"K" is for Knowledge. Easy right? Well...
Pujya Swami Swaroopananda-ji has been covering some basic principles of the human condition during the discourses this week, using the second chapter of the Bhagavad Gita for source material. It's all stuff I am qualifed to teach also. However, every medic, every lawyer, every financier - everyone who lays claim to a professional status also understands that there is a need to both keep current AND to review the basics of their understanding. We can become so caught up in the high-thinking and advanced concepts that the application and practicalities are sometimes left behind.
Everything, in the end, needs to be brought back to the individual. Who we are, why we are the way we are, and what we can do to 'fix' it!
Self-knowledge is one of the most challenging aspects of being human. We can be very adept at not looking at ourselves objectively. Truly without colouration of likes and dislikes, loves and hates, wants and needs. When we look in the mirror trying on a new dress, all we tend to view is the external. For the dress that is fine. For the person wearing the dress, what is there to see? Again we only tend to view the body. The physical. We assess everthing in our lives based upon our attachment to this vehicle of our being-ness and it is this we base our lives around.
We are so clever at justifying our behaviours and thinking. We are particularly good at looking and pointing and correcting others. We are happy to call their bluff, but if they do that to us...?
The true happiness in life is to have no 'skeletons', no drowning attachments, no uncontrolled desires and thoughts or reactiveness. Knowing who one truly is and living according to that, means to pass through life leaving only light behind one. There is no sorrow, no fear. There is no beginning or end to the Self. Knowing the eternal nature of that Self which is "I" alone, is the Knowledge which passes all understanding.
Therefore, Knowledge, of the capital 'k' kind... that takes some work!
Pujya Swami Swaroopananda-ji has been covering some basic principles of the human condition during the discourses this week, using the second chapter of the Bhagavad Gita for source material. It's all stuff I am qualifed to teach also. However, every medic, every lawyer, every financier - everyone who lays claim to a professional status also understands that there is a need to both keep current AND to review the basics of their understanding. We can become so caught up in the high-thinking and advanced concepts that the application and practicalities are sometimes left behind.
Self-knowledge is one of the most challenging aspects of being human. We can be very adept at not looking at ourselves objectively. Truly without colouration of likes and dislikes, loves and hates, wants and needs. When we look in the mirror trying on a new dress, all we tend to view is the external. For the dress that is fine. For the person wearing the dress, what is there to see? Again we only tend to view the body. The physical. We assess everthing in our lives based upon our attachment to this vehicle of our being-ness and it is this we base our lives around.
We are so clever at justifying our behaviours and thinking. We are particularly good at looking and pointing and correcting others. We are happy to call their bluff, but if they do that to us...?
The true happiness in life is to have no 'skeletons', no drowning attachments, no uncontrolled desires and thoughts or reactiveness. Knowing who one truly is and living according to that, means to pass through life leaving only light behind one. There is no sorrow, no fear. There is no beginning or end to the Self. Knowing the eternal nature of that Self which is "I" alone, is the Knowledge which passes all understanding.
Therefore, Knowledge, of the capital 'k' kind... that takes some work!
Thank you for sharing this very post.....
ReplyDeleteHugs HiC
I have to say that watching my father slowly descend into the fog of Alzheimer's disease challenged any sense I ever had that there is an eternal nature of Self. Anyway, good to hear you're having a stimulating time in Oz, and I hope you're also finding time for some R&R!
ReplyDeleteCheers, Gail.
Knowledge pops in for unknown sources.
ReplyDeleteCoffee is on
" The true happiness in life is to have no 'skeletons', no drowning attachments, no uncontrolled desires and thoughts or reactiveness. Knowing who one truly is and living according to that, means to pass through life leaving only light behind one. "
ReplyDeleteLOVE IT!!!
yes that is the knowledge... but it is hard to find out who one truly is... maybe if we see with our heart and not only with our eyes we can see it better...
ReplyDeleteAs one learns more, that self may evolve into a slightly different self. namaste, janice xx
ReplyDeleteHari om
DeleteThe individualised ego-self, yes... the Eternal Conciousness from which that ego-self arises is changeless, no beginning, no end... That Self Are You (tattvam asi). :-) Yxx