The Analects of Arthur Norris
Everyone on the path of understanding encounters a teacher, somewhere along the path, for some length of time.
Share in a just a fraction of the wisdom of mine.
Learning is duality. First we learn, then we do.
Without balance there is only extreme.
It is what you do not know that gets you.
The situation you are in is brought about by your own decisions and choices. Who can you really blame?
Simple = Profound
Whatever you are interested in, you will be good at.
God does not make mistakes. You have been given roads to travel and all the tools you need to travel them.
Everyone already knows. They just do not know they know.
Gaining wisdom is a two part process.
First we gain the knowledge, then we use that knowledge to gain understanding.
Knowledge + understanding = wisdom. The greatest prize of all.
Mankinds knowledge now vastly exceeds his understanding.
Learning without tolerance brings loneliness.
Watch the Ms and the Ds.
The obstinate always have hearing problems.
Knowledge and learning are only tools. Application of the knowledge is key.
There you gain understanding.
Knowledge must be used.
Mistakes must be made.
Your feelings, though sometimes painful, tell you that you are alive.
Learning costs, but not learning costs even more.
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
The New Day
In tandem with my Inner World exploration, and in order to attempt to integrate my findings in that place, work continues hap-hazardly on a treatise, a manifesto, or a set of wild scribbling (call it whichever you like), entitled 'The New Day'. The work aims to define and describe, once and forever and for always, what is wrong with Life on Planet Earth. (Look around - things surely weren't meant to be like this were they?)
Once identified, the work aims to provide the solutions.
That will be a quick task before dinner then?
Strangely not!
The scope of my enquiries has widened considerably since I began, but interestingly many of my observations seem to point in similar directions.
Who knows how long it will take to write? Who knows where I shall be by the time of its completion? In the meantime, enjoy a draft of the Introduction.
The greatest ill to befall the billions of souls to have walked the Earth has been their belief that this is all that there is. The billions of individuals who have born and died since the beginning of time have overwhelmingly died in poverty, horror or starvation. Even today, the world as advanced as it has ever been, the majority of children born today will die unsatisfied with their lot and empty inside. The belief has, and is still, prevalent that our lives are as good as they can possibly be, and that the Power to Change is beyond us, outside our grasp.
How different would our world be now, if it were accepted that there is more to life than this, this is not the way it was meant to be and we could shout with force and conviction "I can change it!"
Where attempts by individuals or groups over the ages have been made to change the status quo, to set the world on a better path - they have all failed insofar as none of them achieved lasting success. Many ideas flourished, then died, leaving only the hardcore idealists to carry the fight through to the next generation. The roots of our illness, the depth of the illusion, the denseness of the fog that surrounds us all, has thus far, proved impenetrable.
All the great solutions of history have failed; the Roman and Greek Empires, the Divine Monarch, the British Empire, the French Revolution, Communism, Fascism to name but a handful, or are failing; the American Empire, Christianity, Islam, Capitalism to name a few more.
The fog of confusion has been impenetrable, because the essential nature of things, truth, has been overlooked, marginalised or just ignored, as too tough to swallow. Truth is tough to bear, but the alternative is tougher. As events on Planet Earth spiral out of control, the time for truth, the time to address the essential nature of things, plain and simple, unadulterated and raw, has final arrived.
The seeds of our predicament occupy the first part of the book. It endeavours to cut through the superficial and the transitory, and addresses those factors that have persisted for centuries. For that reason I expect the criticism of over-simplification to be levelled at the work, early on. This is incorrect however, for there is a world of difference between a simplistic approach, and a disciplined analysis of the core of things. By necessity, many issues which I feel to be extraneous to the core will not be mentioned, at which point you may say "Hang on, what about so-and-so?" When this happens, as inevitably it will, I would urge you to consider the fundamentals, and relate them to the example that burns on your lips. No-one is perfect, but I have made a genuine attempt to ensure that the fundamental causes (part one) and solutions (part two) are applicable to all that reside on this Earth.
If a New Day is to dawn, and embrace all, then it must fully address all aspects of life and encompass all peoples, rich and poor, young and old, white and black, male and female. When it does this it must have gathered and weighed all the factors involved, including all that is seen, as well as all that is unseen. Part of the problem on Planet Earth has been the extent to which ‘unseen forces’ have been disregarded, only to be ridiculed when they do see the light of day. Unseen forces are at work all the time - instinct, passion, anger, inspiration, genius, love. You cannot bottle and reproduce any of these things. They are all unquantifiable, immeasurable, but illicit significant and powerful results.
