| A Second Life |
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| — This Is Your Last Chance — |
If you truly wish to begin living authentically from this point onward, then I ask you to make a firm decision:
Use all the time remaining to you — all the time you still possess this physical body — for that purpose.
First and foremost, your own determination and decision are essential.
Without making that inner commitment yourself, it may be impossible to live a truly authentic life.
You may feel that this sounds like something very difficult.
And yes — it is difficult.
Because, in a sense, a true way of living means creating within yourself a current that runs directly against the flow of present-day human society.
Naturally, that is not easy.
However, this "countercurrent" will reveal its true value more and more as time moves forward.
Eventually, it will become the guiding force.
Why?
Because humanity is heading toward dead ends from every direction.
No matter how earnestly we strive or how many methods we employ, human society will continue collapsing from all sides until it reaches a state where there seems to be no way forward.
In truth, the call urging you to "live authentically" has already appeared many times throughout your life.
You have probably experienced several major turning points in your life already.
And in fact, those turning points themselves were the message.
Unfortunately, however, most people have never been able to recognize them as messages arising from within themselves.
Are you truly living your real life?
What is a true life?
Do you truly know yourself?
At each important turning point in life, we have entrusted these questions to ourselves.
The problem is simply that we have not known how to receive them in that way.
Why is that?
Because until now, our hearts have constantly faced outward, always viewing and judging life through the world of form.
Do you understand what it means for the heart to face outward?
Human beings naturally tend to seek information from outside themselves, and that tendency is very strong within us.
We use our eyes, ears, and other senses for this purpose, and our inner antenna is constantly directed outward in order to receive information flowing in from the external world.
Because we live in such a state, once information is received, the mind immediately shifts toward questions such as:
"How should I respond to this?"
"What should I do about this?"
And our thoughts begin revolving around those concerns.
So when I say that the heart is directed outward, I mean that our attention becomes completely occupied by the words and actions of others, by external events, and by how those situations eventually turn out.
For example, suppose you hear what someone said, observe what someone did, or witness something happening.
You then react emotionally, feel something internally, and finally take some form of action.
Usually, however, one important part of this entire process gets overlooked:
What exactly did you feel within yourself?
Or even if that part is noticed, it is not considered very important.
Instead, people focus almost entirely on:
And if the situation ends favorably according to one's wishes, then the story ends happily there.
But if things do not go as hoped, the heart remains trapped there, dragging those emotions along endlessly.
As long as the heart continues facing outward like this, it inevitably becomes bound by surrounding people and external events.
And while attention remains fixed there, the truly essential thing is neglected.
Yes — the essential thing.
That is:
What did I truly feel at that moment?
What became visible within me?
What did I begin to realize?
And how will I use that realization in the way I live from now on?
These truly important matters are usually passed over almost entirely.
A turning point in life exists so that something may be learned there.
It is precisely because something must awaken within us that it becomes a turning point.
But if the heart remains directed outward, then the turning point ceases to be a true turning point.
Of course, one may still learn something to a certain extent.
But it is highly unlikely that one will ever reach the deeper question:
"Am I truly living my real life?"
As long as the heart remains outwardly directed, such questioning is extremely difficult.
Therefore, if you have now decided to begin living authentically, then what you must do from this point onward is to consciously turn the habitually outward-facing heart inward — deeper and deeper within yourself.
To turn the heart inward means this:
When something happens around you, or when you hear or see the words and actions of others, instead of immediately focusing outward, begin asking:
"What thoughts are arising within me right now?"
Notice the feelings surfacing within your heart.
Observe the movement of your own mind.
At first, simply begin by repeatedly confirming where your heart is directed.
Where is my heart directed right now?
Am I becoming absorbed only in what others have said and done?
Please develop the habit of asking yourself such questions.
And as you continue observing the movements of your heart, you will begin to notice something else:
Your mind is constantly preoccupied with outcomes.
Depending on those outcomes, it immediately rushes ahead toward the next concern.
