We are programmed to live in pretense.
I’d like to pass on a sentiment, not an exact quote, but an idea from John Trudell from his book ‘Lines from a Mind.’ He says that everyone’s minds are molded to be broken enough to live in the society that we have.
He’s very interesting because all this stuff that comes to us from people in the native tradition. They are seeing our culture from outside of it. We, as spiritual seekers, are seeing our culture from inside of it and trying to figure out how to break through. So, all these observations from outside of it are very interesting and informative to us.
We’re trained to live in pretense, and it is so deep. Like, we have religions full of insane stories, and we’re told if you don’t believe this story, you’ll go to hell.
It creates a crazy loop inside of our heads because when you believe something that’s not true, when you’re living in a lie you go crazy. You’re very intelligent. If your stories don’t make sense, your mind fills the gap with more stories and stories and stories to justify and retell these lies to yourself.
In what the Native Americans called the conquering societies (which is the society I come from, more than likely the society that you come from), in these conquering societies, we have been living this life for centuries, a long, long time. And everyone’s been caught in this loop.
Life becomes an attempt to justify ourselves within this loop. It’s created a mad world because the whole world that we live in, our culture, is removed from and divided from and separate from reality. Change the word ‘reality’ to ‘spiritual.’ There is an entire spiritual world that’s real and ripe and understandable, and we live separate from that. So, the question is, what do we do? How do we break through this loop?
I think there’s a couple of very easy things to think about. One, realize it’s a loop, and you’re caught in it. Every attempt your intelligence has at breaking through this loop is not going to work because your intelligence is going to just go around and around and around in the loop.
We’re almost victims of our own intelligence. So, don’t ever think you’re stupid because you’re stuck in this loop. The more intelligent you are, probably the more stuck you are in it because the more you’re able to attach meanings to all sorts of different things.
Two: once you’ve admitted that you’re in this loop, then realize that your thinking intelligent mind can’t see it, or define it, or understand it, simply because we’re stuck inside of it.
John Trudell, he sees us from the outside, and so he has some clues to give us.
One, understand you’re in this loop. Two, understand that you’re thinking mind creates this loop. That means you can get out of it but you have to use different tools than the ones you use to stay in it.
You’ve got to do something totally radically different to jump out of it. And again, just simply admitting that this loop exists is a radical step because we’re not supposed to see it. The only way it can have power over us is if we don’t see it. Maybe you’re still not clearly seeing all the details of this loop, but simply totally admitting that it’s there is a huge step. We’re in it, we are taught to live in pretense.
Three, the tools of nonduality are designed to get us out of this. Literally, that’s their job. Nonduality is telling us: you are not separate. The second you see who you are you know that “, that “who you are” naturally has no separation.
Boom, it’s gone.
You can jump right through the loop over to the other side.
Here’s a quick little story I heard about Krishnamurti . One day, he’s sitting giving his talks. Krishnamurti was very intelligent and kind of a dry speaker. He would tend too deep in describe things and totally confuse his followers.
One day, he tried to make it simple and said, ‘All you have to do is just open the door and walk out. It’s just like you open the window and there’s the outside. You just step right through, and out you go.’
A seeker raised his hand and looked at him and said, ‘But Krishnamurti , my window has been painted shut so tight that I can’t get it open.’
And Krishnamurti goes, ‘What if the house was on fire? How quick would you go through that window?’
Right, so maybe this is the other thing to know: You are stuck in a loop. Your thoughts can’t see it because your thoughts create it. You, however, are always free of it. You can step right through it, AND the world is on fire, like literally, the world is on fire. We need to step through this loop to the other side where we’re not living in pretense, where we’re living in what Krishnamurti calls ‘the truth,’ the undefinable, always there truth.
The clues: Who are you? You’re not two. You’re you in the vast unity of existence.