The Three Truths In Human Life

by Robert Wilkinson

The following are three Truths in human life. These truths apply equally to all of us, regardless of time, space, cultural, gender, age, or historical distinctions. For years I've tried to think of another human truth that affects everyone on Earth, without success. If any of you can come up with a fourth truth not derived from one of these three, it’ll be a great launch pad for an interesting discussion. And in the spirit of eternal jocularity, or the Divine Play that the Vedic scholars call "Lela," I’ll even entertain entertaining suggestions. These have been put various ways, they're all pretty simple and straightforward, and they have nothing to do with religion or local belief systems.

1. All forms pass away.

So don’t get too uptight at the changes. Don’t get too attached to suffering the difficulties, and don’t get too attached to the enjoyment of pleasures. Both the problems and the enjoyments will pass, so chill out and don’t take any of it too personally. Live life to the fullest while not getting stuck by clinging to habits in thought, feeling, or action that lead to suffering.

2. The Golden Rule works.

Also known as, "What goes around, comes around." Even though we may not see the larger workings of the eternal law of cause and effect, it’s there if you take a wide enough point of view. A logical corollary of this truth is that as one acts, feels, thinks, and aspires, one creates the tendencies for these to manifest in the future. We just usually have such short attention spans that we don’t see the bigger picture of the cause-and-effect cycles of our lives. Still, the Law works in mysterious ways whether we perceive it or not, and if this second Truth actually works for all of us, then it is easy to see that a third Truth is...

3. Love is the way.

Since Truth number one is inevitable, and Truth number two is an expression of a "law" governing the field of sensory manifestation, then this third Truth is the only sane way to live. It is not that all things are likeable. However, if one greets all experiences with as much love as is possible, eventually one can look back and realize that regardless of circumstances, you have had nothing but loving experiences. And if "what goes around comes around," then love is the only sane way to live, since anything else will bring passages at one time and another where we choose to love or suffer.

And contrary to popular religious and cultural superstition, I do not believe that love and suffering go together. That’s just weird, and somewhat sado-masochistic. We can learn how to be loving in the face of suffering, and to paraphrase Ram Dass, we must learn how to break the link between pain and suffering. Life can be pretty painful, but we do not have to suffer.

There's nothing here on Earth that warrants us being in a non-loving state. Not all things are likeable, but we must choose to learn to love without the usual conditions. It’s that easy, and that difficult. But since only the body, feelings, and brain die, it’s not like there’s any other game in town. And to quote some very popular guys, "The love you take is equal to the love you make."

Comments

[Sonja]

Hi Robert,

I needed a reminder of the last Truth today as life has handed me some sticklers lately. The one thing that I try to remember beyond the three Truths above is "Don't take it personally," although that is probably a variation of the "What goes around, comes around". I read once (maybe in this blog) that insects are the karmic results of small non-loving thoughts. I find that now I smile when I see gnats and mosquitos -- more karma has burned up, Yea! -:)

As for the current sticklers, it's time to breathe and Love and Dance some more.....

[Robert]

Hi Sonja - Well, not taking things personally combines detachment and dispassion, so I suppose it's a combo of the first two truths. Yes, supposedly the insects that vex humanity are a product of too many unproductive thoughtforms from humanity's infancy. May they all be transmuted (whap!) through the grace of Lord Shiva the Recycler! And loving and breathing and loving and breathing and loving and dancing are very good things.

[cathetel]

May I suggest two more rules, though perhaps they are a subset of the first three.

