The problem is that this is a lot like modern medicine – we’re spending our time treating the symptoms instead of the disease itself. Modern medicine has shown us that there is great value in this. By effectively treating symptoms we’ve been able to moderate the affects of diabetes, allow HIV positive people to live healthy lives for many years, beat back cancers and helped to alleviate high blood pressure. The list could go on.

Holistic medical practitioners, however, might argue that we wouldn’t have to deal with all these medical problems if we simply attended to the real problem – lifestyles that encourage these diseases to manifest. Some might argue that there really is a ‘silver bullet’ that would allow for perfect health. But it would require a completely new idea of what ‘health’ means, and would necessitate living a totally new kind of lifestyle.

When it comes to emotional and spiritual problems, we’re in the same boat. Many of today’s teachers ask us to attend to the symptoms of the disease. Just as in modern medicine, there is value in this, and we can see great improvements in our emotional and spiritual well-being if we utilize these methods. But these problems all arise out of a single disease – our dualistic world-view.

Non-dualism isn’t about some magic ‘enlightenment’ where you can suddenly walk on water or levitate. It’s not about anything mystical at all. It’s simply about using our intelligence and awareness to see what’s at the ‘root’ of all our experience – to clearly see the dualistic world-view operating in our lives.

When we see this clearly, we at once understand the mechanisms that have been causing us confusion, fear, or stress. These negative emotions don’t ‘disappear’ – rather, we are able to experience them fully, and within the context of that experience they transform.

When we seek enlightenment, we’re really trying to do the same old thing – we’re trying to change our current behavior into something we envision as ‘better’. This may get results, but it will never fully cure the disease.

All of our life problems can be seen with perfect clarity if we allow our natural awareness to do its job, and if we use our intelligence to explore our basic ideas about life. In this way, we can get better ‘results’ if we explore such basic life-ideas as our sense of linear time, cause/effect, and selfhood, instead of trying to tackle, one by one, the symptoms caused by these unexamined beliefs.

Here are a few places to begin exploring:

What This Site is All About

Self-Improvement and Awakening

The Meaning of Life

Be sure to visit www.kentonandrebecca.com to read our Adventure Journal.  This week it’s about the amazing experience called ‘Winter’.  You can also read about making homemade eggnog and learn about a fun winter tracking game you can play if you live in the snowier climes.  Find it all in the Explore More section of www.kentonandrebecca.com.

You’re also invited to make free Intention-Manifestation requests at www.thegenerosityproject.com.

In general, I don’t like people in my kitchen. Being overly prideful of my cooking, I see each meal as a precision balance of textures, flavors, and aromas. It totally skews the whole experience when someone starts trying to mess with the equation.

At any rate, the greens were cooked up and deposited in an unsightly pile on the edge of my plate.

Well, I thought. I might as well try them.

And how did they taste? Totally and completely bitter.

Meanwhile, Jen and Rebecca were eating them with relish. Later on, Rebecca said to me- “Isn’t it amazing when instead of just being open to ‘pleasant’ flavors, we can taste food and experience a whole range of different flavors?”

Her words reminded me of the ‘Vinegar Tasters’ – that old Chinese illustration that was re-born to popular culture by Benjamin Hoff in The Tao of Pooh. Usually the illustration shows three great teachers – Confucius, Buddha, and Lao Tzu. They’re each tasting from a vat of vinegar. Confucius finds the vinegar sour, the Buddha finds it bitter, but Lao Tzu finds it sweet and delicious.

The point here is that there’s an awful lot of life experiences, including certain emotional states (as I wrote about in a recent article), physical sensations, tastes, and situations, that we spend a lot of time trying to avoid. Sometimes as we get older, our sphere of comfort shrinks until we insist on having life ‘just so’ if we’re going to enjoy it.

But life is so much richer than that! We’re surrounded by so many experiences, and we can count ourselves wealthy to the extent that we can fully experience each moment that is given to us.

This is not a call to go out and try to devour as much experience as possible. It’s not about trying to watch every movie that’s ever been made, visit every country on Earth, or trying to seek out uncomfortable situations. Rather, it’s a call to allow ourselves to experience what’s happening in each moment.

The next day, when I ate the bitter greens as leftovers, they seemed just as bitter as the day before. But that bitter taste wasn’t so unpleasant. In fact, it was quite a marvelous taste, full of sensation. I didn’t have to ‘enjoy’ the greens – just experience them. And you know what? Next time Jen brings her greens, I’ll still give her a hard time about being in my kitchen. But secretly, I’ll be excited to taste whatever is going to be set on my plate.

Be sure to visit www.kentonandrebecca.com to read our Adventure Journal – this week it’s about a horse-friend who died. You’re also invited to www.thegenerosityproject.com where you can request free Intention-Manifestation for you, your loved ones, or the world.

That’s right, folks. There’s probably one of these Great Gurus sitting in your living room right now, and all you have to do is pick up the remote and turn it on.

Let those silly monks with shaved heads and funny robes spend their time sitting on the floor trying to tame their mind. Forget that, because we’re already experts at meditation. So let’s sit down and turn on that TV!

Within seconds of flipping to a quality channel, our minds will effectively let go of all outside distraction. Our attention will be perfect, so that even if our husband or wife throws a pillow at us to distract us from our meditation, their attempt will be like a snowflake on the perfect tranquility of our minds. It will land, melt away, and be forgotten.

Thoughts will be erased from our minds. Past and future will disappear completely. Watching television, there is only the pure present moment of the flickering screen as our mind follows the unfolding Now before us.

What could be more perfect?

The teachings of the Buddha and the Christ, the silly cryptic riddles of the Zen monks, the countless spirituality blogs, and even this wacko website are nothing but crude tools that make us waste years of our lives trying to achieve what television delivers, automatically, in the space of a few heartbeats.

All you have to do is sit down and turn it on. Nothing more. Even if you try to think of other things, a sufficiently engaging program will do all the work for you. Your mind will be clear, focused, and perfectly aware of the reality that’s right in front of you.

Your spiritual savior is but a click away. What are you waiting for?