Do you seek acknowledgement from others
This originates with people who still define themselves by others, or based on their ego sources.
people who still wait for acknowledgement from others are people who wait for people to love them, who worry way to much what to wear and how are others are going to love this outfit or this makeup of this shirt etc..they want to be called funny, or cute, they doneverything with a cause to be accepted by others.
People who define themselves by ego sources, are those who define themselves by their colleage degrees ( you th when they like to be called "professor" or "engineer" or "doctor"), or by their origins ( im asian, im american, im arab, im french) or by their belongings or properties ( i have a mercedes, i own a big house by the lake), or even by their religion ( im muslim, im christian, im buddist)...MAKE NO MISTAKE, THERE IS NO PROBLEM HAVING OR BEING ANY OF THE ABOVE, IT BECOMES A PROBLEM WHEN:
"IT MAKES YOU FEEL "BETTER" THAN ANYONE ELSE" if it makes you feel that way then you know you are literally feeding you ego.
Both ways; your internal peace is always compromised, cause you externalizing the power.
When you realize that the power is inside you, you are responsible of making youself happy, not your wife, not your husband, not your job, not your kids..it is your own decision to make, you are responsible for staying peaceful and calm...in a zen state, if anyone takes you out - which may happen- it's your responsibility to get back to the ZEN. And gou get back by knowing what they did to make you upset or angry has nothing to do with you, you dont have to defend yourself, you dont have to explain yourself except for few cases. It's their right to think whatever they want about you, not your right to tell them what to think...
let them be themselves, and you be yourself
I agree with your overall message and I think it's very important for us to find an internal source of happiness, satisfaction and stability.
But I don't agree that acknowledging that a label might corresponds to your beliefs ( in the case of religion, political persuasions or other ideas) or to your cultural or national heritage means that you necessarily view that as making you better than other people or giving you additional value as a human being. It happens with some people for sure, but it's certainly not applicable to everybody and claiming that is in a way an attempt to simply the internal worlds of others and by doing so one risks falling pray to the exact believed superiority of the self you are warning about. Of course, that doesn't have to be the case, I'm just pointing out that we should approach such general assertions with cation and doubt and we should give other people some credit before we assume they are simple and self-centered.
boy i like beautiful spirits like yourself and their comments, it's insightful....thanks Dave for passing by...well, im not sure i got you correctly, but what i emphasized on about religion or political persuasions and other Ego sources IF (and i wrote that in bold) it makes one feels superior and better than anyone else, it's normal to be proud being from a certain nationality or some religion, it's the Third Step in Maslow's hierarchy of needs, but it becomes wrong if it makes the person feels that he is better than someone else BECAUSE he is from that nationality or holding that religion.
hope i got your point, let me know if missed anything..
Thank you for the reply and the kind words.
Yep, that was pretty much my point and yes, my disagreement was unjustified as you did indeed point that out and I somehow misplaced your point in my mind. My bad on this one though I think pointing it out once more was not really wasteful. But saying that I disagree was indeed incorrect as I had misrepresented your point.
hey buddy, maybe it was my mistake that i didn't make the point clear. anyway, it was a great discussion, told u in the beginning, i like talking to people like yourself, it's always fruitful
I'm very happy to hear that and I'm sure we'll keep talking about things here.
Still, I have to be honest, I think you put it very clearly and I somehow got confused :) You don't need to be so courteous as to take partial blame for what I have misunderstood. After all, things like this happen, none of us are perfect thinkers and we are prone to mistakes sometimes, the important part is to own them when they get pointed out or when we notice them somehow ourselves :) I think we can move on :D