The road upward - actualize the Divine image within
The impact on the collective psyche of mankind from random murder and terrorist attacks needs to be reversed. Mankind is made in the image of Gd and we are souls that have bodies in order to bring Gd's lovingkindness into this world.
What happens when there is no value for human life (where innocent people are killed at random or targeted out of hatred or where people blow themselves up to deliberately take lives and cause harm and damage) is that those witnessing it cannot be expected to have any respect for human law. Why? Because if manmade laws cannot protect our very lives, street smarts tells us that something else is in order. Social skills, instead of promoting etiquette, concern for the needs and feelings of others, then becomes about a person's ability to survive if someone with a perceived hurt, real or contrived, uses that to lash out. A person then believes the proper thing needed is to be able to successfully stop that person, and this could lead to the soul serving the body - that is, instead of serving Gd and bringing out His Divine image within us, a person could make the mistake of ascribing the need to survive (which Gd wants us to have) as rationale for defending ourselves in whatever way "works". "How do I keep attacks on me in check" becomes the focus and out the window goes giving and civilization as the Torah teaches us.
Why is this happening?
I found a video at http://www.adahan-online.com/index.aspx?id=2516&itemID=1724 that gives support physiologically to why every person is affected when we see such wild behavior - just like we are drawn to violence in movies and video games, we have to recognize that every person, Jew and non-Jew, has an animal brain within them. Judaism is a path to develop ourselves (higher cortex) to bring out the Divine Image instead.
( loose transcript of video: "Each person is born with a lower brain, the "oreph", fully developed when 6 months in utero. It controls our physical needs. The word oreph, if you change the letters around, comes to Pharoah, and paruah, which means wild (e.g. para adom). It has the level of awareness of a snake. If it doesn't get satisfied, it does what a snake does, it attacks. When it doesn't get what it wants it attacks people; it gets angry when our physical needs are not satisfied. It is power hungry, and narcissistic. To the animal brain, there is no Gd,. It is the part of us that is a taker, completely egocentric. We don't want an adult stuck at that level, focused on our physical needs. That said, we don't ever really get rid of this part of us, it gives us a cue as to what our needs are. BUT we need not let this part of our brain take over. We cannot attack people - we want to be in control of that part of the body. ")
When we see people attacking with impunity, it is so overwhelming to our emotional lymbic brain functions that it puts us constantly at behira. If we see no benefit to being givers and to human or Divine law, we resort to the functions of the oreph, the lowest brain.
http://www.adahan-online.com/index.aspx?id=2516&itemID=1725 -
(loose transcript of lymbic functions video) :it upsets our emotional needs. This programming is done by the time we are 3 or 4 years old...are we worthwhile, are we lovable, the self esteem issues are in this lymbic system. When our emotional needs aren't satisfied, we go to lower brain and we attack and we feel bad. Knowing our emotions come from the lymbic system and we are often frustrated, what happens when I don't feel loved or lovable? That is the challenge - how to deal with our emotional needs in a mature and productive manner. The thoughts that come are like "I have to get people to love me", or "a good life is comfortable", or "I have to be beautiful." When I am deserving or not deserving, it goes back to 3 or 4 year old emotions. We have to learn to get above the lymbic system and go to the cortex.)
http://WWW.adahan-online.Com/index.aspx?id=2516&itemID=1546
My tikkun, which is ein od milvado and to see the good in every person and events, means that I strive to be patient and loving when my lower brain is triggered – that I bring in the Divine Image instead, knowing that it is Hashem and none other that can take care of my lower physical needs. Every present moment, using Jewish wisdom, a person can weed out negativity and then bring one of Hashem's attributes to the matter, shining light instead of creating darkness. The more I work on this, I pray that it has an impact on the spiritual realms such that the need for us to experience and witness such overwhelming and societally destroying behavior dissipates once and for all.
May we all cultivate the Divine image within us so that, when we feel lack, and at every moment in any event, we can relate to our needs and the needs of others in a constructive and productive way that is pleasing to Gd.
Categories: G-d Consciousness, Chosen People, Ahavas Hashem, Free will, Ego
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