Why I Go Natural - at end
Sunday, August 18, 2013
False Standards -
Dire Consequences
(Part 2 of 2)
By
Francis William Bessler
Laramie, Wyoming
8/18/2013
False Standard # 3 -
Power is Virtuous!
If Pope Francis and Jesus were to meet on the street, would Jesus go to Pope Francis and say “Attaboy!” for all the “power” that Pope Francis thinks Jesus has committed to him? I doubt it - because I don’t think Jesus would applaud any kind of power in the first place - be it in his name or that of any other.
Remember, False Standard # 1? It dealt with man falsely believing that God is really outside of us for any of us to need to be saved. In fact, the traditional Jesus is based on False Standard # 1. In fact, the traditional Jesus is based on the idea that God and man are separated and that for man to be “saved,” somehow God and man need to be unified. The traditional Jesus is one who was supposed to unite God with man - or man with God; but what does the notion that God is not really separate from man do to the idea of a “traditional Jesus”? It pretty much nullifies it. Doesn’t it?
But power is an aphrodisiac! It gives out another of those many false illusions that man loves so well. If I can’t have an orgasm, give me power - or even if I can have an orgasm, give me more of the same by giving me “power.” Power is the end of it all. Without power, no one deserves to be alive. Only the “Powerful” are worth anything at all in this life. Thus, the emphasis on Power.
But why is power really an illusion of something beneficial for a lasting soul? It is an illusion because it is so short lived. It is like depositing a penny in the bank when you think you have deposited a million dollars. Why? Because Death Ends It All - that is, all that is “powerful.” With death, power ends. So why in the world put any emphasis on it while we are alive?
I think the “real Jesus” was a true advocate of living without power. Was Jesus aware of many of his so called “disciples” - like perhaps, Peter and John - wanting to use him to “achieve power” when he was for having no power at all?
I am reminded of a quote in one my favorite works - THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO THOMAS. Of course those who think power is so wonderful would not agree that Jesus may have said this, but in Verse 21, it is stated: Mary said to Jesus: Whom are thy disciples like? He said: They are like little children who have installed themselves in a field which is not theirs. When the owners of the field come, they will say: “Release to us our field.” They take off their clothes before them to release it (the field) to them.
What is that to say - even though the words may be somewhat confusing - perhaps due to inconclusive translation from the original Coptic (Egyptian) to English? Still, the gist of it is that many who thought they were following Jesus for the “power” it seemed to invest in them would find upon death that they had no such power. His disciples were like “little children who have installed themselves in a field which is not theirs.” That is how Thomas says that Jesus defined his disciples; and when, upon death, those disciples - who thought they had power in Jesus - died, they would find themselves stripped of that power as in having no clothes at all.
And that is “probably” the truth too. When we die, we are like naked, with no clothes to protect us or make us seem as we are not. In death, all are naked - and so, in death, so too were the “disciples of Jesus.” I wonder if ones like Peter & John were around to hear that description. If they were, it seems they ignored it because it seems they were convinced that Jesus meant - and means - Power.
In another verse in THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO THOMAS, Verse 81: Jesus said: Let him who has become rich become king, and let him who has power renounce it. That is perhaps an awkward way of saying that he who is rich is also like a king because there is really no difference between “being rich” and “being a king.” Why? Because being rich and being a king are both expressions of power. It is not to say that one who is rich should also become a real king because only one can become a real king - even as there are many who are rich. How can there be “many kings”? So Jesus is not offering that the rich should become kings, but should see themselves as powerful “like kings.”
The real instruction follows, however. Be you rich or a king or whatever, “let him who has power renounce it.” And therein is the “real Jesus,” I think. Let him who has power in this life renounce it because upon death, he will lose it anyway. It is only to say that the best preparation for death and the life to come - which may be much longer lasting than the current one - is to have no power at all in this life.
Again, faced with the inevitability of death, no man should think that power is really any advantage in this life. It does nothing for the next life - and being that it is totally contrary to the reality of a bodiless soul in death, it is almost useless. So, why seek it in this life?
But Power is an illusion in this life, isn’t it? And one of the ways the so called “powerful” retain their power is to require that all people wear clothes. Regardless of one’s reason or claim to power in this life, however, in all probability, upon death, it goes away. It just disappears like a leaf in a wind. No matter how powerful you think you are in life, you will be without power and impotent in the next Why? Because it is your body that allows you to have power at all in this life; but without a body - no power - until you choose to reincarnate and do the same stupid thing all over again.
