This Meaningless Life
Recognition of meaninglessness arouses intense anxiety in all the separated ones. It represents a situation in which God and the ego "challenge" each other as to whose meaning is to be written in the empty space that meaninglessness provides. The ego rushes in frantically to establish its own ideas there, fearful that the void may otherwise be used to demonstrate its own impotence and unreality. And on this alone it is correct. (W-13.2)
If you ever saw Woody Allen’s movie “Hannah and Her Sisters” you will remember that Woody Allen’s character faces his mortality when he believes he has a brain tumor and is going to die. But his real crisis begins when he finds out he does not have a brain tumor because he realizes that one day he is going to die anyway! Then he recognizes this life is meaningless and goes on a search to find a religion or philosophy to give his life meaning.
But realizing that life in this world is meaningless should not be a crisis but rather a happy embrace of the truth. It is the beginning of wisdom if you let God fill in the meaning. And of course, God’s meaning is the exact opposite of what the ego wants you to learn.
Alas, in the end Woody Allen’s character simply accepts that he does not know what life’s meaning is, but it’s all he’s got. But you now know you don’t have to settle for that.
www.acimmentor.com
To receive this daily blog in your email contact me at Liz@acimmentor.com
If you ever saw Woody Allen’s movie “Hannah and Her Sisters” you will remember that Woody Allen’s character faces his mortality when he believes he has a brain tumor and is going to die. But his real crisis begins when he finds out he does not have a brain tumor because he realizes that one day he is going to die anyway! Then he recognizes this life is meaningless and goes on a search to find a religion or philosophy to give his life meaning.
But realizing that life in this world is meaningless should not be a crisis but rather a happy embrace of the truth. It is the beginning of wisdom if you let God fill in the meaning. And of course, God’s meaning is the exact opposite of what the ego wants you to learn.
Alas, in the end Woody Allen’s character simply accepts that he does not know what life’s meaning is, but it’s all he’s got. But you now know you don’t have to settle for that.
www.acimmentor.com
To receive this daily blog in your email contact me at Liz@acimmentor.com
Comments
i found out just over a month ago that one of my sisters, jess, has a 6cm cyst in her frontal lobe. she had an operation in june last year to remove a cyst on her liver that started out as benign but then started changing, so she is frightened even though at the moment there is every chance this cyst will stay as is and all that will result is the headaches. another sister, molly, was put into an induced coma in july for over a week while they drained her lungs which had stopped working as a result of meth abuse, she almost died twice. both of these girls are much younger than me. (and they have both taken the path of living more fully as they see it, in reaction to their experiences). also in the last two years, my nephew taran and my brother max have been self harming and suicidal.
i had a dream when i was still a new student of acim. the first part was basically just saying that if i wanted to help someone, i didnt need to even physically involve them, but could keep silent and go inward. physically people might not want help, but energetically they would always accept love. then the dream shifted, and i was walking through a carpark in the town i grew up in. in front of all the parked cars were piles of dead sacred ibis. it was like.. the cars were the killers, but not evil. they didnt have to do anything to cause death, it just happened anyway. the birds hadnt been sought out and hit in flight, it was like THEY had sought the cars out. and yet, they were innocent victims, potential unfulfilled, and i was full of so much sadness. the dream switched to seeing myself from above for a moment, and i saw myself walking in deep contemplation, head down, depressed. (i can see now, that i was also looking at the non validity of the victim/perp views i had held, and how neither was as it appeared). then i was back in my self. there was a building running the length of the carkpark, with a wall running alongside it, covered so it was like a tunnel. i was walking down the dark tunnel, it was darkish and i was heading to the light at the end of it. halfway down the tunnel, on the carpark side, was a door. i stood looking at it, thinking 'what a stupid place to put a door. it only goes to where youve just been. you can access the carpark at either end of this walkway, its not that long.. why bother putting a door in here, its a stupid door, a door with no reason'. then i thought angrily 'oh, what the hell' and opened it and went through, and as i did everything turned into light, including me. it was exactly the same scene, dead ibis piled in front of cars, but there was just.. such peace, such love, and uninterruptible beauty and joy. as i looked around, i marvelled how this could be real and see-able without anything having been 'solved'. bam i was back seeing with the old vision, the 'regular world' not the light world, and the the fear was back also, its like i totally forgot the light. then i remembered what i had just seen, and the light world was back again, and i knew that i would go backward and forward between these ways of seeing, and that it was my choice entirely what world i was seeing. and as i looked, the light vision kind of.. changed again without changing. it became clear that rather than lots of individual lights all existing together harmoniously in truth despite appearances, there was actually only one light, one picture, and i started to melt into it.
