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Who
are we?
Our
Purpose
|
Mastering
the Game of Life
by
Serge Kahili King
Do
you want to be a slave of life or its master? If you choose the
latter, the most popular author of books on Huna, the Polynesian
philosophy and practice of effective living, tells you how to ride
the waves of life instead of trying to control them.
This
life is such an interesting experience. We are all participants
in a vast game which we all agreed to play before we got here. The
game consists in trying to thread our way between two worlds, each
with a different set of rules.
On
the one hand, we have this three-dimensional physical world wherein
we have to find food, shelter, clothing, companionship, and to confront
other players of the game struggling to comprehend and cope.
On
the other hand, we have a, let us say, four-dimensional world which
shows this reality to be a produce of our own minds, an illusion,
a "dream-world" from the fourth dimensional point of view.
Masters
and Slaves
What
is the good of knowing all this? It depends on whether you want
to be a slave of life or its master.
To
be a slave of life is to accept everything around you as the ultimate
reality and to act as if you have no control over it at all. It
is to identify with the waves of energy that pass through you from
time to time, which we call emotion, to think that they are you,
that they are yours; and to let them condition your thinking, when
in reality the energy was colored by your thinking in the first
place. It is like a puppy chasing its own tail.
Then
there is the problem of other people. Everything would be great
if only they all did what you wanted or expected them to do. But
other people are such contrary beings. Often they would rather do
what they want, rather than what we want, even when we "know"
that ours is the best way.
So
when they don't act according to our expectations and desires it
upsets us terribly, causing emotional (energetic) trauma and feelings
of helplessness and hopelessness. But - and consider this very carefully
- when others don't act according to our desires and expectations,
then perhaps something is wrong with our desires and expectations,
and not with their behavior.
The
Power of Choice
A slave
of life is also terribly bound by material possessions - money,
land, goods. Their loss or lack causes emotional trauma and feelings
of hopelessness and helplessness, too. We seek such "tangible"
objects out of a need for security, but such a fragile and ephemeral
type of security it is.
The
Bible parable of the man who worked his tail off for years and years
to fill his barns and granaries with riches, only to find out on
the very day that he thought he had attained material security that
he was to depart this life the same night, reflects a fundamental
truth. We are only passing through this life. The material world
is only a tool for our experience. We are bound to suffer if we
try to base our security on swirling atoms held in a temporary pattern,
and to think of the pattern as the only reality.
The
master of life - and it is the here-and-now potential of every human
being to be such - knows that three-dimensional experience is a
reflection of thought and not more. As a master of life you realize
that you choose what you experience through your basic beliefs about
life.
You
realize further, that to change your experience you have only to
change your beliefs, and you understand the difference between desire
and belief. You know that you, and only you, are responsible for
all your happiness or unhappiness.
And
you also know one of the most important truths: that the way in
which you experience life depends on how you choose to react to
what happens to you. For this is an inborn, inalienable power that
each of us has. We choose to be happy or sad, disgusted or overjoyed,
impatient or understanding, bigoted or tolerant, inflexible or flowing.
The
slave chooses, too, but he lets his choice be determined by the
will or acts of others, thus putting his power in their hands, and
then he tries to blame others for his failure or unhappiness.
The
master of life chooses the way he wants to feel, to react, in terms
of what will be the most effective for him, regardless of what happens.
You are all, at all times, masters of your fate, insofar as your
power to choose your reactions goes. The difference is that the
slave refuses to accept responsibility for his choice, and remains
a slave, while the master of life chooses knowingly, and is free.
People
speak of the courage it takes to choose effectively, and of the
struggle to choose one reaction over another. Actually, the only
courage involved is that of risking someone else's displeasure at
your choice. And the only struggle is against your own fear and
doubt.
Riding
the Wave
Of
course, it is easier to float than to swim; easier to go with the
flow than to direct your course, but floating brings you up against
sharp and unpleasant rocks, while swimming brings you to safety.
To
carry on the swimming analogy a bit, let us conceive of a particular
experience in life as a rip tide. A rip tide is a strong current
running from the shore out to sea a hundred yards or more.
Let
us use it to demonstrate a life experience over which you apparently
have no control. Caught in the rip tide, a slave of life either
panics and tries to struggle against the current, in which case
he quickly loses his strength and drowns or he gives up all hope
and floats out to sea with the current, in which case he drowns
any way.
The
master of life, however, flows with the current until he feels its
power weakening, and then he swims around it and back to shore.
Both slave and master undergo the same experience.
The
difference is in how they react to it. To master life is not to
control it; it is to master your relationship to it. A master surfer
does not control the wave. He masters the art of riding it.
Copyright
© 2000 Serge Kahili King
|
The
author
Do
you want to ask questions to the author of this article?
Send an e-mail to info@bliss2000.com
Meanwhile,
let's introduce him. He is
Serge
Kahili King
He is an internationally renowned author, and he has published
the world's largest selection of books and tapes on Huna, the
Polynesian philosophy and practice of effective living, and on
the spirit of Aloha, the attitude of love and peace for which
the Hawaiian Islands are so famous.
Serge
Kahili King, Ph. D., also writes extensively on Hawaiian culture
and is a novelist as well. You can read some of his articles at
The
Teaching Hut of the Hawaiian
Huna Village, sponsored by Aloha International, as well as
in the Captain's
Cabin.
Here
are his books on Huna philosophy recommended by BLISS - New
Age and Beyond. Order them now through Amazon.com
(up to 30% off the price!) by clicking on each title:
Kahuna
Healing : Holistic Health and Healing Practices of Polynesia (paperback)
Urban
Shaman (paperback)
Earth
Energies : A Quest for the Hidden Power of the Planet (paperback)
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