What judge, however, will admit that power is useless - in the long stretch of things? In 1989, I was caught jogging natural on a Friday evening on a beach outside of Savannah, Georgia. I thought I was alone, but some who believed in “power” found me anyway. I was incarcerated for “public indecency” by the power elite of the area and brought before a judge on the following Monday. I was given like the “last rites” before death if I were to ever repeat my daring behavior again. “If you ever do this again,” the Judge bellowed, he would “throw the book at me.”
Admittedly, I was very timid when I asked the Judge if there is such a law as to really prohibit one from jogging natural on a beach - if that is all he is doing. The Judge literally sneered at me as if I was out of order to ask such a question. “There is such a law,” he stated matter of factly, “and if you violate it again, watch out!” Then he fined me $350 for a first offense and let me go.
I have no idea if there is really such a law in Savannah, Georgia that bans jogging natural on a public beach, but if there is, why was it passed? To keep those in power from losing it. It is one of those great illusion things again. Judges think they need power and that the only thing that is worth anything in this world is to have power - and thus laws are passed - legally or illegally - that ban going naturally. Not only would the permission of going natural allow for a judge to be seen as he really is - the same as one brought before him - but there is that horrible thing called “power” that sticks out its rather ugly face.
Let us be reasonable, however. Why is going natural an affront to those who want and need power - or to those who think they need power? Because it is an equalizer. Going natural tells it like it is; and those in power do not want things to be told like it is - lest they lose their power. So, they rule against going natural to keep them in power. At least, that is the end of it all. The truth is that if I am allowed to go natural, so would a judge; and if a judge and I were both natural, how could you distinguish between the judge (ordinarily with robe) and myself - in terms of the power that one of us has that the other lacks?
Imagine the little fellow, Kim, who rules North Korea now having to stand in front of his “prisoner citizens” and letting them know that he is no different than they by taking off his clothes and showing all. Would they follow him without resistance then? Hardly! Thus, Mr. North Korea, bans going naturally in public and outfits all his prisoner citizens with “uniforms” - including himself - to offer and sustain the illusion that he is supposed to be more powerful than they.
False Standard # 4 -
The Truth is “Other Oriented”
At the beginning, I admitted that I like to see pictures of the natural me. There is really a good reason for that; and it is not that I am “obsessed with myself.” The truth is that I am “obsessed with the truth,” but I know that the truth begins with me. That is why I go natural and love to see pictures of me in a natural state. I am looking at the truth when I am looking at me. Now, if I were to go natural for the pleasure of it more than for the truth of it, then, of course, I would not have the same motivation for going natural. Would I?
But why is it so that to find the truth, I must begin with myself. It is because we are all the same and the smallest little atom - as I say in one of my songs - is just as Divine as the biggest star. If that is so, however, and I “know” that, then there is no reason whatever for me to go outside myself to find the truth. If I really believe that all are equally Divine, then that must include me. Right?
But how many preachers believe that? How many would argue that no one can find the truth unless it be told to him - or her? How many preachers are there out there standing in front of millions of people every Sunday telling listeners that they “must believe in Jesus” to be saved - or the like? How many really believe that they are the “center of Divinity” - that is the center of their own Divinity? How about Jesus? Did he even realize that all are equally Divine because all are equally of the Infinite?
My impression of Jesus is that he was very much a “solitary” kind of guy. I get the impression of that by the story that he loved to have children come to him. Why would anyone be “obsessed” with children? Why? Because he realized that every child is the same as every adult - in terms of worth. That is why Jesus would have asked the little children to come to him.
But what does a child know than an adult does not know? All I have to do to learn the answer to that is go back to my own childhood. After all, I was once a child. Wasn’t I? What did I know as a seven year old that I should still know today? That is the key to knowing the truth, I think. Look at the world as a child - and treat the world as an adult as you “knew” it as a child.
So, what did I know at the age of seven? In truth, I knew that I did not know much of anything - and that lack of knowledge was far more important to me than the so called knowledge I would later learn in life.
