You are the quality of your thoughts. That makes sense, doesn’t it? The stoics essentially preach this doctrine. How you functioned in the world was essentially the way you perceive life positively, negatively, hopeful, angry, joyful. It just goes on.
So I guess this is far easier said than done though, isn’t it, in the modern world? I was reading recently that we receive in our phones around 100,000 pieces of data on a daily basis. Gosh. Now, if this is even remotely true, we are subjected to the noise of yellow journalism, aren’t we? And what does yellow journalism espouse?
The darkest, the most dire, the most horrid machinations of humanity. You don’t hear a lot of joy from the news, do you? But you do hear a tremendous amount of pain, and this is gotta be awfully harsh on the psyche. But conversely, if we mostly stay away from it, we don’t really know, do we? And people like Jim Kwik advised us that when we awake in the morning not to look at our phones.
Don’t look at your phone for the first, perhaps, several hours of your morning. Leave it alone. The negativity will always be there. You don’t have to rush. Now I’m pretty busy in the morning and I feel myself for the most part with a great deal of joy, but I would like to share something that happened to me the other day.
I got up and I was feeling good. I got up a little bit early. I made my bed. I said my prayers. I wrote in my notebook, shaved, was ready somewhat for the day.
And then just for a moment, I thought I would check whether the message that I’d sent the previous evening had been received just to confirm if I was going to have class that morning. So I sat it on the edge of my bed and just for a moment, the devil came to me. And he said, well, Leon, as you’re checking your messages, why don’t you have a quick look at the BBC News for whatever reason? And, you know, I debated this in my mind for a moment and then click the BBC News. And here we had the most horrible event.
Some Saudi doctor had driven into some people at a Christmas gathering in Germany and had killed 2 people. And eventually, that went on to be 4 people, I found out, later in the day. But it somehow colored my morning immediately because I asked myself, could I do this? Could I be angry enough about anything to drive my car, my beautiful car, my beautiful old car into a crowd of people with the intent of hurting people and potentially killing them. And the answer is no, I couldn’t.
No matter how angry I was about the world, about someone’s color, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, whatever it is, I couldn’t do this. Therefore, the person who did this is not like me. That kind of person, perhaps, was a camp guard in Auschwitz in 1940. I couldn’t do that job either. Or perhaps a member of the group that murdered millions of people, Jews and commissars and intellectuals and women and children.
It goes on. I couldn’t do that job either and I think most people couldn’t either. Either. We couldn’t do it. So how did this man do it?
But the point is is that it upset me and it immediately colored my day because I couldn’t understand at such a precious time, a holy time, a time that’s supposed to be the time of peace and love and caring and tenderness, and it just goes on. How could an individual do this? What kind of statement were they trying to make? So I guess the answer is, there is no answer. And what one should do is not listen to this nonsense in the morning for the first two hours.
And I have friends who never listen to the news because they’ve never been stabbed, shot, blown up. They’ve aspired to live decent, caring, loving lives as we mostly do. Therefore, the weirdness that is presented in the news is just that. It’s a weird state of being an altered reality that the average person really can’t identify with. And I think the secret in the modern world is that we really need to try to find a way that we begin to understand if we can or at least adumbrate what evil really means.
Because for instance, many of those people that we spoke about in the Einsatzgruppen, if they survived the war, went back to Germany many times into the police force of all things and went on to live normal lives. Grandfather, what did you do during the war? Oh, I was a soldier. Did you ever kill anyone? No.
Not me. Things along this nature. And what I’m espousing is true. This actually happened. Many people who were responsible for horrible crimes were not punished in the expediency of the aftermath of the 2nd World War and the advent of the so called cold war that began with the Russians in the east.
The point being is that we should aspire to fill our mind with good thoughts, with positive thoughts, with loving thoughts. If we do this, we will alter how we see the world. And just, maybe it’s naive, but just by chance, maybe if there are enough loving thoughts, then the world will be a much more loving place. And isn’t that what it’s supposed to be ultimately? If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol.
If I have the gift of prophecy and cannot fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but I do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. And the most famous, love is patient, Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast.
It is not proud. It does not dishonor others. It is not self seeking. It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs.
This is, of course, from first Corinthians and Saint Paul is talking about love. So who is the first person I must love? Myself. So I am the quality of my thoughts. So be a loving being.
That’s what I remind myself. Leon, you must work harder to be that loving being that you desire to be. And keep away from the negativity, Leon, first thing in the morning. Only think of happiness and joy. And it is a beautiful world and I’m grateful, so grateful to be a part of it.
And you know what they say. You know what they say. Critical thinking is necessary if we’re going to have good thoughts and we’re going to aspire to live in a state of love, and critical thinking is great. God bless. Take care. Bye bye.