity and removing the attention from the bad, Western Religion is similar, though the methods are different, in the West, place the attention on God, love and so on, high thoughts, in the East be aware if the attention is on bad thoughts or thinking and so one can place it elsewhere.

Then the mystics, they say doubt your perceptions, question them, transcend them. Be free of your very self! That teaching runs through Eastern and Western religions as well. There is no self or not self, (Buddhism) one must be born again (Christianity) live now detached and free from the burdens of the external world telling us who and what we are and be free from our internal story and memory and conditioning telling us who and what we are. Then the philosophers who tell us, we are not really changing what we are or who we are, we are finding who and what we have always been when we get free of internal and external forces that tell us who and what we are.

Liberation. Freedom from the known. A throwing off of the weight we carry. Just being. What is, is. I don't need an opinion, a belief, involvement. I perceive it, as it is, before I have an idea or opinion about it. Then one finds happiness there, in that way to be, finds love and peace. Like that has always been the root, the core, of who and what we are.

[lemex]

Originally Posted by AbodhiSky

There is no doubt we control and create a great deal in our lives but what others create affects us too. Both are true.

You see so much more then others do and the example given adds a dimension that offers valuable information. One observes all three are true not just both. This is simply a fact you mention that is real, others, and all things, help shape our external and internal. People then need to begin to acknowledge and embrace that contribution. We then create. Change the experience changes the perception. Change the contribution changes the experience. We should look at our contribution.

Reality is defined by perception and everyone knows this, perception is defined by experience and input. I realized long ago what we did is not set and never permanent. If something was different what we did is different. We are looking for no difference then we would know the answer.

Above all, what matters is how we treat others and ourselves because sometimes we are the others. I myself have not yet experienced who I could be. Great posts thus far imo.

Originally Posted by sky123

That's a pity, I could have asked to exchange a few items

That's the Spirituality part, how we deal with what we've got.

Originally Posted by AbodhiSky

There is no doubt we control and create a great deal in our lives but what others create affects us too. Both are true.

Our perceptions of what others create affects us, and how we deal deal with those perceptions but once you understand that you can change your perceptions the Universe around you changes. You understand yourself and how what you create affects others, then you change what you create. You understand that this is what you create and that you can change what you can create, you can also change how you perceive others and that's a fundamental difference.

How you perceive yourself and others - and everything else - is either constructive or destructive, it's your choice.

[sky]

Originally Posted by Greenslade

Our perceptions of what others create affects us, and how we deal deal with those perceptions but once you understand that you can change your perceptions the Universe around you changes.

So true, change the way you look at things and the things you look at change