False tolerance - Truth first!

Tolerance! What a praiseworthy, what a high value?! Who could ever be against it? Who could dare to criticize this great value? Well, I can and I will. Not tolerance per se, but tolerance without intelligence, without reason is what I do criticize! We always have to consider what is the base of our tolerance. From the outside it may look very beautiful, but viewed from the inside, tolerance can be a result of weakness or ignorance. Many people are tolerant because they think that if you do not attack someone else’s position, the person will not attack yours. People may be tolerant out of fear, out of a lack of strong character. Such a tolerance may lead to an outside peace, but it destroys your own soul, it destroys what should be stable inside of you, what is the solid rock in a stormy ocean. Tolerance can never mean to give up your own character, to violate your own boundaries, so that you do not have any conflict with other people.

Tolerance has its place, of course. But if tolerance means to give up truth, not to say what you mean, because it could harm someone and it could make someone feel bad, then it is false tolerance. You are not on earth to have a good understanding with other human beings. It is nice to have it, but it is not necessary. Your job in life is to fulfil your mission, to spread truth on earth and to prepare for the life after life. May the world hate you or not. There is nothing bad about being hated. Being hated for truth is sweet, very sweet. Think of the great Greek philosopher Socrates. He died for truth, also he could have avoided to drink the mug of poison. But his love for truth was bigger than fear of death. What a great person!

A world community, where absolute values are given up, because of harmony and understanding of human beings, is a big lie. It would be better if the world lives in a permanent state of war, than giving up truth! This is a hard saying, I know, but it is rightful and therefore I do not fear to make it public. We see in our world too many compromises, too much of false tolerance. We have to change! And we have to change quickly! Otherwise we will end up in a world of outside peace, but inside terror.

Imagine a world, where people live like the old hippies thought: Love and peace and understanding, no hunger, no war, no terrorism. Again who could not want this? What an evil person someone must be not to love such a “paradise”? But what is the price for such a world? Ignorance of basic principles! It would mean giving up the absolute values, of truth! Such a world would be possible, but it would be an evil world inside, a world without real principles, a world without the complete guidance of the creator! It is a world that is very seductive, it looks so nice and seems to fulfil all the wishes of human beings. The heart of such a world is devilish, is governed by the Antichrist. But it would be too late for the people who glorify this world. The moment they find out what really is set up in the heart of such a world (evil), they are all going to lose their freedom and end up in the worst nightmare imaginable. Evil very often comes disguised by beautiful masks. Or as the old saying goes: The devil is dressed in an angel’s gown and is carrying a bible in his hand to approach a poor soul.

Beware of the nice one, of the people who demand tolerance, harmony, peace and understanding! They are people who want you to give up you character, to give up your (absolute) values. Truth is absolute and it is as hard as a diamond, nothing can split it off. Whoever wants to tell you about moral relativism, who wants to tell you that good and evil are relative and dependent on the situation or time, is not a friend of you, but someone who wants to take what is yours, like a thief in the night. Therefore the only thing, which really counts is: TRUTH, not tolerance! Let truth, and only truth, be your guiding light! That is the only way to end up at the place that is set up for you long before you where born.

The positive side of globalization

Talking about globalization, very quickly leads to strong controversies among people. What the media is presenting us, is mostly the negative side (bad news is good news). And the meaning of the globalization is everything else then good, that is the way it looks for many. Therefore I want to write a little bit about the positive side, which is, what I believe, not covered enough. I only write about aspects which are visible now, I do not speculate about what is or could be coming or what expectations people have. It is definitely true, that a big part of disappointment about globalization is caused by propaganda (economic and political) which has not been fulfilled, as well as wishes people had, projections of one’s own interests.

