True Vision

A few nights ago, I had a dream. I was in a 727 airplane, and at one point jumped out of the plane.  In the past, I have had anxiety and fear when dreaming of jumping from high places, but now, I was not afraid at all, as I confidently jumped out and pulled the chord of my parachute.  I remember knowing I had never sky-dived before, but it didn’t matter.  I was ready.  I knew what to do.  I was willing.  I was able to handle the jump, and eventually landed smoothly, and safely.  When I landed, I remember thinking I needed to find my daughter.  I was not scared, and knew she was not on the airplane or in trouble, but remember knowing I wanted to find her.  I saw a man, and asked him about the airplane, since I knew nobody was flying it.  I expressed concern to him others might be killed when it crashed, but somehow he conveyed to me there was no danger of anyone being harmed.  After hearing his words, I knew they were true, deep down, and felt no anxiety.  At that point, the dream ended.

In relating this dream to my good friend, and then my counselor, some fascinating truths dawned on me.  The airplane symbolized traditional religion, and it’s crashing symbolized the harmless destruction of its untruths. The parachute symbolized my ever-growing awareness, and the insights I have gained through the safety of writing on “The Mystical Voice.” This site is my “safe-haven,” my “parachute,” the place I write to express my vision of Life and existence.  My real name is not John Cross. It is something else, which I do not reveal, because I have several close family members, as well as very intimate friends who would not understand my views, since they are “believers,” Catholics, and/or Christians, those who have superstitious beliefs in “spiritual beings,” “other dimensions,” and so forth.  This environment makes me uncomfortable and lonely sometimes, and I do not share these insights with anyone except with my counselor, with my closest friend for life, and of course, on “The Mystical Voice.”  I guess you could call me a “closet non-Christian.”

It may be that “honesty is the best policy,” but if we call “honesty” sharing all of our points of view, regardless of whom we are speaking to, how “honest” can we really be when our view of Reality contradicts that of virtually everyone we know and love?  How can we truthfully, honestly reveal our views of Reality when we know they will not be understood, that they will threaten and hurt our loved ones, when we know we will be judged, and when we know that seeing Truth is not about convincing nor “converting” anyone?  To do so would be to take the fundamentalist route, which is essentially war.  When someone asks us to be “honest with them,” what they are really asking is that we overlook their prejudices and obvious limitations at understanding what we wish to share with them, but know we cannot.  They are asking to receive receive complete and total trust and sharing in all things, which they have not earned based on their behavior which clearly demonstrates their inability to have a truly open, free-thinking, honest and truthful conversation about certain things without judgment.  The truth is, what most people ask of us in “being honest” with them is completely unreasonable, because we are being asked to do what is futile and hurtful to both parties – to expose ourselves in an unsafe, judgmental environment which will result in nothing positive for ourselves, nor those with whom we might speak honestly of these things.

Can we really tell our boss how we really feel about our job if we don’t particularly like it, but want to keep it?  Can we really tell our parents and close relatives and friends we don’t believe as they do when we know they will be hurt and threatened?  Sure, we could tell them the truth, but do we really want to deal with the consequences of this “honesty,” such as losing our jobs or being alienated by our family and friends?  Common sense tells us why we are all chameleons to some extent in various areas of our lives out of pure survival.  Nobody wants to get slaughtered, nor do most of us desire to hurt others deliberately, which is why we all know deep down there is no point to going down a road we know will be futile in the persuit of “total honesty.”  At the very least, one must demonstrate the possibility for a safe conversation on a given topic for us to entertain an honest discussion with them about it.  In many cases, we can be very open and honest with another in some areas, but not in others. It depends on the person we are speaking with, and how we assess their comfort level based on their behavior and feedback to our words.  For me, the most practical solution to this dilemma is sharing my insights I know I cannot share with others in anonymity, since I must express what I see, regardless of the differing views of my close family and friends.  “The Mystical Voice” is for those who seek to find what I am speaking of.  It is not about me actively “evangelizing” to others.  Truth is about coming to the waters to drink, not being force-fed against one’s will.

