From Self-Annihilation …
Toward the Evolution of Humankind

It is a lie when your society says you will reap (happiness, wealth, success, respect, love, etc., if you live somewhere in the middle of its mandates and your Self. Shambhala Masters know that this fence sitting results in nothing but guaranteed discomfort. Your peace of mind, your physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being, and your zest for life are dependent upon you remaining loyal to and congruent with Life's purpose — its own Self-furthering and the evolution of Consciousness.

The Shambhala Master

As Shambhala students redesign their most significant relationships into spiritual partnerships, they discover that another relationship is severely in need of redesign. It is the family. Why? Because Shambhlala students begin to realize that “traditional family life” is Self-annihilating. Shambhala students still living within traditional family units typically feel limited, unknown, burdened, unappreciated, bored, wasted, trapped, used, resentful, out of control, desperate, angry, frightened, sexually numb, and spiritually dead. Shambhala students who try to fit themselves into the traditional family picture find themselves overwhelmed with a deep sense of personal failure and guilt, regardless of their financial status, social position, numbers of loving children, and their spouse's devotion.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE FAMILY

It is predictable that Shambhala students often feel as though they are drowning in an empty anguish within their traditional family units. Family life is typically based on countless Self-annihilating concepts. For example, the traditional picture of the family unit is based on two “incomplete” individuals coming together to complete each other, two people joining together to become “one complete unit.” But Shambhala Masters know that no person can complete another person, no matter how hard s/he tries. No person can fill another’s emptiness. No person's strengths can compensate for another’s self-imposed or acquired limitations. Bonding with another will not make you whole. No one, no matter how financially well set s/he may be, can eliminate your fears and insecurities about providing for yourself. No one, no matter how warm, tender, and loving s/he may be, can put you at ease with your own emotional turmoil.

Your chemical programming, historical inheritance, and social training powerfully directs you toward finding Mr./Ms. Right, to reproduce and create family because all of this was once necessary if primitive humans were to survive. You still carry these seldom examined social, emotional, psychological and biological mandates. When you dare to question the relevance of these mandates, you will often find your rational decisions chemically, emotionally or socially overruled. You will, more often than not, find your behavior being directed by traditionally cherished values you do not respect. . . values that annihilate Intimacy and Integrity between you and yourself, and between you and your loved ones.

A SOUL-TORTURING BIND

Historical inheritance puts you in a no win situation. Your historical inheritance places you in a soul-torturing bind between your social rectitude and your personal Core Integrity. Throughout time, people who follow the social norms regard themselves as society members in good standing. For example, in today’s world if you follow the social mandates of your culture you will date people of the opposite sex, select one, marry one, and remain monogamous to that person for the rest of your life. You will reproduce whether or not you enjoy the company of children, and whether or not you are skilled in relating to them. You will rent an apartment or buy a home and all the necessary furnishings. You will purchase a car(s). You will provide your family with all the expected necessities that “good” parents give themselves and their children (i.e., televisions, telephones, computers, iPods, Gameboys, bicycles, athletic equipment, school supplies, uniforms, toys, lessons, college educations, etc.). You will earnestly try to service all the debt that goes with this expected “family” consumerism. You will service this debt by securing a respectable job, staying with it, and climbing the ladder of success, regardless of the Self-sacrifices required.

If you faithfully follow these social mandates, then, you are told you will be happy and rewarded with a good life. Consequently, by doing what is socially expected, you expect to be happy and you expect people to treat you as if you have proven your value and worth. When you are not happy and when others do not accord you the respect and courtesy that you think you deserve, then you will be outraged, bitter, and vengeful. After all, you paid dearly to stay within the social mandates. You ignored, set aside, and all too often, prostituted your Self. You paid you dues and you deserve and had better receive the happiness and respect you were promised. But, you soon learn that whatever you get back, in the end, it is never enough to compensate for your Self-abandonment. No amount of devotion from loved ones, lime-light, social respect, wealth, or political power can fill a bankrupt soul.

The other side of this soul-torturing bind has its own challenges. Shambhala students who honor the Call to Self-loyalty walk a uniquely challenging path. As opposed to automatically following the social norms urging them to pair off, marry, and reproduce, Shambhala students walk paths that are uniquely their own. Consequently, you will have to manage your socially instilled guilt and self-doubt. You will question whether or not you are a “mature” and “socially responsible” person. You may even question your own worth as a person because the society you live in tells you, in hundreds of thousands of ways, that people who do not do what is socially expected are failures.

