One of the greatest challenges facing us on our journeys to achieve enlightenment is anger. We seem unable to control it. There's always something happening to provoke a sudden surge of anger from us. Even the small, innocuous, almost unnoticed acts by others can cause us to become suddenly aroused with anger. Anger is one of the most difficult emotions facing us on our journeys.
Whenever someone does anything we believe infringes on our freedoms to express power, we don't like it. We become angry; ready to defend our human sovereignty. This is the type of behavior that comes from our ignorance about enlightenment and happiness. It's not the same, yet it is in a certain sense, as the dreaded ignorance we all dislike. Most of us will not only become angry, but we will rise to the level of taking action against anyone who says we are ignorant.
By being ignorant of enlightenment is not something we should feel ashamed about. All of us are ignorant of enlightenment and happiness until we clear away all the victim beliefs of powerlessness. After all, when we think about it, we have been angry for most of our lives. We were angry even as little children, as teenagers, and as adults we are still angry. Unfortunately, some of us have been conditioned by our environments and cultures to live with anger. We are the children of anger.
It seems that wherever we turn, we see anger spewing from television pundits, politicians, spiritual leaders, and even from the everyday people we meet in grocery, retail, and shopping malls. Anger is all around us. And it's here because of us. And until we recognize it's in us and do something about removing it, we will always be angry. Fortunately, we can do something to overcome our anger. We can transform our thoughts to seek enlightenment.
Similarly, the moment we decide to seek enlightenment is the moment we desire to achieve happiness in our lives. The goal of happiness is inextricably tied to the goal of enlightenment. We cannot have one without the other. This means to achieve either one, we must first understand why we're angry. And to understand our angry, we must first begin the self-discovery process. It is from self-discovery -- the self-evaluation of the cause and effect of our behavior -- where we discover the nexus between anger and our beliefs.
There are some of us who are proponents of happiness and enlightenment. We believe it is the goal of all humans. We believe pure happiness provides us with the freedom to live empowered lives. We believe that there is a way of life beyond the pain and suffering we have endured for must of our lives. And we do so because of the brief moments of happiness we have experienced throughout our lives. This is not to be confused with the joy and pleasure we feel from external things and people. It's what we feel when we experience the completeness of being fulfilled by prayer and meditation.
Similarly, there are many others who believe that enlightenment and happiness can only be achieved when we're no longer human. Accordingly, the goal of enlightenment and happiness is to prepare ourselves to experience it in the afterlife. However, they believe we should work diligently to live virtuous and happy lives while we are here. This means we should treat people with kindness, love, and respect. The happy, commodious life is the goal for all of us.
Nevertheless, regardless to which viewpoint we choose, they both require us to remove the anger from our lives. And to do this, we need some tools to assist us.
We can begin the work by imagining what our lives would be like if we were not angry. While in a blissful, angry free state of awareness, we can imagine ourselves acting calmly as drivers give us the finger as they abruptly cut in front of us on the freeway. There would be no anger, just acceptance without attachments. We can imagine ourselves unaffected by the gossip and criticism from relatives, friends, spouses, and colleagues. There's no anger, just acceptance without attachments.
Moreover, we can imagine ourselves free of anger whenever someone makes a disparaging comment about how we look, or about our race, gender, and religion. Nor would we become angry because of what someone on the world stage did or said that was against our beliefs. There's no anger, just acceptance without attachments.
After we finish imagining, we soon realize that imagining and reality are necessarily congruent with each other. And we must now fight to maintain our commitment to enlightenment in spite of what we believe is happening to us and our perceptions of the illusions we have created in the world. We must begin to cultivate our imaginations and synchronize them with the new realities we are creating from our behavior. In other words, we must create a new oasis of happiness from the anger we are currently experiencing in our lives.
The more intense the anger, the greater resolve we must have to enlightenment. This is very important to those of us who were born into angry environments festering with violence and poverty. We tend to express the most intense anger toward ourselves and everyone that looks like us. We are angry nearly all the time. We despise our living conditions, while envying others who have what we desire to possess. And regardless to how we try to conceal our anger, it's still there, deep within us, waiting on the opportunity to spring forth with a vengeance.
Meanwhile, there are some of us who believe we can transform our thinking even while living in the midst of great despair and anger. We are the enlightenment-seekers working to transform our victimized minds into ones that enrich our lives with enlightenment and happiness. We are working to express our visions so others can see there are other options from which they can choose. In other words, we can do something about the anger we feel in our lives.
As enlightenment-seekers we are working to free ourselves from attachments to all dogma. We are committed to overcoming the beliefs that cause anger in our lives. We are working to do all that we can to achieve enlightenment while we are here on this planet. We want our lives to have meaning and purpose in the present time. And for our visions to be clear and powerful. We desire to have eyes that can see and ears that can hear the silent and peaceful thoughts of enlightenment guiding us on our journeys.
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