Tuesday 16 February 2016

The Magnificent Truths of Our Existence by Daniel F. Parmeggiani


In The Magnificent Truths of Our Existence, Daniel Parmeggiani takes us on a journey of self-discovery to find the key to unconditional love, inner peace, lasting happiness, and real freedom. This key, as Daniel states, is within each of us. We don’t need external pleasures to create our happiness for us. It is all about how we see ourselves within our world. Walking our own personal path to become more in touch with our spirituality will allow us to uncover the guilt, shame, judgment, and condemnation that each of us harbours on some level. Daniel will help us find and release what weighs us down so we can manifest unconditional love for ourselves as well as all others.


At a young age, Daniel Parmeggiani lost his older brother to a horrible accident. Through this tragedy and the inescapable grief and depression that claimed his parents, Daniel also lost any support system, guidance, and link to pleasure in his life. After exploring other avenues of support on his own, Daniel experienced his emotional epiphany at the age of seventeen. “I am always doing the best I can with what I know.” This statement gave Daniel the base to start his search for who he was and what he wanted to be. He realized that how we feel at any given time and in any given situation is all based on how we see ourselves within our world. We are all working towards the same place with the same end desire. Daniel calls this “destination happiness.” Anything we do, whether for ourselves or for others, is done so that we can gain the most pleasure or least pain from it. This is called “The Law of Pain and Pleasure.” “We are always striving, behind every thought and action, to feel better.”


Throughout The Magnificent Truths of Our Existence, Daniel Parmeggiani gives us many good analogies and examples to explain his point of view. He reminds us that humans are the only creature to dwell in the past and present and to judge themselves negatively. Animals do what they must in the moment and if they fail, they do it again without judgment. We have a tendency to become harsh with ourselves for something that didn’t turn out as expected or for the choices we made leading up to it. But as Daniel reminds us, we are only doing our best with what we have access to in that moment. If circumstances were different our choices, and therefore the outcome, would have been different as well. Our inner judge prevents us from enjoying life in the same innocent manner as that of a child.

Not all of Daniel’s analogies were ones that I could agree with. He consistently shows us how we are all working towards the same realm of happiness as equals, including those like Jesus, Buddha, and Krishna. “Even Mother Teresa sacrificed herself for the sick and destitute in India because her own feelings were on the line.” I have a tough time seeing myself along the same path of spirituality as this company. “But rather than demeaning us, this insight lifts us all to the same level as the most revered spiritual icons.” Daniel lets us know that the only difference was how they went about finding their own happiness. “They just happened to know the way.”


The Magnificent Truths of Our Existence lets us see the difference between life and death. Pleasure points the way towards integration and harmony (life), and pain points the way towards separateness and chaos (death). Daniel Parmeggiani believes that to choose pain, and in essence death, is not possible as we only choose what will bring us pleasure. As a species of free-will, “…we are free to choose what we want; it just so happens we always want exactly the same thing.” That would be destination happiness.


Another statement I had some questions with was this: “Any wrong turns along the way only reflect our ignorance of what is takes to get there, and those who navigate straighter do so only because their view of the return home is less compromised.” Leaving out all the negative connotations that have been associated with the word ignorance in the last 30 years, the basic meaning is lack of knowledge. With that in mind towards the statement, I wonder why Daniel sees it as ignorant to make a wrong turn? Is it not considered a life lesson and possible knowledge that will be useful later on in life? Learning from what we experience shouldn’t be presumed a wrong turn since it may very well lead us down a road we were meant to go. How can this be ignorance if it may lead to our destiny? And those who have a straight path may just have been there at the right moment and not have learned a lesson that may lead to a more enriching chance. I feel that this part of the book may have been making it too easy to go down the right path in life and be questioning why we didn’t choose it to begin with. With this in mind, I continued on reading and found that Daniel believes we are ignorant as children because we aren’t aware of the possibility of good or bad, beautiful or ugly, success or failure. I have found that children see clearly and it is the extra debris that sways our beliefs as we age that can create ignorance.


Daniel Parmeggiani states that “we are incapable of being anything but innocent.” He goes on to note that “virtually all of history’s most notable enlightened masters and gurus all recognized that God’s divine quality of innocence was present in all creation.” Daniel tells us that we are all innocent as we are and we have the ability to live in complete harmony. Society has over thought the complete ease to which we can all get along. Guilt is a society-created entity as we are all born innocent. There are some communities in the world that are able to live in harmony and peace without the use of shame and guilt to keep people in line. Eastern philosophy tells of karma teaching necessary lessons and bringing balance to those who have made unwise decisions. Are we ready to live without the negativity and see ourselves as innocent entities?


The second part of The Magnificent Truths of Our Existence is filled with excellent exercises on how to free people of guilt and shame, seeing ourselves as perfect spiritual beings just the way we are with self-acceptance and self-love. Each moment of each day we live is a search for our own inner peace. If we stop fighting within our own selves and surrender to the concept that all things happen as they are meant to, we can live with harmony, love, and oneness within ourselves and our world.

I was unsure of what to expect when I began reading The Magnificent Truths of Our Existence. How could every being on the earth be trying for exactly the same thing? And how could happiness be the one goal of every soul? The further I read in this book, the more that Daniel Parmeggiani made the struggle within each person and the desires we all have make sense. Guilt and shame are killers to the soul and this book helps release that negativity. Lifting the weight off your shoulders and learning to find the beauty in life is a precious gift. That gift is what Daniel Parmeggiani wants to help you find.
Originally Posted in the April 2014 edition of Becoming Psychic Magazine
Cross-posted on Goodreads

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