QUESTION OF THE DAY: SELF-REFLECTION IS ESSENTIAL FOR SURVIVAL

Thank you for your appreciation, AC. You ask "Should we accept help?".

The first thing which comes to mind is "Do we need help?", and this is something which each person is invited to assess at various times in their lives when they find themselves in difficult situations, and when they do not see any chance of talking action - or of gaining a new perspective - all by themselves. Then it is good to seek out someone who one trusts, in order to discuss it with that person. The very act of talking about a problem with someone else may clarify which paths are open to us.

We gain in self-confidence, of course, if we manage to solve our own problems by consistent self-reflection, and by consistently asking ourselves what part we have ourselves played in cornering ourselves into a seemingly hopeless situation. If that can be recognized, there is less danger of getting into similar issues in the future, and less need for "help " of any sort.

There are some people who cannot accept help. These are the ones which are caught up by ego. It is their ego which will prevent them from asking for help, which is in affect "losing face" in their eyes. Thus their problems will continue and continue to fester without clarification and closure.

In our world today, there are also those who offer help with the aim of enslaving those to whom they offer help. On a much bigger scale, this can be seen in any welfare state, where benefits are forthcoming but come only under certain conditions to which one is - from that point on - bound. Accepting help, therefore, can mean a sort of imprisonment, and it is up to us to decide whether we want to enter into any of these sort of "contracts".

Regarding help, the best place to find it is WITHIN OURSELVES. We may have trusted friends, who may help, but they also will have their own ideas and be influenced by their own experiences. The best instructor you can have is your internal DIVINE FATHER FRAGMENT, which one could also call INTUITION or HUNCHES.

This fragment has ONLY OUR BEST INTEREST AT HEART. In meditation, one can quieten one's mind, ask a question, and see what answer "springs to mind", or what images appear, or what feelings arise. All these are indications of the next step to take, and if we follow them, and note down the advice and whether it had any value, we can document all this and trace our spiritual development as prompted by this divine inner advisor.

Thanks for your great answer OP.

The reason I asked the question is because I've read that we cannot be free unless we reject all help and also that we will never taste freedom unless we go feral on our own. I can see the reasoning behind those two choices but they are a bit extreme for me at this time. Your balanced approach makes more sense to me for now.

Cheers!

I will give my answer to this: for most people, it is the DIVINE PART OF THEMSELVES which they have killed, or which they have allowed others to kill for them. Everything which is divine in our lives has been ridiculed. It is not "cool" to be of high morals, to have LOVE as oneÄs main principle, to be compassed by compassion, to respect all life. Instead it is cool to be "badass", unprincipled, independent bordering on selfish, with high levels of tolerance of everything, including everything bordering on the degenerate. Sensitivity to others, sensitivity to nature, sensitivity to high vibratory music with the ability to heal, sensitivity to other's suffering - all this has been killed. And most of all, it is the connection to the DIVINE CORE WITHIN which has been killed - the inner advisor or intuition which helps us master our lessons and furthers our spiritual journey. Without this, we descend into materialism and selfish hedonism.

This is the cold hard truth of where we collectively find ourselves today. It's actually frightening and so very sad we've let this happen.

OP what would you say to people who say that we're just sticking our fingers in our ears when we refuse to join in with the hatred and condemnation of others? And that we're ignoring reality when we go within to create our own reality?

How difficult is it for you to accept that the negative qualities in another person are a mirror of yourself?

This is a realization I had - in the course of a seminar to increase self-awareness - a long time ago. It was proven to me that the other members of the group were a mirror of myself, in the sense that what I saw in others (whether positive or negative traits), were traits with which I MYSELF WAS FAMILIAR; and therefore, I CARRIED THEM TOO.

Thus, other people were showing me things about myself. This was great, when it came to positive qualities, but not so great when it came to things I disliked. For example, if someone would not communicate fully with me, I would get very annoyed. But it showed me that I should communicate more, which was indeed the case at that time.

The realization that everyone is my mirror was very difficult to accept at the beginning. My whole life played through my eyes again, as I passed review, pinpointing those people who had "failed" me. And it was clear that I, in some way, had also "failed" them. And the faults I saw in them were actually also MY FAULTS.

If we take this principle and apply it to our lives and relationships with other individuals, as well as other communities and even nations, then we would certainly take a big step towards mutual understanding.

Why would I want a relationship with other nations where they call all the shots and I am accused of projecting when I call attention to any abuses?

Why would I want a relationship with other nations where they call all the shots and I am accused of projecting when I call attention to any abuses?

Well, if that is the way it has to be, then that's the way it has to be.

Then the abuse that instilled that fear has done it's job.

You provide some insightful answers, REASON DIDN'T WORK: thank you.

If someone has been abused, and lives in fear of it happening again, there is a distinct possibility that this will happen. But it does depend on the person concerned: I have known people who have been abused who have understood why it happened, and what part they themselves played in it, and so have changed their own behaviour and attitude as a result. They have turned into strong and fearless people who quickly recognize predators.

By saying this, I am not condoning abuse. Neither am I saying that anyone "invites" it. I am just saying that there are certain unfavorable constellations which contribute to the possibility of it happening. Fear is one of those factors. Feeling "unloved" is another: if one feels unloved, or "needs" the appreciation of another, they will be more easily led into a situation where they think they are going to receive support/love/appreciation, and can more easily be taken advantage of.

Lady, a person can isolate another, weaker person, and then use a combination of fear and praise to effectively take advantage of these aspects of a person's nature. It's abuse. This site does it. One can also demonize the natural desire to retaliate for malicious harm as being 'negative,' or 'bad intention,' as this site, its posters, and it's mods also do. Once these connections are hammered into the victim, then the statement that one is being taken advantage of is also played off as simply more negativity.

Psychological torture has been researched, especially by Israel and England it seems, because it leaves no marks and results in a victim who is mentally ill. This site is a vector of it. To a person who has been abused, the suggestion that they themselves played a role in it, is sure to come off as blame, whatever provisos you may add to it.

As for victims of abuse having a keener eye for future predators, nothing could be further from the truth. The person denied the right of self-defense will see their attackers everywhere under a heightened state of arousal. This will conjure up false-positives, and make them liable to being used as attack dogs by the very same entities which in other cases turn a blind eye to the exact abuse they have themselves suffered.

Whatever your desire to protect something, and whatever motive from which it springs, you have found yourselves in precisely that sort of company on this site. One desire to continue to think well of people, to think this planet doesn't deserve/need to be devastated by our abuses; but these feelings will always be viewed as weakness, and exploited by the sort of people who work here. Always. In the end, the future of the planet ends up being the hostage of their survival, and potentially their survival alone. One can hardly think of any service they perform that balanced out that sort of grievous and malignant destruction.