The first aspect I want to cover is an economic one. Barriers of commerce have been decreased, international standards have been established and a mutual competition among companies has led to the optimized use of capital, workforce and know how. Crops and commodities are available in nearly any quantity and at any time. The liquidity of financial markets is providing enough capital for national and international growth. International credit standards and accounting standards make companies more transparent and enable people to compare companies of different countries with each other. That was a big problem for many years for capital administrators, when looking for foreign investments. One thing should be mentioned here: Globalization is nothing new in the world of economics. Before World War I. the international trade volume among different nations has been nearly as high as today (in relation to the size of nations, population etc. of that time of course). Barriers where build up during the first half of the 20. Century and it took many decades to get rid of them. Internationalization and globalization are everything else but knew.

Democracy is spreading around the world. Even if many nations resists this development (at least until now – look at Northern Africa, I am sure in the near future we are going to see some major changes there!), more and more people become aware of their human rights. The idea that there are human rights which are given to everybody, not by the government, but by nature of human beings itself, is becoming well know to a big part of mankind. An easy and transparent legal system which guarantees private property to people and secures personal values, is necessary for economic growth, as well as the freedom of conscious. This becomes common knowledge around the planet. Even totalitarian regimes are not able to control the information their people get nowadays. We have seen this impressively in the last years. And a few courageous companies, who have a strong backbone, show us how not to give in “the evil”.

People speak at least one foreign language, apart form their mother tongue, and the understanding of foreign cultures and civilizations gets improved. Means of communication are very quick and everywhere available, so what was exclusive and very expensive decades ago and only possible for a small elite, became part of every person’s daily life. The internet is the symbol of globalization of communication. Of course, most of what can be found in the net, is of low or very low value, but let us not forget the pearls which exist and which can be found. We have an enormous amount of information but what is mostly missing is a strategy to cope with it. Communication takes too much of our short time and the personal and/or economic value we get out of it, is quiet low. I am sure we will learn to cope with information in a way that provides better results in the future. The increase of the productivity of mental work of work based on knowledge, is one of the big tasks management is given in the 21th century.

Culture: We also see a better understanding of others cultures in most parts of the world. We watch the same movies, read the same bestselling books. Actors, writers, artists are know throughout the world. Many think that this global unity would destroy the local character of culture. That was true for the beginning of this development, but the more people are globalizes, the more they ask themselves about their own roots. There is a rising awareness of the culture you come from. The farer the branches reach out into the world, the more the roots get strengthened. That is the new human of the 21th century. You do not push aside your home, your origins, you live them more consciously, the farer away you are form your home.

Religion: For most big religions, globalization is nothing new. Most of them offer solutions for all human beings and they are represented all over the globe not only for years but for centuries. There knowledge could be very valuable in the ethical and moral development of the world. But there has to be paid attention to the theological depth of the belief. There is a big danger in staying on the surface, of presenting a religion “light”, which is nothing more than a lifestyle, which changes very quickly. Religions are fundaments, are solid rocks, in an ever changing world. The highly moral demands of the religions must stay as they are completely and unchangeable! There cannot be any change in questions of belief itself. Religions are more demanding than most of the other “systems” we know in the world. But if rightly understood, they have an enormous potential for the good. They fulfil the most demanding need of human beings: the need for sense in life. So religions could really become the “salvation” for the world.

These are just a few aspects of the positive side of globalization. There are many more and I do not claim to have covered the topic in its wholeness. That would not be the sense of a short article, written on a private blog. But I hope I could make sure, that globalization is not something negative per se. We have concentrated too much on the economic development and have very often let aside the other parts (social, political, ethical and most important the moral side!). It will be the job of the next years and decades to develop a complete globalization which includes all aspects of human life. Well, there is a big job to be done.

The goal and the way

Viktor E. Frankly (1905–1997), the great Austrian psychiatrist and founder of the Logo-Therapy, once said that there are two kinds of people in the world. On the one hand, there are the ones who think that reaching a goal, justify any means, which are necessary therefore. On the other hand, there are the ones who believe, that the way of reaching a goal is equally important than reaching the goal itself. But how do we decide? How do we make valuable decisions? How do we really come to a judgement which has its roots in moral and ethics?

