Good people of the world,
Are you feeling it yet? You watch the news. You’ve felt that inner conflict. A part of you knows what is happening. Another part of you is resisting it. But no matter how much you try to suppress it, that little voice inside of you telling you that something has gone horribly wrong with this world is growing louder and louder.
The children’s fable “There’s No Such Thing as a Dragon” tells the story of a baby dragon that grew larger and larger because the adults refused to acknowledge its existence. Eventually it grew so large that “cognitive dissonance” was no longer a viable option. It had to be acknowledged. When it was finally acknowledged, it disappeared. Can you relate to this metaphor?
More and more of us are beginning to awaken to the uncomfortable truth. We’ve resisted looking too deeply at it because it is so uncomfortable. And yet, the dragon has been growing larger and more difficult to avoid acknowledging. Soon we will have no choice but to acknowledge its existence and to face the uncomfortable fact that much of what we believe about this world is untrue. I write this for you to help you to ease your transition from discomfort back to equanimity.
the origins of “correction”
Consider this … None of us are born into this world as saints. As children, we act on our compulsions and are corrected by our parents when those actions are unskillful. We may not understand why we are given pain correction at the time, but we know that the people delivering the discipline care for us and have our best interests at heart. If they are skillful, they will tell us exactly why we are being disciplined and why correcting this unskillful behavior is so important for our own wellbeing.
However, it isn’t until we actually violate these rules and we see the consequences with our own eyes and feel the remorse for causing harm to others that these constraints on movement become voluntarily integrated into our mode of being. When we are caught stealing, for example, and are forced to look into the eyes of those whose trust we have violated and feel their anguish. These are the moments that transform us. The overwhelming guilt we feel consumes us and strengthens the prohibition against stealing which we were taught. Now we no longer need to rely upon external coercion to restrain the compulsion to “take that which is not freely given”. Our conscience is all the restraint we need.
the failure of “correction”
We do not want power. We have never craved power. The very idea of seeking to inflict our will upon others is revolting to us. And yet, for the same reason we discipline children who violate the rules of civilized behavior, we have reluctantly allowed the state to use force to constrain the behavior of fools in the hopes that they would change their ways.
In fairness, this was a reasonable hypothesis. We’ve experienced ourselves the formula of
(1) patient correction by an authority figure +
(2) validating experience
giving rise to the
(3) voluntary adoption of the moral rule.
It worked on us. We’ve seen it working on other family members. We’ve seen it working with many other good people. It should work on everyone, right? All humans are redeemable, right?
Why isn’t it working?
Why do they continue to behave this way?
And yet THIS is the dragon in the room which we are so reluctant to acknowledge.
The state which we allowed to exist as a “necessary evil” to protect ourselves from a greater evil has now been thoroughly taken over by the very evil it was intended to protect us from.
turning towards the dragon
Having seized full control of the state we constructed to protect ourselves from them, the fools wield the weapon of power not to constrain and correct evil, but to extinguish all constraints against it; Not to bring mutual peace and prosperity to the community but to unleash the ancient spirit of predatory greed; the very same spirit of predatory greed which our ancestors established the moral rules and rule enforcement known as “civilization” in order to constrain.
Throughout all of history, good people have sought to create constraints to protect themselves from evil people and to train evil people to become good.
And throughout all of history, evil people have sought to subvert those constraints.
And throughout all of history, good people have been CONFUSED.
Why isn’t it working?
Why isn’t it working?
The fools wield the weapon of the state, a constraint which *we* created, not merely to inflict their will upon others reluctantly. Rather, they do so with joy. Wealth, power, status, … these things which are sickening to us are craved above all else by them.
Why isn’t it working?
Why do they continue to behave this way?
seeing the dragon = “seeing things as they actually are”
Good people of this world,
I have a message for you.
Before I speak it, I implore you to consider …
The truth will set you free.
The truth is your salvation.
But first it will upset you deeply.
I implore you not to hate the messenger.
More importantly, I implore you not to run away.
HATE and AVOIDANCE are the sins which have enabled Satan to seize control of this world.
You’ve come this far.
The choice to run away from uncomfortable truths is the very reason the situation has deteriorated into what it is.
The horribly bad habit of
(1) turning away from uncomfortable truths and of
(2) being insufficiently curious
is the reason why evil has been allowed to grow as strong as it has in this world.
Every time we make the decision to choose cowardice over courage, ignorance over investigation, we are choosing to allow evil to grow stronger and stronger and stronger.
finding strength
2500 years ago, the Buddha said “I teach one thing and one thing only. Suffering and the end of suffering.” He offered the 8-fold path to nibbana – the total end of suffering.
Nibbana has some interesting side effects. When you train your mind to respond to (1) pain with (2) investigation instead of (3) suffering, your relationship with pain changes. Your irrational fear of pain is extinguished. You will feel as though you have become unbreakably fearless. You will not fear the truth. You will never be insufficiently curious again. This, in turn, will enable the full potential of that beautiful brain you’ve been blessed with to be unleashed on the world in the service of good to unleash a heretofore unimaginable rate of innovation. Together, genuinely *woke* people can create a heaven on earth. That is, of course, if we do not destroy ourselves first by refusing to confront the dragon.
I have attained nibbana. You can too. It’s not as hard as it sounds. It’s not as fantastic as it sounds. It is the “total end of suffering” and nothing more. It is a skill like any other. With deliberate practice, you can acquire this skill just like you have acquired every other skill in your life.
On the pages of this site I have explained the accelerated path to nibbana which I used. Learn it. Acquire the skill. Become a genuinely unbreakably fearless warrior for good. Teach it to others. Add your own innovations to make the teachings more effective.
Why isn’t it working?
Why isn’t it working?
Why do they continue to behave this way?
I won’t tell you the whole truth here. The full red pill would be too much for many of you to bear until you have strengthened yourself.
I’ll give you a hint.
The fools DO NOT change because they CAN NOT change.
They never will.
Nor will their children or their children’s children.
The belief that everyone is redeemable is a LIE!
The belief that everyone is redeemable is a LIE!
skillful “corrections” for a new reality
In the same way as the prohibition against stealing was strengthened when we were forced to feel the pain of our victims, choose to allow the pain of guilt to strengthen these skillful prohibitions.
1: Don’t hate them
Nobody can change the way they were born.
2: Don’t be overly-compassionate towards them
But neither should you allow your compassion for the suffering of fools to allow harm to continue preying upon good people. A suffering predator is still a predator.
3: Don’t hate yourself. Hate the wrong view you are clinging to.
Don’t hate yourself for avoiding the truth for so long and allowing the evil to grow stronger. Direct your hate instead towards the unskillful beliefs and habitual behaviors which allowed this situation to come to pass.
4: Seek to make amends
If you hate yourself instead of growing your resilience and helping others to do the same, the evil will go stronger and more innocents will suffer. Choose to make amends for your sins instead. There are far too few of us in this world. We need you. We cannot do this without you.
Be the change you wish to see in the world.
Choose to become unbreakably fearless.
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