The search for pleasure is the search for god

[Nikolai1]

The spiritual life is a kind of alchemy. In any given moment there is dross and sublime essence and our task is to separate them. The dross is the outer circumstance and the essence is the pure inner truth, peace and rapture that might be discerned if only we knew how.

 

To those who do not know the spiritual life the dross and the essence are the same thing. They feel the pleasures of life but they do not have the wisdom to extract it alone. They therefore carry on seeking the essence all mingled and disguised by the dross. They take both together. Their attachment to things spiritual are all bound up with their attachment to dross. This is attachment to the things of the world.

 

The discerning person notices that the sublime can be felt within, independent of the outer form it arises in. They have discerned the essence but at first only in a subtle, barely noticeable dose. With time they recognise it better and better. They learn to identify moments where the essence and the dross are less firmly welded. They find that what they once gained from liquor is better gained from prayer.

 

As time goes on the essence, that inner good that lasts independently of the dross, adheres to them more and more. In each moment they are somewhat aware of its existence. What started out as a brief 'high' after a shot of vodka is now something forever coursing in their veins. They know that they lacked this when they were younger, and they see that others don't possess it as they do. This inner good is now associated with all manner of outer circumsatnces. The inner and the outer are the same. But this baffling change of state needs a name and they see in flash that it has many: God, Tao, Higher Self.

 

Those who call alcohol bad names are not entirely wrong. But they are focussing on only one half of the story. Yes, alcohol gives you a hangover, yes it makes you violent and unfit to function. But it also gives you something of the utmost importance: the essence that is God.

 

To depend on alcohol is vulgar, but to dismiss it out of hand is an act of the utmost spiritual vulgarity. Things aren't so simple as we think. There is no such thing as an unmixed bad. When we open our eyes to the true nature of alcohol, we understand the behaviour of the alcoholic. Now we can admire him for what he's seeking, and sympathise with him, and help him.

 

This argument applies to all our pleasures. When we find God we can't help but laugh. We knew him all along, but had to go searching for him in certain places. These places we called our pleasures. God isn't something new and exotic - something completely out the leftfield. If that's what you're expecting then you'll be disappointed.

[Nikolai1]

Hi CT,

 

 

Just following the heart, or seeking pleasure in order to bring God closer, are examples of shallow concepts fit for those with a lot of dust over the eyes. These are mere diversions.

Yes, most people are simply living their lives, following pleasures haphazardly. But this doesn’t mean that their pleasures are not important and meaningful – it means that their methods are awry. If people could only link their pleasures to a higher purpose. In other words, if they could only believe that their pleasures are just rudimentary versions of much greater pleasures then they might to stop indulging in what you call diversions and start structuring their pleasures. We must appeal to the hedonist in us all. There is no greater misapprehension then the idea that the spiritual life means the renuniciation of pleasure.

 

How did this idea come about?

 

From people who think the worldly and the spiritual have nothing to do with each other. From people who think alcohol is bad and has nothing relevant to offer the spiritual seeker. From those people who think we should sober up and go to church instead.

 

I say sober up by all means, because only by sobering up first can we get properly drunk.

 

 

The old traditions have systematically mapped out routes that free a person from grasping and aversion, en route to the cessation of all sense gratification.

Yes, I agree with this. The traditions have a very broad-based appeal and are useful for that purpose. But unless these traditions are actually achieving an inner effect on the individual - an inner transformation - then they are not working. There are many people attending Mass under duress, or because they think they should. To these the Mass is useless. The system must always answer to the individual. The unwise can’t see this. Unless these traditions are being enjoyed on the inside, spiritually, they are not working. If we cannot replicate the grandeur and solemnity of the service in the privacy of our own room we have attended church in vain.

 

If vodka does what the Mass cannot do, then stick with the vodka for now. This is the safest course at present. But never imagine that the vodka is an end in itself. Do that and you’re as bad as those fools in the church. If you can’t follow their system then you must be a grown-up and devise your own. Start with the vodka if you must, but if you get stuck there then your own religious conscience will impel you on and call you bad names, and so will everyone else. Serves you right!

Edited September 30, 2013 by Nikolai1

[C T]

Hi Nikolai,

 

I can appreciate your reasoning, and will agree up to a point. Where we disagree is your advocacy of temporary dependency and reliance on alcohol as a bypassing substitute, akin to a spiritual pleasure route, if i may use that term.