I can “prove” what I am saying by imagining that a seven year old is zapped by lightening and is “taken away” from this world before he - or she - even begins learning much of anything in life. If I had been zapped by lightening when I was seven, would my worth have been impacted by anything at all? If I had been zapped by lightening as a seven year old and had never learned a whit about what people like Moses and Mohammed and Buddha - and even Jesus - might have told me, would I have been lacking in worth?
Any child knows the answer to that. Of course not - that is, of course I would not have been lacking in worth had I died as a child. What does that tell me? What should that tell anyone who has any sense? Knowledge from without is absolutely useless in the long run of things. It is only knowledge gained from within that means anything at all.
But the problem is that as we live - and supposedly learn - we actually “dislearn” the most beautiful and wonderful of all truths - that all are equally good and that no one needs another to be saved. Unless you tell a child that he needs some advice from without, he - or she - would never know he - or she - is lacking. It is the process of life, then, that derails most people from really knowing how wonderful they are.
How many great people in the world know that, though? How many kings are aware that they are no more important than the ones who might be serving them? How many servants under kings know that they are as special as the kings they might serve? How many adults know what a child instinctively knows - that life itself is the great treasure of life?
What if the people down below that mountain that Moses supposedly climbed knew they were “as good as children”? What if they had been aware that Israelites could not be more “Godly” than Egyptians? What if they knew they could have no more worth than their children - or anyone’s children? What if everyone down below that mountain that Moses climbed were aware of their true worth? Could Moses have come down from a mountain and told them anything that was useful? Of course not; but the truth is those Israelites were totally ignorant of their own worth - and that is why a Moses could come down from a mountain and tell them what they did not need to know - and, in fact, should have never been told.
What were the Israelites told that they should have never been told? They needed to “serve someone else” in order to know meaning themselves. If those Israelites had been aware they were already worthy just being the centers of a Divine Existence, they could have never been misled by a Moses - or a Mohammed - or anyone.
Again, go back to being seven. As a seven year old lost in a little world of worth, would I have had to know anything about what someone else would tell me - like a Moses or a Buddha or a Mohammed - or even a Jesus? NO! One can truly illustrate the worthlessness of some so called item of truth by asking if he - or she - really needed to know that item to have worth. If you need to know something I know - or think I know - and I never tell it to you - would you be less than you are? Of course not!
So, what am I really saying here? I am saying that the truth is really within - and as such - no one need depend on anyone outside of him - or her - to tell him - or her - anything worthwhile. I am saying take off your clothes and go back to being a little child. Imagine yourself being zapped by lightening - and then ask yourself - did I really need to grow up to learn what any so called wise person had to tell me - like a Moses or a Buddha or a Mohammed - or even a Jesus?
In truth, before I knew any of these people existed, I was. That is, before I knew they existed, I was only aware of me; and therein is the key to really knowing the truth.
That is not to say that Moses or Buddha or Mohammed or Jesus may not be filled with wisdom. They might be - or one or two of them might be; but my argument is that whatever wisdom they might have had I do not need to have worth. My worth - or your worth - is not dependent upon someone knowing about it. It just is - by virtue of my life having no dependence whatsoever on any other living being in terms of being dependent upon another living being for personal worth. Again, that can be “proved” by the possibility of my living and dying without any knowledge of any alleged sage that may have lived.
If a child in Iceland, for example, lives and dies without any exposure to any of the great sages of the world, would he - or she - have less worth because he - or she - did not know about a certain sage? Of course not!
Conclusion:
Choose Your Own Standards!
I have often admitted that I love the natural - but not for exhibition reasons. That is, I do not go natural because I think I am some grand tribute to mankind. I am just “one of the gang,” so to speak - just one among an “everyone” that just happens to be the same. Sadly, I think, most of the human race has lived and still lives like we are different. In fact, most pride themselves on “being different” - not being the same. From that concentration and insistence on “being different,” we have endured and are enduring terrible conflicts and wars because that is what happens when people focus on “being different.” Liberty is defined by those who insist on “being different,” not by finding common ground, but on standing on uncommon ground and being willing to fight for the right to be different.
I love taking pictures of myself in the buff, so to speak, because I want to see me as I am - not as others might want to see me - which is “different” from them. The natural tells it like it is; and as it is, we are all the same. Most people cannot handle life as it is, however, and insist on making it something different; and they have problems with ones like me trying to do just the opposite - concentrate on how we are the same as if there is nothing more important than “being the same.”
