Fooled by Positivity and the Image of "Good"
Many people seem to have an infatuation with the image of being "positive", or doing "good". The result is often a focus on feeling-good and avoiding the negative. This can get in the way of stopping the negative and evil that is present in our lives or in the world at large.
For if we are not aware of something wrong, can we don anything about that wrong? If we are not willing to look into a wrong more to understand why it's here, can we really do anything to change it? I think not.
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If we try to create good while we choose to ignore how we ourselves are creating evil, will we truly advance? We will be thinking we are doing good, but doing evil. We will think are being moral, when we're still being immoral. We will think are living in truth, when we're living in falsity. How can we truly move ahead while we're blinded to ourselves or our way of life?
To be focused on the good and positive without looking at the evil and negative is a confused, counterproductive, inconsistent lunacy and will not work. We may think we are taking two steps forward, but we make only be taking one step forward, or maybe even two steps back. Only when we face this contradiction can we heal our "insane" conditions of living.
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Good deeds are good, sure. But what's more important than trying to do good or positive deeds, is to realize the bad/evil deeds. Evil must be faced and stopped before new good can truly and fully work. Focusing on good at the cost of ignoring evil allows evil to continue and creates two potential paths we may not realize we are on:
- the path for evil to wash away the good that was built upon a faulty foundation
- the path for evil to consume the good into its own preservation, projection and protection, i.e. a mask or illusion of "good" to accept evil
This is the big deception of philanthropy and charities. While the public image is of people doing good in some gestures that they are praised for, they keep doing what they do in other ways that are not good, right or true, but are evil, wrong or false.
Do good deeds balance out the evil? Does doing right wash away the wrongs? I think not. It only masks the wrongs while they continue to be created. Only stopping wrongs can stop the wrong. Only stopping evil ways can stop evil ways. No amount of doing other good deeds or positive thinking can remove them.
The appearance of "right", while continuing the hidden wrongs all around, is not a true path forward. Do we really think doing wrongs with the left hand and washing it away with the right hand will work? It only masks evil so we have trouble readily seeing it for what it is, creating artificial images and illusions of "goodness". Meanwhile, the negative grows because we're not facing it and stopping it.
Thank you for your time and attention. Peace.
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Good thoughts. People are absolutely afraid of facing evil and bad things. It’s the mantra of our society nowadays; everything is good, you should always be happy, feel good and ignore everything negative. This seems to be the pharmaceutical way to think since they never allow someone to be honest with their bodies and understand that things go through positive and negative cycles. It’s the way of life. Instead they prescribe pills that try to eliminate the negatives instead of embracing them and using it as a learning experience.
The clintons come to mind when thinking about the faux philanthropy on the front and slaughter and oppression on the reverse. But they do so much good throughout the world!!!!!.....Sad that people would think this.
Yup, false fronts fool people all over, meanwhile dark shit happens behind the curtain...
@krnel - your post is very relevant in this era of "new age" spirituality, wherein people are encouraged to avoid everything that is evil, dont even look at it or confront it or try to comprehend it. Instead just keep a narrow focus on whats good and virtuous and the consciousness will automatically purify.
What resonates me with this post of yours is that you cannot transcend this realm spiritually without looking very closely at its hidden workings. And it is a stinky deceitful violent and parasitic world indeed. We have a group of people controlling all important land and wealth creation on this planet, we have Geoengineers manipulating the climate and creating storm systems almost twice a week, we have social engineers deepening the chasm in the collective consciousness based on caste, creed, religion, sect, sex or color, we have pedophiles placed at the highest rungs of government who rape and murder kids, we have media selling lies to start wars on innocent people, we have a mutigenerationally confused population perennially hooked on drugs flouride porn and socialmedia.
But thats not all- we do have a living and feeling universe, we have the creator working through all of us,only if we open our eyes to realise it.
So you are right on, just a narrow focus on viture will only end up in virtue signalling. New age is truly the new cage. And we need to look and accept all that is unholy to realise whats is here that is not affected by virtue or vice, that simply is, more fundamental than space, eternal before time.
Very good summary on the problems going on.
Yes that’s the thing, the good deeds do not balance out the evil. If we are doing back things we cannot ‘balance’ the evil by doing good, we must understand the evil side and try our best to extinguish this side of us. We all have evil inside but it is possible to not have this and be a good person, it will always come but but within ourselves we can overpower the evil inside with our good. Then, once the wrongs are internally corrected, then we can be good and ‘reap the benefits’ within and personally. I do not feel we should be good just for others to notice or purely to make others feel good, it is also for ourselves just as much as others:)
Yes, we have the capacity for good and evil. We must choose which one we want to be.
I was guilty of this while in the “New Age” mentality. I’ve since taken everything I learned there and expanded upon it to realize that it’s not about ignoring evil, it’s about recognizing it, and turning your attention immediately toward solutions that you can personally enact right now.
