The Spirit Of Spirituality: Illustrations to understand spirituality

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Illustrations to understand spirituality

This is one of the articles in a book I have written on spirituality. The book is available on Amazon.com.

The Spirit Of Spirituality

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As I studied spirituality, there were various illustrations given to make the esoteric concepts easy to understand. I am listing a few of them below. In many of these, I am using the first person way to illustrate points and it does in no way imply that I went through these situations.

A. There is a snake in my backyard!!!

It was a cloudy night and the lights in my backyard were not working. I heard a small sound and went out to investigate. As I walked around, I could not see anything and then I saw something. My blood froze and my heart started pounding. Lurking in that backyard was a long snake with a hood. For a moment I froze and then, sweat dripping from my sides, I ran inside shouting. After I recovered my breath, I called my friend an expert snake catcher. When he came, we took a torch and went outside to catch the snake. He had the necessary equipment to catch a snake.

I led him to the place where I saw the snake and ran back. I then heard a loud burst of laughter. I heard my friend telling me to come and see the snake. I hesitantly stepped out and saw why he was laughing. At the place I saw a snake was in reality a long rope. The fear of snake gone, we went in laughing.

Spiritual meaning

The reality is Brahman, or consciousness which is the only reality. How did a rope become a snake? It is due to ignorance. Just as darkness made it impossible to see the rope, our ignorance makes it impossible to see the reality. The strange thing is that non-apprehension about the rope caused misapprehension that it is a snake. It is the innate nature of the rope to look like a snake. But it cannot be blamed for being seen as a snake. But without the rope, the snake would not exist.

In exactly the same way, Brahman provides the basis or substratum and ignorance causes the reality to look like the manifested universe. As indicated earlier, because there was no light, rope could not be seen and further it became a snake. So our ignorance not only causes us not to see reality, but also causes misapprehension that Brahman is the manifest universe.

How did the snake vanish? First of all there was no snake. Once light came on, the snake was gone and the rope was seen. The rope was always there. The light only cleared the misapprehension and revealed the truth.

In exactly the same way, knowledge of reality through the study of scriptures helps remove the ignorance of reality and leads us on a path to reality.

B. I see a thousand moons!!!!

I am a young child. I am in in our family courtyard and it is the full moon day. It is the water festival and I see thousands of buckets of water in the courtyard. Some have clear water, some have colored water, and some have muddy water. I peep into one of the buckets with clear water and see the moon. I jump with joy seeing the moon. I peep into another bucket with red water and exclaim, “I saw a red moon.” I peep into another with muddy water and say, here is a muddy moon. My father comes near me, lifts me and points up to the bright moon. He says, look at the moon up. He gradually explains the moon up there is one and the moon in each of the buckets is but a reflection. He pours water out of one of the buckets and mysteriously the moon vanishes.

Spiritual meaning

Brahman is the only reality. But this reality reflects differently depending on the medium. The medium in which Brahman reflects is the body/mind/complex. Depending on the nature of this complex, Brahman reflects differently. The reflected Brahman is called the Atman or soul. Just as I thought the moons in each bucket were different and real, without realizing the moon above was real, we go through life feeling that each of us is real and different, without understanding that the only reality is Brahman and each of us is nothing but a reflection of the Brahman.

C. I am a fantastic actor

I played a role in a movie. I was a rich man with the best cars, bungalows and yes, I had miss universe as my heroine. I went through the scenes and at some stage, in the movie, I lost all my wealth and became a pauper. I was going from house to house begging for alms.

However good my acting is, however well I get into the skin of the role, not for a moment do I forget who I truly am. I do not for a moment believe that the cars/miss universe are mine and get elated nor do I worry that I became a beggar. I just do my role as directed and move on to the real world once done. The fact that I was a rich man or poor does not in any way influence my real world existence.

Spiritual meaning

We have come into this world to exhaust a small set of desires that we have accumulated over several births. Each life is like a role in a movie and just as the role goes through various phases of joy and sorrow, we go through vicissitudes of life. Just an an actor finishes one role and moves on to the next role, we move on to the next role in a new birth and again go through the same sorrow/happiness.

If only we realize that our act in this world is just like an actor! We can put in our best effort in this world without getting attached to the events in life. An actor cannot get emotionally attached to a role and forget his reality. That’s the only way he can maintain his sanity.

In exactly the same way, if we realize our true self and go through the motions of acting in this world, we will maintain our sanity. An actor even though he knows what he is doing is not real, will put in his best effort to make it look real without getting emotionally involved. We can also put in our best in every role of life without getting emotionally bound. This can lead to peace in our existence.

E. It is very dark as I walk away!

I am a caveman and have lived deep inside a cave. My family lives here as have my ancestors. We know of no other life except this cave. We have a fire burning inside which provides us heat and light. Our entertainment is the figures that come on the cave’s wall as we walk.

I wanted to explore what was there beyond the cave. One day I started walking away from the fire. I could still see the fire, but I continued walking till the fire was only a spec. As I walked away, the light decreased and darkness increased. Then came a point when the light was totally gone and it was totally dark. I was afraid and wanted to run back, but something kept on pushing me to walk ahead. As I walked I saw a distant light. It was a small speck of light and as I walked forward, the light increased and darkness decreased, till I suddenly saw only light. I saw a totally different world outside the cave. All my concepts of life were shattered when I came out.

Spiritual meaning

All of us live in a cocooned world of our own and believe that is the only reality. It is a rare Buddha or Adi Shankara of relatively modern times who have ventured beyond the comfort of the world to see the reality. As we try to move away from the comfort zone to understand the reality through spirituality, our discomfort increases. The lure of our existing world pulls us back because it becomes darker and darker as we move away from the comfort zone. But if we continue on the spiritual path long enough, we will see a glimmer of light. We have the choice to continue towards that glimmer or rush back to our old comfort zone. If we continue further, the ages of ignorance driven darkness gradually melts away till we are face to face with the wonderful reality of our true existence which is nothing but pure consciousness.

As readers may be aware, 3 of my books on spirituality are available on Amazon.com.

I invite readers of my blog to try any of the books and give me feedback so that I can make changes in the next edition.

1. My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality

My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality