Who am I? - Part 3
Hello all,
Namaste! Hope all of you had a fantastic week where you were able to clear the mind of all pre-conceived notions and ideas and keep the slate of mind as blank as possible, with an attitude of the lord, Ganesha. But it is so easy to say, 'clear your mind and keep the mind as a blank slate'. So easy to say, but so difficult to do.
So, today let us explore why we have such a tough time to come out of the preconceived notions and attitudes we have for our life? Why is it easier said than done? As we have discussed many times in this blog, I as a person have a very strong intuition that we as a Soul go through lifetimes after lifetimes. As I have mentioned before, this blog is not to prove any theory, hypothesis or attitude. This blog is about how to use the ancient wisdom of Vedic philosophy for modern times. So, according to what I intuit, there are numerous lifetimes, we as a Soul go through. All of us have been around the block may be million or thousand times, as worms, birds, trees, stones, and yes as humans as well.
Vasanas, Conditioning, and more: So, now being a Soul having experiences, we through each time take up essences of those particular lifetimes that become associated in our Soul. This particular essence even has a name in Sanskrit, 'Vasanas' or more clearly attitudes. These attitudes are subconscious knowledge that we store, so more clearly knowledge as part of memory. So, all of us are a storehouse of these memories. So, this is the first block towards a clear state of mind. Whenever we are under stress, duress, or chaos, we behave as we behaved some hundred lifetimes back. At that time either we were a human running away from a wild animal or a human escaping religious or racial persecution. Or we were fighting against it. So, that terror, anger, and desperation due to that emotions or feelings behind it got deeply etched in our memory. We have carried it forward in the next hundred lifetimes. Now, when an apt moment happens, the same behavior comes out in a split second.
Now, before moving further, let us discuss another point. Every Master, Sage, or Saint asks us to be balanced and be in the middle without showing many emotions. Why? What is the real reason behind it? Is it just to get into an attitude of a Saint for ourselves? Actually, no. There is a very scientific reasoning behind it. Any life experience when we perceive with too much happiness, or sadness or anger, gets entangled with many feelings or emotions associated with it. That experience affects us so deeply, the emotions associated with it gets etched in our subconscious memory as a Soul. We carry it with us lifetime after lifetime after lifetime.
So, say for example we have deep anger or hatred towards someone in this lifetime, that is it. It is getting totally etched in our subconscious and we are going to take that burden for the next hundred lifetimes. Do we really need it? Even after hundred lifetimes also we would be carrying the same emotion, which we took up so many lifetimes ago. We may not even realize, why we are angry, in the first place. That is the real reason, Masters are asking us to stay balanced, not going very much to one side or the other. They are asking us to 'travel light'.
Now, back to the difficulties of making the mind clear. So, one point was our 'Vasanas'. Next point. All of us have come from tonnes of ancestors starting with worm, bird, monkeys, humans and more. Each one of us carries DNA within ourselves. What is DNA- Deoxyribonucleic acid? That is the genetic code we carry within ourselves that make us who we are, humans. This code has encoded information that makes two cells (Spermatazoa and Ova) to a fully functional thriving baby. We as humans are not providing the baby with any manual to form itself. The only thing the mother provides is food, water, and oxygen. The baby forms itself. The same with a baby growing into an adult. We give the baby or the kid, food, water, and education. The breath they take from the air and grow using their own genetic code.
We are already carrying the Vasanas, and the information embedded in the genetic code. Now above this, our ancestors also impart their precious DNA to us. So, above our own life experiences we carry as Vasanas, the genetic code for ourselves, we also carry the genes our ancestors bestowed upon us. So, through us or our DNA, our ancestors are living and we behave many times exactly as our ancestors did. So, this is the second layer of difficulty.
Now, the third layer. We are born as babies. We have our parents who already have their DNA and in that DNA also our ancestors live. So, here, our parents as well as our ancestors through their DNA, train us exactly to behave as they behaved for eons. Talk about the formation of a family cult, in each family! Hahaha! I can imagine the ancestors as faceless people wearing hoodies instructing our parents through the DNA. So, even though we feel our ancestors were living eons back, that is really a false pretense. They are also living now, this very moment through us and our parents, through our DNA. The real plain truth. So, this family conditioning is the third layer.
Now, to the fourth layer. At the age of 5-6 years, we are taken to school and we start our education. Here the school and society teach us how to behave in the world. How to function as a functioning and productive adult. Have you ever gone to any preschool where the toddlers are playing together? They just play together, as a group, and sometimes fight for purely taking a toy from them or another kid pulling their hair. They don't fight because a person is a white kid, or a black kid, an Asian kid, or a person is a Hindu, or a Christian, or a Muslim. They fight just because they need something, or someone took something from them.
We, the adults, fill the minds of the kids with divisions, groups, religions, races, attitudes, castes, and creeds. Then we ask them to take those fights forward for the generations to come. So this is the next layer of social, religious, political, caste, creed, and race conditioning. What the parents tell the kids at a young age is taken deep within, without any questioning. Kids at age 3-8 are pure sponges. They imbibe and absorb everything. So here above familial and societal conditioning, it also becomes mental and subconscious conditioning.
So, layers upon layers of conditioning by ancestors, grandparents, parents, society, and the world. No wonder many times by age 40-50 we are the puppets in the hands of the family, society, and the world. When we are behaving from our pre-existing conditioning, where is our own free will and choice? Remember, here the parents or the grandparents are not culprits. They also have gone through the same conditioning and they are what they also have done. They just taught us what they know, that is all. So, total 'autopilot' mode from eons. So, now with all the above perspectives in mind, think about the mountain we have to face to find 'our own free will and choice.'
No wonder when people come face to face with their 'life purpose path' and the question of 'Who am I', they are faced with a deep identity crisis. Yes, I also went through one in 2015/2016, where nothing made sense to me anymore, because we have been conditioned so much, we don't even realize we have a 'free will'. When we suddenly realize yes, indeed we do have a free will, we are totally confused and whatever persona we have built for us and in ourselves for eons start to crumble all around us. Yes, I was totally confused and not a single thing about life made any sense, anymore.
Free will and choice: In this autopilot mode, we lose our own 'free will and choice'. Now, let me write a little bit about our free will and choice. I find from the Quora questions I get, people are totally confused about their own free will and choice. Free will and choice! Many times people feel either they have no choice at all or they have to destroy or topple everyone to get their choice. Both attitudes are wrong. The feeling that a human has no choice, but to just do what they have been provided, that is a wrong attitude. Humans do have choices, where to live, what to do, how to live and more. To do that one does not have to topple anyone from their path.
Here, let me write another thing. Interfering in another's life path/life/ purpose is the activity that brings forward, a huge amount of Karma, in the form of diseases, sickness, poverty, hospitalizations, accidents, incarcerations, and more. So, that is the first thing we have to stop fully in our life. 'Never interfere in another's life or life purpose.' Of course for kids, they do need guidance, until they are adults. Here, I am talking about the adults. We many times as adults feel we have to topple every one and stand strong for ourselves to get our free will as well as our choice. Wrong! Paramahansa Yogananda wrote, "Some people try to be tall by cutting off the heads of others." That pursuit of free will and choice is wrong.
Now, we feel we don't have free will and choice at all. That also is wrong. We do have free will and choice. But, that comes with some strings attached from the Universe. We don't have free will and choice to do whatever we want. Our free will and choice should never kill anyone, above humans even birds, animals, or other forms. Our free will and choice should never hurt anyone-mentally, physically, emotionally, psychologically, or subconsciously. Our free will and choice should never do anything bad to the environment, Earth, or the Universe itself. Within this constraints if we can do our free will and choice, and if it helps humanity, globe, world, Earth, and Universe itself, that is the best free will and choice.
