We think we live; in fact, in thoughts we live. Thinker thinks that he lives and thought thinks that it is the thought that lives the thinker. Because thinker is the thought. Thinker is lost in the thought. It is impossible to bring both of them on table to observe. You may find when thinker is, thought is not, when thought is, thinker is not. Only thinking goes on. This is how we think we live our life in thinking.
In thinking we live. But life is far different than thinking. Thinking is old and not new. Thinking is extension of the past memory. If we wish to live, we have to die first. To die to whatever we know. To be free from the past memory. To die means that this thought that we are living has to die first. The moment this thought disappears from you. When you die now you are born to the new. It means all your past dies; you become a person who can live in the beauty of life. Death may become a moment of life. When you think that you are living so your ego thinks that it is living but it is continuation of memory. To live you have to die to everything within you.
When you die to the known, you become new. Everything becomes new to you. If you look at the moon. You look at the moon into the absolute moon-ness of being from your absolute-ness of being. When you look at a flower you look into the absolute flower-ness of being from your absolute-ness of being. That moment is the beauty of life; that is the beauty of being. Because you become one with the flower and your energy that is looking at the flower returns to you and that is the moment when it is said that observer is the observed. When you look at the clear sky it enters you and you enter in it. When you look at the vast presence into the sky-ness you find yourself one with it. In that togetherness you know that you are part of that-which-is.
When you begin to evolve the understanding in you that you are living and the body shall wither away, that is the moment when meditation begins dawning on you automatically.
When we think that we live, in that thinking we live in forgetfulness. We forget who we are and what we ought to be. We forget the code that is imprinted on our seed which has to flower into the tree of intelligence to flower into the awakening that blooms into a thousand petalled lotus of consciousness. That is the possibility that we have but we are instead living in state of deep slumber. In thinking thoughts go all around you and as thinker it is difficult for you to understand who you are because every thought takes you miles away from you-from the state of consciousness, from the state of who you are. From absolute stillness of your being, thought creates ripples in your mind and those ripples resonate creating a whirlwind sea of thoughts. Thought means your mind has taken control of your being.
When you become unhappy, miserable. In fact, you don’t get unhappy. It is the thought of unhappiness that traumatizes you. It is the dream of being unhappy in the hope of happiness makes you unhappy.
You can learn a few words by gaining the knowledge but knowing the knowledge by your being is different than learning. In fact, to know something by your being is to unlearn your knowledge because that knowledge becomes hindrance in knowing the truth. Your knowledge is your thoughts. Then you gain religious knowledge and hordes of religious thoughts. You memorise religious scriptures and may recite them with clarity and you begin thinking that you are religious and thoughts of enlightenment are bred in your mind.
You have to start unlearning and you have to die to your knowledge. In that unlearning you will tend to learn who you are and you could realise self-actualisation. When truth is bound in words, words do not convey the truth. The words are limited. Vocabulary is limited. Truth is vast. When you look at the morning sun coming out from the horizon you get mesmerised in experiencing the experience. But when you turn to write the experience, it already turns into memory. Or when you take a picture of the moment, you get a shadow of limitless enormity which remains always short of experience.
When you give meanings to your words. Everyone attaches one’s own meaning and as many meanings get created as many readers. This is what has become of our religious scripture.
The seers who saw that-which-is who saw the truth naked they spoke the truth, howsoever difficult it was to speak, which is captured in words so that these words could become guiding maps for you to reach the truth that-which-is. But seers have not created those maps for you to memorise them and repeat them daily in pursuit of some sort of ritualistic theism. These words are the milestones in your journey to reassure you that you are on the right path to know the truth. But if you cling to the milestones recite odes to milestones you tend to create knowledge that brings you back into the world of thoughts.
Life is a prayer. Life is a blessing. Life is a flow. Life is not a flight of the ego to make you addicted to the ego. You better get de-addicted from ego. The moment you leave yourself aside, God will enter right there in you. Let the flow of river take you wherever it takes you. Let you be flown into those gushes that life brings to you—that’s benediction. Don’t fall into the trap of ego that you have to win. But become the one who is not ready to win so that there is no cause left for others to make you lose.
Life is a journey to go find the maps and explore the treasure that is hidden within you. All these Vedas, Dhammapadas are expressions of experience of the self-remembering and self-actualisation. They are there to help you stimulate to take up that journey. But don’t cling to the words. Cling to the goal of self-actualisation.
One has to create one’s own Dhammapada, the Gita, the Vedas; nothing short of that will work for you. There is no shortcut to truth. There is no shortcut that you can memorise words of Buddha or Mahavira and think about enlightenment. You have to create your own scripture. Your scripture would get incarnated into your being and manifest to the world as love and compassion. When the one that-which-is is the one who is already you, the flower of self-actualisation will blossom. And you will say “Ahm-Brahsmi” (I am Brahma) or “Ana-al-Haqq” (I am the Truth I am the God).
The author is a spiritual coach and an independent advisor on policy, governance and leadership. He can be contacted at arunavlokitta@gmail.com.