Introduction to Neon Preacher: This post can have two sections: Gems and Spells.
*This is a collection of ideas I've found useful. I wrote this a week ago and wanted to do another Travel log this week but since my computer in Laos is too expensive and slow I thought I'd print this first Neon Preacher instead. Today is Christmas and I'm in Laos which I refer to as Asian-Mexico. This is I guess a Christmas day black and neon preaching via Laos.
GEMS
Another word for life could be difficult. Trying to separate difficulty from life is like trying to separate wetness from water. They are slight variations on the same experience.
This is a fundamental aspect of our daily lives. Hidden within this truth are an array of wonderful gifts or gems. Gems, and gifts are often hidden behind depressing, scary, heavy, dark concepts. If we move through the darkness we can find prizes. To move through the darkness is to acknowledge, and to accept, and to not want to change, the fact that the difficulty we have always felt, the difficulty we now feel, and the difficulty we will always feel, is part of us. The gift which this awareness provides has to do with our relationships to other people, and to the present.
First, any substantial relationship that we can develop with other people is built upon a shared experience of struggle and hardship. Suffering is an essential material in the growth of love, friendship and all interpersonal understanding.
Second, difficulty when properly understood as a principle element in what we are, is no longer our fault. That we feel pain, discomfort, anxiety, fear, is not our fault. That the people in our life suffer and face great troubles that is also not our fault. That people throughout the world are sprawling in want, that is not our fault. To end difficulty in our lives, in our families, and in the world is not our responsibility.
Dramatic point
People sometimes kill themselves and people they love so as to prevent their suffering. (See "Johnny" from the great band Suicide) This type of murder is an extreme form of an action which we all take - if on a more microscopic level. This is because distinguishing a specific problem and cause of pain from the underlying field of difficulty requires work and attention. Specific problems can arise so quickly that they blur and overwhelm us. When overwhelmed we see generalities rather than specifics. This can lead very quickly and naturally to a hating of life itself - and this manifests itself as a hating of our self and or the world.
To use a metaphor, negative thoughts and feelings directed towards huge concepts like, self, life, or world, are the equivalent of throwing the baby out with the bath water. Rather than love the cute little booby, focus on cleaning the dirt of the baby, and accepting the bath as part of life, we lose sight of the kid all together. Sometimes people commit double suicides but mostly people resenting life and eating another big mac.
What are the gems again?
Difficulty bonds us to people we love. Difficulty is not our fault or responsibility.