In the end, neither adhering to group norms nor honoring Self-loyalty promises “happiness.” There are two reasons why neither guarantees “happiness;”

1. Happiness is an illusion. It does not exist, at least, not in the way it has been defined throughout the ages, and
2. Life was never meant to be about the pursuit of socially defined “happiness.”

Life is about its own Self-furthering. By honoring the Call to Self-loyalty, you powerfully align yourself with Life's Purpose to improve upon its Self and, in the process, you discover that you are gifted with so much more then the illusionary pictures of “happiness.” How does it work? Why is it that by aligning yourself with Nature’s Intent to improve upon its Self you are gifted with unimaginable wealth? And, specifically, what is this “wealth” that is gifted to those who align themselves with Life’s Self-furthering?

ALIGNING YOURSELF WITH LIFE’S PURPOSE

To align yourself with Life’s Purpose and Nature’s Intent to improve upon its Self means aligning yourself with Life’s journey towards Consciousness. Life’s eagerness to continually improve upon it’s Self has one powerful purpose … the evolution of Consciousness. To become a partner with Life in this process you must honor your own Core mandates (i.e., You must be all you are meant to be. You must live your life fully. You must shed your socially and biologically acquired limitations. You must require your words and your behavior to be congruent. You must honor your personal Integrity. You must create Intimacy with your Self and the Selves of others.). By doing all this you become Life’s cherished partner. You become one with Life. In turn, you are supported by Life. You are compatriots. When Life is furthered, so are you. When Life is diminished, you are decreased. When you dedicate your every breath to the furthering of Life — Life returns the favor gifting you with unimaginable wealth. You find peace, purposefulness, and Power in the partnership.

NATURE’S INTENT

by the Shambhala Master

Life is the Artwork of the Source.

The Source is Nature and Nature is the Source.
They further the continuity and the excellence of Life.

The Source is creating the human mind
As its finest Masterpiece.

Through this Masterpiece you sense your
unlimited possibilities
And the limited time you have to awaken your Self.

If you treasure the Masterpiece
By furthering the Artistry,
Life becomes a celebration,
And you become Partners with the Source.

Shambhala Masters honor the Partnership.

But, if the social pressures become too much, and you cheat on your loyalty to your Self, if you fudge a little here and compromise your Self a little there, you begin to die inside. You begin to wage a cold war within yourself. Your Self-loyalty sets itself against your self-righteous sense of social rectitude. Your spirit shrivels up, as it repeatedly takes a back seat to your socially acquired needs. You become an empty shell, a paper-thin facade, a robot on automatic. You are alone. Even in a crowd, you are haunted by your loneliness. Your emptiness drives you to continually avail yourself of the limitless chemical rushes your culture provides (i.e., stories, illusions, sex, romance, entertainment and distractions, over-indulgence, etc.). You distract yourself from the panic of your isolation with high risk experiences and their chemical rushes so you can feel something through the numbing deadness that is consuming you. You desperately try to keep busy and numb yourself as you resign yourself to the drain of your life.

THE WEALTH OF PARTNERSHIP

Partnering yourself with Nature’s Intent and actively furthering Life’s aim to improve upon its Self results in a bountiful wealth. Committing yourself to Integrity may not increase your popularity and your financial prowess, but it always bears fruit, and the fruit it bears is true Wealth. There are many different kinds of wealth, as many different kinds of wealth as there are people looking for it. But there are at least four kinds of true Wealth that result from Partnering yourself with Nature’s Intent and the evolution of Consciouness.

Emotional and Mental Wealth – Mental and emotional clarity which fosters peace of heart and mind

Physical Wealth - A sense of purpose and personal empowerment that comes from accepting self-responsibility and personal accountability; a comforting feeling of being at home in your own body and at ease in and with the world; more freedom from the symptoms of stress and compromised health (i.e., migraines, ulcers, heart attacks, over-indulgence in the extremes, eating disorders, drug abuse, alcoholism, etc.).

Relationship Wealth - Meaningful interactions with the people who are closest to you. The ability to deeply know and be known by your loved ones. Intimacy with your intimates.

