I was recently asked this question by someone who visited my website: http://www.spiritual-intuition.com:
How is it possible that we “create” our own reality or experience? If this is the case, then it follows that the mind is all-powerful. If this is not the case, then it follows that what the mind creates just distorts reality, blocking out “that which is.”
Just a question I wanted to ask you, because this seems to be a popular assertion based on my explorations of current and successful authors and teachers on the web, and the entries currently on our site (www.truthcontest.com) say the exact opposite, that reality is “that which is,” not our mind’s creation. Here is my response:
We do create our own experience. When the newborn child you mentioned enters this earthly existence, it is the result of, or creation by, the spiritual being (I call it god) who will occupy that body and grow with it into whatever. What happens for all newborns is that after the initial excitement of the birth the adults in the new baby’s life begin to reprogram the child into seeing things the way they were taught to see. After about ten to fifteen years of this, the child embarks on a life that confirms and reinforces what they were previously conditioned to see, accept and/or believe.
This is why I say we live in an illusion. It does not start out that way but all the experiences, training, etc. that go into making us who we are as “humans” cancels out what, in fact, we truly are and what we were when we first got here. Newborn babies have no egoic identity whatsoever, and therefore everything in and about life is wondrous and incredible to them.
Mind based thoughts are powerful but spirit based creative powers are much more so. In fact, the suffering of most humans can be tied directly to the struggle between “what” they are (or were when they got here) and what they have been conditioned to be after they arrived. Perhaps one of the best examples of this is that in the United States (true for other western countries as well) over 70% of the working population hate what they do as a career but for most who are unhappy in their career field they were conditioned to go down this path contrary to their nature which craves something else. How sad for us!
You mention the mind being all-powerful (rhetorical) but let me be very specific. We are each two individuals. The “mind” created individual and the spiritual being, or what I call god, that dwells within us. Those first few years you mention are so critical in the development of a child’s mind because what we are conditioned to believe initially will mask what we really are for the rest of our lives. Very few will break free of the conditioning they undergo and return back to the “unidentified” being they were when they came here.
Our lives here should not be about finding purpose and meaning but rather about finding who we are. In finding that, and synching the mind to our spiritual nature, life unfolds in a very un-conflicted way. “We”, that is the real “We” we were before we got here, is made manifest and life, our creation, unfolds in a way that reveals that being. There is power in our thoughts but our thoughts, as rational as we like to think they are, are anything but.
From the moment of our birth, we are taught to want and have and possess to the point that when we “get” we completely identify ourselves with all the things we have gotten. Life becomes, in essence, a continuous pursuit of things the getting of which is what we falsely believe, make us who we are. An example is I can be “me” after I get my college education or when I get this particular job or career or when I get this particular house, etc., etc. We literally identify with “what we are not” and determine that until we get (what we are not) we are not complete. This is craziness. Until we re-access that divine being that dwells within us we create a reality that is as wild and crazy as the one we live in now.
The beauty of the un-identified newborn baby is that in their creation everything is simply WOW! (good article on this at http://cbozeman.wordpress.com/2009/11/22/the-frequency-of-wow/). There are no judgments about anything and the entry into life is incredible in every way. No judgments is the key. With a mind free of judgment or identity, everything just simply is. Children “act” without thinking and do so until we as adults condition them to judge everything. Life slowly but surely loses its Wow-ness.
Bottom Line is that when a newborn comes into this life its body is occupied by a “god” who has already created the experience of being here for no other reason than just being here. That god is thrilled and everything about the experience is exhilarating until the “human” has been conditioned to judge good and evil and place every life experience from that point on into a good or bad range. Ego identity takes over and from that point, life experience becomes confused and challenging. It was never meant to be so.
In a nutshell, we create our experience but it is either a mind created experience or a “spiritual being” created experience. Unless the mind experience is in synched up with the spiritual experience there will always be conflict. The two typically see things in a very different way and “identify” with reality accordingly. The mind has become powerful but it is not “all powerful.” The mind is finite. The spirit is infinite. We, individually, are the purpose we seek and try to create with the mind. All we have to do is turn off the mind, dis-identify with the things it (the mind) has determined are necessary for its identity and simply enjoy the richness and wonder of this life experience. When we let go of “mind” created identity the wonder and spectacle of life opens up in a way I cannot possibly explain here. It truly is unexplainable.
The god that you are “created” this experience long before you arrived here on Earth. The mind identity fights against that original purpose. Find the inner self and you will begin to recognize the awesome power of your own creation. Pretty cool!