In the Hearts of Men

Immanuel Kant wrote:

We can judge the heart of a man

by his treatment of animals.

Man has been given a marvelous thing: nature. We are its guardians, caregivers…and, all too often…its destroyers.

Free will

It is also true that we have been given free will; the ability, through thought and action, to choose how we proceed in this life on Earth. She is a living, breathing thing; this Earth we live on. She is our Mother and our responsibility. How do you treat your Mother? What responsibility to you take in her future…our home?

Animals and Men

This is especially true for the animals that we depend on and who depend on us. Unless you are a vegan, they are our food. We must be concerned with how they are raised and brought to our table, their treatment will affect us as well. On the other hand, we have domesticated animals that we call pets. From birds we keep in cages to the horses we keep in barns, but especially the cats and dogs that have become a member of the family.

These animals that we have taken out of their natural environment and brought into our homes. Fido and Fluffy should be treated with the utmost respect, kindness and love. All too often, we see stories of abuse and abandonment. This is a reflection of the heart of their owner. For, as an abuser can do this to an innocent animal, so can it be done to anyone.

Have a Heart

There is a current admonition, “If you see something, say something.”

This applies not only to strange or suspicious behavior in public, but also to those things you may see or be aware of through personal contact. We are each others’ keepers. That goes not only for humans, but for animals…as well as nature.

© 2017 DeBrady.biz

Judging and Others Changing…NOT

The Real Reason Judging Others Doesn’t Change a Thing About You

by Guy Finley (3/4/2013)

Key Lesson

One way to prevent yourself from going through a considerable amount of useless pain is to see the truth of the following, and then to act upon your discovery accordingly: judging others doesn’t change how much they disturb you; it serves only to distract you from seeing just how little it actually takes to set you off.

Stop Singing the Notes of Discord

We are all notes. We are all the notes of the kingdom. Each of us is able to resonate with things we would never dream could produce either such a soothing or scary resonance in us. What should be evident in this fact is that when the “sound,” or manifestation, of someone else sets us off and sends us into a fit, it is not their vibration that vexes us and makes us a “victim.” What really disturbs us is the internal vibrations of a few of our own unknown strings as they sound off (within us) in a natural sympathetic response to the dominating tones of the moment.

Truths for Living

Our recurring resistance to these undesired moments, to such people and conditions as create in us this discord we mistakenly blame on them, keeps us from learning how to utilize these relationships in order to realize their true purpose for us. For instance, say there is someone at work who tends to irritate us. Our usual approach is to avoid this person, as our errant thinking tells us that being out of sight is out of mind. The only thing is, as we have all come to experience, we cannot escape the sound of our self; so if it isn’t that person we dodge at work, surely someone else will come along and strike a similar chord, “making” us hear those same sorry sounds of self again.

What is the answer? To realize deeply, personally, that we cannot outrun any one of these sounds of ourselves anymore than a piano can move out from under the strings by which it plays; and, as an integral part of this new self-understanding, that we need not, must not, resist some unpleasant note of our own, or that of someone else. These notes, whatever their tone, do not define us unless we make the mistake of identifying with their sounding. The false sense of self that each such sound produces within us is just that: a temporary self that is, itself, little more than a passing effect of the blending of these sounding notes.

To change our relationship with life, to realize its unlimited song, we must bravely learn what it means to hear all of ourselves. Here is the key to this new relationship: Our quiet awareness of any one sound of ourselves, regardless of its bright or dark tone, is the field of relationship and not its sole content. What does this mean? When we see a spring pasture, our pleasure is derived from seeing the whole of it — all of it colors, each of its shapes. Imagine judging a field of flowers by picking out one weed.

As we learn how to listen to the sounds of life within ourselves, as we open up to life’s endless relationships by becoming aware of them within ourselves without limiting their sounds simply because they don’t agree with our present five-note self, then we begin to realize our real life. We hear at last within ourselves the lost chord that has always been our true self.

This article is excerpted from Seeker’s Guide to Self-Freedom (pages 149-151).