We need balance – Life is Dualistic – Dualistic is Messy

How many people know what I mean when I say we live in a dualistic world?

Everything is relative and exists in pairs of opposites.

We know we live in a dualistic world, yet knowing it doesn’t seem to buy us any peace of mind about it.  One of the useful functions of the mind is to separate and categorize, but we must also allow the equally valid holistic, integrating perspective.  When we label something, we give some validity to a particular state as if it were definitive and permanent, when in reality, everything will naturally cycle.

Life is messy because it is complicated and paradoxical.  Show me one thing that is complicated, and full of chaos, that is not messy!  But just because life is messy, doesn’t mean it’s wrong or broken.

Being human is a huge paradox!  Another word I want to use for paradox is mess.  When things are not black or white, we call it a “grey-area”.   The term grey-area doesn’t generally engender confidence, peace, or trust.   Yet life is all about grey!

Nothing in life, or in complex experience, is black or white.  And to think that it will be black/white, causes us a lot of difficulties.  Much of our suffering is a result of not allowing, accepting, or expecting the existence of this duality.  We need a balance of “nurturing /incubating” and “making it happen”.  We need both compassion for ourselves and then sometimes a swift kick in the butt.  Life will always be messy.

When we have answers to life’s questions, we often are simplifying — not a bad thing unless we think our answers are true.   Often when we have answers, we become harder to live with.  When we have answers, we often don’t hear other people’s answers.  It is human to expect that other people will see and interpret the world in the same way that we see it and interpret it.  And they don’t.   Messy eh?