Many people in our times think that what counts in the end is what feels good for them. I have written about the feel-good society in a previous post (If it feels good, do it!). The lack of moral standards has become a disease of our times. People have become very suspicious when it comes to the decision of right and wrong. We have seen throughout history that a legion of different systems claimed to have the absolute truth. In different countries and times, right and wrong was what authority claimed to be right or wrong. That has led, in the course of liberation of men, to a position of uncertainty, a kind of moral vacuum which could not be filled. And whoever claimed to be able to fill this vacuum, did not get the support of the majority of the people. What stays left, are a moral relativism and a huge amount of cynicism, which is always the result of uncertainty and anxiety underneath. People crave for clear standards, but it seems that nobody can provide such standards and declare its usefulness. Scientists expand the relativity of their own business onto ethics and moral. In the end right and wrong are subjective and depend on circumstances, persons, society, politics and a lot more. Nobody is completely satisfied, but we are told, it is the best we can get. The hunger for sense und direction stays, but we have to hold it out and stay unsatisfied. At least the human ego can celebrate itself as a modern hero, who goes through a senseless life but shoulders the heavy burden with pride. After centuries of being guided and controlled by someone else, human beings crave for freedom, freedom of men, freedom of systems, freedom of ideology and indoctrination. But in many cases the pendulum has swung too much into the other direction. More and more people see, that freedom can never mean living without rules. As well is it can never mean to deny all rules coming from outside.

But true freedom is a process which always puts the ego into the second row and let something greater than human rule the life. It takes humbleness to accept such a rule of “the father”, as Christian, for example, would call. The reign of “the father” makes free, but the reign of human beings puts you into bondage. This paradoxical fact is everything else than easy to be understood and it takes emotional, intellectual and spiritual maturity to reach at such an insight. And it can never come solely from outside. Nobody can be made to act morally, the light of insight must shine from within and the ignition is always a kind of grace, nothing human being could completely reach by himself.

We definitely live in more complex times, than any generation, who lived before us. Moral questions have never been more difficult to be answered. What is lacking is a solid rock in the stormy sea, the one thing we can rely on. It is easy to see, that nobody can make complete and wise decision who has not found himself. A person, without complete knowledge of his or her own values, is unable to stay “on course” during hardship and turmoil. Emotional balance is crucial to decision making. The power to make decisions is one of the characteristics of a complete mature person. Opportunism is immaturity as well as anybody is not a complete person who uses other human beings as tools for his own fulfilment and joy or reaching his goals. For a wise person it is never true that sweet fruits come out of evil deeds – never! Nobody does a crime and gets away with it – never! Also many people nowadays believe that being smart hides the evil intention and action. An immature person will believe so, but the wise one knows: The reaction will come, sooner or later, with certainty! Look at all the white collar crime. For many years people are heroes of the masses, the media, but in the end they fall deep, deeper than anyone could have imagined. Nothing stays hidden forever; everything gets disclosed in the end.

That brings us back to the beginning of this article: The way is equally important, than the goal, the end! The end depends on the beginning. In our times, where society is split up into more groups than ever before, the potential for conflict is even bigger than ever before. Many groups try to wipe out others and deny their right to exist. The “majority” is ever changing and people will learn than in most cases they will be part of a minority. Being a member of the minority becomes completely normal! That is a situation most people are no used to. And the consequences are enormous. The security of the group is gone and individuals will be confronted more and more with a strong wind blowing into his face. Without personal values and boundaries, one will be blown through life like a leaf in the wind. The permanent self-betrayal will lead to depression, senselessness and tragedy in life. The world will not help you, for nobody is interested in your good but yourself (and your creator of course). Mature people will conclude that the only way to guarantee peace in modern society is by having a few basic principles on which a people is built. We need a real respect for the other ones as human beings. If respect depends on a certain worldview, political opinion, religion or the like, an understanding is impossible. Imagine an atheist and an evangelical preacher. Without accepting each other as human beings, one side will always believe in superiority. Superiority and inferiority thinking poisons every social climate and by the way are never justified at all!

