Peter Spiegelbauer

I say YES

When I first started to explore the origins of everything my personality is made of, my way of looking at things and my world in general, I was blind.

Blind to the truth. Blind to others and their attitudes. My message was clear and yet in itself impossible to put into action. The rule that dominated my life then was, ‘Realize your potential and thereby change for the better!’

But how do I find my true self? What does “better” actually mean? How do I decide what is beneficial and what is harmful to me and my personal development? How much influence can and should my environment exert on myself and my actions? How do I transform myself and others without hurting, limiting, lying, killing, destroying at the same time?

I was driven by these and other questions. Driven into a global search for answers. Many of these questions, which still date from a time when I first “came into myself”, I have already answered a long time ago. But to me, the fact remains that in spite of all my experiences and knowledge, my path is still far from reaching its finish line. To begin with though, examining the question, ‘What does it mean to “live”?’ must be a priority.

I have come to the realization that any person who asks this question is ready to embark on a journey that ultimately leads to answering this most existential question of all. The answer lies within us. In our decisions, in our personal development, in our way of expressing ourselves. From our very birth on, we are busy communicating with our environment – however, leaving out the most important person of all: ourselves. We satisfy our needs. We acquire and increase our wealth. We interact with our environment in order to achieve, build, create. But for whom or what are we doing all of this?

Some would say for God. Others would say for the people closest to us. But the truth is simpler. We create our very own worlds in which we move around and slowly but surely use up our lifetime – for noone but ourselves. We accept this fact – be it consciously or unconsciously – day after day. Should we have the misfortune of one day meeting someone who asks us, ‘Who are you really?’ we would not know what to say.
We would not know who we are. We would not know why we are worth putting ourselves in almost life-threatening situations, just so we develop our personality, if we still did not know who we really are.

Coming into this world, we are free. Free from constraints, free from prejudice, free from rules or laws, free from everything we impose on ourselves throughout our later lives, just to then spend a lot of energy stripping them off again, like a second skin. The older we get, the more we realize that our parents and their parents have acted exactly the same way when they had reached our level of knowledge.

Finally, only one question remains, ‘What are we to do if we do not have anyone in our lives anymore who has more insight than we do?’ If there is noone left whom we can ask for advice or with whom we find comfort and shelter when our mere existence puts us down, chokes and crushes us? But even these questions can be answered.

Oddly enough, it is the same answers we find, when we understand our human nature in all its vastness. And when these answers are found, there is no more angst. No constraints, no fears, no anger and no more suspicion. Because at that point we have realized that the miracle of life lies within ourselves.

We live in a time in which concepts such as love, honesty, strength, sincerity and unity, have become meaningless. Like faded photographs from another, long-forgotten era, they are still somehow present in our lives, showing up from time to time to remind us of their existence. But what do these concepts really mean? And what is even more important, what do they mean to us personally and our journey? Many people ask themselves these and other questions, consciously or unconsciously, day after day. However, are we also prepared to go down this difficult path of enlightenment and work on answering these questions?

I say YES. YES, to people whose ambition is not only to work on themselves, but also to reach and communicate with others. I say YES to people who are willing to make decisions for the good of all and are also ready to live with the consequences. I say YES to US. I say YES to my path. I say YES to your path. I say YES to life.



The Great Dictator's Speech

I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone - if possible - Jew, Gentile - black man - white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness - not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way.

Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost....

The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men - cries out for universal brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children - victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.

To those who can hear me, I say - do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish. .....

Soldiers! don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty!

In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is within man” - not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.

Then - in the name of democracy - let us use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give men a chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfil that promise. They never will!

Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers! in the name of democracy, let us all unite! - Charlie Chaplin
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Todos los derechos pertenecen a su autor. Ha sido publicado en e-Stories.org a solicitud de Peter Spiegelbauer.
Publicado en e-Stories.org el 25.02.2015.

 
 

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