The failure of the material plane

Living life on the material plane generally fails. Look round a room in AA where most of the people are sober a while but not particularly working the steps and you'll usually discover a lot of complaining and unhappiness. This is the result of living life on the material plane. Now, there's nothing wrong with the material plane. It was just never designed to be lived on, if you're a human rather than a rabbit or an avocado, without the superstructure of the spiritual plane.

In those rare cases where it is a success, however, it still offers an inferior product. What are the two ways that living life on the spiritual plane beats life on the material plans hands down?


(Alcoholics Anonymous, Page 42 et seq.)

Fred talks about how his life is more satisfying and more useful.

Lack of satisfaction is also well described as the restlessness, irritability, and discontentment presented in the doctor's opinion as the precursor to a return to drinking.

A feeling of useless is one of the bedevilments that are the hallmarks of the untreated alcoholic, on page 52.

Unhappiness and low self-worth? If these are prevailing, we're on the wrong plane. The point about living life on a higher plan (but through the material plane, which is an inalienable element of this) is that we discover a solution both to the generalised disappointment of the material plane and to the sense of personal futility and pointlessness that living life on the material plane engenders. The reason a material life feels disappointing is because it is disappointing. You're not wrong or deluded. You're observing its true nature. The profound sense of futility many people spend their whole lives running away from (and I speak from experience here) is good. It is to be encouraged. Because it is only from the springboard of this futility that the energy can be concentrated to leap into the higher realm. It is only by finding our true role as servants of Gods, 24 hours a day, that satisfaction and a sense of usefulness can be achieved.