Never before, ethical and moral values have had a bigger impact on politics, whether it is national or international, economy and society as a whole. After the times of crises there is always a time of new clarity. After this time of common relativism we will see a time of new orientation and clarity. When people of good heart stand as a moral example and act by it, how much resistance they may every face, people will start trusting and learn that trust is better than mistrust. Without a basic optimism, no society can exist for long. If human beings do not trust east other, if society is divided it must be doomed to fall. If a house fights against itself the result will be ruin. If the devil fights against himself, he cannot prevail. Lucky is who possesses a strong moral code of ethics, by which his feet are guided. America is rooted in Christendom. The founding fathers always prayed and quoted the bible more often than any other works of philosophers and thinkers. Also Europe can find its eternal moral values in its history if it is ready to reconcile with its history and origin. As for the individual the task is the reconciliation with the source – so salvation, moral action and wise decision will be the prosperous harvest!

What is esotericism?

Last week I wrote about anthroposophy and Mr. Rudolf Steiner. As I told, the idea came into my mind by meeting an old friend of mine after many years within which we haven’t met. I did some research and found out about anthroposophy, which descended originally form theosophy, and its teachings. But what was even more important for me, was to take a close look at my fiend’s life. This was a true revelation! His life had turned into a chaos, since he began to become involved with anthroposophy. A once happy marriage was divorced, he doesn’t want to have any contact with his children any more, his money is gone (all to the society which he now serves) and he is living from public welfare. But what is most surprising it, that he does not see the reality of his life. According to his statements, he has risen very high on the ladder of spiritual levels and is about to become a masters. Therefore he has to avoid all people with “low” character, and most of the world would be to dirty for his “pure” thoughts. It would only take a short time from now and an uprising of the planet would take place, but only for the “chosen” one of course. Everybody else would be sent to lower levels of beings, for the world (which is considered a living being) would be taken to a higher (lighter) state of being (I somewhere heard the same nonsense from some 2012-the-end-of-the-world people).

I haven’t heart a bigger nonsense for many years. This reminds me of many people who are involved within the New-Age or Esotericism scene. They believe to come into contact with “higher” worlds or spheres. Well, from the scientific point of view such phenomenon are nonsense, may be some hallucinations, a case for psychiatrists and in worst case for mental institutions. But other religious traditions, especially Christian ones are aware of the existence of such “worlds”. For example, the Catholic Church is still education exorcists to free people from evil spirits. Whatever we think about such practises, one think that cannot be denied is the fact that people make experiences and that there are many ways by which such experiences can be made. Whoever meditates for a certain time will have experiences, which are not explainable by scientific ways. Even the most “reality”-orientated person cannot deny such experiences.

The word esotericism originates from the old Greek and means, hidden, secret, inside. It is the same as the Latin word occultism. But occultism has some negative connotations and most people interested in the “paranormal” or “supernormal” use esotericism for it sounds much more harmless and is more attractive. But the fact stays that it is the same. Esotericism cares for all things that cannot be perceived in the ordinary, sensual way, we live our daily life. Many people start esotericism, because they are disappointed by the experiences, which they made within their traditional religions (if they have any experiences there at all). They come into contact with the “supernatural” and this experience makes them believe. In contrary the traditional religions did not give them this experience and stay boring and old fashioned in their minds. Many think esotericism offers them the freedom they are searching for. Religion seems to be a way to rule people and take away their freedom. It is nothing to accuse people for, for the reign of humans brings slavery, but the reign of God makes you free. But people consider God being a bigger kind of human being. They have never understood God, they believe in the old point of view of the old polytheistic religions. Gods are a kind of superhuman, according to these traditions, they have bright characteristics and dark characteristics. If you see God as a superhuman with a good and a bad side you haven’t understood a think of the truth of Christendom.