it started out with the man who i still saw as my spiritual guide at the time, (though he had left my life in anger many months before) sitting behind the counter in a shop, and i was standing outside just looking at the storefront. then i was wandering across a desert plateau, and came to huuuuuuuuuge cliff. then i was at the bottom of the cliff, it was suddenly dark, and i was standing in what i knew to be primordial slime, bubbling mud. i bent right down to look closely at a blobby, wobbly thing, like an .. amoeba snail, made out of blue light. as i watched it split itself into two. it was dark, muddy and yet the light was beautiful. and i had a knowing that every single step in evolution was as .. necessary, equal in value to every other part.. like, take even the smallest cog out and the 'thing' wouldnt 'work'. i turned and there was a safety net (like.. a fishing net) made of light going back up the cliff, as a ladder. it was made of the same light as the amoeba snail. i climbed for a long time, looking at the beautiful blue light, and then i noticed that the sections i would hold as i climbed had started popping into each other, the way bubbles in a bubble bath do, so there were less and less handholds. i was terrified, i knew i didnt have time to climb back down, and i knew if the light all popped into each other id fall to my death, there seemed not enough time for me to make it. i had the idea that my only chance of making it to the top was to stop looking at what i was doing, where i was climbing, stop finding the best handholds cos it was slowing me down to do so. i doubted my ability to find good safe holds without focusing on what my hands were doing, but the alternative was definite death, so i looked up at the goldeny white light, much brighter than the blue light, focused on it, and climbed as fast as i could. i woke up, as i realised i was safe, i would make it, reaching the light was in no doubt.
isnt that a dream of meaning too? ive just seen that the storefront probably represents like.. a place of choosing truth or not-truth. am i seeing real meaning in these dreams, but mistaking that there is meaning in the timing and synchronisations as relating to their reflection of an experience of this minds? thats what i thought you meant when i asked about synchronicity before, but i was too scared to ask in case id have to let go of something i was relying on. not so scared now!
ah, just one bit more, because this verification i had two screens, i had to select the squares with signs. after completing the first screen, road direction signs, another came up, (again, this hasnt happened before). this one was a sing with sos. which puts my question more clearly for me.. arent these signs and sychs, helpful signposts on the way? and while this world has no meaning in and of itself.. arent the uses holy spirit puts these things to, meaningful? so, if a synchronisation kinda says.. 'take note' to me, can i relax into looking for the meaning int he way i have been.. or is this no longer helpful??
The first thing ACIM does is empty the world of meaning so you can give it new meaning (to remember Truth/God). Only later does all meaning drop away naturally when you no longer need it. So as long as you need meaning you will find meaning.
even without understanding that, i can see you have clarified what is most helpful for me where i am at now, as far as trusting this process regardless of my current understanding or lack thereof, and thank you for that.
Just relax and let your experiences be. If it has meaning for you that is all that matters. You cannot go "wrong".
the only thing that is really surprising me, feels like a jigsaw piece that doesnt fit, is the one line 'your mind is making connections between random things in the world'. i didnt think anything was random, unconnected, wouldnt that mean the dream i experience could be an outward picture of 'something elses' condition sometimes?
i had actually gone through something in relation to meaning and meaninglessness two nights ago, i felt the truth in what you said, which made that last puzzle piece fit. i had an experience and then wrote it down as well to see if i could express it clearly. i was wondering if you could tell me if this is on the right track?
so - a pretend/nonsensical/untrue/meaningless idea/story can NOT be understood, BECAUSE it is nonsensical. (being unreal it is no threat to what is real, and therefor there is also no actual NEED for it to be understood.) only the real can make actual (complete) sense, (have meaning) and therefor only it CAN be understood.
but LOVE, being itself, and kind, 'meets you where you think you are'. it will SEEM at first to be bringing itself to where you are...
