Fearless Puppy on American Road

from Fearless Puppy on American Road by Doug "Ten" Rose Return to Chapter List

Preface to a Shortcut to Heaven

Want a shortcut to heaven? Of course you do. Everyone does.

I’m going to take it for granted that we all understand the basics here. We’re not talking about going to some heaven far away in the sky. Heaven’s meaning here refers to the frame of mind that allows one to live without self-inflicted misery on Earth. (Upon arrival at this heaven, it becomes obvious just how much human suffering is self-inflicted.)

The most commonly asked question about heaven, liberation from suffering, enlightenment, salvation, or whatever you want to call it, is “What’s the quickest way to get there?” Not an altogether bad question, and even more understandable coming from a fast-food society.

Many say there is no shortcut.

I’m just a street dog, so my opinion may not be worth much, but I have to disagree. Don’t misunderstand. You will still have to do the work. You may get calluses on your ass from sitting in contemplation before you have a stabilized heaven in your mind. It helps to sit quietly enough for long enough to reach the natural stillness required to get to the place within you that can experientially register the so-called secrets (they’re not so secret) of the Universe. Then, you may have to maintain the stillness even longer in order to continuously reinforce the possession of this knowledge and make it habitually accessible.

But there are concrete paths to that stillness that can save you eons of time and trouble, if you get on them and stay on them. The shortest distance between any two points will always be a straight line. Grandfather Eli had some straight lines on his map. Another such line follows.

The particular method referred to in the next few pages requires no religion, ritual, or dogma. This account is not complete. It may not even be accurate. It’s just how I saw it. If you want more information, don’t just find a source. Find a verified, reliable source.

Here we go.

* * *

Everything you feel we’ll call a sensation—hot, cold, wet, dry, tired, energetic, thirsty, hungry, satisfied, etc.—anything that comes through the senses. Suffering is caused by our emotional attachment, in one form or another, to these sensations and the consequences of those attachments.

Here’s what those consequences are about.

Any sensation will automatically cause a craving for it or an aversion to it. This will cause an action on behalf of that craving or aversion. You will like the feeling and eventually take action toward feeling more of it, or you will dislike the feeling and have an aversion reaction that drives you away from it. These actions will foster another sensation (pleasure/pain/whatever), which will manifest yet another action (reaction, you could say) to that next sensation’s resulting craving or aversion, and on and on. You taste something nasty. You have a dislike for it. When you see it again you cringe. You eat your favorite food and you love it. Next time you see it, you know how good it will taste and you want it again. Even if you don’t see it for a while, you will probably think about it and crave it anyway. (After a while there can actually be more of an addiction to the craving or aversion itself than to the original sensation!)

It’s very helpful to realize that all of these sensations (and everything else for that matter) are actually equal in importance (or lack of importance if you want to look at it that way) and are temporary (they will pass away, as surely as they have arisen). Only the attachment (craving/aversion) to these sensations, in the form of the repetitive attention that sticks them in our minds, makes them a source of lasting pleasure or pain—and in either case, eventual misery.

Let’s say you want a candy bar or some other sugar fix. You’re with a friend who’s dying for a cigarette. You don’t smoke. He doesn’t eat sweets. The sugar is only special to you. The cigarettes are only special to your friend. This is because you each have your respective cravings for them. These things are only important because you and your friend have made them important to yourselves.

Sugar and cigarettes are not, objectively, any more important than rubber, broccoli, or rocks. Your friend can’t stand sugar. It tastes nasty to him. Cigarettes disgust you. They make you sick. The desire for these, again, hasn’t as much to do with sugar or cigarettes as it has to do with the way you and your friend have developed attachments (craving or aversion), attitudes, and reactions to them.

These attachments can open the door to all kinds of pissy feelings. If you don’t have any sugar you start to think about it more and aren’t paying attention to what’s happening around you. If you’re stuck in a place smelling smoke it can make you too irritable to be aware of or enjoy what else is happening. The man/woman of your dreams or some other golden opportunity could fly right by you. You might be too preoccupied to notice. You could step on a hundred dollar bill and never see it because you’re thinking about how you hate the smoke or need the sugar. Your friend might do the same for what seem like the opposite reasons. He hates the sugar but loves the smoke.

Actually, you are each operating like that for the same reason. It’s not the sugar or the cigarette. It is the importance you’ve manufactured and attached to each of them subjectively, with no regard for objective reality. That objective reality would make it as plain as the nose on your face that nothing’s more important to you than you allow it to be. Don’t believe me? Ask a recovered heroin addict. They may be able to tell you about a substance they would have killed for at one time, but now wouldn’t accept for free. Anyone who has ever been addicted to anything—a drug, another person, whatever—can tell you about hell being a craving or aversion.

* * *

Cut the chain of cause and effect (sensation—attachment—action—sensation—etc.) at the link of sensation before it reaches the link of attachment to that sensation. If you do so, you can rid yourself of the attachment to the craving for, or aversion to, that sensation. You will then be free from the suffering that wanting more of (or wanting to get rid of) anything will surely subject you to. These are both states of want. They draw your attention away from being fully present and accounted for at any and every given moment.

The obvious problem with this is that the present tense is where all the good stuff happens. The past is just remembering and the future may be hoping or planning for, but the present is where real life goes on. If your mind is elsewhere, it can’t be here.

Escaping this aversion or craving, again, seems to have a good deal to do with realizing the true equality of things, as well as how temporary all things are. That means seeing everything as what it is, instead of what you feel about it—and remembering that neither what that thing really is or how you feel about it will last indefinitely. Everything is only so very important because you’ve made it that important to yourself, not because it really exists in that state of importance independently. Adjust your mentality to objective reality and you’ve found the road.

So who the hell can consistently remember (especially when the shit’s really hitting the fan) that all things are really equal and impermanent? Who can consistently keep in mind that it’s only our subjective and therefore actually unrealistic attachment to these things and situations that give us our many types of drama and misery?

Anyone can.

Yes, they can. It won’t all happen overnight. You can’t pick this stuff up in 30 seconds at a drive-through window for $2.49. But if you want to spend as much time doing things that will help yourself as you might otherwise spend on things that won’t, the technology is readily available to make life a much easier and more pleasant experience.

* * *

The above is my subjective slant on just one of many methods available to people who want to make life a happier experience.

I’ve tried to be perfectly unclear and obscure here. Hopefully, it has worked. I don’t know anything, and am not trying to relate knowledge to or inform anyone.

There certainly are folks who know how to teach this stuff, and similar beneficial notions, in a clear and functional manner. If you’re interested, you need to find them. No problem. Several names and locations are in many places besides (as well as in) this book.

If you want to pursue a voyage on any of these roads, find one that fits you. And find someone with a real knowledge of that road. You’re going to want to ask questions. You’ll want someone who can help you bring answers out from within yourself—answers that make sense within the context of your life. That someone should be able to point you toward the road in user-friendly language. Their advice should be both understandable and worth following.

Make yourself comfortable. You’re going to have to pay attention for a while. It will be worth it.

If you stay with the process, the benefits have to come to you.

They have no choice.

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