I’m always looking around for anyone who can explain things to my satisfaction. What that means is they need to have proof and be able to show me that proof in a way that I can comprehend. This rarely happens in the meaning of life department. But there was something I read recently on an unprovable topic that stuck in my head.

I was reading something about “Beings” having stages of development. This stage idea has something to do with the development, or evolution, of consciousness. Better put it’s probably something like the shift, or connection, to the higher consciousness. However we look at it doesn’t matter, for now I just want to use an idea or two from the story. After all the purpose of this little article is to help people deal with the low periods we all experience.

I’ll wake up some days and not feel good. I’ll check to see if there is some physical cause. Some physical variable in the equation is always present. But, if I haven’t done something completely goofy like eat a whole cake or only sleep five hours, it’s mostly true that the trouble lies elsewhere. The elsewhere is what we can discuss. In that article I was reading it stated that the higher stage beings (I think there were 5 or 6 stages ) could deal with those obstacles with coinciding numbers. In other words level 2 beings could deal with level 2 obstacles. As I thought about this I could see that some people I’d run across seemed to view a lot of things as – big deals. While others just seem to flow along.

Looking at my own experience I can see that there are situations I once looked at as big deals – that I now flow through. In regard to the story about stages, what would that suggest? Have I managed to move up a few notches? In the article all the obstacles talked about were obstacles that we would find here on earth. Also when he talked of “Beings” he was referring to anything and everything. Rocks were beings because – rocks “are”. Rocks have an extremely hard time moving about independently. Tremendous obstacle if you’re a rock. I, on the other hand, have walking down pretty well.

I didn’t buy the whole story. Not because it’s not all within the realm of possibility – but because I can’t prove it. But let’s say we are all at some stage of development. Could we approach our lives as – advancement through the overcoming of obstacles?  Those days I’m talking about – the ones where I just didn’t feel good – repeatedly I find  that when I’m there I got there by being confused about something.  Usually I’ve decided, through some mental process, that something is what it’s really not. Most likely I’ve assigned a level of importance on something that isn’t necessarily real. I usually begin this head trip with an “I want, or If only” statement and then build the delusion from there.

Once I find out what it is I’ve done I can begin to undo it. This is the restoration of sanity that’s talked about by so many and mentioned often in the big book of alcoholics anonymous. It’s the reality of the mental world that we can think whatever we want. It’s also true that we will suffer or benefit from those thoughts. These are the main obstacles we deal with. As always I intend to nudge a little and see what happens.

I believe in a people inertia. That means that once people start moving in a direction they tend to continue in that direction until they’re met with sufficient resistance. If we decide, as the result of “thinking about it”,  to head in a certain direction, then we have developed some inertia. If this road gets rough there are a couple of choices we can make. We can bear down, lean into it and march into the storm. Or we can stop and see if there is another less punishing route. I’ve met people who have kept marching. I have done a fair amount of marching myself. I did it because I thought it was the right thing to do. Is it the right thing to do? Is the right thing to do  hard?  We’ve all heard it said that sometimes it’s hard to do the right thing. I wonder. Maybe it’s just not the right thing.

With any chosen direction there will be progress. A general rule is to measure progress in acquisitions. One might want to have a house and move off in that direction. Any acquisitions in money, materials, space or ideas will be seen as progress. So it’s true for the world of objects that this progress is pretty simple to map and record. What about as beings?

How would we measure our progress as human beings? We could look around at the conditions human beings have created and decide that no progress has been made. Sound observation – different topic. We could decide that since conditions being what they are that progress for human beings is not possible. Sound observation – get’s us where? Or, we could decide for ourselves what progress as a human being would look like and take off in that direction. I think that’s a sound decision – how would we measure our progress? We could say to ourselves, If I make sufficient progress and I’m heading in the right direction then things will go smoother and I’ll be happier. Makes sense – what if things get worse and I’m not even close to being happy?

Here’s the first nudge – what if obstacles are signs of progress? What if seeming to get nowhere is a sign of progress? We can test this hypothesis. We can move along in the any direction and at some point we’ll meet an obstacle. Something will seem to stand in the way of our happiness. We’ll have a bad day, or a bad week, or we’ll feel hopeless, hurt, mad, despondent and so on. Are we on the wrong path?

In some sense I would say yes. Does this mean we are heading in the wrong direction? If direction and path were synonymous I guess we could go with that “wrong path” deduction. But are they? We have decided to move in a certain direction. We have chosen a path. Or we have been given a path to follow. The question is, does this path lead to where I want to go. When I’m on this path am I really headed in the right direction?

Well, what are these paths made of? Is the path rock, sand, pavement? That’s a good material for a path to getting a house. The path we follow to make progress as human beings is made of thought. The obstacles we meet on the gravel road are not the same as the ones we encounter on paths to progress as human beings. The insurmountable objects are not objects at all.

How will they appear to us? It’s different for people at different times. But at one time or another every person will encounter the same set of obstacles. Here’s the second nudge – the obstacle is the sign of progress. We will all meet this obstacles. There is no obstacle on the path we cannot overcome because there is none we do not make. After all, who does our thinking? We can learn how to progress passed these or we can meet them over and over. This doesn’t diminish the severity of the obstacle. The fact is that the obstacles we create can kill us, or make constant misery a way of life. In fact they are the only real obstacles we’ll ever face.

The greatest asset we can have on the path of progress is experience. I know from experience that there will be no insurmountable obstacles for me in this life on earth. This I know from experience. From experience I know that once a person develops enough human progress inertia there is nothing that can stand in their way. The first obstacle is always figuring out what the path is made of. We will make great strides from figuring out where we are, what the path is made of, what the obstacles are made of and so on. That’s enough nudges for now….