Financial Wealth – Having debt-free and worry free financial well-being. Knowing how to emotionally invest in substance as opposed to being impressed with the superficial, coveting what others appear to have, indulging in greed, and spending beyond your means.

To enjoy Life’s true Wealth you must honor your Partnership with Life on its journey towards the evolution of Consciousness. You can honor your Partnership with Life by choosing:

1. Consciousness over distraction, escape, and denial
2. Reality over fantasy and creative whimsy
3. Integrity and Self-respect over popularity
4. To confront your fears and painful realities as opposed to being distracted from them
5. To hold the tension of the complexities and paradoxes in life as opposed to indulging in black and white thinking and quick fixes
6. To align yourself with Truth as opposed to lies, rationalizations, and self-deception
7. Unity of self, becoming one person, and personal integration over duplicity, role playing, and stylizing your personality, according to your audience.
8. Being true to your Self even if it means disrupting the status quo9. Self-accountability over self-pity, guilt, worthlessness, and taking the easy way out.
9. Substance over fads, trends, and novelty
10. Your own good company as opposed to suffering the company of fools
11. To associate with people of substance and Integrity as opposed to flashy, flamboyant, empty personalities.

FENCE SITTING

It is a lie when your society says you will reap happiness, wealth, success, respect, love, etc., if you live somewhere in the middle of its mandates and your Self. Shambhala Masters know that this fence sitting results in guaranteed discomfort. Your peace of mind, your physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being, and your zest for life are dependent upon you remaining loyal to and congruent with Life's purpose - - its own Self-furthering and the evolution of Consciousness. Self-loyalty requires you, like a salmon, to swim upstream.

It is hard work swimming against the social current of pair bonding, marriage, and reproduction. It takes rigor and accuracy to jump barriers and dodge rocks that lay hidden beneath the surface. But, it is also exhilarating. For Shambhala Masters and their students it has always been well worth the effort. During the journey upstream you will encounter a multitude of thought provoking, mind expanding, and life enriching experiences. The average fish drifts with the current, down deep in the dark where it feels safe. It mingles with the multitudes of others who are also drifting along with the current. Shambhala students are not swimming with the masses, instead they leap from the murky depths over barriers flying into the sky, taking in vistas the masses never see.

Shambhala students are buffeted around from time to time by the multitudes drifting downstream, for the masses do not step aside to make your passage easy. The masses ridicule and attack those who make heroic choices because your courage illuminates their cowardice. And, when you encounter their ridicule and disdain, you will feel frightened and disaffirmed. You will wrestle with Self-doubt and monsters-in-your-mind. You may want to yield; you may want to return to the social mandates and pride yourselves on not breaking the rules, not rocking the boat, not making others uncomfortable. But, there is a price you will pay to enjoy the comforts of drifting downstream. It will cost you your relationship with your Self.

Either way, whether you sit on the fence or commit yourself to Life's endeavor to improve upon its Self, you are faced with soul-challenging decisions. You either answer the Call, make heroic choices with every step you take, and revel in the delights of swimming upstream, managing as best you can your historical inheritance as it burdens you with fears and self-doubts, or you can simply stop swimming. You do not even have to make a Conscious decision to turn around, the current will do that for you.

For Shambhala Masters there is no choice. Living with a compromised Self is a painfully empty existence, so we honor the Call. We answer it every time. But not too loudly, for Shambhala Masters have no need to unsettle those who prefer to drift with the current. We do not take pleasure in making waves. It is not our business to require others to turn around. However it is our business to not be intimidated by the numbers of people drifting down stream. It is our business, and yours, to not let the noise they make drown out the Call to be Self-loyal. It is our business, and yours, to not be frightened by their choices and their lack of affirmation. It is our business, and yours, to not become so invested in swimming upstream that we discard and reject everything and everyone who is not Self-loyal. There is much to enjoy and to learn from tradition and societal patterns. Too much to learn and too much to enjoy to throw them all away. It is our business, and yours, to Consciously evaluate all of Life’s possibilities and select the ones that are personally Core-enriching and Life-furthering.

*The word “Called,” is spelled with a bold capital “C.” The Shambhala Master uses bold capitals when referring to the primal, Core, spiritual essence of a word, as opposed to the conventional understanding of the word. Please consult the Master’s Glossary for the definition of this and other unfamiliar terms.

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