Beyond Belief: Living Outside the Belief Box

By Timothy Gooding

In our world, colliding beliefs create devastating struggles. The battle to be right fills the world with a raucous noise, not only obscuring what we seek, but sometimes threatening our very existence.

Would you be willing to sheath the sword of Being Right and travel where few have dared? Even if you have never carried this sword, you may be surprised by what you find.

First we explore how we are wired in feelings and thoughts to filter out much of reality. Then we loosen the filters. We escape the belief box. Then we begin to tackle the greatest filter of all?the human group subconscious.

Our journey will take us to a place with enormous possibilities. If we are lucky, we may even start an evolution.

The magical part of this journey is you can keep your beliefs, whatever they may be.

Let's go on a quest together, through the mountains of "facts", beyond the valley of "have-to-be", through the deep waters of our group subconscious to see if we can find something precious, delicate, and powerful, in reality, right now.

Are you ready?

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Dec 9, 2003
• ISBN: 9781462087679

Timothy Gooding

As a dedicated researcher, Tim Gooding diligently practiced the Dark Art of Being Right in three English-speaking countries. Today, he has been forgiven by most of the people involved. At the time of writing, he was building fame as a warehouse labourer, in Surrey, England.

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Contents

Author’s Note

Once upon a time…

You, I, and other Individuals

We, Us, and what We create Together

Kicking At The Darkness

Author’s Note 

It’s unbelievably hard to communicate without beliefs. At first, I tried to write without beliefs and assumptions but found that without any of them, I could not write a readable book. So, in this book about looking beyond all beliefs, you might notice beliefs peeking around many of the paragraphs. This is especially true in areas where the book examines a possible future. When I tried to write about what could be, unless I used beliefs and assumptions, all future deserted me.

Fortunately, if I have accomplished my goal you will easily see past my words, beliefs, and assumptions anyway. Then the fun really begins!

As your euphoria wears off, you may notice that the references in this book are minimal. One can gather expert references on just about any topic under the sun and, like statistics, prove just about anything. The key to effective references is their credibility. Credibility depends on the belief system of the people reading the book. Sometimes it is simply the number. Wow, he has 491 references. He must be right!

Since this book is for people of all belief systems, there were no references I could use that would be universally accepted. As such, I have mainly used references on complex topics where I thought the reader might want to explore a subject further.

In spite of touching on some heavy subjects, I have tried to write an enjoyable book first. I hope you will think I have succeeded. If not, well, then I will know that you must be trapped in a belief box that is distorting reality terribly…

Good luck in finding your picture that I allude to in this book. If you do, please let me know.

Timothy Gooding

November 2003

Once upon a time… 

…when beliefs reached out to us, they quietly hoped we would accept them and secretly longed for us to love them. They were certain they could help us filter the infinite variety in our lives, creating a joyful dance of discovery as we grew closer to the parent of all beliefs, reality. Gathering their courage, they knocked on the doors of our consciousness.

To their glee we immediately fell in love with them. We drew them in and held them tightly to our hearts. At first, this tight embrace seemed a loving gift of life, but as time went by the embrace did not lessen. People started to insist that their personal belief was the most beautiful, most intelligent, and the strongest. Some even claimed their belief was reality!

Slights on our beliefs became cause to hurt or war with the transgressor.

These attacks prompted us to build personal towers of truth. In the top of the towers we erected a pedestal. To make a safe home for our beloved beliefs, we carefully constructed beautiful boxes that we eventually placed on the pedestals. You will be safe in here, we assured our beliefs.

Their eyes widened.

I won’t be able to breathe in there! one said.

Don’t worry. It’s just until everyone realises you are the one that is reality. Truth is on our side. It won’t be for long.

The heavy lid swung shut. As we secured the massive lock, the muffled sobbing coming from inside saddened us.

We strapped on the Sword of Rightness and picked up a powerful shield. Then we turned to face those who would dare hurt our beloved beliefs.

Having lost a brutal battle, one man staggered back to his tower only to find rubble on the ground. With a cry he sought out the box. After hours of searching, he could only find fragments of it. He fell on the ground and wept.

It doesn’t have to be this way, a soft voice whispered.

