Diminishing Ripples – Thinking it through. . .
Here’s a thought. We need to pursue the idea that we can “peel the onion” of our belief systems to clasify the core.
As a stone in the pond produces a diminishing strength of ripples, so also, our beliefs produce ripples that radiate out from our core of absolutes. We do what we believe! These absolutes extend to our feelings, preferences, changing opinions and even cultural norms.
It is my desire to move more and more toward a Centered Life and therefore seek to establish and increasingly solidify the core. I believe that such a life is an expression of our absolutes and must be stable, unwavering in its foundations, confident in its basic premise of existence and growing in the revelation of purpose and destiny. A Centered Life begins with believing that such a life is possible!
The question, I believe, is this; “What do I hold to?” Am I trying to build on conflicting beliefs? If so, what are they and how can I see them? Can a centered life be based on a weak foundation of truth? How, then, can I make decisions that result in a more centered life? Considering the question, “What kind of person am I?” will assist in beginning to define your base. Are you the kind of person with absolutes derived from the reality that “there is someone out there” or the kind that believes that “you are all alone and everything is an accident?”
The ripples from your core of absolutes will either bring a greater security in life or produce diminishing ripples of confidence.
So I’ll begin with the core, our absolutes. These are the things that I believe which are considered total and unequivocal. Beliefs held with no doubt of misinterpretation. We all have these beliefs, even if we conclude negatively that truth is relative and there are “absolutely no absolutes!” If a belief is held that there is “no one out there,” the result then is a life that cannot be centered due to the resulting instability from the fear that we are all alone and the hollow feeling that nothing really matters.
We need to be aware of the diminishing ripples of certainty, the layers of our beliefs. It is an important awareness because we attempt to reason and make our choices based on the light that we have. These processes define our conclusions and establish our deductions. They are drawn from our narrow windows of truth and life experiences. I love the humility and enlightenment from the quote attributed to Albert Einstein,
“The ever lengthening diameter of my knowledge only reveals the circumference of that which I do not know.”
In other words, we must realize that our deductions are always changing as we grow and learn and experience life. Some have, unfortunately, stopped growing and learning a long time ago. These continue in misdiagnosed conclusions and conflicting beliefs.
The next layer is even more ambiguous, our interpretations. As with the previous layer of our deductions, this layer is determined by the lenses we are currently looking through, our perceptions of life, of truth and reality. If your life is not centered, then I suggest that maybe you need a new prescriptions for your lenses on life.
jc
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