Those feelings of freedom and enlightenment occurred again today as I went to a class on a part of Mormon scripture called "The Pearl of Great Price." We discussed what is reality? Well in the reality of our lives it is what is tangible or can affect permanently our lives or the lives of others. But in the context of eternity we never experience reality, at least not now. Reality is the mind of God, the context of where he dwells and his state of being. It is without beginning of days or end of years, it is eternal. Reality has no place in this life of ours. Here we can break away from the reality of eternal life, escape or rather postpone the consequences of actions as we make choices. God cannot exist here, nor can he stay in a permanent state here, and for us to be able to endure his presence we are transformed to a point where we are in reality and can experience him. He seeks to teach us, to enlighten our understanding and show us what is real, but we must choose to accept it in the context of this "fake" world of temporal decisions and effects. He teaches in the temple, and thus in the context of being between heaven and earth, in his figurative if not literal presence we can experience the ideas of the eternities. Just like non-linear time, this speaks to my soul. We seek for so much more than this life.
I remember being a little boy, well about 15, and aching for this world. I hated the injustice, the last of love and concern that was evidenced. I made dumb decisions one day when I grew despondent of life. After playing with my own existence, and a momentary lapse where I literally ran through the willows about a mile from my house with nothing on but my guilt and own anguish, I came home and slept. I remember feeling like we, humanity was meant for so much more than this paltry life. I think we have all had those moments where we recognize that we are not living a real life, but it is so beneath us, and yet so hard for us to comprehend. We are eternal beings, our souls feign to understand temporal when we have only ever known eternal. We have lived for eons as non-linear beings, ideas and concepts, and now we are forced to follow a linear world and the constraining upon us is the best evidence for which we can FEEL that this is not real. I feel so unlimited when I recognize that there is more. The commandments of God are not walls to control us, rather they are instructions into symbolic levels of what is real.
My second, rather random thought is that of anger. I have held rancor in my heart towards someone who, though they recognized I was unhappy and continued to seek to push me, seemed to only be doing that which he has done time and again. Individuals, though infinite with possibility and chance, are so much like the helix where they are bound to repeat their own decisions and choices again but at a different moment in their life. This individual does not understand his own actions, and merely plays his part. When we recognize our ability to change that part then we are held accountable for its consequences but until then we are like children merely acting out. I have such remorse for holding him in such low regard and now seek rather to love him and forget. Anger gives us nothing back in return but rather drains us until we are forced to feed upon ourselves. Forgiveness and love are an never ending well that will spring up more of their own feelings and therefore sustain us.
Here is to love, forgiveness, and the concept that we live outside reality......today has been a good day.
