The primary metaphysical assumption: Is one Spirit or Matter
Metaphysics define our base assumptions of reality.
Even if one does not understand the meaning of metaphysics, one still lives according to certain metaphysical assumptions. In the Matrix movie, Neo lives in the matrix assuming that it is 'reality' - until he takes the red pill and is made to see that his previous metaphysical assumption was wrong. And how miraculous a change took place when his assumption changed! Suddenly, Neo could do apparent miracles in the Matrix reality, with the laws of physics and time/space losing all meaning. Metaphysical assumptions determine how one believes reality works, how reality is experienced, how it is lived.
The 'problem' of suffering or the "solution" of perfect happiness can be explored through examining the mind-matter metaphysical assumption:
On the mind-matter spectrum, there is materialism on one end and idealism on the other. The majority of people seem to possess metaphysical assumptions that lie somewhere inbetween;
Materialism is the belief/assumption that everything is derived from matter, including consciousness, and there is an objective, material world with specific causes and effects derived from matter. So for instance, disease and illness are caused by specific viruses or bacteria, that certain foods are objectively 'healthy' and other foods are objectively 'unhealthy', that the physical brain is entirely responsible for creating consciousness and then when it disintegrates, consciousness simply fades. That wars and plagues and disasters are really caused by certain events and people, and that had those specific factors (say Hitler and WW2) not existed, the 'bad things' would not have happened. Science, of course, only matters and can be done if there is indeed an objective, material existence.
Idealism believes/assumes that everything is a mental projection of consciousness, a figment of the mind, and that everything is 'subjective' - subject to what the mind believes. So disease and illness are not really caused by particular viruses or bacteria, but by the belief that these viruses and bacteria do cause disease/ illness, that foods are simply neutral symbols with as much 'healthy' and 'unhealthy' effects as we project onto them, that the entire physical world, body, brain is simply a projection of consciousness. So, there will always be new wars to fight, new diseases that crop up, new disasters as long as the mind is still projecting these painful and conflicted states; and the end of all conflict once the Mind is at total peace. Science is only as meaningful as the meaning our minds give it.
***
In spiritual teachings, the juxtaposition of mind vs matter is often illustrated with the question 'do you believe you are a spirit or body'. For the belief that one is a body would lead to beliefs, actions and behaviors very different from the belief that one is spirit.
If one is body, then all their perceived physical needs are very real and meaningful. Food, water, air, sleep, physical pleasures, comforts, etc. Since the body is one all has, then the material world is of utmost significance as that is literally all that matters. Since there is only the existence of the physical body, a child is deemed young and an elderly person old. Once a child is born, they must begin preparing to support the physical needs of themselves and those around them since physical survival is of utmost importance. There is an obvious need to prolong one's physical existence since that is all one has. So there is a great drive and obsession towards pursuing things like good grades, educational degrees, good jobs, and little time can be wasted on fun and play except to reach that perfect balance where 'fun and play' in some way aids ones ability to prolong one's physical existence. So one has fun, hobbies, play, not really for the sake of itself, but because in some way it 'aids' one's ability to remain as a functional body.
If one is spirit, then all perceived needs of the body are meaningless. The body is just made up by the spirit, much like the avatars people create in games. Food, water, air, etc are all only as meaningful as the meaning the Mind gives, or the coder programs it to have. Chronological age of the body does not indicate the age/maturity of the spirit (so children that appear to be wise beyond their years and childish adults). And whilst there may be a desire to care for one's avatar, ultimately the birth or loss of the avatar has no real meaning. And truly, to support the body requires no real food, water, sleep or all the material projections made up by the spirit, but simply the desire to do so. For instance, Jesus would not need any food and water to live as a body since his mind was so clear in the knowledge that he was spirit, as was Neo that he was in a matrix (Morpheus and Trinity could not free their minds as far as Neo). Thus, for one that knows they are spirit, the entire rat race is a truly meaningless and futile distraction to no end. The only thing that would matter is what brings Joy, and so all would be done for Joy.
