Primed, Manipulated, and Biased

The sage lives his life, perfectly content to do whatever his 'nature' expects him to do, accepting whatever happens thereafter as God's Will. The sage lives his life, knowing that his life is being lived, and therefore, without any expectations of any kind.
(Ramesh Balsekar)

Someone is asked to go in a room to participate in a study. Unbeknown to him, though his sub-conscience certainly picks it up, there are dollar signs on the screensaver of the computer he works on. Someone else comes into the room and ‘accidentally’ drops pencils. He gets up from his chair and helps him to put the pencils back into the box, as probably every good citizen would do.

So far so good, perhaps nothing about this scene surprises you. The head-scratcher comes when we find at the end of the psychological study that those folks who had been primed with money symbols beforehand are less helpful on average to pick up pencils than those who have not. We are being primed all the time. We are constantly exposed to life’s energy that nudges us towards our decision.

So what do you do with this knowledge? Do you get depressed that you are being led and manipulated like a puppet? Do you quit your job in the private industry to avoid the profit driven corporate culture? Do you put sunglasses on to stop seeing the naked bodies on the bill-boards? Well don’t! Never mind a little sex and money energy as long as you know what to do with it.

It’s not our job to be Mother Theresa. It’s not advisable to escape from life as it presents itself. If God put us there it must have a reason. It’s also not our job to question every situation like a psychology student and examine our biases and the conditioning of our environment. What we spiritual travelers are asked to do is to deal with life as it presents itself and see God in it. She is always around, we just have to look.


We are on a journey Home. It is automatic and it is as quick as humanly possible as long as we get our self out of the way. Our nature is as it is, and life wraps itself around us to help us get rid of everything that holds us back. Distracting energies are not the problem; angry opponents are not the problem; a little sexual temptation is not the problem. All that matters is what we do with it.

Our choice matters, as does our perception. Our thoughts can point us in the right direction, as can our feelings. True, there is a little bit of steering involved not to be fooled by the energies that no longer serve us, but it is actually fun to figure this all out. So what if we miss a step here or there. The Force that leads us Home tells us all about it, we apologize and try better next time around. That’s what spirituality is all about!

Primed to go Home? Certainly! Manipulated into doing things? How could that be? Do you think anyone could manipulate a child of God that doesn’t want to be misled? Biased? Most definitely! Biased to love, to trust and to see God in good and evil.