Kids
of Lower Utopia - V6 No3 - A Letter from the Front Lines
(
A-work-in-progress)
V6 No3 Page 4. Introduction Part 1
AN
INTRODUCTION TO V6 No3 KIDS OF LOWER UTOPIA
A LETTER FROM THE FRONT LINES BY RIVER SCOUT FINNAGAIN
(Introduction Part 1)
This book is an allegory
of the truth as I have experienced it. It is about what is real. What
is real does not change, that is how you know it is real. For me, what
is real is the only conversation worth having - the only story worth telling.
So, the question at the heart of this story and at the very heart of each
image is; "what does not change - what is real?"
Nothing I say here
is new. What is true was true long before the woolly mammoths stopped
singing, and will still be true when this earth is no more. We humans
are always growing in two portentous directions equally at the same time.
In one direction we are destroying ourselves by destroying each other
and our environment and in the other we are learning ways to live in peace.
The way to a world of peace and love does not depend on governments, leaders,
new ideas, beliefs, concepts, precepts or religions. It will and does
occur when each of us recognizes what is true within and lives it.
So there are two forces
on the rise in the human story. One force is that of the mind whose persona
is the ego. The mind has dominated humanity for some five thousand years.
The mind's nature is that of comparison, judgment, greed, fear, control,
conflict, and ultimately separation. As a consequence it leads us towards
war and suffering, and perhaps self-annihilation. The mind is properly
a tool of the body that evolved for our survival but has grown to dominate
our lives far beyond its healthy function. Because of the dominance of
the mind/ego we live with constant war and suffering because the mind
is running the world by its nature, and its nature is … conflict
(us against them).
The other force on
the rise is that of truth, whose nature is peace, love, and compassion.
The truth is beyond thought; it does not belong to the mind. The truth
is not a concept or belief nor is it an idea beyond all other ideas. The
truth is an experience, an experience beyond the mind. It lives inside
you. It is you. It is life itself. It is available to you when you realize
that "what is perceived cannot be the perceiver." You are not
your thoughts, you are the perceiver beyond all thoughts of identity in
the mind, and from the vantage of the perceiver you are free from the
reactionary nature of the mind.
You are that close.
Thinking cannot think its way out of thinking. It is thinking that precludes experience - it is thought that bars you access to that vast ocean of peace beyond the mind. The work of life is to realize and experience the truth that you already are. But realizing the truth is not a thing that can be "done" because doing is a function of time, and time is an invention of the mind. In experience there is only now, so all that you can "do" is to allow what is, in this moment . . . to be. This is why "finding" the truth is called realization, because you realize that the truth is who you are … already.
Perception without
thought …is bliss.