If there is an objective, material world, then one must take care to be knowledgeable about all the various causes and effects of matter. So "unhealthy" foods, habits, behaviors (smoking, drinking, sugar, salt, drugs) must be avoided and "healthy" ones pursued (exercise, dieting, vegetables, etc). One has to defend themselves from all sorts of threats and dangers, seek security in all manner of defenses (inhibition, repression, suppression, violence, aggression). Paranoia and 'pragmatism' is but a matter of degree. The idea of insurance is entirely predicated upon the belief that what happens to the body is to be feared, and that one must insure and protect their bodies. Material wealth becomes extremely important since they unlock material pleasures and enable one to prolong their physical existence.
If the material world is but a projection of Spirit, then one needs to no longer concern themselves with the apparent 'real-ity' of objects in the material world. So no attention needs be paid to what types of food one should avoid or consume, no care is given for insurance (for what is there to insure against but the projections of one's mind?), or what activities one should be doing, what accomplishment one should have, what defenses one must construct around themselves to defend their self-body-image. Material wealth is given no importance because everything is recognised to be a projection of the mind, so the attainment of even material comforts or pleasures or items does not even depend on money, but on mind.
When one identifies with the body, then great significance and meaning is invested into material objects and symbols. So the usual idols of money, status, fame, sex, objects, etc, all of which have something to do with the body-image are given great meaning. Guys are deemed superficial because they prioritise physical looks of attractive-looking girls, whilst girls are deemed materialistic because they prize the sense of security a resourceful guy can provide. Both are only acting out their belief systems that invest meaning in the body and material. If someone calls a body-image ugly or stupid or something negative, that insult is taken seriously because it seems that there is a very real attack from a very real, separate source attacking a very real body-image.
One that identifies as Spirit recognises that whatever apparent pleasure or pain associated with material objects are but projections of the mind. By themselves, the idols are entirely neutral, and have their meaning and effects projected upon them. Money is not the root of evil nor is it a great prize, much less does it have any power to corrupt (the root of 'corruption' is the identification with the body which causes meaning to be invested onto all the other false idols). Nor is sex, or fame, or romantic love. When an attack is apparently 'launched' onto a particular body-image, the attack is seen as a projection of an unconscious self-hatred of the mind, just as one recognizes that dream characters do not really possess an independent existence that can 'attack' the body-image of the dreamer. So instead of looking to defend oneself from that apparent 'attack', one see and recognises it as unconscious self-hatred of the dreaming mind being played out.
With body-identification, there appears to be a separate, objective world with independent causes and effects operating in a linear-time relationship that one has to actively participate in before the time between birth and death runs out. So there is the sense that the body-image must independently 'do' something to get a certain outcome. So to make friends, one has to deliberately look for them. 'Effort' must be 'made' to 'build' or 'maintain' relationships. Jobs and opportunities must be 'actively' sought for and plans must be actively made for things to get done, the future to be planned for and taken care of. Seeing the external world as causal, it appears that there are 'opportunities' one could have missed, 'accidents' one could have avoided, 'lucky breaks' that happen. If only one had done this or that, that one must do this or that in order to-. So one checks their phone or emails obsessively, or think in circles trying to figure out just the right thing to say or do (which never ever works out), or creating fantastical narratives hoping that it will play out, or replaying endless past possibilities of what could have been. One apparently has a certain, limited time period to gather as much resources as one can before retiring, or a limited amount of time to 'see the world', to 'have fun', to 'do certain things', etc, and that once that time has passed, is used up, is no longer, one can only look back and reminise on what was, what could have been. And then one dies.
As Spirit, since the world is only a reflection of one's state of mind, the mind is the true cause and the world is only the effect. Thus, outward behavior is an effect of one's inner state. So rather than looking for love in order to be loved or looking for friendships to feel fulfilled, one sees that a loving person attracts external symbols of love, and a fulfilled person brings about friendships that wish to share the fulfillment. External behavior and effort exerted onto the world is seen as meaningless because the world is not the cause but the effect. So there are absolutely no accidents, no lucky breaks, no 'missed' opportunities. Whatever happened, happened and was always going to happen because one's state of mind only allowed that to happen. One got 'lucky' because they were in the right-mind, and 'unlucky' because they were in wrong-mind. Whatever is meant to be will be because all can only be a reflection of the Mind. Personally, every friend I have, i have never tried to make them into one, and every person i tried to make a friend, either did not become one, or did not become one as a result of me needing/ trying hard to make them one. There is no longer a sense of 'time ticking' or 'time running out', or any worries about the future or retirement, or regrets about the past, or angst/anxiety about the past being gone, because Spirit is timeless and eternal and anything and everything can be played out over again. Literally, the only reality is the eternal Now which can be 'replayed' infinitely for eternity. The body doesn't even 'die' in any sense, but simply the mind stops projecting the body, like how a mind wakes up from a dream.