(ie, it will seem to be bringing love, kindness, inner peace, connection etc (in other words, something meaningful) to where you are, and the means by which our minds are communicating this to themselves will be expereinced as meaningful also to that part of our minds, while that is where our identification lies...
but seeing as truth cannot actually be brought to not-truth, this CAN NOT be what is actually happening!
it will seem like meaning comes, it will seem like this meaning falls away as 'truer meaning' arises from a 'truer' awareness of Truth, and the cycle is meaningless and yet given to holy spirit entirely helpful.
but there is only actually any meaning at all in TRUTH/REALITY. THAT is why the things which are expereinced by me now as meaningful are in actual fact not, and why this is perfectly 100% a-ok!
hmm, i just re-read above where you say that eventually all meaning falls away. do you just mean all meaning falls away from this experience/idea? if meaning means purpose, that would make sense to me, truth has no need for that. and finding 'meaning' in truth would mean simply value rather than function?
Yes, meaning means purpose and that does fall away. There is no need for meaning and purpose when you are aware of Truth because there is no lack in Truth.
You are really way over-thinking this. I did the same, thinking I had to understand first and then I could move forward. But it was really the other way around: As I put it into play (as in, just pursued meaning where I found it without judging it) understanding came.
the key part in the experience
(it was just i saw the logic and it suddenly made sense that there was no meaning here.. i was still, during the experience, and afterward, experiencing the experience as meaningful.. and i knew that that was perfect in growing trust and so opening myself to Truth, even though it wasnt actually meaningful.. it was to me right then, and i felt no guilt about it!!
a side shoot that i realised just afterward was that while i identified with this personal self as real, then i would still be finding temporary meaning in a helpful way with HS, and the flip side was that while i identified as a separate self, that self will also see meaning in things that arent helpful, as in.. there are things i NEED to do to bring peace to earth etc, help and change people, and this is just part of thinking that pain has meaning, ego meaning.. which i can then look at with what thought system i choose. it was like.. this is just the system, its meaningless, in and of itself it says nothing real about anything. it all became neutral in my mind then, or rather maybe, innocent.)
i had was that yeah.. it will SEEM to me like truth is being brought to not truth (i will feel there is meaning and value in my experiences) because as i 'pursue meaning where i find it without judging it' i experience growing kindness, gentleness, love, the dropping of guilt... but this can not be what is actually happening because only the truth is true. (i really like how you say things so concisely!)
something you have written here that clicked that i didnt get before, or had not retained, was that seeing meaning and purpose was filling a lack.. its in my mind now though! the myth of sisyphus just came to mind, the impossibility of the task, and i felt pity and sorrow, and it was ok.. just the ego responding as to be expected!
and the last paragraph you wrote is awesome.. practising the different approach you speak of feels very doable, as i dont feel guilty for experiencing this feelings of temporary meaning any more. actually ive only been consciously aware of that guilt for a few months, before asking you about the red cockatoo tail feather experience i thought i had a handle on meaning! and since asking you about the meaning of that experience, i could also see how, correct or not, my perceptions of changing meaning over time had led me here, so that was obviously not a bad thing. i just didnt know how to move forward with trust.. it was through this synching of dreams and appearances in the world and thoughts in my mind that i had come to trust that 'something very loving and helpful' was loving and helping me. i was scared to let go of that, and didnt know how to feel about it anymore as something i was still.. experiencing, utilizing, tho i was still entirely grateful to my past experiences. nice side effect.. im dropping the feeling of attachment to specific communication methods ive used and have experienced as my saviour.. the saviourdomness feeling is shifting from the communication tools or methods, to my mind, so i dont feel panic at the thought of meaning dropping away around it anymore.
thanks elizabeth c.