 

Why does pleasure have to be sourced from alcohol? Why not fishing, or watching the moon, or adopt a kitten or a puppy? Maybe stamp collecting, or learn to create stuff with one's hands, like pottery, and/or other constructive/creative indulgences?

 

I have a hunch.

 

 

 

Actually, the afore-mentioned premise is almost the same as in India and the Carribbean, where the sadhus and the rastas smoke pot all day, smiling, chilling out, and spacing out on the delusion that they have achieved union with the divine.

 

If only they were sturdy enough to actually become more proactive in the world, instead of bumming around occupying precious space. Substituting the phrase 'hallelujah' with 'peace, maan' does not a holy man make. Both are cop outs, in the sense of seeking to replace and fill an inner thirst (no pun intended), which is only a creation of a mind devoid of proper perspectives and priorities.

 

When i said the old traditions, for certain, it was not referencing church-going for mass. On that point regarding the uselessness of such rote practices, i fully agree with your view. The old lineages and traditions which can impact on a person's transformation was more what i meant. These are the trusted paths where progress engenders ever moving forward, with no crutches being formed along the way.

[Nikolai1]

CT

 

 

Why does pleasure have to be sourced from alcohol? Why not fishing, or watching the moon, or adopt a kitten or a puppy?

 

In the OP I talked about a spectrum between those who can take pleasure diluted across many activities at one end - and the drinker and drug take at the other. The first is a seeker of breadth and the second is the seeker of depth. The task for both is to ascend from their starting points. Each needs to find the divine in the depths and the breadths.

 

Yes, it would be wonderful if we all got an intense kick from watching the moon. But we don't. This is reality. And rather than make the drinker feel deficient, I just want him to know that he too has his own ways. He won't disagree when I say his methods need to be perfected.

 

The average fun seeker, kitten lover, cake-baker is wholesome to a degree. But we have no culture of calling these people bad names. Maybe we should start, for consistency's sake because spiritually speaking these people are as unregenerate as the raging alcoholic. These people need to be coaxed out of their banal, complacent ways. They profane creation with their weak bloodless celebration. With their mild Pharisaical self-satisfaction they offend any hero who knows we can do better.

 

The true spiritual teacher beats the criminal with his stick...beats also the Pharisaical law-abider. Or he embraces them both. Both are true ways and are in fact the same way. This is hard to understand. Even Jesus had to side with the criminal, so as to achieve greater rhetorical effect.

Edited September 30, 2013 by Nikolai1

[C T]

Hi Nikolai,

 

Just to be clear, even though we disagree, i am really appreciating your views, and i understand that you hold this matter quite dear to heart.

 

I am still not in favor of seeing dependency/pleasure-seeking as a safe, workable route towards spiritual progression. Grasping leads to grasping -- a cycle of ever-deepening depths of despondency and despair.

 

From experience and observation, there are far too many desperate issues and complex, secondary harm which follow this form of extreme practice. Ethically, and also morally, i have to reject this premise, although i do admit that every once in a while a habitual dependent could break thru and experience some sort of turnaround but the numbers, statistically speaking, are so few and far between that the responsible thing to do is to vehemently advise against it.

 

But i really do get what you are saying...

[SriChi]

^ Hi CT, are you equating dependency and pleasure-seeking?

[Stosh]

The true spiritual teacher beats the criminal with his stick...beats also the Pharisaical law-abider. Or he embraces them both. Both are true ways and are in fact the same way. This is hard to understand. Even Jesus had to side with the criminal, so as to achieve greater rhetorical effect.

No ,the leader who has spiritual insight, doesn't randomly beat people with sticks or get too cozy with his students . Its not hard to understand at all. he is dispassionate about circumstances which run counter to his personal goals or which entangle him in a web of dependencies.

Edited October 1, 2013 by Stosh

[Nikolai1]

Hi CT

 

I think maybe SriChi has noticed what I'm wanting to talk about - that you are worried that encouraging people to enjoy alcohol will lead to dependency.

 

Of course, many people are addicted to alcohol. But they are addicted because nobody has the courage or the wisdom to tell them the truth about alcohol.

