God or No God? or Is this question appropriate?

Atheists are utter idiots, Theists are Supreme idiots .

If you start thinking what is correct, you will become either atheist or theist. The problem is both are correct!!

Believing vs Knowing

When it comes to matters of your core values determining your course of action, goals & your very direction of life it is better to form them based on ‘knowing’ rather than ‘believing’.  It is critical to know the difference between believing something  & Knowing that thing.  When you believe in something you subscribe to other person’s knowledge or his belief and your actions from such beliefs are not a function of your core values.  When you know a thing,  your words, actions  would be a function of your deep understanding at that time or from your experience.  If you look back in human history all wars, genocides, were between two beliefs.

There is only one step in transition from believing to knowing. It is accepting that you don’t know. If and only if you accept that you don’t know, inquiry/longing to know will start. Not knowing is a void and the natural tendency of mind is to seek to know based on intensity and priority you assign to your inquiry.

I used to believe in GOD (superior being governing all existence in universe). Now, I neither believe nor disbelieve God.  I know there is no GOD.  This  knowing resulted from my  experience and intellect.  I had to accept during my late teen years that I do not know for sure that GOD existed or not. Once I got this revelation I find my actions and words regarding God, religion are more stable, with more impact  & with more conviction. Beliefs act outside in and are impregnated, either by parents, society, yourself.  Everybody will be impregnated with a belief system and one cannot escape that.  It happens one way or the other during your childhood.  However, one should deploy the discriminatory aspect of  mind and become conscious of root of their actions and words.

The beauty of actions emanating from knowing is that you act from your knowledge at any given moment and will take total responsibility for your actions. Knowing flows  from inside you outwards to the world from your understanding,  experience and when you act from knowing you will be creative at one level or other and provide value to others.

Insightful Quotes & Captures from Movies

I watch lots of Movies & Series. The thing which I can say I learned is Various ways of ‘BEING’.  The following are some Insightful Captures from various movies that stuck in my mind and  changed my way of viewing things and being.

You are not here to try to get the world to be just as you want it to be, you are here to create the world around you that you choose,while you allow the world as others choose it to be to exist also.

- From ‘The Secret’

You just have to be open to allowing for a truth which differs from your own opinions,
or else you’ll never actually see the truth at all.

- Grace is Gone

….But you’re wrong if you think that the joy of life comes principally from human relationships.God’s placed it all around us.It’s in everything.
It’s in anything we can experience.People just need to change the way they look at those things.

- Into the Wild

From movie ‘Platoon’:

Sergeant O’Neill!
- How are you doing? – Just fine, sir.
That’s good, cos you got second platoon.
Yes, sir.
- Ready? – You bet.
I think now, looking back,we did not fight the enemy,
we fought ourselves, and the enemy… was in us.
The war is over for me now,but it will always be there,
for the rest of my days,as I’m sure Elias will be,
fighting with Barnes for what Rhah called possession ofmy soul.
There are times since…
I’ve felt like the child born ofthose two fathers.
But be that as it may, those ofus who did make it…
have an obligation to build again,
to teach to others what we know,
and to try with what’s left ofour lives…
to find a goodness, and meaning, to this life.
“

From the movie ‘Man from Earth’ one of the best movies I saw:

A:
do you believe literally
everything in the bible, edith?
B:
Yes!
A:Before you say it, I know it’s undergone a lot of changes,

B:But god has spoken through man …. To make his word clearer.

C:He couldn’t get it right the first time?

B:We’re imperfect! He had to work to make us understand.

C:(sarcastic) He couldn’t get us right the first time, edith?

D: taken alone, the philosophical teachings of jesus are
buddhism with a hebrew accent- kindness, tolerance,
brotherhood, love,A ruthless realism acknowledging
That life is as it is here on earth, here and now.
The kingdom of god, meaning goodness,
Is right here, where it should be.

“I am what i am becoming. “

That’s what the buddha brought in.
And that’s what i taught.
But a talking snake
make a lady eat an apple,
So we’re screwed.
(pause)
Heaven and hell were peddled So priests could rule
through seduction and terror,
Save our souls that we never lost in the first place.
….

D:
I see ceremony, ritual, processions, Genuflecting,
moaning, intoning, Venerating cookies and wine,
And i think…
It’s not what i had in mind.

B:
But that’s vatican flapdoodle.

It doesn’t have a thing to do with god.

A:
As you said, john, everywhere, religions…
From exalting life to
purging joy as a sin.
Rome does it as grand opera.
(sarcastic) A simple path to goodness needs
A supernatural roadmap.

C:
Supernatural…
A stupid word, i mean…
Anything that happens,happens within nature,
Whether we believe in it or not.

This is from my favorite series (as of now) which I watch, HOUSE.M.D:

A: I just want to die with a little dignity.
B: There’s no such thing.
Our bodies break down.
Sometimes when we’re 90.
Sometimes before we’re even born.
But it always happens,
and there’s never any dignity in it.
I don’t care if you can walk,
see, wipe your own ass.
It’s always ugly. Always.
We can live with dignity.
We can’t die with it.

will be updating more later!

My Thoughts on GOD, Fate, Life

I feel happy to express some of my thoughts, revelations, ‘My Truths’ & experiences. I hope it triggers some thoughts on growth and produce value to people who read this. If not, at least an amusing read.

