Honest Living (A Means to an End)

Morality in our present days is a delicate subject. Possibly at no other time in history has there been so much uncertainty worldwide as to what the concept of morality means. Why many people might ask should one struggle to live honestly? On whose authority does the state or our religion tell us what to do? In this scientific age with the erosion of religious and social values many people are left wondering whether an acceptable basis for a moral code even exists. Faced with so much contradiction and uncertainty they prefer to live their lives just as it pleases them or for immediate short-them goals.

If we choose to follow the way of the saints it means that we want to use our life to realize our divine potential and that we have said to ourselves that there is more to life than short term goals. The gift of initiation provides us with a practice we make a commitment to live by specific values. These we must remember are not values imposed on us from any outside authority we make the commitment to ourselves within ourselves to help us on our way.

By examining our values rationally we can refresh and deepen our understanding of them .no code of conduct can give one all the answers but if one understands the principle that underpin it. It becomes easier to find the answer within oneself. if is the purpose of this small book therefore to try to understand the principles that support moral living and their far reaching implications for daily life.

Before the invention of steamships the success of a voyage was dependent on several factors : understanding the tides currents and winds so as to use them to one advantage and maintaining the seaworthiness of the ship. Even if one owned the finest sailing vessel in the world and knew everything about one ship without knowledge of the sea and the forces moving and driving the vessel one journey might prove disastrous. Is a similar way we setting out on a journey of self realization. To complete it successfully we need to understand life and the forces that drive us. Our then and keeping in view our objective can we formulate our code of conduct can we understand how to keep ourselves seaworthy.

Our understanding is based upon a spiritual and moral perspective that is common to all scriptures and wisdom writings of the world. This perspective is not the property of any religion. It belongs to everyone. It arises from the pool of our common humanity and flowers naturally when a person reunites him or herself with our common spiritual source. The people who embody it most clearly are the mystics – saints and god realized souls of all religions.

To demonstrate the universality of this understanding we have included quotations from as wide a variety of sources as possible but it on the mystic’s knowledge of life that we primarily rest our case.

The spiritual perspective

In essence the entire mystic perspective may be expressed in three simple points: there is only one supreme power which is the foundation and support of everything. We have all come from this power we are all drops the same one divine ocean. And each one of us is accountable for everything we do.

However it is described in different cultures all mystics agree that the fundamental reality of life is spirit. Our essence is spirit not the physical or mental. Soul or spirit is the real nature of what we think of as me mystics highlights our common confusion by pointing out that we are spiritual beings having a human experience not (as we more frequently think of ourselves) human beings looking for a spiritual experience. Anyone who gets in touch with his or her spiritual essence the life giving word or shad within them will be naturally led by it to its source beyond the limitations of time and space. This then is the object of our journey. But we are handicapped because we experience life through our senses and usually fail to recognize what we are .just as a child has difficulty accepting that the atmosphere is vibrant with radio waves so our spiritual immaturity hides from us our divine potential. Saints tell us that as long as we remain busy with the world around us we will continue to be limited seduced and fooled into thinking that only the physical world is real. We start to think we can know everything with the intellect.

To free ourselves we need to widen our circle of compassion to recognize that we are spiritual beings drops of that one ocean that is god. for this the saints give us specific guidance. They teach us a technique that ultimately will enable us to embrace not just nature but the creation and the creator. We are guided how to withdraw our attention from the world and concentrate it so that ultimately we can detach ourselves from the distortions of body and mind. But the saints also tell us that it is not simple there is a catch and that is the law of karma or cause and effect. This law is the force that runs the creation. Because of it we can never know pure spirit apart from matter or separate our soul from the world until we have settled our life account.

What is this account? It is the record of everything a we have ever thought or done since our soul left its source and become encased in a mind and body. This record brides us to the creation because we have to remain in the creation moving from life to life to account for all we have done . freedom lies in setting this account from the past and in not incurring new debts . once we understand that what we do now binds us in the future then we have a practical basis for a moral code that will guide us as to what we should and should not do to become free.

Applying our understanding of the law of cause and effect to our daily lives consciously so that we are always aware of the consequences of what we do is therefore our way of making ourselves seaworthy for our voyage to god.