4. There are multiple realms, overlapping, and interacting, though in this phase we rarely experience the others.

5. There is a governing Entity that unites all living parts into one whole, despite the illusion that we are separate. (This could be a subset of Rule 3).

cathetel.com

[Robert]

Hi cathetel - Well, you raise some interesting points. I would think that no. 4 is more a statement describing the field than human experience. Kind of like saying gravity works. That's a truth, but not necessarily confined to being a human truth. For example, the three Cosmic "Laws" governing our system are 1)Magnetic Attraction, 2)Economy of Energy, and 3)Synthesis. They apply to all of us, but are not necessarily "human" truths. I would think your no. 5 is a combination of all three Truths. The "governing entity" is that all that passes away is in fact part of a greater Wholeness. It is also that which ensures the ultimate outcome of any thing is related to that which was or was not done, the second "Human Truth." And of course, you're right in that the "governing entity" is Love, which we are told is an expression of the Law of Magnetic Attraction. Thanks for raising some very powerful concepts that will stretch the imagination of all who visit this thread.

[Felita]

Hi Robert and others,Through my experiences may I say that lack of trust is an obstacle to all these truths and we would trace this back to fear which would have created pain. AS we mature and release our former pains and suffer our fears to discover our obstacles to clarity then we would release Duhkha.Then the three truths would be our reality.
I believe there are many tools to removing our obstacles to clarity,Spiritually evolved astrologers like you Robert and others who venture this SIte are unveiling the pieces of this philosophy.We all need to know ourselves.Trust,to me and everyone is a big part of acceptance of these three truths in a natural way the rest of the time we are just trying.Although practise makes it easier. I like your explanation of Karma .My latest love is knowing that if i follow my heart and enjoy the good i do then good things will happen even if i cant recognise the extension or positive results i just continue to do this and looking back i can see much joy and clarity and growth that has been gained by what was tragedy and sometimes just minor calamity which was only an incorrecf perception as i was not clear.I am a better orator than a writer,You may have to read this out loud. I continue to enjoy the comments and am researching the archives to grasp more truths. Felita

[Robert]

Hi Felita - You're right that fear, being one of the four primal emotions, is the root cause of many types of suffering. Trust is born of knowledge and experience of the Wisdom, the Way, and the Community. As for karma, whether we see the good or not, when we generate love and compassion at least we're generating forms of positivity, or Bodhichitta, which is bound to have an altruistic effect.

[Svetlana]

Robert,this Truth-Trinity is really just around...I lost my dad on Transfiguration Day(in Orthodox church it is August,19) But I felt that the material you wrote earlier about your own,less natural and more unexpected loss,helped me.Thanks
As for Love as the governing Entity and expression of the Law of magnetic attraction I can add the words of an aquaintance of mine who wondered what the main name of God is and got an answer in meditation:It is Love!

[robyn]

I wouldn't be one to say that all forms "pass away" i would be more inclined to think that nothing is created nor destroyed, it merely transforms. (think science: gas, liquid, solid). We are of the elements, like everything in the universe. Everything is dynamic.

I think that your 2nd rule of truths should be something like we are all creators. Yet, I think that might be number 1 in my book. That "what goes around comes around" is the law of consequence to that truth. Love is also something we choose to create.

Maybe the 4th could be something like, we are all subject to the physicality of this world and all that is in it. But i'm sure that can be related to something else stated. Good topic... i'll be thinking about it for a while.

[Valerie]

Dear Robert,

How do I tie this in...I just had the happiest, most awesome time on 8/27, at a Jimmy Buffet concert (Jones Beach, L.I.,N.Y.) I was thinking of how friendly everyone was to eachother, sharing food and drink, being kind and courteous, celebrating life, dancing, singing along, etc. We made friends with total strangers on all sides. Of course, Jimmy Buffet and his wonderful backup band put on a great show, but I kept thinking how great the people were. I definitely believe in your 3 rules but I also think love is a self perpetuating condition. It's contagious. Maybe it's because until before the concert I had been alone for so much of the time, and then all those people in one place... and stationary Jupiter trine the sun? I have felt this way on many other occasions, just not lately. I'm still so jazzed, I think it will keep me on cloud nine for the next few weeks. I can't wipe the smile off my face. Love is all around. And I agree, the love you take is equal to the love you make! Rock on!