Doubt & confusion

I was raised in a orthodox Hindu family with a belief system that God, an Omnipotent being exists and govern every being on Earth. During my childhood, I grew up with the belief that there is God who goes by different names and he takes care of all your needs. In my last year of high school I started to get disconnected with the thought of an ‘single omnipotent being’ sitting somewhere and governing everybody:

• What is His purpose?
• Why does he have to create humans, have some deeds categorized as ‘Good’ and some as ‘Evil’ , reward people who does ‘good deeds’ , punish people who does ‘bad deeds’, evalute them based on their  actions and send them to a place called ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’?
• If He is the one who created ‘Good’ , ‘Bad’ & humans , why does He make some people do good/bad deeds , and again rewards them based on the actions which He made them do. What is the point?
• If He is Omnipotent Master of all that exists, why does he accept 1, 28, 108, 1008, coconuts (In India, especially south India, Lord Ganesha is famous for this) and costly gold ornaments, Cash from his subjects and grant them what they ask for? If he is doing this how can He be the one who knows all that is there to be known? Is he doing this as a hobby? business? or Are all these be a creation of    Human Mind?
• Questions arise when people use the phrase “God fearing”:
• If an all pervading singular super-conscious being expects the people whom He created in the first place, be afraid of him, make his subjects do evil stuff which He Himself created, can He be GOD?
• Can any GOD who elicits a low Conscious feeling called FEAR from his subjects, be ‘GOD ‘in the first place?

Is there a possibility that all these rituals & were created by human mind. I wanted Solid answers. So I started grabbing whatever books I can and became voracious consumer of various thoughts. I had access to various works of Vivekananda and translated version of Upanishads in used book stores. During adoloscence, my brain was not wired to grasp the concepts conveyed from some rational minds. The following excerpt is from RajaYoga by patanjali which triggered some serious questioning about the way I went about ‘worshiping’, ‘believing’ God (just because I was expected to be that way by parents & family members) :

“..The man who thinks that he is receiving response to his prayers does not know that the fulfillment comes from his own nature, that he succeeded by the mental attitude of prayer in waking up a bit of  infinite power which is coiled up withing himself. What, thus, men ignorantly worship under various names, through fear and tribulation, the Conscious One declares to the world to be the real power residing dormant in every being…”

Revelation & Evolution

As Richard Feynman has said, when you look at the universe and understand its laws, ‘the theory that it is all arranged as a stage for God to watch man’s struggle for good and evil seems inadequate.‘

As I opened myself to new ideas and re-evaluated my beliefs and ideas, I had whole new paradigm on life. Now, I do not subscribe to a specific religion or do not need an idea or concept of an entity called GOD: a superior being sitting somewhere governing everybody’s life. With this above idea, I also believe there can be nothing called FATE: the idea that says, for humans, everything is predestined, that before getting born one is destined to go in some paths, meet specific people, marry particular person, get x number of kids, die at particular date. Thanks to Vivekananda’s works, RajaYoga and Bhakti Yoga, Ayn Rand, many more books and articles.However, my take on astrology was like: There might be some forces in universe which is not known to human brain (science) yet which might affect human lives and decisions.Having the fact that nothing is predestined how can there be a predictive theory ( astrology) because astrology conforms to idea of FATE( that events occurring in human life are fixed and predetermined)and there cannot be a PREDICTIVE SCIENCE. That idea shattered and in came the revelation that nothing is predictable; it is all what one creates for oneself. After reading the following articles (Astrology Vs Science I & II).If there is no entity called GOD there cant be a thing called FATE ( by fate I mean the idea that for humans everything is predestined).

My close friends, parents,WONDER about my assertiveness and totally opposite stance when compared to some years ago. My parents have the notion that my stances as ‘youthful peppiness’ and it will phase out. They somehow cannot accept my differing opinions and thoughts. I used to enter into discussion with them which turned into arguments.That is when I realized I do not have intense need to be right. This is the way I see things & the reality is that just because I can see something does not mean that others have to see the same way. Others have their own ways to understanding things and ‘their truths’. However one question pestered me : What is My Purpose here on Earth? when I was ruminating this question I stumbled on this very good article, Why does purpose matter?.

Where I am now?

I am the prime Mover of my Life! I and only I am responsible for whatever happens in my life! Nothing is predictable. I would even say that You & I are GOD. All there is to one’s life is what one creates for oneself.  I would like to quote a dialogue which I heard from a film & which makes sense to me: you just have to be open to allowing for a truth which differs from your own opinions, or else you’ll never actually see the truth at all.  I am inclined on the thought that there is something more to be explored, which I would like to name as Collective Consciousness.  I am not sure. I am still exploring. I think this is why human brain is for: questioning, analyzing and fine tuning for understanding the ‘TRUTH’.  It is a never ending progressive process!

People may react anywhere from totally agreement to total disagreement to some of my thoughts.  Finally a quote from on of my favorite blog by Steve Pavlina..

“As I see it, if you and I agree on absolutely everything, we can’t help each other grow. It’s only by exploring our differences that we can learn from each other.”

I request readers to post in their comments, share their thoughts.

First Post

This blog is to pen down my thoughts on various subjects. I find myself getting more clarity when I express it by writing down my thoughts. I hope this produces value to who ever reads this blog.