His head came up to see the gentle presence standing by him. Who are you?

She smiled. I am your belief.

He gawked. She looked so different. So empowered. So beautiful. What happened?

Reality destroyed the tower you built and the box you put me in.

Were you hurt?

Laughing, she shook her head. No, reality never wanted to harm me. I was set free. Now I need to know if you want your freedom as well.

He frowned, not understanding.

She knelt down beside him. We must allow the world into our relationship so we can find our place in reality.

But I thought you were reality.

I know, but you were wrong. No belief can contain all of reality, silly man.

Then why do I need you at all if you are only part of reality?

Leaning close to his ear she said softly, With me you can find the magical possibilities that whisper to you from a reality that is not yet, but could be.

You, I, and other Individuals 

Whereby the beautiful delicate dance of our beliefs and reality helps us, heals us, and colours our world with vivid, breathtaking, life-giving pictures; and when our beliefs are boxed from reality, they curl onto themselves, darkening, struggling, seeking sustenance to replace the nurturing that reality would give them; and where boxed beliefs are forced on others and we commit our most heinous acts.

Cube Wars

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When many people first look at the drawing above, one side seems to jump out as the front. For you, was it the left higher side or the right lower side?

Let’s pretend, for a moment, that there is a philosophical outcome to whether the front is towards the right or the left. Let’s pretend that the validity of a scientific theory, economic practice, or the faith of a religion depends on the answer here.

Something stirs deep within us.

Towers rise and boxes are constructed. No penny remains unspent. People find themselves categorised according to the side they support. Neutrality becomes suspect. Muscles are flexed.

There are talk shows with Experts. Organisations form. Doctrines are created. Events of the world are read through filters proving the Left side is correct. No, Right is right! Hold on, government research shows the Left side is true. No, Left is Lucifer! Ludicrous, you can only ascend from the Left. Left side factions bomb the Right side. The Right side performs surgical strikes on the Left side. I wish we’d never discovered the Cube, wails one mother who has lost her children. The army mobilises. Nervous people preach peace: Can’t we just accept both sides?

Tension is high.

There is, in reality, no cube. There are, in reality, twelve lines printed on a piece of paper. Anything else has been created by your own mind simply by the way you have been trained to process information. That the cube exists at all is something created by us and all other realities based on the cube are beliefs. All proofs come from reality filtered down to serve the cube.

Luckily, our Cube society does survive its apocalypse, though severely bruised and hurt. It takes several generations to heal itself after the devastating Cube Wars. People’s investment in whether the left or right side is the front slowly fades.

Now, there is room in people’s beliefs for a vital discovery. Look at this! If you stare at the cube long enough, you will notice that the front appears to flip back and forth. No side is actually the front.

Everyone, except those who love conflict, smiles with relief. There is laughter in the street again. They shake their heads at their silly ancestors. The war was about what? they ask themselves in disbelief. Silly superstitions. I’m glad we’re so much more evolved now. The cube is really two two-dimensional planes sitting one over the other. It demonstrates that even though our minds perceive three dimensions, we are only two, just like the Cube.

Some people draw back in shock. The Cube has six sides. Our minds see three dimensions but reality is actually six!

We’re TWO dimensional!

SIX!!

Articles appear.

Mathematicians prove we have to be six.

Only God can be six. People are two-dimensional until they have been sainted.

Young souls are two. Mature souls are four. Enlightened souls are six. The Creator is fourteen. (I’m thirteen, but you can’t see ten of them.)

Nature can exist in balance in either two or six dimensions.

Trying to be more than two-dimensional on Earth is the Devil’s work!

Fundamentalists burn books for saying we’re four.

Shots are fired.

Tension is high.

Go back to the twelve printed lines. Can you force yourself to see only the twelve lines? Hard, is it not? Even though it is easy to point out that there is no three-dimensional object here, it is still difficult for many of us who have been conditioned to see three-dimensional images in two-dimensional drawings. This has become a reality filter.

Now, imagine how hard it is for someone to prove to you that your facts may not be facts at all if they have no proof.

But remember, even if someone is using a non-existent cube to prove their beliefs, it does not necessarily follow that their