One truth I have learned is that if we are unhappy or irritated or unsatisfied, then we need to find the root cause and do something about it. This sounds very simple, and yet so many people I know do not really follow this idea, for if they did, their illusory ego-selves would begin to unravel before their eyes, and that is just something that most people are too cowardly and/or greedy to do. They rationalize an explanation that will allow them to keep their illusions intact, they don’t want to face the root causes, the things about themselves that make things the way they are in their lives.
Of course, the above concept assumes that people want to get out of that place of dissatisfaction and be happy. The problem with that is that I don’t think that most people even have a solid concept of what happiness is. In addition, given the way that people love and fight for their fears, I wonder how much these people really want to change their situations, or whether they want to at all.
The other problem is that, since people are so ignorant and confused, many people think they are happy when they are just ignoring and denying their inner confusion, fear, and sadness. This is, I think the state of most people in this society. Or, if they are unhappy, they find the reasons for their situation anywhere but inside themselves.
I am one of those people who believe that we only do what we want to, that there is no such thing as something we “have” to do. We always have a choice, and thus if we don’t want to do something, we don’t have to. We only think we have to because of illusions and prisons that we have built to make us think we are not free in this way.
Your “need” is just an illusory shadow of your beliefs.
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From my personal notes, 9/7/99.
