We are at heart human beings rather than human doings or human havings.
Human doings are always busy - no time to lose - no pain no gain - the devil finds work for idle hands to do. The work-life balance can become skewed such that workaholism results. But we are goaded into this way of living. "What are you doing with yourself these days - you're too young to retire."
"Work to live. Don't live to work."
Human havings are obsessed by the ever-changing fashions of must-have. Houses, cars, clothes and holidays are as much status symbols as things in their own right. We are got at by consumerism and materialism despite a deep understanding that "you can't take it with you".
Plants and animals are conscious to the extent of responding to changes in their environment, Human beings are perhaps unique in being conscious of their consciousness. When we make time to 'stand and stare' we become conscious of what it means to be. We can notice what we are noticing and think about thinking. Have you ever 'been' or are you a potential 'has been who never was'?
Here are links to some briefings by George:
- To have or to be?- a one-pager based on the thoughts of Erich Fromm
- How to recognise a mystical experience - a short intro to various studies - "Despair is 25 times more likely to ‘produce’ religious-mystical experiences than happiness and the distractively potent combination of sex, drugs and rock and roll rates very low on the scale!"
- Closer to God in a garden than anywhere else on earth - to find "infinity in a grain of sand, eternity in an hour" (William Blake)
Optimum knowledge in the being mode is to know more deeply. In the having mode it is to have more knowledge. The active, alive person is "like a vessel that grows as it is filled and will never be full." (Eckhart)
In yoga, self-realization is knowledge of one's true self. This true self is also referred to as the atman to avoid ambiguity. The term "self-realization" is a translation of the Sanskrit expression atman jnana (knowledge of the self or atman). The reason the term "realization" is used instead of "knowledge" is that jnana refers to knowledge based on experience, not mere intellectual knowledge.