Responsibility is not an easy approach to Life, yet it is only one that makes sense. To take responsibility for one’s suffering and one’s deeds is the only sane approach to Life.
To take responsibility for one’s desires is sanitizing. One desires what one desires because one desires to desire the thing one desires.
There is no escape.
One cannot hide. One cannot shy away from one’s desire. One cannot deny that one desires what one desires.
Nor can one claim that one is not responsible for desiring what one desires. The fact that you desire something implies your own involvement.
You cannot say ”well, I have no control over my desires, I cannot help desiring what I desire”.
Desire is not something that happens to one. One is desire. Desire is something active. It is an conscious act!
One can deny this, of course, yet this is not true. With each enactment of desire, there is an conscious element of involvement.
One is never unconscious, fully unconscious, of the acting that one does.
One knows.
And the more one tries to deny this, the more desire functions outside of conscious involement.
The reason why so many of our desires appear to us as if they were waves that overcome us, as something that we passively undergo, is because of disintegration.
Denial of desiring what one desires is the cause of suffering. Denial of the very fact that one desires what one desires is the essence of alienation.
Of not feeling at ease in one’s skin. Of escapism, suffering, a split consciousness. Of inner conflict. Of an inner turmoil without end.
It is responsibility for one’s desires that is the mark of an individual in the becoming.
Total absence of inner conflict would be the sign of having achieved individuality.
Freedom is really not that difficult to achieve. It is uncomfortable, at least, the way towards it. But not difficult.
The countless myths that proclaim that freedom is something only for historical, mythical, God-like figures is putting the bullock cart before the horse.
They have become historical figures because they have done the work. Because they felt terribly responsible to understand and go beyond the cause of suffering.
They started out like you and me.
Each proclamation of the impossibility or the necessity of God-given grace in order to achieve freedom is made by someone that either does not understand, or is him or herself not willing to do the work necessary. And of course, these two conditions of being go hand in hand, are not really separable.
If you proclaim freedom to be an impossibility it is because you have put asleep your capacity to be attentive, willingly. Because you like it better that way. Because you have contented yourself with blaming either circumstances or other people for the lack of fullness of your Life.
And, naturally, when you do not go for it, how could you understand the intricacies of it?
So, then, it is easy, and more comfortable to claim it to be impossible. To claim it to be a matter of cosmic lottery.
The fact of the matter is, that whenever you decide to distantiate yourself from what is happening, you opt for the illusion of control.
It is to opt for the idea of control, while simultaneously, in daily action, deny that you have any.
To distantiate yourself from the outer world, to retreat in a supposedly separate, confined, private realm of being, is to, instantaneously carry over this schism within your very own Heart.
One action cannot go without the other being the effect, the consequence of that action.
The difficulty of integration, besides its arduous nature and the many myths of impossibility, unhumanness and unovercomable difficulty, resides in the myriad of domains in which we have divided Life. In which we have divided our very own being.
From childhood onward, we are trained, conditioned, indoctrinated with plenty of ideals of what constitutes a favorable, successful and towards happiness-leading life.
In other words, we are thought to be attached to certain outcomes of Life, while simultaneously, inseperably, unavoidably, are given plenty of incentives to vehemently object, deny, fear the opposite of these favorable ways of life.
With that statement, I do not attempt to inspire some counterculture sentiments. Counterculture is as much present in each one of us, as is the supposed ruling, dominant culture.
The two are created at once.
The leading two principles concerning a successful and happy life seem to be security and pleasure. One is spoon-fed strong inclinations to maximize both of them, without further thought or question as to their sanity or counter-productivity.
These two principles, which overlap to a great degree, if not completely, form our lines of division, according to which we separate Life into multiple domains.
As if these constructed separate domains were truly separable from one another in actuality.
These divisions in our Life, along the lines of supposedly mutually exclusive domains, are causal of the tremendous inward mess known as fragmentation of being.
We are like broken mirrors inside.
And, healing, unification, integration, the disappearance of these lines of division, according to the very far and wide-stretching dominant narrative, is an impossibility for modern men and women.
Pretty convenient when you make a living, feeding of off the inner turmoil of your fellow human beings.
Pretty convenient when you desire to blame your neighbors for your suffering.
As long as you blame others for your suffering, you can go on suffering indefinitely. Then, in your vision of things, Life has given you permission to suffer. After all, you yourself cannot do anything about it.
You are powerless.
And how perfectly this story suits those that want to obtain, and maintain, power at your cost.
After all, it are only the powerless that seek power over others.
Having being unable, unwilling, to solve this puzzle, this challenge of being sane, they seek to rule over others in order to camouflage their own inadequacies. In order to remain as unaware as possible of their own impotence in so many areas of Life.
The attempt, or actual success, of inflating oneself at the expense, at the denigration of others is as much an escape from oneself as is to deny responsibility for one’s own suffering.
The two modes of being dance together, need one another, and are, in fact, inseparable from one another.
When the desire to cast a shadow over another being is present, one can be sure that he or she accepts the shadow of someone else as the determinant, conditioner of his or her actions.
By the same token, those that let others rule them, whether the submission they live under, and deem as inevitable, is blatantly obvious or rather subtle, but nonetheless present and effective, surely apply the means of suppression in those they deem weaker, of less significant then themselves.
Those that let themselves be ruled, dominated, are as complicit, as involved in their own submission as those that carry out the dirty work. And, they are responsible for allowing someone else to take advantage of them.
When your Lion does not roar, what do you expect?
Yet, a true roaring is not aimed at anyone, it is not aimed at others, nor aimed at oneself. A true roar has no direction, it comes unsolicited. It is simply an expression of not being able to take it anymore, irrespective of whom is to blame.
In order to roar, one has to be deeply aware and in touch with one’s own suffering. Then the cause of one’ own suffering matters not.
What matters is your suffering as such, and, the deep desire to gain true power to stop further suffering.
When this happens, a great step is made.
It is the beginning of the end of suffering, but far from the end itself, yet.
The end takes place when one is wholly free. When all inner conflict is understood as a refusal to take responsibility for one’s own being and desiring.
It does not stop when desire has stopped. This is an unachievable, inhuman and very destructive ideal.
It is not to be striven for. It is neither noble nor sane.
To attempt to stop desiring is an attempt to kill one's own inner energies. And leads only to more inner conflict, for it cannot be done.
Not very Life-favoring, indeed.
One must simply understand, actually, full-heartedly, in reality, in full action, in daily life, that one desires each desire one desires.
Then one becomes one with one’s own desire, perfectly attuned, utterly inseparable from one’s desire.
Then, desires cease to inflict pain and conflict. Then, desire ceases to be a disturbance, a problem, something to be overcome.
Rather, one finds oneself full of desire. Fully alive, fully joyful, fully playful.
Fully at ease with him or herself.
Fully attuned to Life itself.