This week the @ecotrain chuggs deep into the forest as we delve into a loaded question that is sure to bring up a lot of feelings. The Question "Why do bad things happen", as opposed to, "If there is a God, why do bad things happen" is very different. If there is a God, implies the deeper question of, "If there is a God how could s/he let bad things happen?" Is that not what this question asks?! This is a topic that we discussed in school many years ago, when pondering how God could have let the Holocaust happen, and how and why in general there is so much suffering in the world. If there is a God then why the heck isn't everything beautiful and perfect all of the time? Why would God want us to suffer? These are the questions that I will delve into and more on my answer to this question of the week!

WHAT IF....

What if you were free?
To Choose for yourself,
Whatever You wanted?

What would you choose?

F R E E D O M ?

A fREE wILL unIVERse?

DUALITY!

Would you want to be a slave?

Would you choose to be good or be bad?

iS THere such a thing as too much freedom?

Are we the right ones to judge Gods parenting skills?

Ok so many questions I know? I mean does God even exist in the first place.. That is a very important part of this question, and somewhat implied by it.. SO i will get to that later ... The last question I just wrote, "are we the ones to judge Gods parenting skills" is a good question to ask I think. Many of us are parents, and we do for our children what we feel they need and is in there best interests. I'm sure as a child I questioned some of the punishments I received, and from my child’s perspective it seems like they are so wrong for doing the things they did. As parents though, when we look down at our children who are crying and screaming, and they are saying that we are SO mean that we don't let them have another chocolate ice-cream ... we know as parents that whilst we do give our children freedom, we also guide them toward their long term needs and health.. even if that means a bit of tough love sometimes. So, ultimately if you do believe in God and want to read the short answer then you really need read no further! If you do believe in God then all you need to focus on is your love for God and being surrendered to life. That is enough because the philosophical question of why God does allow so much suffering in the world is one that takes quite some thought and soul searching.

If you are cosmically minded, like I am, you may understand that not only is this Universe seemingly infinite, but that there are also infinite universes existing. We live in one universe of an infinite number of them, and this Universe has some very special features! One of the most unique features of this Universe is the notion of free will. Whilst we may take it for granted, we are all born with free will, and choose to exercise it or not according to our will power. Some people with very strong will power are able to dominate and shape our world, and others become victims in a dualistic world. I say dualistic because that is a second very special feature of our universe! We live in total duality, and we can find it from the very smallest of things to the very largest. Where there is Good there will be bad, where there is happiness there will be sadness, where there is light there will be dark. We live as male and females, and have a sun and a moon, and earth an a sky. Our entire consciounses is built upon the foundations of duality and that pervades this entire universe. What we do here, the opposite happens there. To really understand this we have to take a lesson in either metaphysics, or religion. If you study religion then you can learn this Universal Truth by understanding Karma. Karma is built right into the Universe, and is the way in which balance is kept in the world. It is not just about good and bad, but more fundamentally about creating and maintaining balance in the smallest things to the biggest things. In the bible it states "an eye for an eye", and I believe it is talking about Karma. This is a very easy way to understand why so many bad things happen in the world.

According to the law of Karma, it would be fair to say that approximately 50% of things that happen are bad! Not always of course, and it depends where you are looking. But do you start to see my point? We LIVE in a dualistic world and so we will always have bad things happen, and equally will also have good things happen. What really shapes our view of reality is our perspective, and our character. Learning to see the glass half full or half empty may shift ones view of the world entirely.. What IF, for example, this question was titled, Why is there so much Good in the world? Just by asking a different question we can shift our whole view of things. We are subtle beings, with very flexible minds, and we are not always well placed to really say what is right or wrong, good or bad. We are all like little children dancing around on the stage of life.. playing our part in a divine play.. and most of us don't even realise we are on the stage! The curtains will close, and we will remember so much more about the world, the universe, and our place in it.

Have you ever noticed how you can tell a story about a pretty terrible past event that may have happened years ago, and you are able to do so, at least sometimes, with a smile, maybe even a laugh? When we look back on things just a short few years ago, they seem almost laughable today. We may even laugh at ourselves for how angry or upset we got in the heat of the moment. It is with time and perspective that we can learn to see things in a different light. So, perhaps it is the same with why God would allow so many bad things to happen here on earth. What seems so terrible to us, is but a fleeting moment in the eternity of all that is.. and who knows what great lessons and teachings we are learning whilst playing our part in this divine play.

So, as for whether there is a God, that is the question only you can answer for yourselves. God only knows the answer to that! One thing is for sure, which is that something or someone created this incredible world, and that someone has a greater intelligence or power than I can even imagine or conceive of. Maybe we are just a part of a great cosmic experiment. Maybe that is what life is, just a very grand experiment on ourSElf. I believe that God created this entire universe to learn more about Love.

When you are Love, and love itself, and only love, you can not know what you are. When you are only pure divine love, it is timeless and it is silent. This dualistic world was created because the way to learn what Love is, is to experience what Love is not. To understand what kindness is, we have to witness meanness and selfishness. To appreciate what Love is, we have to have tasted hate. The more we expand one, we expand the other as duality is always polarised. The more happiness you experience, the more and deeper the sadness you will know as well. This is life, and this is why we are here. It is not always so terrible that bad things happen. What is terrible is when suffering happens. We can avoid the majority of suffering in our lives through surrender or detachment, which is simply accepting the inevitability of there being good and bad, and experiencing them without needing or rejecting either.

 

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