So, now standing in this tenet, look at the movements, 'Hindutva', 'Islamic fundamentalism', or 'Communism' or even 'Capitalism'? Does it gel well with the laws of the Universe? Most of the times, No. It is pitting one group against another or taking advantage of one group over the other. In other cases, it is hoarding resources by one group at the detriment of another. These groups and divisions we humans made. Divine or the Universe didn't ask us to divide among ourselves as religions, politics, caste, creed, races, and more. We, humans, do that. We fight in the name of the divine or the one 'Universal intelligence', which can exist as Rama, Krishna, Allah, God, Jesus, Mary, Guru Granth Sahib, or even as you or me. Without realizing this oneness in the threads that make the fabric of you and me, we fight till the end of our lives or the end of the Earth.
We divide, bicker, hate, kill, and put others down. So, if we realize the same oneness is sitting within me and within you, what are we fighting about? In deep esoteric perspective, the oneness through humans is fighting with itself. So now say, how can humanity progress in the realms of the mind, when we divide ourselves so deeply from our very own core. So, such free will and choice, the Universe never accepts. It rejects it totally. Hence, we humans keep on riding the same 'ferrets-wheel' for the period of the entire humanity. So, this type of free will and choice never works, where someone is being put down for someone to stand up.
Now, what is a truly free will and choice? A choice one takes, that is first great for oneself. Yes, great for oneself. Only if with that choice, we are happy and content, we can share that happiness and contentment with others. If we are unhappy, how can we give happiness to others? Our cup is dry, how can we fill the cup of others? We only would share sorrow and unhappiness then. So, with the choice, first, we should be happy. Then that choice should work for our family, friends, community, society, and finally the world. That type of free will and choice the Universe supports, cent percent.
Let me give an example. When I started this blog, I analyzed whether I am happy and content with it? Yes. Is my family happy and content with it? Yes. Would my family, friends, and blog readers, receive guidance from it? Yes. Is it good for the community and society? Yes. Is it good for the world? Yes. Am I hurting anyone writing my blog? No. Am I hurting my family and friends? No. Am I hurting any group sentiments or feelings of the society? No. Am I bringing down any group, caste, creed, race or anything? No. So, that is a free will and choice, that works perfectly according to me and the spiritual laws. Now, what do you think the Universe would say? Yes or No? Seeing the Sunlight streaming towards me from the window, I definitely have my answer.
All of the above perspectives are only for finding one's true life path or purpose in life. This is not about small decisions like having an ice-cream, going to a movie, buying a dress, going to the mall, or going on a vacation. All these perspectives and viewpoints were about the single most important question of, 'Why am I here, in this Earth plane, at this time of the Universe?'
So, to even reach this stage of a clear perspective of the free will and choice, first we have to find a way to come out of the Vasanas, conditioning we already have filled our mind with. So, between the conditioning and reaching the place of free will, there is a huge tunnel, that one has to go through. Only at the other end of the tunnel, we even would be shown our true purpose, free will or choice. As the post has become pretty long, we will discuss this tunnel next week, in the next post on 'Who am I?'
I wish you a good weekend and I'll see you next Friday!😉
Next week: Who am I? - Part 4
Note: Images from Wikipedia Commons and Pixabay.com.
Ralph Waldo Emerson writes, "There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance ; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better for worse as his portion that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried".
All rights reserved to Jayasree Padmanabhan and SwaroopaBlog.
To my Blog readers: As all of you know, the European Union has passed laws regarding the collection of the user data. This is just to inform all my EU blog readers, I just use Google Analytics, which Google provides, to look at from where readers are reading my blogs. I also use Specific feeds to use their service for subscription list. I don't collect or intend to collect user data to sell or provide to third-party applications. Regards,
SwaroopaBlog.
Namaste! Hope all of you had a fantastic week where you were able to clear the mind of all pre-conceived notions and ideas and keep the slate of mind as blank as possible, with an attitude of the lord, Ganesha. But it is so easy to say, 'clear your mind and keep the mind as a blank slate'. So easy to say, but so difficult to do.