Being the same, however, does not mean that we are not different in the details of our anatomies. For ones like me, however, those kinds of details do not matter a whit. Just because I am “different” than you because I have a small penis and you have a large penis does not mean that we are not the same. We are the same in nature - in spite of our differences in anatomy - and pictures once again express how much that is so; and that is another reason I like pictures of natural people so much.
Throw in fashion, though, and the entire picture of our “sameness” becomes obliterated. When we cover up, our sameness disappears. Why? Because our focus then becomes our different clothes and we lose sight completely of our “same nature.” Fashion, then, becomes the real King; and we all become servants of that new king - and thereby lose sight of who we really are - wonderful creatures who are being given wonderful bodies and wonderful natures that are all “the same.”
In spite of Fashion being the “Real King,” however, I have gone natural all my life - when I’ve considered myself alone or have been expressly invited to do so - to emphasize for myself that I am no different than anyone else; and therein, I think, I have found the ONLY KNOWLEDGE that is important - the knowledge of knowing that I am just like everyone else and it is that knowledge that really allows me to live the “liberated life” I have lived - or have tried to live. I have lived outside of the “normal standards” of a man being measured by the size of his penis - or a woman being measured by the size of her breasts. I realize the idea of needing no power significantly aids me in doing as I have done, too. I have also realized that power is an illusion for the soul. That realization, too, has aided me in my own chosen virtue - to love life as it is because it is worthy of being loved.
On occasion, I have spent a few days in jail for stepping outside the normal limits of things. There is that 1989 (or perhaps 1990) Savannah, Georgia incident I mentioned - and then an earlier one in Atlanta, Georgia in 1985 where I was thrown in a cell for riding natural on a bike in an empty parking lot. Then, too, I thought I was alone, but prying eyes found me not alone. In that case, I was detained on a Saturday and released on a following Monday. The Judge in that case was a woman and she actually agreed with me that we should all be allowed to ride our bikes - au natural - but she argued that I had to impress a legislature to pass a law to permit it. She fined me $100 and urged me to appeal to a legislature.
I paid the fine, but I have yet to appeal to any legislature to modify anti-natural laws simply because I know there has been almost no chance of any American legislature doing that. We Americans are much too dependent upon old morality laws to even consider a new morality - or at least we have been. Maybe the time will come, however, when a legislature somewhere - American or foreign - will consider that anti-natural laws are generally harmful - and may cause much of the outrageous behavior - like rape - that it is claimed they should prevent.
Then there was a Virginia incident in 1994 when three truckers trapped me to prove to them that I was driving without clothes down a Virginia highway. Such daring conduct! How could it be allowed? So one trucker kept me from passing another trucker so they could be sure I was without clothes from being able to peer down on me in my smaller car from a lofty seat in a truck.
Normally, if driving without clothes, I do not pass another vehicle unless I can pass it quickly, thus preventing passengers in a vehicle I am passing from seeing me in such an “offensive state”; but in this case, one truck in the right lane just ahead of one I was passing veered to the left while I was passing the truck on the right - thus preventing me from “whizzing by.” Apparently the trucker ahead of the one I was trying to pass must have noticed earlier that I was natural - and thus to be sure I was natural - must have communicated with the trucker I was now trying to pass. Then a third trucker pulled over to the left lane behind me and prevented me from falling back.
I may have it wrong, but it sure seemed that way. Call it “entrapment” by a series of truckers. In any case, I was caught driving without clothes when normal practice would have allowed me to pass quickly and give no one a chance to see me from an elevated seat. Before that experience, I had probably traveled at least 40,000 miles driving without cover-up - and had not once had an incident. I am almost certain that I was “trapped intentionally” because later - down I-81 about 20 miles from my entrapment - I was detained by a highway patrolman - even though when the patrolman stopped me, I was dressed. The patrolman asked if I had been driving without clothes about 20 miles back. I said “yes” - and I was told to follow the patrolman as he escorted me to a local jail.
In that jail, a holding cell, I was alone. So, I proceeded to get natural again to focus on the miracle and wonder of life as I often do when I am natural. An officer appeared at a window and commanded me to put on my clothes. For awhile I resisted; but eventually, I agreed to put on my clothes to “keep the peace” in the community. It is truly amazing what we humans consider important. What difference would it have made if I stayed in my cell without clothes? I was the only one there. What did it matter anyway?