"What if this happens?"
"What if that happens?"
"And what if the worst happens…?"
Before anything has even begun, the heart becomes scattered in countless directions.
Yet when the heart is facing outward, we rarely stop to ask:
"Why am I suffering?"
"Where is this pain coming from?"
Our attention remains fixed almost entirely on how situations turn out.
Even if we do notice our suffering, we usually cannot understand where it truly comes from or why we feel it so deeply.
At most, we assume that the cause lies somewhere in the events happening before us.
Because when the heart faces outward, we naturally believe that suffering also comes from outside ourselves.
However, once you begin directing your awareness inward, you will gradually realize that external events merely trigger suffering that already exists within you.
The pain wells up endlessly from inside yourself.
Even then, it takes time before the heart can truly accept that the source of suffering lies within.
Human beings do not easily admit such things.
That is the reality of humanity.
Human beings are creatures that constantly justify themselves.
Please keep this truth somewhere quietly within your heart as well.
In any case, once you decide to live authentically, begin by doing this much:
Repeatedly confirm where your heart is directed, and develop the habit of turning it inward.
When you actually try practicing this, you will likely discover how difficult it is.
In daily life, thoughts and emotions naturally scatter in many directions.
Before we realize it, our hearts have already drifted outward again.
That is why the next thing you must do is this:
Find a place — even for a short time each day — where you can quietly settle yourself.
Secure such a time and space within your daily life.
And then, there is something you must begin doing there.
You must seriously begin the work of turning your awareness inward and observing your own heart.
What do you need for this work?
A pen and notebook.
Or, if you are comfortable using one, a computer.
And what will you do with them?
You will begin reflecting upon your mother — the one who gave birth to you.
First, begin remembering what your mother has done for you from the day you were born until now.
Surely she did many things for you.
She gave birth to you.
She fed you milk.
She changed your diapers.
Even the smallest memories are fine.
Simply begin writing down what your mother did for you.
As you continue doing this, your heart will gradually return to childhood.
Some memories may come back vividly.
Others may be painful enough that you do not wish to remember them at all.
And as you recall what your mother did for you, also begin writing down:
What feelings did you direct toward your mother at those times?
What words did you speak to her?
How did you treat her?
Many emotions will emerge.
At first, feelings such as "Thank you, Mother" probably will not appear naturally.
What will surface instead are complaints.
Dissatisfaction.
Resentment.
"I wish she had done more for me."
"I wish she had treated me differently back then."
"There were things I never wanted her to do…"
For you, your mother was probably someone who was expected to do everything for you and give everything to you.
Wasn't she?
And because that seemed natural, there were likely times when you became irrationally angry whenever she failed to meet those expectations.
The important point of this reflection is to bring out your feelings honestly and without concealment.
Writing only beautiful or proper things accomplishes nothing.
The purpose of reflecting on one's mother is to allow yourself to clearly see the dark, tangled emotions that exist within you.
How have you truly seen your mother?
Perhaps you have never looked at her directly and honestly at all.
Some looked down on their mothers.
Some idealized them.
Some feared them.
Some longed to be acknowledged by them.
Some tried to escape from them.
Some wanted to possess them entirely.
Surely there have been many different ways of seeing your mother.
The existence of "mother" draws out many hidden aspects of yourself.
As you reflect upon the feelings you directed toward this one person called your mother, you will begin discovering many versions of yourself:
Once you have finished recalling what your mother did for you and the feelings you carried at each moment, then next try remembering what you yourself did for your mother.
And while doing so, once again pay attention to the feelings behind your actions.
What do you discover then?
Probably not very much.
Compared to everything your mother did for you, what you gave back to her may feel astonishingly small.
In any case, continue examining your feelings toward your mother from every possible angle.
Some may ask:
"Why is reflection upon the mother considered so important?"
"And why not the father?"
But before asking such questions, simply try it sincerely.