 

It takes great courage and faith for the alcoholic to stop drinking. They must believe that they can live and be sustained in a world without alcohol.

 

When we call alcohol bad we do not do help them. The only thing they need to know is that they can get what they need elsewhere. And yet we don't point this out to them because we don't understand it ourselves. The problem of alcoholism is the problem of tee-totallism: same thing. Though it sounds paradoxical, this is the deepest truth that can be said on the matter. It is the ignorance of those that deride alcohol that keep the alcoholic trapped as a drinker.

 

The most helpless alcoholics want to be and aim to be tee-totallers.

 

If they knew the true worth of alcohol then they would also know that it can be substituted by other things.

 

Therefore, CT, your fear that advocating alcohol creates dependency on alcohol is the very thing that creates the dependency. It takes huge courage to actually help an alcoholic, huge daring. If you don't have courage then you can never be a healer of any description. What is the hardest most daring thing to say to an alcoholic, the statement most full of pure trust? It was not wrong that you drank.

Edited October 2, 2013 by Nikolai1

[Nikolai1]

Hi all,

 

The alcoholic is at one end of the scale, he knows the divine, and is pursuing it in his own way – but I think we’re all agreed that he is nothing more than a novice, spiritually speaking. Maybe it would be interesting to shift to the other end of the scale – to how the spiritually proficient understand desire.

 

If a person has a very strong desire but he can clearly see that pursuing it will create harm, then the spiritually robust person is able to withdraw. The Tao is the virtuous way, and if your actions might be considered bad from anybody’s perspective then your desire does not accord with the way.

 

You must have the spiritual strength and trust to sit back and wait. One of two things will happen:

 

Either, the object will fade as an object of desire. If this happens then you know that the object did not adequately meet your desire. You will therefore find that you are able to swiftly move on to another object that will fulfil the same desire, hopefully in a way that is virtuous (I.e does not cause harm or conflict with others). This cycle of search, desire, disappointment, search is normal life.

 

Or, changes in time and space will make attainment of the object possible without a breach of virtue.

 

All desire is for God. Desire objects that manifest in the world are either deeply spiritually satisfying or only briefly so. If something is spiritually unsatisfying we know it in one of two ways:

1) We attain the desire, but it soon leaves us dissatisfied again – either for the same type of desire or dissatisfied more generally.

2) If unattained, we are able to easily locate the same quality elsewhere – and our attentions move on.

 

If a specific object is spiritually satisfying we find that we yearn and yearn until we get it. The closer the object is to God, the more we will yearn for it.

 

We might yearn for a certain person for many years. If transformations in time and space allow our union to be virtuous and we finally get to be with that person they will satisfy us deeper and for longer.

 

But our yearning will return at some point because we will realise that our yearning for this woman was actually a yearning for God. Only God will truly satisfy our yearning, but many people don’t realise this. It is a moment of huge good fortune when we realise this to be true of ourselves. Our search for pleasure becomes truly intelligent.

 

But things must be done in the right order!

 

If you are yearning for a woman, then she is your God and there is no other. Do not think that we can bypass things of the world and go straight for God. The ascetics think they can do that with their mortifications - but simply end up lusting after more mortification.

 

God is nothing in particular, but always takes some form or other. If your yearning is for a woman, and time and circumstances are making it harder and harder, then the universe will step in and you will fall in love with another woman, who will be yours without any breach of virtue.

 

There comes a time when no specific object of desire can fascinate us. It is only in this state that we find ourselves consciously yearning for God.

[C T]

Hi CT

 

I think maybe SriChi has noticed what I'm wanting to talk about - that you are worried that encouraging people to enjoy alcohol will lead to dependency.

 

Of course, many people are addicted to alcohol....

....which, in most instances, start off as harmless pleasure-seeking. Certainly, at that infantile stage, seeking God while indulging in a bit of 'harmless fun' would be the last thing on the minds of those who cannot see the full impact of their actions.

 

The issue here is not how to help an alcoholic, but whether one should experiment with substances as a means to uncover hidden depths which would be difficult to access from conventional, formal traditions --- is this correct? I understand this to be your original premise, and not how to empathize with alcoholics in order to lead them to God.

