Let’s shatter some of your beliefs
Ego picking.
We don’t like getting challenged when it comes to beliefs, because those beliefs shape our identity. People who are open to being challenged in their beliefs are the ones who are open to possibilities and hold a wider perspective.
Congratulations, if the title made you want to read this article it means you are open to possibilities.
No matter how open to possibilities we are, we do hold some kind of beliefs and if those beliefs are challenged we begin questioning our own existence and in turn, may build a little frustration.
Some of my own beliefs contradict with what you are going to read below, but I have put my faith and belief aside to look at things from a wider perspective.
For a few minutes, let's step above our ego and see things as they are, not what we think they are. It’s okay if you disagree with what you read and get frustrated or even angry because that is the whole point of this article.
We don’t know anything
We think we know a lot of things but the truth is we don’t even have one percent of the information to guarantee that our beliefs are right.
Everything we know comes from our knowledge and experiences but unfortunately, it is limited. The stories our parents told us while growing up, and the learnings we consumed and experienced shaped our beliefs. Those beliefs would have been completely different if we had grown in different circumstances.
We hold on to such beliefs and define ourselves with them. We believe in stories that have been passed down for centuries without any actual proof and attach ourselves to them so much that our very idea of self relies on them.
You don’t know anything, all your beliefs were built on basis of stories, stories that religion, nation, and communities passed on throughout the century. Your idea of self is an illusion all built up from the beliefs that come from limited information which may or may not be true. You don’t know who you are, you think you know but the idea of you is just a collection of stories that turned into beliefs.
There is no meaning to life
We all like to think that our life has a special meaning behind it and we are here for a higher purpose( I believe that too because this is what keeps me going) but if we look at it from a higher perspective what meaning would an individual of a micro size compared to the universe hold in this cosmic pool?
Collectively the whole human race that began millions of years ago has a huge role to play in this cosmic pool and nobody knows what impact we are making in the universe but individually there is no meaning to our life.
We give meaning to our lives, we define our meanings. Similar to our beliefs the meanings we give to our life comes from our knowledge and experience and the value we wish to provide. We all hold different meanings to our life because without defining it our very survival mentality may go declining. It is important to have individual meaning in life but it is also important to look at the reality of life.
There is no meaning to your life. You are not here to find and define the meaning of life, you are just here to live and experience the very nature of life.
We don’t control our choices
We humans like to believe that we are in control of our actions. We choose according to our intuitions and decisions, we do what we do because our inner selves tell us to do it. We like to believe that we are the master of our actions and choices. Believing that our choices are totally ours is the dumbest thing in the modern day we live in.
We do have certain control over the choices we make but the power to control our choices has been diminishing since the development of the internet and the digital systems. Everybody is connected to the internet and we are being continuously being fed with information that may or may not be true. Our daily habits are being determined by these devices, the time we wake up, the things we buy, and the belief systems we create are all connected to the devices we spend our time on. Yes, the digital systems are hacking our behavior and we are slowly becoming a slave to these systems.
Imagine what it will be in the next fifty years with the development of artificial intelligence. The computer systems will be able to analyze our feelings and make choices for us. Bioengineering and artificial intelligence will be able to comprehend our feelings with precision more than our internal systems.
Your behavior is already being hacked by the systems and slowly technology will take over every choices and decision you make. You don’t know yourself, you don’t know what your instincts tell you, you don’t know how you function, and yet you think you are in control of your life, whereas digital systems are already in the race to slowly hack your behavior.
We don’t know the facts
We are judgmental beings, we have opinions about everything and think that our opinions are true. We believe in everything we think and in turn make conclusions and opinions about things. The thinking that comes from limited facts blinds us from actually looking at reality.
How much do you think we know about the Nazis and their mission, about human history, about Egypt’s pyramid, Putin’s mission, me too movements, feminism, poverty, capitalism? I can go on with this. We overlook the majority of the facts behind them and make conclusions on basis of what we think. We neglect possibilities and believe every thought we think.
Our thoughts and feelings are nothing but a flow of random vibration, just like a blowing wind, which comes and goes without our control over it.
You don’t know the facts behind the circumstances and hence there are infinite possibilities that might contradict your opinions. You are right not even ten percent of the time. Yet, you think that the assumption you made about an embarrassing situation today is correct, and you suffer that thought. Your probability of being wrong is much higher than your probability of being right, yet you think your opinions are always right.
It’s not just you, it's we all, all human race. I think the problem lies not in the human species itself but in our ignorance of not knowing ourselves. We tend to learn so much and achieve so much by studying the outer world but we don’t even dedicate one minute a day to knowing our inner selves.
We don’t know how our beliefs are shaped, we don’t know what we are passionate about, we don’t know what our purpose is, we don’t know how our mind makes up thoughts and feelings, and we don’t know how we function, we don’t know so much about ourselves.
It’s crucial to know who we are, so let’s begin there by killing the ego that tells us “I know things and I know who I am”.
