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In the movies, much of the terminology is spiritual in origin, like the characters Trinity, Morpheus, the city of Zion, etc. During one scene, Mr. Smith, an agent, was telling Morpheus that human beings did not want a problem free existence, and that when it was tried, they rejected the programming. No, they (human beings) preferred contention and misery to truth and peace!
Mr. Smith was talking about the ego's preference for unconscious suffering. And I was realizing that a huge part of the artificial self's identity is derived from suffering. Vernon Howard once talked about something similar: pleasurable pain and painful pain, both a form of suffering because the source is ego. According to this measure, excitement would be pleasurable pain, and depression painful
pain. Ditto with pride and shame, winning and losing, low self-esteem and high self-esteem, etc. Both are kinds of "pain" because they are part of the same ego-coin. Perhaps our biggest mistake, then, is thinking we can keep one and discard the other. Impossible.
Earlier in the movie, Neo was given a choice: red pill or blue? The red pill symbolizes the opportunity to learn the truth, to wake up from the dream (matrix) and to begin to suffer consciously, to begin to see yourself and the world as it is behind the facade without resisting or seeking to escape what you see. Morpheus tells Neo to choose wisely because there will be no turning back once the red pill is taken. Later in the movie, Cypher wants to be re-inserted back into the oblivion of the Matrix with disastrous results. Here is a quote from Peter in the bible that parallels these scenes:
"For if, after they have [begun to escape] the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ [Spirit of Truth Within], they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.
"For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them."
Why should this be so? I think once a person begins to seriously work on himself, the seed of the Divine within becomes stronger and his being begins to change; he is pulled in new direction. Before then, the "pain body" (to coin a phrase from Eckhart Tolle) remained dormant, and erupted only to replenish itself in a cyclical fashion. However, once consciously challenged, the egoic self (of which the "pain body" is a part) begins to fight for its survival. Thus, we come into the "battle" between darkness and Light. According to some spiritual scriptures, one must consciously pass through hell to reach heaven. In other words, suffer the darkness without resistance, suffer it CONSCIOUSLY. Many metaphors have been given for this: bearing one's cross, climbing Calvary Hill or, more recently, ascending Mount Doom (the one ring symbolizing ego, of course).
Here is where mental confusion becomes a chief weapon of the darkness. I've heard it said that "an ounce of falsehood can ruin ten thousand pounds of truth." The false prophet within seeks the false prophet without, and we get organized religion, along with many other kinds of spiritual imitation and nonsense. Most would rather take the easy way out than climb Mount Doom. No surprise there. Perhaps that
is why an authentic state of enlightenment, if it exists, is
exceedingly rare.
So the qestion that reality is always posing to us is:
"red pill or blue?"
Ken
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