***
A materialist explanation of idealism:
Even from a materialist standpoint, a pseudo-Idealism can be argued quite convincingly. Everything the body perceives is actually made up of electrical signals sent by the nervous system to the brain. So everything in one's perception is literally an interpretation of electric signals. One can literally change the world in their perception if they knew how to adjust the way electric signals are interpreted in the brain. There is not really an 'objective' way things are or look; a colorblind person *objectively* perceives something only in his colorblind terms, as does a blind person *objectively* only perceives non-sighted signals. Ultimately, everything is an interpretation of the brain-mind.
False idols of money, fame, status, sex, pleasures, etc only have any meaning because of the emotional feelings/ states they bring us. Say if having sex was as painful as stepping on legos, sex would be a painful experience to be avoided. If having money made one extremely depressed, being rich would not be sought after. But what are emotional states, but the chemicals produced by our own bodies? So our bodies literally produce all the emotional states we seek and avoid, the pleasures and pains we experience and project onto the objects and idols in our experience. To be more specific, our brain-mind produces all these emotional states.
***
It seems obvious that the more one moves towards the extreme-Mind-Idealism end, the lighter, more joyful, adventure fairy-tale like quality one's life takes on. Because the body is so fragile, so impermanent, so object-ive, to be identified with the body-image naturally invites a sense of fear, vulnerability, scarcity, and objectification of oneself and the world. Time is very real and meaningful to the body, since it only has an apparent temporary existence between birth and death.
In Spirit, there is no worry, no stress, no planning, no fear. Perfect Joy is seen to be a quality of Being and not of the world. All Spirit has to be happy is to recognise itself as itself and not the body. The cause of pain and suffering is its identification with the body-image which causes it to feel separate and alienated from God/Existence, to feel alone, vulnerable, frail.
How does one move away from body-identification to Spirit? For unless one is a spiritual genius like Neo, just recognizing the (un)reality of the matrix alone does not enable one to fully and totally divest belief of the matrix.
A persistent spiritual practice is necessary, for there are both insight and practice aspects to spirituality. An insight/ realisation enables one to perceive the unreality of the matrix, and consistent practice of the insight enables to mind to realse all its false belief in the matrix.
Whenever pain is experienced, the conditioned response is to blame the world, the body, other bodies as long as there is belief in the body. But when one acknowledges that all is mind-projection, every apparent attack is recognized as a projection of the hostility within the dreaming mind that has dreamt up such an attack. Until one is fully healed of the body-idenfication, one must trust in the Spirit to guide one towards healing. For those with fully healed minds that perceive the unreality of the world like Jesus and Neo, they can indeed defy all the apparent laws of physics, nutrition, economics, etc, stop bullets in their tracks, turn water into wine, feed thousands with a single loaf. But until we are able to do as Jesus proclaimed
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father."
we can recognise the unreality of our beliefs in the world of causes and yet go along with them until they are gently released. So as long as i feel hungry and thirsty, despite acknowledging that the real cause is in the mind, I still eat and drink in the trust that i will be guided towards the Spirit for whole healing. When an apparent attack on the body-image occurs, and an emotional impulse to lash out at the world arises, even if the emotional reaction cannot be fully curbed, i can yet still reflect and see the unreality of my own reactions. When pain, or conflict, or apparent problems arise, I do not seek external solutions unless guided to them. And guidance usually comes in a gentle, obvious, often serendipitious manner.
Behavior and circumstance can only be a product of our state of mind. Thus Jesus proclaimed;
"But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you"
If the world is a projection of the mind, one must first seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness (the state of Being, Spirit, the right-thinking, the right state of mind), and the world MUST follow and reflect the righteous mind.
