Updated on March 18, 2024
Doug Tales 162: Balance, Part One
Doug Mendenhall shares ten traits of mental balance and eight traits of mental imbalance in I See…Awake! (2015), pp. 74-75, and every single one of them is based in things he himself and those close to him went through. The more one reads Doug’s writings and experiments on what he says, the more one perceives, understands, and sees how much his viewpoints are grounded in actual experience. Or to quote Doug’s friend, Denver Snuffer, “It is the doing that leads to the understanding.”(“2 Nephi 33:15” blog post, Sept. 9, 2010.) Even when Doug is just listing principles, he is encouraging us to look deeper to how these concepts work in our own lives, and by experience come to better comprehend them ourselves.
When we are balanced in our mind, we will display the following characteristics of the true self:
• Understands and respects the self-ownership and sovereignty of all beings.
• Understands natural law and strives to live in harmony with it at all times.
• Understands true non-dualism and strives to live in non-contradiction in thought, emotion, and action.
• Understands, espouses, and works toward true freedom.
• World view reflects the understanding that there is no real separation between self and others. The answer to this question, “How do you know if you are truly suffering?” is: If someone else is suffering. We are connected.
• Does not exist in mental schism.
• Seeks to break down institutionalized belief systems that hold back the progress of consciousness. (Think of Jesus Christ here.)
• Concerned with the alleviation of suffering for all beings. A negative example of this would be the world goes nuts over the killing of a lion (which was wrong) but doesn’t care about aborted babies and having their body parts sold off. There is a definite mental schism there.
• Knows that Jesus Christ is the great prototype, and we should become like Him—perfect.
• Understands that this should be only through our Lord Jesus Christ and by doing His will. “I am Jesus Christ; I came by the will of the Father, and I do his will.” (D&C 19:24)
Those who are only concerned about themselves, their false self, here are some of the characteristics they may display:
• Do not understand or respect the self-ownership and sovereignty of all beings. “We will force vaccinations on you and your children.” “You will obey me!”
• Does not understand natural law and lives in opposition with it in ignorance.
• Lives in dualism—perpetual contradiction between thought, emotion, and action.
• Cannot even envision true freedom, seeks only to control.
• Exists in a mental schism.
• Accepts and reinforces institutionalized belief systems that hold back the progress of consciousness. (Think of Satan here.)
• Completely unconcerned about the suffering of others, thinks only about the self. “Hey, anybody have a camera on their phone or iPad? I’m lookin’ good today!” “I’d better get home so I can blog about myself today.”
• Hears the adversary and does his will. He becomes their prototype.