What exactly can we influence in our life? Do we possess enough freedom to change our destiny? Why can’t we naturally obtain this wisdom? Why, in spite of the fact that our nature is based on laziness and healthy egoism (desire to receive the maximum through minimal effort), unlike animals, do we perform thoughtless and ineffective actions?
Perhaps we act, where everything is preprogrammed, and our role must be a lot more passive? Perhaps in most cases our life is preordained, while we choose to believe that the course of events depends on us? Perhaps we should transform our life and stop thinking that we are decision-makers, let it flow and remain passive, acting only when we can really change something?
We who live in our modern society, or generally, in society during all incarnations to date—in all places, man is at war with his environment. It is a war where there are laws—but in every war there are laws. Those who have been through wars know that there is some agreement; “I do not touch this, you do not touch that, if you do this, I will do that…” So then, people understand how much it is worthwhile or not worthwhile to get into conflict. It is the same here in this society. Meaning, it is not society in the sense of bonding, but it is an environment, a hostile environment that I want to use for my own pleasure, and it wants to take from me as much as it can, without regarding me, and that is the truth of the matter.
A totally new situation is developing before our eyes, and we have no idea how to relate to it, or make decisions regarding the future as we have done in the past. This is because we have gotten the most that we can out of man’s basic nature, and it is beginning to dawn on us that all the progress in the world is not going to bring us happiness. Religions no longer provide the satisfaction people seek, medical advances are not helping us become happier and healthier, technology is only helping us destroy one another, psychology is not helping keep the family unit intact, scientific advances are accelerating unemployment, and culture is gradually being replaced by cheap thrills. We have no idea how to go about finding security within ourselves because all the things we used to build our dreams on are fading away.
If everything is limited to this life, then life itself becomes meaningless. Is the ultimate purpose just to exist normally? Isn’t it better not to exist and avoid suffering? The finite is senseless. Or should the person exist so as to disregard life’s terminal character and not to reflect on this? It will then seem to him that life is endless…
If we ask an ordinary person, he will say: “I do not want to think about death and about the fact that everything comes to an end. There are today, tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow. I live in the present.” What does “to live in the present” mean? A person imagines the flow of life as infinite, hence he can live. The moment he perceives life as terminal, he either falls into depression or is obliged to search for an answer to the question about life’s meaning. There is no getting away from that.
All of us want to receive pleasure through the same enclothments: lust, money and honor, control, knowledge and spirituality. We have an internal computer, that calculates the amount of pleasure we can receive every moment, against the amount of suffering we will experience if we don’t get what we want. That’s why it is said that “one does not covet the king’s daughter”, because he simply isn’t interested in suffering enough to get her. At the same time, each of us acts in accordance with the particular structure of our personal desires, and for that, we are willing to take more or less risks.
Our development depends directly on our sensation of pain. The more a person suffers, the more he wants to attain, the more he feels the need to attain higher intellectual skills, and the more our mind develops.
The contrary is also true. It is possible that a person will possess fantastic inherent intellectual and analysis abilities, but if he gets everything in life without any effort, his mind will not develop, but regress. That is why it is not worth it to be so envious of rich people who live completely like beasts, because that society is on a spiritual decline. The history of our people constantly proves the efficiency of the constant search of a way to exist under impossible conditions.