[Robert]

Hi Svetlana - First, my profound condolences on losing your dad. Still, your heart and his are joined through time, and this is when you get to experience a greater unconditional love. For sure "All-That-Is" could be described as Love Eternal in Its Infinite varieties.

Hi robyn - Perhaps if I elaborate on some things my statement will make more sense. All forms do pass away, being impermanent aggregates held together strongly or weakly by waxing or waning magnetism of one strength or another. That's why everything from concrete buildings to relationships to the cells in our bodies go through changes. Everything in this field of our apparent reality is a thought form. Whether our bodies, our relationships, our mental constructs, our emotional reactions, even our sense of a "Higher Self," ALL of these are impermanent. Thus they are temporary in whatever forms they take in this life or another, and will in fact pass away. There is no inherent "permanent" source of magnetic attraction in any "thing" able to be perceived by the 5 senses and the mind, since even our Sun will eventually wane in power and cease to exist. If there is no permanent sustaining power of attraction in any thing, then there can be no permanence in that thing. The process is dynamic, but there is no permanent sustainability in any form temporarily produced by that dynamic process. Perhaps the process is "permanent," at least in our system, but even that is conditional to this system.

We are not truly "creators," though we do participate in the process by shaping the temporary forms. We create NOTHING except temporary forms. "God," and only "God," aka "All-That-Is," is the only true creator. We did not create the infinite cosmos, the Sun, or butterfly wings. We did not create the atmosphere, ionosphere, or the principles governing magnetism and electricity. We create little beyond our own reactions to things. That is the 2nd "truth." The 2nd truth is an expression of the law of magnetic attraction, just as are the 1st and 3rd. All 3 of these also express the Law of Economy of Energy and the Law of Synthesis, but that's another whole article!

Love is not something we choose to create. It IS, and we choose to participate or not. Love is a Cosmic Principle that exists of its own regardless of how we choose to participate in or utilize that particular magnetic energy. What we call Love is known under other names in the higher meta-human realms of existence. And we are only subject to the physicality of the world in the sense that all physical forms pass away, we shape elements of the world's physicality by our thought forms by which the "Golden Rule" works itself out in forms through the Law of Magnetic Attraction, and we must learn to love without the conditions of the world's physicality interrupting that greater Love.

Hi Valerie - I saw Santana at Jones Beach and it's a great venue. Perfect place to have a great time communing with others. I believe that concerts have the capacity to create perfect incubators where we can come together in a larger experience of togetherness. That's why I did so much concert promotion in the 70s and 80s, from small intimate venues to 100,000+ person shows. In the music we lose our separateness, and are enveloped in a larger wave form we share with others. Appreciation, love, exhilaration, poignancy, hope, remembrance, and a thousand other sensations can be shared without explanation. The mind divides us as well as unites us, but the heart only unites. As per what I wrote above, Love simply IS, and is a condition of the greater field of Magnetic Attraction. It is why the planets stay in their orbits, the Sun stays in its relative position with Sirius, and all things can ultimately find the harmony of connectedness within their larger field of life. It's contagious, in that when we enter the field of Love we find others who also are participating in that field. Pleasure shared is pleasure doubled, as our old friend the I Ching states. Glad Jimmy could be the conduit for such great shared vibes. Love is in fact all around, and we can find it anywhere we look, even in the midst of uncertainty. It only takes a moment to go from isolatedness to connectedness, from the mind to the heart, and from form to essence. "What a marvelous night for a moondance...."

[Valerie]

Exactly!! and Jimmy does a nice rendition of Brown Eyed Girl...
Happy Birthday Van Morrison another one of my favs.

[robyn]

Well, i found your response very elaborate and forthcoming.
i do understand, i didn't mean that we were the God type creators beyond what is the Creator. What we do "create" per se, is our own reality among the greater forces that we live among. I think i contradicted myself in that statement as is were anyway.

what books do you read that i can get my hands on?

