WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT?
Chapter Two
Have You Ever Felt "Boxed In?"
(Is It "Real" or Is It "Empowered Illusion?")
Historically, and even into the present day, most people have unnecessarily lived out their lives inside what might be viewed as a box, of sorts. The box should not be thought of as a physical space but, rather, a mental construct. From its thick outer walls to its innermost recesses, it is a space in which winning is always tainted by losing. Inside this construct, Plus and Minus are locked together, defining all aspects of reality. Absurdly, Plus and Minus are viewed as "real," instead of simply the two primary and opposite descriptive words which any person can use to characterize a particular event or other aspect of life. For example, a close friend of mine once attempted suicide because he chose the negative "interpretation" (creation) of events which were occurring in his life. Years later, he "described" (again, created is the more accurate word) the earlier circumstances as having been "a growth experience." In simple fact, his circumstances were no less growth experience when they were happening than they were fifteen years later. If it was "real" to him that they were "negative" earlier, it was only because he said so. In other words, he used his creative power to declare them negative.
Of course, the moment he did that, the moment he breathed life into that creation, he gave it a "reality" all its own.
I suggest the phrase "EMPOWERED ILLUSION" as accurately descriptive of this process. Of all the creations available to my friend in the presence of his circumstances, he gave birth to a horrifying, if hardly atypical, possibility. The moment we bring into existence a primary reality of that nature, we will then "see" (create) the secondary aspects of the reality, such as our "experience" and our "thoughts" and our "feelings," in a manner consistent with the primary creation. The primary creation might be compared to choosing whether to pick up a red (negative) filter or a blue (positive) filter, and holding it in front of our eyes. It is astonishing that so many people pick up the red filter, look through it, and then wail, "Oh NO, life is RED out there." They think they are "seeing life accurately," and base most of their choices in life on their "ability" to make such judgments and evaluations.
In truth, the "ability" to see red through a red filter is one of life's most limited - and overrated - "skills." For example, would you rather be in relationship with someone who could "accurately" see you through a red filter, or a person who had some notion of the fact that they could choose which filter they wished to put in place before they looked at you and began "describing" what they saw? The latter person actually has the opportunity to be not only creative, but consciously and deliberately creative! Such a person is unlikely to walk around creating a perpetual running commentary about how they have been victimized by you. Even when something "negative" happens, they are able to "see" (create) the potential for positive contribution such an event might carry.
Of course, people do not only have this opportunity in relationship to other humans. People who take no responsibility for their choice of filter have historically "found" fault with God Himself, if they can even "see" the possibility of "God's presence" in life. This is the absurdity faced by those who are "looking" for "evidence" of God. The person who chooses a negative filter will "see" negative evidence, whether of "God's performance" or YOURS! This is the reason so many irresponsible individuals angrily throw away husbands, wives, employees and others, only to later see the persons they had created as "defective" (or some such) go on to be "appreciated" (created through a positive filter) by another spouse or boss!
Scripture is specific, and useful, on this point: "...I have set before you life and death...therefore choose life." That advice can always be applied first to one's choice of filter. Unless and until we begin to choose a Pure Plus filter instead of the "traditional" plus-MINUS filter, none of our "creations" will go well. Or, if they do, we will probably not "see" that fact. Such possibilities as "growth experience" will continue to live outside the box in which we live, as though veiled from our sight. What we "see" (create) within the confines of the box will always be tainted, suffused with just enough Death to preclude the fullest meaning of the word "Life."
That is why Scripture tells us to CHOOSE life instead of "find evidence" for life! From the point of view of the individual, God, for example, can only be CHOSEN. To a person who sees life through a negative filter, such a choice will "appear" irrational, at best, since it is not supported by the "evidence" which can be seen from the only point of view they know is available. The truly responsible person knows that even God can be created as right or wrong, from the human point of view. Interestingly, people are amazingly consistent about these things. People looking through a negative filter will manage to find something negative about anything which crosses their field of vision. One of my favorite ministers once found himself complaining to God that some of his parishioners didn't fully appreciate his efforts. God's response to him, he said, was, "I know ... they don't much appreciate My efforts, either!"
