From: Amara Graps (amara@amara.com)
Date: Mon Mar 03 2003 - 08:41:26 MST
Jeffrey Paul Soreff to Samantha Atkins:
>What do you see as the key difference that adding
>spirituality/mysticism makes? The impression that I'm getting
>is that you are expecting it to add something like a degree
>of individual benevolence, above and beyond what is justified
>rationally by mutual assistance, alliances, and so on. Is this
>what you mean?
in my view:
- psychological support, connectedness, strength, warmth
- less rigid: fewer walls and more open with yourself and others
- more delighted in the mysteries of existence
- listen better to your own inner voices and dreams
- listen better to other people
- long term visions are shared easier
(you might call it the ecstasy experience without the tablets
and for durations of longer than 8 hours)
I define the word "god" in my own way, given that I'm an atheist by
most people's definition. And in my quasi-Buddhist-Amara's-god-universe-
perspective, my spiritual world is important to give me support when I
hit OOPSes on my life-path, as well as other for times of despair when
I wonder wtf I'm doing. We are each of us alone, you know, no matter
what people are around us in daily life. (Doubly important to have this
extra dimension when you really are alone.)
In my use of spirituality, sometimes those "deities" are inside of you,
hence, by this path, we arrive at a non-deist spiritual practices
embracing individuality, compassion, and personal growth that are
compatible with other aspects of the transhumanist perspective. "You
are it," as the Upanishads say, and gods are the personifications of
the energies that inform life, the same information that builds the
trees and moves the animals and whips up the ocean waves.
Some time ago on extropians I quoted some words I read in a Nelson
Mandela speech, which Samantha told me came from another source,
which I've forgotten now the name. Whatever the source, I like these
words alot.
(I substitute "Universe" wherever the word "God" appears, but please
substitute whatever is appropriate for your world-view.)
---begin{quote}
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves,
Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world.
There's nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It's not just in some of us; It's in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine,
We unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
Our presence automatically liberates others.
Nelson Mandela
1994 Inaugural Speech
---end{quote}
-- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara@amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." --Anais Nin
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