The Word - I know nothing!
Hello all,
Namaste! All of you, my dear blog readers, know about my website-swaroopa.net. I have started my business, Swaroopa store, which can be accessed from Shop tab on my website, for beings who are interested in a personal reading. There is also the Swaroopa Store link, on my blog's left side. Now to the post.
I wish all my blog readers a Happy Vishu, for Kerala New year! May this New Year bring all health, wealth, abundance, opportunities, prosperity and happiness! Once again, Happy Vishu!
 |
| Vishu Kani! Image credits - Edukeralam, Navaneeth Krishnan S, via Wikimedia Commons |
Hope all of you are keeping up your spirits, being hale and healthy. Yes, the pandemic is still the sword of Damocles hanging over humanity's head for some time to come. How things can change within a matter of few days and months. Any one remembers the time before February of 2020. Looks like it was ages and eons ago, when humanity "used" to have "normal" times. Hopefully soon it would comeback.
Until then, it is our job and duty to protect ourselves whether cricket matches come, Kumbhmela comes or Carnival comes. Because, the Universe's job is done. It has provided us with a very smart, brilliant mind and intellect. As a divine spiritual being, we should know that the divine is everywhere. So, it is not necessary we need to go to Kumbhmela or go to see Vishukani at Guruvayoor temple during a pandemic. At this time, we also should be smart enough to know, going to a gathering is asking and inviting the disease.
So, trusting that divine hears everything, we should pray from home. We have learnt divine is omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent. So, won't the greater force hear us from our personal space of home? It definitely will. So, during a pandemic, going to temple or a mela, isn't it actually not trusting in the higher force, thinking we need to go to the temple or mela to commune with the divine? A truly enlightened person would understand, the leaf on the tree outside itself is as divine as the Ganges or Yamuna. Later, if you get a chance, very definitely go. But don't go during a pandemic and invite the disease to your personal temple- your body.
Socrates- Hope all of you have heard about the famous Greek philosopher, Socrates. He used to live in the 3rd or 4th century BCE, Athens, Greece. He had famous disciples as Plato and Xenophon. His wife was Xantippe and his vocation, a stone mason. He used to wander around the city streets in tattered clothes and barefoot. Finally, he was made to drink poison of hemlock and executed.
There are many famous Socratic wisdom made as dialogues in the form the Master and disciple between Socrates and Plato. There is a quote accredited to Socrates, in which he comments as "I know nothing" and that is the best wisdom of the Universe. Today, let us analyze the phrase - I know nothing, from my perspective. This is not as Socrates envisioned. But my thought process, idea as I see it and understand it from my own thought process, ideation and critical analysis.
So, I know nothing. The person is saying. This saying is coming from the logical mind. The logical mind is usually the mind that is facing outwards, which comes in contact with the other humans, daily dealings of human life and this globe itself. If we truly understand, how truly is our reality emanating? We as a human take up information through the sense organs, through the nerves to the brain and process it, invert it and later as I understand, it is our mind that most probably interprets it for us. So, in truth, are there other beings, the world and even the Universe there? Does it even exist?
Question to ponder, isn't it?? So, all the hundred different things that we take up from the outside, is it really there? Or is there only one person, you the reader, each one of you for yourself/ your Universe and I, the writer just for myself, sitting within my own Universe or world of creation, writing for myself? Think, are there seven billion humans really giving us company or is it just a few impulse information that is coming into our own mind, from outer million sources? If so, they are just pure impulses carried from the outside to confuse us, should we trust that outside information?
So, then what should the outer mind say to itself that is devouring on every kind of information that is deluging us as news, sitcoms, advertisements, social-media, websites, news channels, correct information, false information, mis-information and more? I, from the logical mind know nothing. I cannot infer what is true and what is not. Both of them are pure information captured through the sense-organs. How can I trust what is correct, what is wrong, what is fake and what is truth? So, here who is actually there?
 |
| The logical mind that brings the outside information to the within Image credits - Pixabay.com |
I know nothing: So, the logical mind should surrender saying, "I know nothing". I cannot understand what is truth, what is false, what is correct and what is incorrect, isn't it? Because all of them are the impulses of information the sense organs are capturing and giving to the mind. Even the mind is considered as the sixth sense organ according to deep esoteric Hinduism. So, five sense organs are capturing the information and the sixth sense organ is analyzing it for us. But all of them are information coming from the outside to within. How do we know, the information is really there? What if our mind is playing a number on us?