It is true there is a world of God and there is a world of humans. And in between we find many spiritual phenomena with angels, demons, light-beings and the like. It is true, that they exist, they are no illusions. But one think is an illusion: To think that the spiritual world can bring salvation, you can never be free by caring for the spiritual world. God is much higher! And another thing: God is absolute, the spiritual world is a relative (good and evil) and it never serves mankind. There are a lot of lies, which have it’s origin within this spiritual world. The idea, that human beings have a divine potential or that human beings and god are the same. Esotericism thinks human beings can do things on their own if they follow certain rules. Truth is, that without God human beings are unable to help themselves. Nobody can find the way to God without the grace of God. God alone can do the revelation, whatever human beings do, they can never find it on their own (for example Buddhism thinks human beings have Buddha-nature, which is one of the big lies of Buddhism!).

In many of my next posts on this blog, I will explain more in detail the relationships between esotericism, religions and spiritual experiences.

An unusual way of learning

Learning is one of the most important skills of our times. What we learn and what we have to learn during our lifetime changes where quickly. New inventions, ever changing circumstances demand a growing awareness and flexibility, not only in physical movement but even more in mental abilities. But even when things around us are changing, there are certain stable rocks that change very slowly if ever in our lifetime. One of such stable components is the way we learn. School normally suggests that there is a right way for learning, as well as there is a right way to do things. In effect, pupils and students are forced to accept a certain way of doing things, whether it applies to the individual personality or not. Whoever fits into the educational system will be promoted and probably get successful. But the ones who fail or have learning habits, who are very far away from what is called “normal” will get bigger problems, or in worst case, fail completely and are called dull or mentally underpriviledged. One indicator by which this can be seen, are the school marks. For good marks tell very little about the real abilities of children, but even more about the adaptability to the system. The more you conform, the better your marks will be. Smart pupils always knew that in order to get a good mark, it is not necessary to be enormously intelligent, but to impress the teacher, by telling him what he wants to hear.

This leads me to the question of the style of learning. Many people do not know their own style of learning or thoughts, and believe that it is not really necessary to find one’s way of learning things. School is over (for luck), they think, and the rest is a more or less successful struggle through life. I cannot agree to this and more and more people can’t because they feel the negative consequences of not knowing their one learning habits. So there are people who prefer reading things (reading types) or others, who do best, when they hear, what they have to learn (hearing types). These are the types, who will be most successful in the traditional school system. Then there are others special types of learners, like the one’s who have to read aloud or walk through a room by learning (like a lawyer before court). Some people have all kinds of rituals to promote their mental awareness and creativity. Think of poets like Friedrich v. Schiller (1759-1805) who had always old apples on his desk, while working or many artists who have their muse to inspire their mind to produce their most wonderful works of art.

I am sure that there are many other ways of learning, which are as individual, as there are personalities on earth. My personal way of learning is writing. I never learn better, than when writing about something. This blog is one way of doing so. Whenever I read or hear about something new, I sit down and write a few sentences about the topic. By doing so I recapitulate what I have got to know, I structure the lessons learnt and express myself. It took some time to find out, that this is the optimum of doing so for me. Until a few months ago, I was sure my way of learning would be walking through a room and recitate what I have to learn. It was a very well working way for me, which was successful for many years. But now I have found another and even better path to learn. It is not what will be accepted very well at school. I got to know that Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965), the famous British Prime Minister, did learn exactly the same way. Well if someone winning the Nobel Price for Literature was learning in that way, it may not be the worst choice for me also!

Hero of the net – coward of real life

There is an interesting phenomenon which can be witnessed during surfing the internet, whether it is public newspapers, information guides, private blogs, online communities or worst of all, diverse kinds of forums. Obviously the persons behind the nicknames or the apparently anonymous posts, feel the strong urge to blurt out into the world his or her degenerated and highly unqualified thoughts. What I am referring to are the masses of anonymous writers that penetrate all areas of the World Wide Web and increase the amount of confusion, disinformation and entropy by which the average internet user is molested permanently.