All I can do with those I love is share love with them.  I meet them where they are, and love them as I can under the circumstances. There is honesty in that – honesty in recognizing what can and cannot be shared.  True honesty is not “full disclosure,” but using intelligent discernment with what is and is not appropriate to share with others.  It is akin to recognizing there are some things we can share with children and other things we cannot.  There are some things which are simply not appropriate to share with them, things they cannot comprehend or process without doing damage to their developing minds.  This would include things like adult situations, relationships, and adult sexuality. If these things are revealed to a child at too young an age, it can be harmful and confusing to their developing minds.

Would it be loving and responsible to reveal information of these things to a child when we know they do not have the maturity to understand and process it?  Or would it be loving to recognize what they can and cannot handle, and share honestly what can be shared?  Would it be loving and responsible to hand our 11-year old child the keys to our car just because they ask for them, when we know full well they cannot drive it safely and responsibly?  Of course not.  To hand over our keys to them when we know better, even if they think they can drive would be irresponsible and most un-loving.  This is how we must handle adults as well.  Most adults are simply grown children.  They may say they can “handle the truth,” but most often they cannot, as reflected in the famous saying by Jack Nicholson in “A Few Good Men.”  As condescending as it may sound, the fact of the matter is, just as not everyone is equal in their physical, emotional, or intellectual development, not everyone is in the same “place” in their spiritual development as well, as I discussed within “The Mystical Voice” book.  There are those who are ready to hear Truth, and others who are not.  All must come to Truth in their own time, as this process cannot be coerced nor forced.  If it is forced, then it is fundamentalist manipulation, coersion, and inrigue. That has nothing whatsoever to do with sharing Truth. 

As I have stated before, I am surrounded in my life by delusional people.  We all are.  When “New Age,” “supernatural,” “paranormal,” and “psychic” books outsell scientific books by double, it is clear most people are not interested at all in seeing Reality, but in perpetuating their delusions.  A simple question we need to ask is, “Why do we even care about so-called “psychic,”  “paranormal,” “supernatural” phenomena?”  The only reason we care about such things is for egotistical validation, nothing more.  We want to believe our dead friends and relatives are still “alive somewhere,” that there is a God in his Heaven who loves us, and makes all things “right.”  It gives our egos comfort and hope. But it is a false hope, played upon by so-called “mediums” and other “spiritualists” who unscrupulously take advantage of the sorrow, sadness, and vulnerability of those who are gullible, and those who have experienced grief and loss.  And while it may appear “harmless” to confirm the hopes of those who long to believe in such things, these “mediums” are making money posing as legitimate, “real” psychics and spiritualists (a contradiction of terms), while actually being charlatans and spiritual prostitutes, preying like Vultures off the vulnerable, the weak, and the grief-stricken, by peddling lies and delusions to them.  It is despicable anyone would do this to another human being, that they would show such an insidious disrespect for those who are vulnerable and grief-stricken, and for the memory of those whom they have lost.

Derren Brown is a brilliant illusionist who appears to have “paranormal abilities” and other “psychic powers,” but he readily admits he does not, and uses all natural, non-supernatural means of achieving his insights.  In this amazing video, Derren exposes Joe Power, a British psychic medium, for the fraud he is.  Joe Power claims he can contact the dead.  As we discovered before, and is further backed by Derren Brown’s investigations, so-called “magic” is an illusion, and the entire universe is all natural, since the “supernatural,” “other realms of existence,” and “the afterlife” are all fictions serving nothing more than our strong ego needs to believe we are something “special” and different from any other creature or aspect of existence.  As we discovered before, we are no “better” nor “worse” than a flea, a mouse, an amoeba, or any other aspect of creation.  All is One. 

Again, this common failure of virtually the whole of humanity to see the Oneness of All, is the reason all of these fantasies and delusions are continually perpetuated.  The ego is an illusion with no essential, permanent reality.  It never wants to see itself for what it is because to do so would be to confirm its illusory, impermanent existence.  We then would have to face the Truth of the matter – we are nothing and nobody.  This is completely unacceptable to the ego, which perceives unless it is “important,” “eternal,” and “the center of the universe,” it has no “reason” to live, nor “purpose” for its existence.  This is why virtually everyone is looking for Life’s “purpose” and “meaning,” when there is none, save what “meaning” and “purpose” we assign it.  This is not a negative thing, unless we are looking only from the limited perspective of the ego.  To live life only within the perspective of the ego is pure Hell, because there is never any answer for it.