The New Day must take the unseen forces, endeavour to comprehend them, and incorporate them into its philosophy.
We will identify and define these unseen forces at more length in Section 2 of the book. But first, we must look upon the face of the problem, fully and completely.
Once identified, the work aims to provide the solutions.
That will be a quick task before dinner then?
Strangely not!
The scope of my enquiries has widened considerably since I began, but interestingly many of my observations seem to point in similar directions.
Who knows how long it will take to write? Who knows where I shall be by the time of its completion? In the meantime, enjoy a draft of the Introduction.
The greatest ill to befall the billions of souls to have walked the Earth has been their belief that this is all that there is. The billions of individuals who have born and died since the beginning of time have overwhelmingly died in poverty, horror or starvation. Even today, the world as advanced as it has ever been, the majority of children born today will die unsatisfied with their lot and empty inside. The belief has, and is still, prevalent that our lives are as good as they can possibly be, and that the Power to Change is beyond us, outside our grasp.
How different would our world be now, if it were accepted that there is more to life than this, this is not the way it was meant to be and we could shout with force and conviction "I can change it!"
Where attempts by individuals or groups over the ages have been made to change the status quo, to set the world on a better path - they have all failed insofar as none of them achieved lasting success. Many ideas flourished, then died, leaving only the hardcore idealists to carry the fight through to the next generation. The roots of our illness, the depth of the illusion, the denseness of the fog that surrounds us all, has thus far, proved impenetrable.
All the great solutions of history have failed; the Roman and Greek Empires, the Divine Monarch, the British Empire, the French Revolution, Communism, Fascism to name but a handful, or are failing; the American Empire, Christianity, Islam, Capitalism to name a few more.
The fog of confusion has been impenetrable, because the essential nature of things, truth, has been overlooked, marginalised or just ignored, as too tough to swallow. Truth is tough to bear, but the alternative is tougher. As events on Planet Earth spiral out of control, the time for truth, the time to address the essential nature of things, plain and simple, unadulterated and raw, has final arrived.
The seeds of our predicament occupy the first part of the book. It endeavours to cut through the superficial and the transitory, and addresses those factors that have persisted for centuries. For that reason I expect the criticism of over-simplification to be levelled at the work, early on. This is incorrect however, for there is a world of difference between a simplistic approach, and a disciplined analysis of the core of things. By necessity, many issues which I feel to be extraneous to the core will not be mentioned, at which point you may say "Hang on, what about so-and-so?" When this happens, as inevitably it will, I would urge you to consider the fundamentals, and relate them to the example that burns on your lips. No-one is perfect, but I have made a genuine attempt to ensure that the fundamental causes (part one) and solutions (part two) are applicable to all that reside on this Earth.
If a New Day is to dawn, and embrace all, then it must fully address all aspects of life and encompass all peoples, rich and poor, young and old, white and black, male and female. When it does this it must have gathered and weighed all the factors involved, including all that is seen, as well as all that is unseen. Part of the problem on Planet Earth has been the extent to which ‘unseen forces’ have been disregarded, only to be ridiculed when they do see the light of day. Unseen forces are at work all the time - instinct, passion, anger, inspiration, genius, love. You cannot bottle and reproduce any of these things. They are all unquantifiable, immeasurable, but illicit significant and powerful results.
The New Day must take the unseen forces, endeavour to comprehend them, and incorporate them into its philosophy.
We will identify and define these unseen forces at more length in Section 2 of the book. But first, we must look upon the face of the problem, fully and completely.
Further Steps Toward the Light
A breakthrough has at last been made in my work on the updated edition of Steps Toward the Light. Entitled 'Further Steps Toward the Light', the journey continues, yielding fresh realisation about the nature of reality and our inter-relationship with it. It would appear that as we advance, far from the road becoming easier, it becomes more difficult to traverse and sometimes much harder to see. But nonetheless we proceed, for the alternative is far worse. We only have to look around us for evidence of that.
The work will expand on the themes contained within Book One, specifically the objective existence of the Inner World and our subjective view of it. Greater emphasis will be given to colour and detail, as if I can now see them, where before I could not. The work will explore new reaches of the Inner World and is intended to be offered up, as before, unexpurgated and as unfiltered as a human mind can, at this stage, allow.
The work will expand on the themes contained within Book One, specifically the objective existence of the Inner World and our subjective view of it. Greater emphasis will be given to colour and detail, as if I can now see them, where before I could not. The work will explore new reaches of the Inner World and is intended to be offered up, as before, unexpurgated and as unfiltered as a human mind can, at this stage, allow.