Even if one does not understand the meaning of metaphysics, one still lives according to certain metaphysical assumptions. In the Matrix movie, Neo lives in the matrix assuming that it is 'reality' - until he takes the red pill and is made to see that his previous metaphysical assumption was wrong. And how miraculous a change took place when his assumption changed! Suddenly, Neo could do apparent miracles in the Matrix reality, with the laws of physics and time/space losing all meaning. Metaphysical assumptions determine how one believes reality works, how reality is experienced, how it is lived.
The 'problem' of suffering or the "solution" of perfect happiness can be explored through examining the mind-matter metaphysical assumption:
On the mind-matter spectrum, there is materialism on one end and idealism on the other. The majority of people seem to possess metaphysical assumptions that lie somewhere inbetween;
Materialism is the belief/assumption that everything is derived from matter, including consciousness, and there is an objective, material world with specific causes and effects derived from matter. So for instance, disease and illness are caused by specific viruses or bacteria, that certain foods are objectively 'healthy' and other foods are objectively 'unhealthy', that the physical brain is entirely responsible for creating consciousness and then when it disintegrates, consciousness simply fades. That wars and plagues and disasters are really caused by certain events and people, and that had those specific factors (say Hitler and WW2) not existed, the 'bad things' would not have happened. Science, of course, only matters and can be done if there is indeed an objective, material existence.
Idealism believes/assumes that everything is a mental projection of consciousness, a figment of the mind, and that everything is 'subjective' - subject to what the mind believes. So disease and illness are not really caused by particular viruses or bacteria, but by the belief that these viruses and bacteria do cause disease/ illness, that foods are simply neutral symbols with as much 'healthy' and 'unhealthy' effects as we project onto them, that the entire physical world, body, brain is simply a projection of consciousness. So, there will always be new wars to fight, new diseases that crop up, new disasters as long as the mind is still projecting these painful and conflicted states; and the end of all conflict once the Mind is at total peace. Science is only as meaningful as the meaning our minds give it.
***
In spiritual teachings, the juxtaposition of mind vs matter is often illustrated with the question 'do you believe you are a spirit or body'. For the belief that one is a body would lead to beliefs, actions and behaviors very different from the belief that one is spirit.
If one is body, then all their perceived physical needs are very real and meaningful. Food, water, air, sleep, physical pleasures, comforts, etc. Since the body is one all has, then the material world is of utmost significance as that is literally all that matters. Since there is only the existence of the physical body, a child is deemed young and an elderly person old. Once a child is born, they must begin preparing to support the physical needs of themselves and those around them since physical survival is of utmost importance. There is an obvious need to prolong one's physical existence since that is all one has. So there is a great drive and obsession towards pursuing things like good grades, educational degrees, good jobs, and little time can be wasted on fun and play except to reach that perfect balance where 'fun and play' in some way aids ones ability to prolong one's physical existence. So one has fun, hobbies, play, not really for the sake of itself, but because in some way it 'aids' one's ability to remain as a functional body.
If one is spirit, then all perceived needs of the body are meaningless. The body is just made up by the spirit, much like the avatars people create in games. Food, water, air, etc are all only as meaningful as the meaning the Mind gives, or the coder programs it to have. Chronological age of the body does not indicate the age/maturity of the spirit (so children that appear to be wise beyond their years and childish adults). And whilst there may be a desire to care for one's avatar, ultimately the birth or loss of the avatar has no real meaning. And truly, to support the body requires no real food, water, sleep or all the material projections made up by the spirit, but simply the desire to do so. For instance, Jesus would not need any food and water to live as a body since his mind was so clear in the knowledge that he was spirit, as was Neo that he was in a matrix (Morpheus and Trinity could not free their minds as far as Neo). Thus, for one that knows they are spirit, the entire rat race is a truly meaningless and futile distraction to no end. The only thing that would matter is what brings Joy, and so all would be done for Joy.