[robyn]

On a side note: I find that mostly all Cancers (like myself) or those with Moon or Venus are scared of emotions and/or commitment. It's like you have to slip it by them ... slowly, and even then they (we) are one of the most elusive of the zodiac. It's quite a contradiction.

[Robert]

Hi robyn - Well, I'd start with "Light on the Path/Through the Gates of Gold." by Mabel Collins. Then you can read "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Paramahansa Yogananda. Anything by the Dalai Lama and Ticht Nhat Hahn are also very good. All of the Alice Bailey material, as well as the Agni Yoga material, along with Manly P. Hall. "Occult Preparations for A New Age" by Dane Rudhyar is an extraordinary work (along with quite a few other books on our cultural crisis in learning to grow into galactic consciousness), and for excellence, absolutely anything by H.P. Blavatsky, if you can wade through them. It's major homework and not easy to digest due to her 1880s style and the profundity of the material. "The Key to Theosophy" and "The Voice of the Silence" are less voluminous than other works. "The Secret Doctrine" is source material. Anything by her student, pioneer feminist Annie Besant is good. Also the Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita, Dhammapada, and other venerable works, including meditating on the red letters. The I Ching is one of my best friends of many years. After you read whatever your heart's desire, email me and let me know where your head and heart are at, and I'll recommend others.

[Robyn]

i've decided to go along this path... for the time being. :)
Thought-Forms" by Annie Besant

Thank you Robert!

[Robert]

Hi Robyn - In an interesting coincidence, "Thought Forms" was the very first book that allowed me entrance to the Ageless Wisdom. Excellent choice!

[larissa]

Hi Robert - nicely said that love and suffering do not go together. It occurs often though, but I agree it is strange. LOve is a beautiful thing but if it makes you suffer - it is not love but something else, maybe jealosy, obsession and so on, insanity. I think.

[Robyn]

Robert, surely it must be my psychic intuition. i get in people's heads some how!

ha! i'll let you know how i interpret the book when i'm done....

[Valerie]

Robyn, may I humbly add you should read some Edgar Cayce material as well...There is a River, by Thomas Sugrue (I think) or anything on reincarnation (Many Mansions by Gina Cerminara).

And Cancer ladies are very psychic and intuitive! You know when the phone is going to ring... I've been like this all my life. It's scary sometimes but it can be great. You go, girl.

[franklin]

"Hi Robert - nicely said that love and suffering do not go together. It occurs often though, but I agree it is strange. LOve is a beautiful thing but if it makes you suffer - it is not love but something else, maybe jealosy, obsession and so on, insanity. I think."

There is one beatifull work of osho about this, he says:
Right now where you are love isnt only love, love is 1% love and 99% jealosy, obsession e etc...When you climb up the mountain of you spiritual growth you will notice you have hundred of ways but ultimateli all will lead in to love(think it as a mountain, it dosent matter where you start you will reach the same end)"

osho is very beatifull, I havent read these other writers but what I like most about osho is the ways he treats "bad" emotions, instead of saying you to represse he says: set them free only them you may love, something like that.

sorry for my english, long time no pratice.

[Robert]

Hi franklin - Well, I probably wouldn't do well composing in a foreign language, so as far as I'm concerned you're doing fine! You're right in that often what we believe is love is really a lesser form of desire and feeling. BUT! We ARE Love Eternal and Unconditional. It's the personality that confuses who we ARE with all the other strange learned emotions that are not helpful to anything or any one. And of course, in the process of remembering we're Unconditional Love we often get frustrated when the conditions of worldly love are taken away. However, I don't believe we should indulge unhelpful feelings, since a pattern is a pattern and getting into a habit of expressing unhelpful feelings usually only breeds more. The Buddhist training I've had over the years leads me to the view that we should observe with infinite dispassion and detachment the tendency of negativity, however it begins to arise, and then release it without making it into any form at all. Then the passions do not control us, nor even reside in us as something to be externalized, but only a prior tendency that isn't as strong as before.