We have been taught to think of "creativity" as involving "things," whether works of art, relationships, jobs, or any other in-form possibilities. Our first acts of creativity, though, always involve what might be called "the choice of filter" through which we will be looking at life's content. When our first creative act involves picking up a plus-MINUS filter, and looking out at life through it, we can count on impacting any in-form creation we might attempt. If we next create a relationship, or "our day," for that matter, we will "see" the relationship or day as both positive and negative. The effect is much like planting seeds in soil to which we have first added a toxin. If anything grows at all, it will probably be less than might have been available.
Choice of filter is the first place people actually have access to something akin to "power." In a sense, this choice is the first and most fundamental which human beings have the opportunity to make. A person who is unconscious of the fact that they are making this fundamental choice, can seldom get farther in life than the apparency that they are being victimized by what they see through the filter. You can tell when you or others have been doing this, because life is often next described as "Minus-manifesting." This is the mechanism by which each of us has been taught to re-enter, or recreate, "life in the box," moment by moment. When we limit our point of view to one in which Minus is elevated to the status "real," instead of held as merely one of the possibilities of the full spectrum, we paint ourselves into a corner.
Most people pick up one filter or the other from time to time, almost randomly, without realizing how crucial their choice is. It is almost as though they pick up whatever filter happens to be at their finger tips, like the person who simply grabs something to wear from their closet without considering what they might really prefer to choose from their full wardrobe. This is where we get phrases like "I got up on the right (or wrong) side of the bed today." Then, depending upon the filter they "happen" to pick up, they "get what they get." Sometimes, for example, what they see will "make them" happy; at other times it will "make them" feel sad. The possibility that they can create their emotions is essentially inconceivable. A person who cannot create something simple, such as an emotion, will find it virtually impossible to create anything more complex, like a relationship. Or, more accurately, they will create emotions and relationships, but (1) they will be unaware that their own creativity has been at work, and (2) they will probably not be ecstatically happy with the creations.
Unfortunately, most people have neither been trained, nor have they noticed, that the process works in this manner. Ludicrously, and often disastrously, we have been taught to focus on the mental, emotional and other experiential byproducts of our creativity, instead of on the Minus-based machinery we have constructed which generates those byproducts! Observing the results is about as pleasant as watching a sewer "back up." People say they are, for example, "feeling" bad, and often spend time looking for what "did it to them," without ever noticing their own creative roles in the matter.
We have been taught to reinforce this absurd and usually counterproductive view of life in a myriad of ways. "Good" people, for example, are expected to be "empathetic," and are urged to ask apparently-benign questions such as, "Gee, how did you FEEL about that?" Even children, I have found, are capable of answering the more direct and useful, "How did you create yourself feeling about that?" The latter question honors people's creativity and instills the possibility that human beings HAVE feelings, instead feelings having them. When my friend attempted suicide, it was largely because he (1) picked up a negative filter and (not surprisingly!) saw negative feelings; (2) had no idea that he had any creative role in the matter, nor any notion that he could create a different reality; (3) made the sort of choice one might expect of a victim who "had no good choices."
If we continue to create ourselves as less powerful than such ephemeral stuff as "feelings," we will continue to evolve as a species specializing in victimization. The only "interesting" issues in life will involve what a person has been victimized BY. One needn't look much farther than much of the content of American television to see the degree to which this process has already evolved, featuring almost a competition on the subject of "most victimized." It comes down to the question, "Isn't there something we would rather do?" It would be available, in the alternative, to emphasize what we are able to create in the presence of life's "stuff." The former is the domain of losing, a universe in which the best you can expect are dreary things like empathy and sympathy. In this universe, the things we do not want tend to receive our attention and our energy. It can be a challenge, requiring "all we've got," to generate the things we profoundly hope for. Given this fact, does it make sense to continue to apply such vast amounts of our time and energy to the unwanted?