So, today let us explore why we have such a tough time to come out of the preconceived notions and attitudes we have for our life? Why is it easier said than done? As we have discussed many times in this blog, I as a person have a very strong intuition that we as a Soul go through lifetimes after lifetimes. As I have mentioned before, this blog is not to prove any theory, hypothesis or attitude. This blog is about how to use the ancient wisdom of Vedic philosophy for modern times. So, according to what I intuit, there are numerous lifetimes, we as a Soul go through. All of us have been around the block may be million or thousand times, as worms, birds, trees, stones, and yes as humans as well.
Vasanas, Conditioning, and more: So, now being a Soul having experiences, we through each time take up essences of those particular lifetimes that become associated in our Soul. This particular essence even has a name in Sanskrit, 'Vasanas' or more clearly attitudes. These attitudes are subconscious knowledge that we store, so more clearly knowledge as part of memory. So, all of us are a storehouse of these memories. So, this is the first block towards a clear state of mind. Whenever we are under stress, duress, or chaos, we behave as we behaved some hundred lifetimes back. At that time either we were a human running away from a wild animal or a human escaping religious or racial persecution. Or we were fighting against it. So, that terror, anger, and desperation due to that emotions or feelings behind it got deeply etched in our memory. We have carried it forward in the next hundred lifetimes. Now, when an apt moment happens, the same behavior comes out in a split second.
Now, before moving further, let us discuss another point. Every Master, Sage, or Saint asks us to be balanced and be in the middle without showing many emotions. Why? What is the real reason behind it? Is it just to get into an attitude of a Saint for ourselves? Actually, no. There is a very scientific reasoning behind it. Any life experience when we perceive with too much happiness, or sadness or anger, gets entangled with many feelings or emotions associated with it. That experience affects us so deeply, the emotions associated with it gets etched in our subconscious memory as a Soul. We carry it with us lifetime after lifetime after lifetime.
So, say for example we have deep anger or hatred towards someone in this lifetime, that is it. It is getting totally etched in our subconscious and we are going to take that burden for the next hundred lifetimes. Do we really need it? Even after hundred lifetimes also we would be carrying the same emotion, which we took up so many lifetimes ago. We may not even realize, why we are angry, in the first place. That is the real reason, Masters are asking us to stay balanced, not going very much to one side or the other. They are asking us to 'travel light'.
Now, back to the difficulties of making the mind clear. So, one point was our 'Vasanas'. Next point. All of us have come from tonnes of ancestors starting with worm, bird, monkeys, humans and more. Each one of us carries DNA within ourselves. What is DNA- Deoxyribonucleic acid? That is the genetic code we carry within ourselves that make us who we are, humans. This code has encoded information that makes two cells (Spermatazoa and Ova) to a fully functional thriving baby. We as humans are not providing the baby with any manual to form itself. The only thing the mother provides is food, water, and oxygen. The baby forms itself. The same with a baby growing into an adult. We give the baby or the kid, food, water, and education. The breath they take from the air and grow using their own genetic code.
 |
| An animated image of the DNA - Our genetic code! brian0918™ [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons |
We are already carrying the Vasanas, and the information embedded in the genetic code. Now above this, our ancestors also impart their precious DNA to us. So, above our own life experiences we carry as Vasanas, the genetic code for ourselves, we also carry the genes our ancestors bestowed upon us. So, through us or our DNA, our ancestors are living and we behave many times exactly as our ancestors did. So, this is the second layer of difficulty.
Now, the third layer. We are born as babies. We have our parents who already have their DNA and in that DNA also our ancestors live. So, here, our parents as well as our ancestors through their DNA, train us exactly to behave as they behaved for eons. Talk about the formation of a family cult, in each family! Hahaha! I can imagine the ancestors as faceless people wearing hoodies instructing our parents through the DNA. So, even though we feel our ancestors were living eons back, that is really a false pretense. They are also living now, this very moment through us and our parents, through our DNA. The real plain truth. So, this family conditioning is the third layer.