It has been said, that at least two third of the net’s content consist of misinformation, propaganda und sex. For that is definitely true and complaints about such facts are all in vain, I am one of the strongest proponents of not falling into the trap of the illusion, that the world outside of you can be changed. Not at all. What makes me think about this anonymous writers is more of an academic interest, the need to know and to understand, an effect of my unsaturating curiosity. The phenomenon is well known, but only little studies are done on the subject. I remember in fall of 2008, when Jörg Haider, the politician of the Austrian right, died in a car accident, it became a very big story in Austria. The media and especially the net where filled with all kinds of propaganda and conversations of the lowest level imaginable. Most posts where worthless, either there was glorification or happiness about Mr. Haider’s death. The net turned into a bloody battle field. A well known psychiatrist wrote in a local newspaper about the kind of person that exists behind the anonymous posts and nicknames.

There was a study of a Swiss psychiatrist, who found out that the personality of the people who write very courageously and seem to have strong personas and opinions, own the complete opposite of these qualities in real life. The net seems to turn them around and under the secure cover of anonymity they pretend to be great and powerful people, they live the illusion in the webspace they do not dare to live in their real life. When I read this article, I discovered parallels to my personal experiences. Reading some homepages always made me ask, if the writer is serious or just writing fiction. Behind the outside appearance, there is shyness, anxiety and feelings of not being worthy and a strong lack of character. But most of all, such people feel a big amount of aggression inside themselves, which need to be expressed. For they do not dare to express aggression in there daily life, the web becomes a substitute, a “safe space”, where all the non-digested energies are thrown into. The anonymous writers crave for acknowledgement, for they believe there contributions have not been evaluated enough and the respect of the community is painfully missing. Of course the writers feel secure and do not believe in any negative consequences for themselves, otherwise such actions would not be possible. These people are cowards, they are what without any doubt can be called a narcissistic personality. But may be there is one good effect of these internet user’s activities. If they use the net for their expression of aggression, they do not act aggressively in the “real world”. As far as I remember that was the conclusion of the mentioned article.

Non the less, the internet shows a lot of what is really going on inside the human’s mind. It seams to me like a course in free association sometimes. Robert Greene writes in his “33 Strategies of War”, that it is fatal, that human beings of our times are trained for peace and not for reality, what is war. Hypocrisy and manipulation became very common, everybody is searching for the “trick” to get things done the way they like it. The surface is shining like gold, but the deep waters of character are highly intoxicated. Make people become emotional and you see through the vale of complacency presented to the world. Never overestimate the moral of people. The person who exposes him- or herself as highly moral, is oftentimes the complete opposite of being moral. We all know the false Phariserians, who shine outside and stink inside, without even knowing it; most of them really believe what they tell themselves. They are hypnotized by their own words and ideas and cannot see the truth. One part of their personality contradicts another one, without even recognizing it. A human person normally includes all kinds of contradictions. But if we are aware of ourselves, we see that different aspects of us (often appearing as different inner voices) have different positions toward the same thing. Goethe, the great German poet expressed this by saying: “there are two souls living in my chest”. But for luck I am quiet sure that nobody of my readers belongs into the category of this anonym writers. At least I hope so!

The guy whom can be trusted

One of the most crucial factors in choosing our leaders in society, business, politics, as well as our friends, companions and people we socialize in general, is trustworthiness. To trust means to believe in someone without proof. That does not mean, that we trust blindly or without mind and thinking; not at all. It just means that there is a solid base, a strong fundament, on which our beliefs are grounded. It is evident that all comes down to the question of character or personality. In this text I am using character and personality as synonyms.