Believing our egotistical perspective is the only reality, and not able to perceive a way “out” of our hellish life within the ego, with no awareness of the Oneness of All, we are then forced to invent “answers” to cope with the pain of our ego identification.  This is the essence of why humanity creates “gods” – to provide “answers” which bring comfort to our egos when we don’t know something.  This is why the essence of religion is faith.  We always believe when we do not know, as faith only serves to pacify the insecurity we feel in our ignorance and fear, and has nothing to do with knowledge.  If we know, if we have knowledge, and if we are not enslaved by our fears, faith is unnecessary.  This is why faith is ultimately a lie – because it is the invention of “answers” which only serve to make us feel good, to justify our ignorance and pacify our fears, not because they are the Truth.  When these so-called “answers” are invented, they are always nothing more than the products of our dualistic ego, which only creates more conflict.  This involves things such as creating a fictional ego in the sky called “god” who creates us “for a purpose” so we can “feel good” about ourselves.  Because these “answers” are nothing more than wish-fulfilling lies and not Truth, they only create further conflict and contradiction, since inventing a fictional ego like “god” makes it necessary to then create all kinds of excuses, rationalizations, and justifications when “god” inevitably fails to “answer prayers,” deliver on his so-called “promises” in scripture, or does not appear to have “purpose” or “meaning” to what he “does” or “fails to do.”  The reason “god’s promises” are not fulfilled, and “god” appears to sometimes “have a plan,” “answer prayers,” and other times not, is because all of this is imaginary.  Our conceptions of “god” are completely imaginary.  Very simple.

The ego never sees this, and so it continues to play the game of creating further “gods” and other imaginary notions to justify the illusion of itself.  The problem is, all of these answers are utter failures and contradictions because every “escape” the ego produces, from “gods” to “afterlife theories” are all self-contradictory because all notions which assume individual permanence, ego, self, is a contradiction.  The Truth all is One, while believing in individual, permanent self-essence at the same time is a contradiction.  There is only Oneness, which invalidates any notions of individual “permanence.” The ultimate Truth of all is One – Life itself, with the forms within it being ever-changing, temporary, and illusory.  This is a fact of life everyone can easily observe by simply looking at the constant and endlessly changing world of form and appearances.  It is easy in this realization to see the ego exactly for what it is – an animal chasing its own tail in endless futility.

The reason all “answers” fail is because there is never an “answer” for the dualistic ego, the lie, the passing, the illusory.  When the Oneness of All is seen – truly seen, not simply “understood” as an intellectual concept, true liberation takes place because that is when one is finally dead to the ego and its illusions, when all the wasted movements of game-playing egotistical self-justification comes to an end.  This is what it truly means die into Eternal Life – to be dead to the ego and its illusory existence – to see it for what it is. This is True Salvation, not being deemed “righteous” before a “just” and “holy” god.  True Salvation has everything to do with awareness, and has nothing whatsoever to do with “righteousness.”  Being “made right” or “justified” depends on the reality of the ego because there must be some thing to justify.  Since the ego is ultimately impermanent, not Reality, and is an illusion, there truly is no thing to justify.  All is One. 

I still live in the world as an ego – a person who, like everyone else, has responsibilities and things I must accomplish.  The difference between myself and so many others is I have no attachment to my ego.  This does not mean I live in despair in the realization there is no “god” who designed me “for a purpose,” or that life has no meaning or hope.  On the contrary, I live with true purpose, and joy in the knowlege I am the Oneness of All.  What could possibly be better than that?  This means no matter what I go through, I am free… free of the attachment to my ego… free of the need of my ego to live forever. I still get angry, sad, happy, frustrated, exhilarated… all of the common experiences and emotions of human life.  But I experience these things more as an observer, rather than being consumed by an illusory identity with these things.

I am not my ego, nor my egotistical experiences.  I am the Oneness of All… who has no identity, only revealed through the ever-changing manifestations of the same, timeless One, who experiences life through the ego of “myself,and every other aspect of manifested creation. The Oneness of All is what everyone truly is.  We are not limited to being “someone” or “anything.”  We are nothing, and nobody.  In that, we are ONE… the ALL… the Oneness of All…

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