Now, to the fourth layer. At the age of 5-6 years, we are taken to school and we start our education. Here the school and society teach us how to behave in the world. How to function as a functioning and productive adult. Have you ever gone to any preschool where the toddlers are playing together? They just play together, as a group, and sometimes fight for purely taking a toy from them or another kid pulling their hair. They don't fight because a person is a white kid, or a black kid, an Asian kid, or a person is a Hindu, or a Christian, or a Muslim. They fight just because they need something, or someone took something from them.
We, the adults, fill the minds of the kids with divisions, groups, religions, races, attitudes, castes, and creeds. Then we ask them to take those fights forward for the generations to come. So this is the next layer of social, religious, political, caste, creed, and race conditioning. What the parents tell the kids at a young age is taken deep within, without any questioning. Kids at age 3-8 are pure sponges. They imbibe and absorb everything. So here above familial and societal conditioning, it also becomes mental and subconscious conditioning.
So, layers upon layers of conditioning by ancestors, grandparents, parents, society, and the world. No wonder many times by age 40-50 we are the puppets in the hands of the family, society, and the world. When we are behaving from our pre-existing conditioning, where is our own free will and choice? Remember, here the parents or the grandparents are not culprits. They also have gone through the same conditioning and they are what they also have done. They just taught us what they know, that is all. So, total 'autopilot' mode from eons. So, now with all the above perspectives in mind, think about the mountain we have to face to find 'our own free will and choice.'
 |
| The boxes of conditioning we put ourselves in! Image courtesy - Pixabay.com |
No wonder when people come face to face with their 'life purpose path' and the question of 'Who am I', they are faced with a deep identity crisis. Yes, I also went through one in 2015/2016, where nothing made sense to me anymore, because we have been conditioned so much, we don't even realize we have a 'free will'. When we suddenly realize yes, indeed we do have a free will, we are totally confused and whatever persona we have built for us and in ourselves for eons start to crumble all around us. Yes, I was totally confused and not a single thing about life made any sense, anymore.
Free will and choice: In this autopilot mode, we lose our own 'free will and choice'. Now, let me write a little bit about our free will and choice. I find from the Quora questions I get, people are totally confused about their own free will and choice. Free will and choice! Many times people feel either they have no choice at all or they have to destroy or topple everyone to get their choice. Both attitudes are wrong. The feeling that a human has no choice, but to just do what they have been provided, that is a wrong attitude. Humans do have choices, where to live, what to do, how to live and more. To do that one does not have to topple anyone from their path.
Here, let me write another thing. Interfering in another's life path/life/ purpose is the activity that brings forward, a huge amount of Karma, in the form of diseases, sickness, poverty, hospitalizations, accidents, incarcerations, and more. So, that is the first thing we have to stop fully in our life. 'Never interfere in another's life or life purpose.' Of course for kids, they do need guidance, until they are adults. Here, I am talking about the adults. We many times as adults feel we have to topple every one and stand strong for ourselves to get our free will as well as our choice. Wrong! Paramahansa Yogananda wrote, "Some people try to be tall by cutting off the heads of others." That pursuit of free will and choice is wrong.
Now, we feel we don't have free will and choice at all. That also is wrong. We do have free will and choice. But, that comes with some strings attached from the Universe. We don't have free will and choice to do whatever we want. Our free will and choice should never kill anyone, above humans even birds, animals, or other forms. Our free will and choice should never hurt anyone-mentally, physically, emotionally, psychologically, or subconsciously. Our free will and choice should never do anything bad to the environment, Earth, or the Universe itself. Within this constraints if we can do our free will and choice, and if it helps humanity, globe, world, Earth, and Universe itself, that is the best free will and choice.
