Our time on earth is brief. Upon closer inspection, our existence speeds by, appearing as merely a moment in the grand timeline since the dawn of life. As both organic and spiritual beings, we are torn between wholly contradictory desires. We oscillate between the urge to sustain life and the desire to touch eternity. In essence, we could easily define ourselves as hybrid beings whose primary source of suffering stems from juggling prosaic desires and the pursuit of transcendence. Between surviving and perpetuating our genes, and the desire to reach the peaks of the cosmos while remaining forever in the hearts of millions.
Like all other carbon-based beings, we need to keep our bodies alive while feeling the need to pass our genetic heritage to the next generation. This notion manifests in pleasures that materialize our connection to the living world: hunger, thirst, the need for sleep, sexual instinct, etc. These thoughts and the pursuit of pleasure occupy a significant portion of our daily lives. Moreover, a cultural element can summarize this indirect quest for pleasure: money. Indeed, money is often sought because it enhances our ability to procure pleasure. The modern world is firmly rooted in the organic dimension of human life, as money plays a prominent role. As such, while the pursuit of money is often criticized as being contrary to spiritual life, it is precisely because of the sensory pleasures it induces. Of course, having more money can have a spiritual impact on the world, which is only true if one is firmly rooted in spirituality; otherwise, our pursuit of money most often boils down to satisfying prosaic and equally ephemeral desires.
The spiritual quest is not devoid of pleasure; in fact, it is quite the opposite, however, these pleasures are of a different nature. They do not depend on the body but on an immaterial entity: the soul. Growing spiritually means becoming more aware of our immaterial and permanent dimension. Being too mired in the world of the senses prevents us from realizing the more subtle dimensions of our existence. This explains why it is necessary to restrain our senses to allow our soul to express or manifest itself. The eternal and constant is what seems to characterize it the most. As such, the soul is naturally drawn to different things.
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