Energy flows where attention goes, for sure, but this is misinterpreted to mean that NO attention should be given to evil. One cannot possibly place attention on appropriate solutions if they don’t even know what the problem is. So it’s not just OK to acknowledge problems, it’s essential; and it’s also imperative to bring them to the attention of those who are unaware.
Good post. If I was a scammer, I would stop there, but I'm not so...
First, I agree evil(immoral) must be acknowledged.
My foundational belief is that good will win out over evil. Battles still rage in our every day lives. I do believe it is right for us to choose good, but how could we choose if evil or immoral weren't options?
I think this is one of the most important human traits that separates us from all other creation. Nothing else in creation is born into the conundrum humans get to struggle through.
I believe in the Socratic moral intellectualism that says that every evil action is a direct cause of ignorance. People who do evil don't do it because they are bad per se, they believe that they are good, and when they choose between good and evil, they believe they choose good while doing evil. This is because they don't really know the consequences of their decisions (ignorance), and they choose with little or no information.
Except some things can be done willfully knowing they are wrong. Some things can be done willfully being ignorant and not caring to know if they are wrong. And some things can be done being ignorant at the time of knowing the the difference between right and wrong.
Yes, I believe that an ignorant can do both good and evil, because he does not know and does not understand the meaning of those words. If someone knows what is correct, but still decides to act incorrectly, it is because he does not understand, he does not understand why the right thing is right and why the wrong thing is wrong. He only knows what is good and what is bad, but he does not know why.
All the concepts that we have about good and evil, that we drag from the beginnings of our civilization, have a meaning, they are not there randomly, and if people act immorally voluntarily, it is because he does not know that the actions he is doing, even though they can bring him an immediate benefit, will eventually cause greater damage to him, his descendants, and society as a whole.
The point is not only to know what is good and what is wrong, but to know why that is so, that is what really changes the attitude of people, and prevents someone from voluntarily acting immorally.
We only choose one over the other because we have the power of abstracting concepts such as good/evil, moral/immoral. If we had no concept of these things, we would just be going off of whatever suited us, and from more of an unconscious drives to motivate behavior, not conscious processing of conceptual principles to motivate us into certain ways of being and doing.
Don't you think many choices are made due to conscience?
If I do this thing, will I be able to sleep at night?
Will the rewards be great enough to put up with the negative judgement of others?
Will my choices gain me eternal life or eternal damnation?
How will my choices effect my kids future?
To me, these all seem to be based on... what am I going to get from this choice?.
The first step to prevent crime is through good and wise teaching / notification. because the concerned may not know that what he does is a crime. And maybe in this first step he will stop his crime. Next, is to advise, warn, and frighten. This is when the offender is known to do so consciously. The third step is to rebuke loudly and clearly. This is when advice and warnings do not work, if there are signs of negative effects on the community or others.
The next stage is to prevent it hard. For this, often in many cases must involve the authorities, because not to prevent it leads to greater crime.
Indeed, good steps. Educate, rebuke and warn, then apply consequences.
Far too many people are barely able to grasp whether their own actions or others are good or evil.
I agree with you that good does not cancel out evil. It is not just sufficient to do good for yourself and for people around you, but at the same time you also have to confront the evils that you encounter. Or else, like fear it just keeps growing in power.
Yes, the world would change greatly if everyone focused and confronted the evils to do something about it...
They do say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Good and evil are highly subjective and relying on context in my eyes. Thinking too much about them just clouds the mind. I used to be a real justice warrior always wanting to stand on the highest moral ground possible.
In doing so, I ended up missing out on plenty great opportunities and experiences just because of some false idea of grandeur.
And I didn't even save the world in the process.
No one saves the world. We are all in this together. Principles of moral truth are important to stand on and be integrated with, otherwise you flip flop for whatever justification you have and only stand for them when it's convenient. Then we just bend over and sacrifice to compromise...
Well, I do say in my description that I usually tend to be between lawful neutral and chaotic neutral, so that sounds fitting.
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In my opinion the concept of Good and Evil always an subject of Individuality, this means many times when people do wrong then there will be two people one who support them and one who blame them for their wrong doings.
But the concept of reality only watch out for one subject and that is either you are good or evil but you cannot be both. But still in this world we see people who do one action willfully and outside they pretend other aspect.
Life is about goodness but if anyone agrees or not, if there is an good force then there will be an evil force and we always see fight between evil and good, no matter what the ultimate winner will be goodness.
In my opinion people who hold the high positions, most of them are pretenders and behind the scenes they have their own agenda and they complete it no matter if they have to hurt somebody.
Thanks for sharing this post with us and wishing you an great day. Stay blessed. 🙂