So, now standing in this tenet, look at the movements, 'Hindutva', 'Islamic fundamentalism', or 'Communism' or even 'Capitalism'? Does it gel well with the laws of the Universe? Most of the times, No. It is pitting one group against another or taking advantage of one group over the other. In other cases, it is hoarding resources by one group at the detriment of another. These groups and divisions we humans made. Divine or the Universe didn't ask us to divide among ourselves as religions, politics, caste, creed, races, and more. We, humans, do that. We fight in the name of the divine or the one 'Universal intelligence', which can exist as Rama, Krishna, Allah, God, Jesus, Mary, Guru Granth Sahib, or even as you or me. Without realizing this oneness in the threads that make the fabric of you and me, we fight till the end of our lives or the end of the Earth.
 |
| Our maze of life! Need heart, mind, Soul, and wisdom as a whole to figure it out! Image courtesy - Pixabay.com |
We divide, bicker, hate, kill, and put others down. So, if we realize the same oneness is sitting within me and within you, what are we fighting about? In deep esoteric perspective, the oneness through humans is fighting with itself. So now say, how can humanity progress in the realms of the mind, when we divide ourselves so deeply from our very own core. So, such free will and choice, the Universe never accepts. It rejects it totally. Hence, we humans keep on riding the same 'ferrets-wheel' for the period of the entire humanity. So, this type of free will and choice never works, where someone is being put down for someone to stand up.
Now, what is a truly free will and choice? A choice one takes, that is first great for oneself. Yes, great for oneself. Only if with that choice, we are happy and content, we can share that happiness and contentment with others. If we are unhappy, how can we give happiness to others? Our cup is dry, how can we fill the cup of others? We only would share sorrow and unhappiness then. So, with the choice, first, we should be happy. Then that choice should work for our family, friends, community, society, and finally the world. That type of free will and choice the Universe supports, cent percent.
Let me give an example. When I started this blog, I analyzed whether I am happy and content with it? Yes. Is my family happy and content with it? Yes. Would my family, friends, and blog readers, receive guidance from it? Yes. Is it good for the community and society? Yes. Is it good for the world? Yes. Am I hurting anyone writing my blog? No. Am I hurting my family and friends? No. Am I hurting any group sentiments or feelings of the society? No. Am I bringing down any group, caste, creed, race or anything? No. So, that is a free will and choice, that works perfectly according to me and the spiritual laws. Now, what do you think the Universe would say? Yes or No? Seeing the Sunlight streaming towards me from the window, I definitely have my answer.
All of the above perspectives are only for finding one's true life path or purpose in life. This is not about small decisions like having an ice-cream, going to a movie, buying a dress, going to the mall, or going on a vacation. All these perspectives and viewpoints were about the single most important question of, 'Why am I here, in this Earth plane, at this time of the Universe?'
So, to even reach this stage of a clear perspective of the free will and choice, first we have to find a way to come out of the Vasanas, conditioning we already have filled our mind with. So, between the conditioning and reaching the place of free will, there is a huge tunnel, that one has to go through. Only at the other end of the tunnel, we even would be shown our true purpose, free will or choice. As the post has become pretty long, we will discuss this tunnel next week, in the next post on 'Who am I?'
I wish you a good weekend and I'll see you next Friday!😉
Next week: Who am I? - Part 4
Note: Images from Wikipedia Commons and Pixabay.com.
Ralph Waldo Emerson writes, "There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance ; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better for worse as his portion that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried".
All rights reserved to Jayasree Padmanabhan and SwaroopaBlog.
To my Blog readers: As all of you know, the European Union has passed laws regarding the collection of the user data. This is just to inform all my EU blog readers, I just use Google Analytics, which Google provides, to look at from where readers are reading my blogs. I also use Specific feeds to use their service for subscription list. I don't collect or intend to collect user data to sell or provide to third-party applications. Regards,
SwaroopaBlog.
Disclaimer: This is a personal blog. The opinions and perspectives shared here are that of the author/owner only. Even though the author/owner will try to research well before posting the information, the author/owner of this blog does not make any portrayal of the accuracy or correctness of the content on this blog or the links provided. The author/owner will not be liable for any omissions or inaccuracies occurred. The author/owner will not be liable for any damages or losses due to the use or display of this blog. These terms and conditions can change at any time.
This blog is purely for informational purposes only.
©Jayasree Padmanabhan and Swaroopa, 2017- Eternity
This blog is purely for informational purposes only.
©Jayasree Padmanabhan and Swaroopa, 2017- Eternity
![brian0918™ [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ADN_animation.gif){kind=link}
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