We shall not choose the ones we follow by their resources, their social network, their power or by their outside appearance. Such criteria for election have always been a disaster in effect, as history is full of stories of the charismatic leader, who led his people into ruin. But the leader of a country, may it be a king, a dictator or an elected president, is always a representation of the mass consciousness of a certain people. So it can be said, without being sarcastic, that every people has the leaders it deserves. That it definitely true, and makes us draw a crucial conclusion from it. If we want to have better and more capable and competent leaders, we have to change ourselves first! We have to act more mindfully, more in the present of the moment with guiding the help of our heart and our brain. What I mean is not some weird, esoteric or New-Age thinking, without connection to reality (we have had enough of that for a few decades now and the results are everything else than fruitful). It just means, we do not be blinded and irritated by the smoke of fake personality and see through all the deceptions that come along our way.

One is never deceived, we always deceive ourselves. The lack of our own integrity opens up a hole in our personality, so that outside forces can invade us and may take control of our true being. We may feel like being out of control, and that is true to some degree, for we let an outside force (normally another human being) take control. But we always have the power to re-establish our own reign. So first of all, if we really wish to live in a world of trustworthy people, if we want to have prospering relationships, we have to become, what we want to perceive - trustworthy. If you want to have good friends, first it is your duty to be such a good friend to others. And considering the question of trustworthiness, it is your job to be trustworthy yourself.
Many people think, detecting the personality of another human being and being successful in life comes from a certain kind knowledge and the training of clearly defined skills. In other words, they believe, that success, may it be in business, society, sports or relationship and the like, comes from knowing “tricks” and having special information most people do not have, or which are hidden from public. They believe that knowledge is power, and that you could change the word outside of you. So they read books, visit seminars and workshops, listen to “Gurus”, who seemingly have “the wisdom”, and pay thousands of Euros or Dollars. Nothing could be more short-sighted. Fact is that you can control to hundred percent what is inside of you (at least potentially, not to say you have already acquired this ability) but the world outside of you is completely out of your control. You have zero control over what is not inside of you. So any change in life can only come from inside. The outside is only an effect; the world is an indirect perception of ourselves, not more and not less!

Let’s go back to the question of character and trustworthiness. A person, that knows his boundaries, knows what he can control and what is outside of his control. Ideas of “let us change the world and make it a better place” are dull, especially when spoken by a politician. The attempt to create heaven on earth has always led to hell! (By the way did you notice that dictators are always talking about peace: Hitler, Soviet Union et. al.) A mature person accepts what cannot be controlled and is not wasting energy on it. If we have the wish for vengeance, we live in the illusion to controlling the past, which can not be controlled. If we are afraid of the future, we are living in the illusion of controlling the future. Regret or vengeance are suffering over the past and anxiety is suffering over the future. But we can only live in the now. Suffering means there is going something wrong in our life. Suffering tells us to stop, what we are doing. But that is not the way human beings look at the world. Suffering is just wasting of energy, we are alarmed by our mind, not to waste energy, and therefore suffering exists. The truth is, that there is never a past and there is never a future, they are never real. A person, who is afraid, as well as a person, who regrets the past, is not living in reality. Suffering also tells us, that we are not living in reality. In reality there is never pessimism, there is only optimism. Pessimism is nothing else than immaturity. And do not be deceived by people who tell that the reason, why they are pessimistic is because they are realists. That is another deception to justify their negative view of the world and themselves. For whatever we think about the world, is what we think about ourselves.

So we have another factor of a mature person, whom can be trusted. A mature person is an optimist. A trustworthy person has strong personal boundaries. He knows what are his goals and values; he knows his priorities and lives by them. So he is able to say “no” when someone wants him to act against his values or goals. We may not like, that a person opposes us with a “no”, but at least we can respect such a person and we can trust him, for what we know what he is standing for. He has a profile, in other words, he has character. And character is destiny, as we know since the times of the old Greek.

The ability to choose other people by their character is one of the most important skills we must learn in life. Without this skill, we end up in bad jobs, bad economic situation, bad relationships and bad societies. But keep in mind: You are the master of your character, your are the master of your word, everything begins with you! Character is destiny!