We were born through the womb of our mother — not our father.
And while passing through the mother's womb into this world, something profoundly important is conveyed to us.
Yet after entering this world through the mother's body, we gradually forget it completely.
And instead, we begin seeking joy and happiness within the world perceived through our physical bodies.
Our attention increasingly turns toward the visible world of form.
To the physical self, the world of form is deeply attractive.
And little by little, we lose sight of ourselves.
Our awareness becomes fixed entirely upon our physical existence and the world surrounding it.
With our hearts directed outward, we repeatedly live in ways that go against what was conveyed to us through the consciousness of the mother.
But because the heart is already facing outward, such a way of living feels completely natural.
It is simply how one lives when the world of form is believed to be real.
That is why you probably never felt that you were losing yourself.
Nor did you ever feel that you were betraying something essential.
On the contrary, as you sought happiness, fulfillment, and purpose within the world of form, and as you succeeded in grasping many things with your own hands, you naturally experienced satisfaction and achievement.
Yet such satisfaction never lasts long.
And so, once again, people begin chasing new dreams, new challenges, new goals.
The heart continues moving outward, outward, endlessly outward.
Meanwhile, beneath the excitement of believing oneself happy, the heart that has lived in opposition to the consciousness of the mother remains filled with suffering.
You have never known this.
And yet, somewhere deep inside, you have probably always sensed that even when outwardly fulfilled, something within still remains empty.
To understand this structure of the heart more concretely and clearly for yourself, there is only one way:
You must repeatedly observe the feelings and thoughts you have used through reflection upon your mother.
In other words, you must continue turning your heart inward.
No matter how advanced the information age becomes, you will never discover from the external world the true way of living.
Because the world itself treats form as absolute and uses it as the standard for everything.
According to that standard, if outward conditions improve or appearances become more impressive, then happiness is assumed to follow naturally.
Certainly, when outward circumstances improve, the heart does feel pleasure and happiness.
I do not deny that.
The issue, however, lies in how we interpret those feelings.
Most people think of the heart as something invisible, yet still believe it exists only as part of the physical body.
Therefore, the joy and happiness felt by the heart become directly identified as "our" happiness.
But originally, the heart does not belong to such a limited dimension.
The heart exists independently — as feeling, as consciousness, and as energy.
It is not something confined within the tiny container called the human body.
The heart does not merely accompany the body.
The emotional world tied to the body is extremely small.
The pleasures, happiness, and sufferings experienced by the body-bound heart are all part of a very small world.
And I believe that discussing "human beings" and "life" solely through the lens of such a tiny world is fundamentally mistaken.
Originally, we were not given physical bodies by our mothers merely to experience the small pleasures and pains of such a narrow emotional world.
I am heart.
I am feeling.
And the essence of human beings is consciousness.
We were born in order to come to know this within ourselves.
And this was conveyed to us while we were still within the womb of our mother.
Through the body you have been given, come to know the world of truth.
And this time, truly live your real life.
Carrying such a message, we entered this world.
And now, you stand at the point of asking yourself:
"Have I truly lived in that way?"
Please understand that you have finally arrived at such a moment.
That is why I ask you not to dismiss reflection upon your mother lightly.
Please try it sincerely, at least once.
Turn your heart inward.
Observe the feelings you have directed toward your mother.
And while doing so, ask yourself:
"What does it truly mean to live?"
"Have I misunderstood something essential all this time?"
Of course, this work requires patience.
It is not easy.
The memories that arise may feel repetitive.
The emotions you uncover may seem to repeat endlessly as well.
And sadly, the mother who gave birth to you also possesses many flaws, habits, and imperfections.
These very things may become obstacles that make it difficult to move forward.
But please do not give up there.
Do not throw the work away.
Because if you stop there, then you have fallen precisely into the trap of your own mind.
Do you understand what that means?
Certainly, you were born carrying the message conveyed through your mother.
But at the same time, you were also born carrying deeply accumulated feelings that resist that message completely.