 

If you insist on keeping to the call for experimentation with substances, then its clear that you have no understanding of how the body-mind works in relation to habitual formations. And if this is not clear in your understanding, then i would say that your words of advice here in this thread are based on a lack of clarity and therefore should not be granted serious consideration by those who are contemplating the 'hows' of increasing depth in their spiritual practice.

 

I am hoping this answers Sri Chi's question simultaneously.

[Nikolai1]

but whether one should experiment with substances as a means to uncover hidden depths which would be difficult to access from conventional, formal traditions --- is this correct?

 

No! I've never suggested that alcohol should be turned into some kind of technique! the only people I might recommend alcohol as a technique to are those Type 1 people who are intellectually attached to tee-totalism - but even these it would be as a kind of thought experiment.

 

I'm not trying to formulate a spiritual tradition here. I am merely talking about the role of pleasure in the search for God.

 

We are all on the path to God whether we realise it or not. 'Normal' life is the slow meandering way. The spiritual life is merely a fast-track of the same route to the same destination. Spiritual practice accelerates what events in time and space are achieving at their own pace. The spiritually aware person quickly learns lessons that the normal person must repeat a few times. To be in samsara is to be repeating lessons, but you are not trapped in an endless cycle. The ageing process itself brings spiritual development in even the most unconscious people, death liberates all. The spiritually conscious ones die before they die.

 

It is in this context that I wish to place alcohol. The instincts of the alcoholic are sure and correct. This is one thing he needs to know. In fact this could be the technique: to listen hard when I explain the meaning of alcohol, and then never touch a drop again.

Edited October 2, 2013 by Nikolai1

[Stosh]

The spiritually conscious ones die before they die.

Pffft ! haa ha ha ha

(Consume alcohol so you too can die before you die , Its spiritual! ) ?

ha ha ha ha

 

(In fact this could be the technique: to listen hard when I explain the meaning of alcohol, and then never touch a drop again.)

Oooh boy , you really need to learn more on the nature of these conditions.

 

I dont doubt you mean well , or that you spend some considerable time in contemplation of mankinds ills with compassionate intent, but in that direction you are in need of some grounding influences. Discuss back and forth during the development of the ideas , and critically decide whether they hold water or not.

[C T]

No! I've never suggested that alcohol should be turned into some kind of technique!

But you did assert that alcohol consumption brings depth and fulfills one half of an aspect with regards to a connection to divinity. Please correct if wrong.

[Nikolai1]

CT

 

 

But you did assert that alcohol consumption brings depth and fulfills one half of an aspect with regards to a connection to divinity. Please correct if wrong.

 

Yes, alcohol brings a genuine connection to the divinity and is much deeper in that respect then many of the pleasures that people pursue.

 

But...it is and always will be very bad technique. The connection it brings, though deep and genuine, is too brief and alcohol comes with many negative side effects. I could never recommend it, but I do endorse it.

 

Alcohol, however bad a technique deserves and needs to be recognised.

 

Alcoholics anonymous has always recognised the role of spiritual realisation in addiction. Consistent with its Christian origins the narrative is dualistic. We are weak and humble sinners, but if we make the appeal then a merciful higher power can help us.

 

What I'm suggesting here is the non-dual counterpart. God, I'm saying, was with us when we were drinking. It was for God's sake that we drank. And he will be with us even more when we stop and find him in other pleasures.

 

This is much more likely to make sense people in an hedonistic age...and there is no need to bring big heavy words like God into it all - though I did in the OP for rhetorical effect.

 

Here are the 12 steps of AA in case any readers weren't aware of their intensely spiritual nature.

 

 

 

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

[SriChi]

While I don't completely agree with the specific subject of alcohol (it just numbs me down), I certainly agree with the title of this thread.

 

Pleasure/Joy is the True North for me. Do what feels good to my heart.

 

I don't think pleasure-seeking and dependency is the same thing. One might lead to another, but that is dependent on other factors.

 

It is all about how aware you are, at the end. I've never felt the "loss of inhibition leading to involuntary spilling of secrets and diarrhea of truth" with alcohol. Because, when I'm drunk, I know I am drunk - I'm noticing myself being drunk.

 

Love is God, God is Love, and Love is Pleasure.

 

I'd agree that "the alcohol path" is not for everyone though. We each have our own path. We are our path.