If there is an objective, material world, then one must take care to be knowledgeable about all the various causes and effects of matter. So "unhealthy" foods, habits, behaviors (smoking, drinking, sugar, salt, drugs) must be avoided and "healthy" ones pursued (exercise, dieting, vegetables, etc). One has to defend themselves from all sorts of threats and dangers, seek security in all manner of defenses (inhibition, repression, suppression, violence, aggression). Paranoia and 'pragmatism' is but a matter of degree. The idea of insurance is entirely predicated upon the belief that what happens to the body is to be feared, and that one must insure and protect their bodies. Material wealth becomes extremely important since they unlock material pleasures and enable one to prolong their physical existence.
If the material world is but a projection of Spirit, then one needs to no longer concern themselves with the apparent 'real-ity' of objects in the material world. So no attention needs be paid to what types of food one should avoid or consume, no care is given for insurance (for what is there to insure against but the projections of one's mind?), or what activities one should be doing, what accomplishment one should have, what defenses one must construct around themselves to defend their self-body-image. Material wealth is given no importance because everything is recognised to be a projection of the mind, so the attainment of even material comforts or pleasures or items does not even depend on money, but on mind.
When one identifies with the body, then great significance and meaning is invested into material objects and symbols. So the usual idols of money, status, fame, sex, objects, etc, all of which have something to do with the body-image are given great meaning. Guys are deemed superficial because they prioritise physical looks of attractive-looking girls, whilst girls are deemed materialistic because they prize the sense of security a resourceful guy can provide. Both are only acting out their belief systems that invest meaning in the body and material. If someone calls a body-image ugly or stupid or something negative, that insult is taken seriously because it seems that there is a very real attack from a very real, separate source attacking a very real body-image.
One that identifies as Spirit recognises that whatever apparent pleasure or pain associated with material objects are but projections of the mind. By themselves, the idols are entirely neutral, and have their meaning and effects projected upon them. Money is not the root of evil nor is it a great prize, much less does it have any power to corrupt (the root of 'corruption' is the identification with the body which causes meaning to be invested onto all the other false idols). Nor is sex, or fame, or romantic love. When an attack is apparently 'launched' onto a particular body-image, the attack is seen as a projection of an unconscious self-hatred of the mind, just as one recognizes that dream characters do not really possess an independent existence that can 'attack' the body-image of the dreamer. So instead of looking to defend oneself from that apparent 'attack', one see and recognises it as unconscious self-hatred of the dreaming mind being played out.
With body-identification, there appears to be a separate, objective world with independent causes and effects operating in a linear-time relationship that one has to actively participate in before the time between birth and death runs out. So there is the sense that the body-image must independently 'do' something to get a certain outcome. So to make friends, one has to deliberately look for them. 'Effort' must be 'made' to 'build' or 'maintain' relationships. Jobs and opportunities must be 'actively' sought for and plans must be actively made for things to get done, the future to be planned for and taken care of. Seeing the external world as causal, it appears that there are 'opportunities' one could have missed, 'accidents' one could have avoided, 'lucky breaks' that happen. If only one had done this or that, that one must do this or that in order to-. So one checks their phone or emails obsessively, or think in circles trying to figure out just the right thing to say or do (which never ever works out), or creating fantastical narratives hoping that it will play out, or replaying endless past possibilities of what could have been. One apparently has a certain, limited time period to gather as much resources as one can before retiring, or a limited amount of time to 'see the world', to 'have fun', to 'do certain things', etc, and that once that time has passed, is used up, is no longer, one can only look back and reminise on what was, what could have been. And then one dies.
As Spirit, since the world is only a reflection of one's state of mind, the mind is the true cause and the world is only the effect. Thus, outward behavior is an effect of one's inner state. So rather than looking for love in order to be loved or looking for friendships to feel fulfilled, one sees that a loving person attracts external symbols of love, and a fulfilled person brings about friendships that wish to share the fulfillment. External behavior and effort exerted onto the world is seen as meaningless because the world is not the cause but the effect. So there are absolutely no accidents, no lucky breaks, no 'missed' opportunities. Whatever happened, happened and was always going to happen because one's state of mind only allowed that to happen. One got 'lucky' because they were in the right-mind, and 'unlucky' because they were in wrong-mind. Whatever is meant to be will be because all can only be a reflection of the Mind. Personally, every friend I have, i have never tried to make them into one, and every person i tried to make a friend, either did not become one, or did not become one as a result of me needing/ trying hard to make them one. There is no longer a sense of 'time ticking' or 'time running out', or any worries about the future or retirement, or regrets about the past, or angst/anxiety about the past being gone, because Spirit is timeless and eternal and anything and everything can be played out over again. Literally, the only reality is the eternal Now which can be 'replayed' infinitely for eternity. The body doesn't even 'die' in any sense, but simply the mind stops projecting the body, like how a mind wakes up from a dream.