Originally, those feelings were meant to be corrected.
Yet instead of correcting them, humanity has only enlarged and strengthened them throughout history.
Until now, we have lived centered upon those resisting feelings.
We have lived centered upon the belief that the world of form is the only reality.
In other words, although the consciousness of the mother continually conveyed:
"Your true self is consciousness,"
we have continuously resisted that truth.
And even now, those resisting feelings still dominate the inner world within you.
That is why I now ask you:
"Could it be that you have been mistaken?"
And within you, the sleeping desire to know the truth has begun — however faintly — to respond.
For your inner world, this is something entirely new.
The consciousness that has ruled within you for so long now struggles desperately to preserve itself.
Like a dictatorship fighting to survive, it fears the collapse of the empire it has long controlled under the belief:
"I alone am right."
And so it tries to eliminate any threat before it can grow.
Using every possible argument, it insists:
What is wrong with seeking joy and happiness in the world of form?
The way you have lived until now is perfectly fine.
You are right.
Devote yourself to your work.
Your family's happiness is your happiness.
Look around you — everyone lives this way.
And so, within yourself, these voices continue trying to reinforce their own correctness.
The reason reflection upon the mother does not progress easily is because within you already exists a vast inner world that you yourself have built over many lifetimes.
I compared it earlier to a dictatorship or an empire, and in truth, that is very much what it is like.
Therefore, while continuing the reflection upon your mother, there is another task that must proceed alongside it:
You must begin identifying the dictatorship — the empire — that exists within yourself.
There is no doubt that you have lived believing the world of form to be real.
No — the entire history of humanity has been a history of living as though form were reality.
And furthermore, even those who feel no connection whatsoever to religion or spirituality today have, without exception, engaged in what I call "reliance upon external power" throughout past lifetimes.
By "past," I mean before this present life.
The world humanity has created through such dependence on outside power is what I described here as a dictatorship or an empire.
And it becomes necessary to understand what kind of world that truly is.
This work must proceed together with reflection upon your mother.
It is called:
"Reflection upon dependence on external power."
In truth, we turned away from the consciousness of the mother because another world already existed within us — a world we ourselves had created.
This theme has appeared repeatedly throughout this book.
It is the world that places absolute value upon form and, from that standpoint, attempts to define self, others, humanity, and life itself.
The reason humanity has never truly lived authentically — indeed, could not live authentically — is because within ourselves we created the world of external dependence.
And the world of external dependence can be summarized in one word:
The world of desire.
What kind of feeling do you believe lies behind wishing for your own happiness, your family's happiness, the happiness of humanity, or world peace?
Ordinarily, people would think that praying for such things is good and natural.
But what exactly do we mean by "ordinary"?
What truly is happiness?
When you pray or make wishes, what feelings arise within your heart?
If there is an object toward which you direct your prayers, what kind of relationship exists between you and that object?
What does it really mean for everyone to become happy?
And how does such happiness actually come about?
To reflect upon the moments throughout your life when you prayed, wished, or folded your hands in supplication — and to examine the feelings you used during those times — this is what I call:
"Reflection upon external dependence."
The inner world built through reliance upon external power truly is, as I described it, a towering fortress — an empire.
And dismantling that fortress is just as difficult as reflecting deeply upon one's mother.
Yet unless that fortress is dismantled, you cannot truly live your real life or fully experience genuine joy and happiness.
You have probably already experienced superficial pleasures and forms of happiness.
But if life ends there, it would be such a waste to have been born at all.
Please come to know a deeper, wider, gentler, and warmer self overflowing with true joy and happiness.
Yes — to encounter and come to know that true self is what real life is.
That itself is true joy and true happiness.
And in order to do so, we must correct the mistake of abandoning our true nature in pursuit of the world of external dependence.
To correct that mistake, we must approach the essence of who we truly are.
And to approach our true essence, we must uncover the deeply hidden world within the heart.