On the following Monday, I appeared before a judge and admitted my guilt. I had been driving without clothes on a pubic highway. So, why argue differently? The Judge fined me a whopping $50 and smiled at me as he set me free as if telling me by his fine that he agreed that I had not violated much at all. And so, I really hadn’t done anything wrong at all. Had I? Who was hurt by my driving without clothes on a public highway? Why should it have been an issue at all? Amazing!
Some - of both family and friends - have cautioned me that my thoughts - and perhaps, ways - can get me into trouble. Do I ever know that! I have already illustrated that with past troubles that I have encountered by doing what I think is right; and there have been some additional incidents too. Trouble may indeed find me, but given that I am not much of an “exhibitionist,” it is not likely I will get into trouble for doing what I do - simply because I do not deal with my beliefs as a public issue, but rather as a private belief.
By that, I mean I have never gone natural in the public when I have known the public is really watching. I realize there are laws against what I consider the Ideal of a Natural Life; and I do not violate them - even as I do pursue my own personal journey to be the best soul I can be. I do not need an audience for that. Like anyone else, the only audience I need - is myself. That may lend to the appearance that I am “obsessed with myself,” but the truth is that I am far more “obsessed with the truth” that Life itself is worthy of everyone’s respect and that everyone should go without cover-up to prove it.
And again, the reason I am mostly alone in my pictures is that no one else volunteers to join me. How can I take pictures of other natural people if no one agrees to go natural? I have attended a few so called “nudist colonies,” however, and I have taken some pictures of other natural people, but for the most part, I have been alone in my love for the natural state. Perhaps someday another or others will join me - and the illusion that I am “obsessed with myself” will go away.
In the end, though, each of us must choose our own standards - or each of us should choose our own standards. If you believe in power, go for it, I guess. You will probably find it rather impotent in the end, but if you believe it is useful, go for it. If you believe that you have to please a God outside yourself, go for that too. If you believe that size really is important, then choose that as one of your standards too. Or, you can take it all off as I try to do - and live your life like there are no judges and no police officers and no dictators and no one to condemn you for doing what is right - to love life because it is worthy - and to do it for that reason alone.
It all works well in the end, though, because in the end, we are all equal. In death, we are all naked - like Jesus argued in the quote I used. In death, we are all without power. In death, size - or color - means nothing at all. So, why act like any of it means anything at all in life? Right? In death, the Kingdom of God in an afterlife will be known to be the same as the Kingdom of God in the life that preceded it.
Where is the “Kingdom of God”? It is right here with you. It is right here with me. It will be there with you; and it will be there with me. The Kingdom of God is a place - but it is a place called “Everywhere.” But the Kingdom of God is also a state of mind. Belonging to it virtually requires awareness. I highly recommend that state of mind. OK?
A song about why I go natural follows.
Enjoy it as you will!
Thanks! (FWB)
Why I Go Natural
By
Francis William Bessler
Laramie, Wyoming
8/18/2013
I’m asked why I go natural.
I say it’s to be a grateful one.
I don’t see how I can say Thanks
by denying what I’m from.
And what I’m from is Nature;
and Nature is Divine.
So I’m so glad to go through life
as a son of Thine.
I’m asked why I go natural.
I say it’s to do what is right.
It is not right to accuse life of wrong
as if we have better sight.
I like that I am part of the All
and the All is All Good.
So, let me prance naturally
to find true brotherhood.
I’m asked why I go natural.
I say it’s to find Heaven here.
Heaven is only knowing God’s all about.
So, that makes Heaven everywhere.
God is really not a person -
rather a Presence in everything.
So, no matter where I go,
Heaven’s bells will ring.
I’m asked why I go natural.
I say it is to find I am at home.
When I know that all are the same,
I know that I cannot be alone.
You see, we are all God’s children,
whatever it is that God is.
And because we’re all of God,
none of us can be of sin.
I’m asked why I go natural.
I say, why not join me?
Look at yourself as a miracle
like the middle of Divinity.
We are all equally worthy
and each of us belongs.
No matter where we might go,
that should be our song.
Yes, no matter where we might go,
Heaven should be our song.