Cruelty

N.J. writes:

In your opinion, why are children cruel to other children.
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Ok, I'll take a SWAG at it:

Basically it all revolves around the delusion of Separation. Being so young and naturally self-centered, they know not what they do.

Broken down into finer detail:

In their self-centered world, everything revolves around them, and thus they cannot yet empathize with the suffering that they are causing to others (Parents and society must take some responsibility for this promotion of self-centeredness at an early age).
Because they are aware and fearful of their own separation, they will join in on (almost) any activity that will make them feel like they "belong" to the larger group of children (most overt cruelty that I am aware of occurs within the context of a group dynamic). This includes teasing, and making cruel remarks to the "scapegoat". The evil in these acts is in making someone feel like they "don't belong" (as in saying "I belong, but you don't belong").
Unless they themselves have felt the pain of being ostracized, they may not yet know the power of their cruel words. Or if they have felt the sting of hard words, they may still use them in order to "belong" to the group, or to get back at others for the past hurt they've felt.
When an otherwise good kid witnesses this type of cruelty, they are often cowed into accepting it (or even promoting it) by their own fear of being next if they don't or by the fact they as yet do not have a strong Emperor working in their psyche that would allow them to stand up to the group-think mentality. It takes courage (courage=doing what reason requires) for a kid to stand up to a group of kids who are doing something wrong. Courage like this is rare in a child.

This is an important point, I think. When someone says something mean to you, THEIR Magician is attempting to penetrate YOUR High Priestess in order to impregnate her with a false and self destructive pattern. If your Emperor (reasoning faculty) is functioning properly, He can prevent any such psychological rape from happening.

For children, their sense of boundary (K4) and reason are still weak. In the meantime, whatever reasoning faculty they have is usually put into the service of their own (separate self-centered) survival which sometimes means attacking others verbally in a tit-for-tat fashion.

Just my guess.

JC
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O.,

You wrote (in part):

"Why does the One see cruelty through 'this personality'?" [...] But when we look at people, we take it more personally. We judge that if 'this personality' was in that situation, we would act this way or that. And we project our 'oughta-be' on to those we watch, judging this one to be cruel and that one to be a victim, [...] But, sub-consciousness doesn't ignore the suggestion. 'This personality' is modified by the experience of observing [...] we observe, primarily, what we're looking for. If we look for cruelty we're bound to find it. But if we seek a higher order, that too is easily found. Each of us may determine that in all things, great and small, 'this personality' sees the Beauty of the Divine expression. Should we look for it, it's always there. Each of us may determine that 'this personality' recognizes the manifestation of the undeviating Justice in all the circumstances of the One Life, because each of us may observe that 'this personality' is a center of expression for the Primal Will to Good - as are all the forms the One observes through 'this personality".

So basically you've made a case for the fact that in the end, it's all for the best.

So where in all this, does COMPASSION (Chesed) and ACTION (Geburah) come in, since YOU are a center of expression for the Primal Will to Good? Or is compassion just a personal notion having to do with "this personality" desires?

Some may choose to watch the feeding frenzy, rationalizing their inaction with "it's just beautiful Darwinism evolving all things for the best", but what would Christ (Tiphareth) do? Just see the beauty in it? I think not.

If we ARE vehicles for the One, then we are also vehicles for Divine Intervention into the natural evolutionary process (Conscious Co-Creation with God). If not, then Jesus wouldn't of bothered.

The KEY here is that when we DO act, are we reacting from patterns of error (K16), or are we responding (K9) from our True Self?

This reminds me of a joke:

Two Buddhists are walking along a river bank, when they see a man fall into the river and start to drown. Buddhist #1 says: "I guess it is his karma to drown today." The other Buddhist #2 takes off his robe, jumps into the river and pulls the man to safety. After saving the man, the Buddhist puts his robe back on and says to the other Buddhist: "I guess it was his karma to get saved today."

Here's a question for you:

In above story, does it matter which outcome occurred?

God is big enough to take care of the world with or without our "help", but IF we choose to participate, (to Engage with Life) then perhaps what we do, does matter - to us and to humanity at large.

You write: "Viewing these children as if they were separate beings, with their own volition, is to ignore the basic tenet of our philosophy."

This is true from the "God side" of the Divine Paradox. However from "OUR" side of this paradox, our task is to:

"...not deny [the phenomenal world's] existence, but to LIVE, using the Laws to rise from lower to higher-living on, doing the best we can under the circumstances arising each day, and living, so far as possible, to our highest ideas and ideals....Read the Message of the Kybalion-and follow the example of 'the wise'-avoiding the mistake of the 'half-wise' who perish by reason of their folly" The Kybalion.