Computers and robots may provide comfortable living environments, but they cannot assist with this work.
This journey begins only when you yourself begin looking into your own heart.
And the two primary practices for doing so are:
Until now, you have not engaged in either of these reflections.
Perhaps some readers have experienced something called "reflection upon the mother" within religious groups or organizations.
But what I mean here is entirely different.
And as for "reflection upon external dependence," it is likely something completely unfamiliar.
Yet these two reflections are absolutely essential.
Without them, awakening to truth is impossible.
A life lived without ever knowing the truth cannot truly be called a life at all.
That is why I sincerely want everyone to undertake these two reflections.
No — even if only you, the person reading this book right now, were to do so, that alone would be enough.
If you now feel uncertain about what you should do with your life — if you feel you must do something, yet do not know what — then please devote your remaining time and energy to these two reflections.
Let me emphasize this once more.
I have written that "reflection upon the mother" and "reflection upon external dependence" are deeply important tasks within life itself.
They are not easy tasks.
But please continue them patiently and without haste.
If you continue steadily, then one day, through reflection upon your mother, you will begin feeling the warmth of the mother within your heart.
This will absolutely happen.
If you continue without obsessing over when it will happen, then one day you will suddenly realize that you yourself have become gentler.
Because the feelings of the mother already live within you as vibration.
As reflection upon your mother deepens, your consciousness will begin touching that world of vibration.
And please remember this:
The essence of who we are is consciousness.
Therefore, there is nothing mysterious about such transformation occurring.
Please rediscover the warmth of the mother within yourself, and come to realize deeply the foolishness of having forgotten your true essence.
First comes "reflection upon the mother."
To proceed into the even more difficult "reflection upon external dependence," the warmth of the mother discovered through the first reflection is absolutely necessary.
As reflection upon the mother progresses, reflection upon external dependence also progresses.
If one stagnates, so will the other.
In a sense, reflection upon the mother is the front wheel, and reflection upon external dependence is the rear wheel.
Only when both wheels turn together can the vehicle move forward.
And when they turn smoothly together, the journey itself becomes peaceful and joyful.
True joy and true happiness begin with discovering what kind of existence we truly are.
And this can never be understood while believing that the physical body alone is the self.
We are not beings confined within the tiny frame called the body.
In order to realize this truth within the heart, countless people throughout history have undergone endless reincarnations — being born, dying, and being born again beyond measure.
And yet, despite experiencing innumerable rebirths, humanity has never succeeded in removing the framework of the body from its understanding of self.
Human beings have never liberated themselves from identification with the body.
To put it another way:
From the moment human beings first appeared upon this Earth until today, humanity has never awakened to its true self.
From the instant humans acquired physical form, they have continued throughout all of history to act from the standpoint that the body is the self.
And the result of that history is obvious.
Conflict fills the Earth.
Even while praying for peace and human happiness, humanity cannot extinguish the flames of conflict because it has forgotten the essential truth and gone astray.
One could say that this is a battle between God and money.
Why does humanity continue engaging in bloody struggles over religion and wealth?
Because human beings have lived greedily without knowing their true nature.
Each person believes the physical self to be the real self and seeks glory and prosperity for that temporary form.
Without realizing that the desire to rule through the power of both God and money becomes dark energy that ultimately returns to oneself, humanity has continued down this path.
Some may say:
"I have never desired anything so grand.
I only wish for a peaceful and happy life for myself and my family.
What could possibly be wrong with such modest hopes?"
Certainly, outwardly, you may simply appear to be an ordinary person enjoying a quiet life.
But if you were to discover the world of consciousness sleeping deep within yourself, you would be astonished.
You speak that way only because you think you know yourself — while in truth knowing almost nothing.
That is why, if you presently have some freedom of time, some financial stability, and still possess your health, then you are in an extraordinarily fortunate position.
For someone like you, I regard this "second life" as the last chance to truly come to know yourself.
Please devote yourself to: