Can you imagine what a wonderful world we would live in if we followed the two cardinal rules – ‘to love the infinite power of good (aka God) supremely’ and ‘to love our neighbour as ourself’? These two beautiful rules are the basis to a happy, fulfilling life. We cannot have this without obeying those rules. I use the words ‘infinite good’ in order to try and secularize the idea because being good is not the property of religion. One does not have to be religious in order to be good. This is not knocking religion but I believe that the two cardinal rules should be the basis of every system of thought.

Our society is governed by laws and, in my view, the need for most of these laws would fall away were it not for the subjectivity of the human mind. Is it possible to rid ourselves of iniquity? Can we, indeed, live a life of perfection? The human mind says “no”, emphatically, but I believe that this should be the conscious aim of each and everyone of us. We need to leave behind the thinking that says ‘me first’ as this is the primal cause of all that ails the human race. And this is made a more-difficult thing to do as the ‘me first’ principle is, by definition, insidious. We don’t, necessarily, realize we’re doing it.

I think that most of us have some understanding of the persuasive powers of thought and this makes it absolutely vital that we ‘stand porter at the door of thought’ – that we guard what we allow ourselves to think. And our subconscious is a sneaky thing – it’s the back door to thought and we really need to be aware of this and step up and catch those sneaky thoughts, as well as the thoughts that are front-and-centre. As with anything, ‘practice makes perfect’.

Zed

Okay, as I understand it, the true nature of each and everyone of us is good. Unkind stuff happens, not because we are inherently bad, but because of rampant self-focus. It seems to me that human thought looks at life in a singular way – “how does this (insert any situation) affect me/my life?” We need to realize that we have a choice.

If we understand that ‘thinking’ means more than “I think I’ll have pizza for dinner”, (although this is a nice thought), that true thinking is deep and inclusive, that it really means consideration for others and that it is great fun “seeking one’s own in another’s good”, then I think we’re on the right track. Logically, we cannot expect our lives to improve if the only entity that we are considering is ourselves. This might work if we were the only person on the planet but, as the human experience is inextricably intertwined, we cannot improve our lives without thoughtful consideration of others. The trick is to realize this and implement it in our daily lives, on an hourly, or more frequent basis.

By considering others, by trying to determine how our own actions can benefit others as well, this automatically makes our own life-experience better. Being almost exclusively focused on ourselves cannot bring true and lasting peace, health and happiness to our lives. Kindness for kindness’ sake, ie, without an agenda, brings wonderful peace. And, what benefits one, benefits all.

Zed