***
A materialist explanation of idealism:
Even from a materialist standpoint, a pseudo-Idealism can be argued quite convincingly. Everything the body perceives is actually made up of electrical signals sent by the nervous system to the brain. So everything in one's perception is literally an interpretation of electric signals. One can literally change the world in their perception if they knew how to adjust the way electric signals are interpreted in the brain. There is not really an 'objective' way things are or look; a colorblind person *objectively* perceives something only in his colorblind terms, as does a blind person *objectively* only perceives non-sighted signals. Ultimately, everything is an interpretation of the brain-mind.
False idols of money, fame, status, sex, pleasures, etc only have any meaning because of the emotional feelings/ states they bring us. Say if having sex was as painful as stepping on legos, sex would be a painful experience to be avoided. If having money made one extremely depressed, being rich would not be sought after. But what are emotional states, but the chemicals produced by our own bodies? So our bodies literally produce all the emotional states we seek and avoid, the pleasures and pains we experience and project onto the objects and idols in our experience. To be more specific, our brain-mind produces all these emotional states.
***
It seems obvious that the more one moves towards the extreme-Mind-Idealism end, the lighter, more joyful, adventure fairy-tale like quality one's life takes on. Because the body is so fragile, so impermanent, so object-ive, to be identified with the body-image naturally invites a sense of fear, vulnerability, scarcity, and objectification of oneself and the world. Time is very real and meaningful to the body, since it only has an apparent temporary existence between birth and death.
In Spirit, there is no worry, no stress, no planning, no fear. Perfect Joy is seen to be a quality of Being and not of the world. All Spirit has to be happy is to recognise itself as itself and not the body. The cause of pain and suffering is its identification with the body-image which causes it to feel separate and alienated from God/Existence, to feel alone, vulnerable, frail.
How does one move away from body-identification to Spirit? For unless one is a spiritual genius like Neo, just recognizing the (un)reality of the matrix alone does not enable one to fully and totally divest belief of the matrix.
A persistent spiritual practice is necessary, for there are both insight and practice aspects to spirituality. An insight/ realisation enables one to perceive the unreality of the matrix, and consistent practice of the insight enables to mind to realse all its false belief in the matrix.
Whenever pain is experienced, the conditioned response is to blame the world, the body, other bodies as long as there is belief in the body. But when one acknowledges that all is mind-projection, every apparent attack is recognized as a projection of the hostility within the dreaming mind that has dreamt up such an attack. Until one is fully healed of the body-idenfication, one must trust in the Spirit to guide one towards healing. For those with fully healed minds that perceive the unreality of the world like Jesus and Neo, they can indeed defy all the apparent laws of physics, nutrition, economics, etc, stop bullets in their tracks, turn water into wine, feed thousands with a single loaf. But until we are able to do as Jesus proclaimed
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father."
we can recognise the unreality of our beliefs in the world of causes and yet go along with them until they are gently released. So as long as i feel hungry and thirsty, despite acknowledging that the real cause is in the mind, I still eat and drink in the trust that i will be guided towards the Spirit for whole healing. When an apparent attack on the body-image occurs, and an emotional impulse to lash out at the world arises, even if the emotional reaction cannot be fully curbed, i can yet still reflect and see the unreality of my own reactions. When pain, or conflict, or apparent problems arise, I do not seek external solutions unless guided to them. And guidance usually comes in a gentle, obvious, often serendipitious manner.
Behavior and circumstance can only be a product of our state of mind. Thus Jesus proclaimed;
"But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you"
If the world is a projection of the mind, one must first seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness (the state of Being, Spirit, the right-thinking, the right state of mind), and the world MUST follow and reflect the righteous mind.