Theos-Talk Archives (May 1997 Message tl00367)

> DSArthur offered a quote:
>
> >The cause of all suffering is the failure to have that which you
> >desire.
> >Therefore, desire nothing ... for that you may surely have.
>
> Kym wrote:
> I just leaned back, in a big, fluffy easy chair, and pictured the entire
> body of humanity practicing these particular words of wisdom from
> Nisargadatta Maharaj.
>
> The graven images of inertia were the centerpiece of every cave.

What you say is very, very true.  But to those who have known inertia all
their lives and desire nothing more, they have everything they desire and
are, therefore, happy, are they not?

The biggest problem with loss of desire is that it is an impossibility
due to our current circumstances and the way our bodies are made up.
Without desires, I see a world totally lacking of humans.  Humans exist
because they have the desire to live.  They have the desire to procreate.
To live, they must eat, and therefore desire food.  They need shelter, and
therefore desire their cave, or their house, or their apartment.  They
must drink, and therefore they desire water.  Not everyone can live next
to a lake or river, so they must desire a faucet.  Someone else had to
have the desire to invent that faucet, the irrigation system, etc.

This was good advice when 100 - 1000 people lived in every city.  When
things didn't have to be complex to serve the complexity of humanity.  I
don't think that the idea anymore is to get rid of desire altogether, but
to get rid of the desires that only waste one's time.  The desire to smoke
a cigarette, (which I do...) the desire to drink wine, (which I
occasionally do) the desire to own little pewter(sp?) images of cats and
dogs and unicorns, the desire to look pretty, the desire for the things
that are pretty, the desire for lakefront property, for a huge bank
account.  All these things are fairly unnessecary(I sware I can't spell
today *laugh* (sware?) ) for our survival.

I think the idea is to find out which desires we have are really important
to our existence and to our evolution, and which ones are just a fancy.

---
Jaqi.