It can, isn't it? So, here the logical mind if we think very deeply are forced to say, "I know nothing". I cannot understand what is the truth and what is not. This is also a clue towards a mind that is deeply bogged down by the sense world, mired in the confusion and chaos of the material world. Remember, we are spiritual beings having a physical experience. But in that deep physical experience the information or truth itself gets lost that we are spiritual beings. Think about people crowding near the banks of Ganges for the Kumbhamela. Do you think the dip is going to give moksha (enlightenment) or Corona?
The beings who are in the path of spirituality also should realize the Divine is omnipotent. Present everywhere. So, is there any special pass or permission for Kumbhamela or temple or church or mosque goers or even anyone who deeply connects with the Divine from the most wretched existence of this world can access a higher power? I am not judging here, simply portraying the truth trying to poke the mind. This again shows, the higher power is always there to help and lead us. It is our own distrust that instead of having faith in our personal spirituality; goes and knocks at the door of every temple, mosque, church, ritual or traditions.
Of course, all these culture, rituals and traditions give humanity beautiful essence, vibrancy and colors. But it should not be so orthodox and traditional that it is asphyxiating us. We, as humans need to know the amount of time, we waste in pursuing the mindless religion, culture and traditional pursuits, while many times our truest purpose or Dharma sits untouched and ignored. I am of the mentality, leaving behind every duty and going to Himalaya or some spiritual pursuit is not going to give moksha.
Moksha or enlightenment is to transcend the material world, not to escape from it. If we escape in the name of Himalayas or spirituality leaving behind all duties, what is the guarantee we won't come in the next life time in the exact same place or slightly demoted because we didn't take up our Dharma in the previous lifetime? These are deep questions, for which as a tiny human life we cannot get answers. So, the best and fastest way to enlightenment is to be deeply involved in one's own duty for the lifetime and do the very best at it.
 |
| The culture of putting Mehendi in Indian and Pakistani weddings Image credits - Pixabay.com |
The heart: Now, the logical mind is saying, "I know nothing", due to the truth that it is just getting information through the sense-organs and cannot differentiate what is truth and what is not. So, an aware logical mind would and must say, "I know nothing", because it actually does not know anything. It is just meant to be a supporter, not the true provider of information. Who is the true provider of information and knowledge? The being who actually brought us here, into this life.
Our Soul. It has come into this lifetime to take upon some specific Dharma task. Instead of concentrating and doing that we are gallivanting to temples, and Kumbhamelas. This higher quiet observer sits appalled at the shenanigans of the lesser being of a mind, because this Soul has come with a very specific purpose into this lifetime. That purpose would be revealed only when the mind is quiet and in a meditative mood. If the mind is constantly chaotic and running behind every glittery thing that comes along, how can it listen to the quiet inklings/ insights coming from the greater being, the Soul?
Isn't that the truth? If the logical mind, which has to analyze the small voice coming form the heart and the Soul is totally chaotic and toddler like making ruckus can it be of help towards a higher purpose? No. Hence here Socrates is saying, "I 'the logical mind' knows nothing." Because the true information is not from the logical mind. My duty as a logical mind is to keep myself calm, the inner space as quiet as a calm lake and wait for guidance to come from within. Because the path, the map, the torch, the idea, the vision and the imagination are provided by the deeper, greater mind of the Soul.
 |
| Sacred heart of St. Joseph Image credits - HeralderPanzapuns; Xavigivax via Wikimedia Commons |
This quote is a nice segway to the next topic, I am planning to write. So, this quote portrays even though we as a person from the logical mind thinks, we know a lot, many times we miss huge chunks of information, when we are always turned to the outside. For example, from my own life, I missed the deep spiritual gifts I have, even though I always enjoyed doing it. It took around four decades and some to realize that I was missing a huge part of my own life. Totally turned outwards, pursuing a deep logical career. What that career could not provide for more than twenty-five years, I am graced to have in much shorter time of just over four years.
The guidance from the heart and higher Self. Logical mind falls way short compared to our own higher being. So, a smart and wise person from the logical mind would declare again and again- "I know nothing". Because the information and truth are not with the logical being, but with the greater being of a Soul. So, why not access that inner truth as well as knowledge and exist as a full, true total being?
 |
| I know nothing! Image credits - Goalcast.com |