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| Swami Suddhananda |
“How many ways are there to reach the Truth”? asked a visiting youngster in our Tiruvannamalai retreat. I asked him, “How many ways are there to reach a place where you are already standing?” The youngster was silent for a long time.
If there is a distance between where you are and where you should be then there are thousands of ways of reaching there. If you are in India and you wish to reach Europe, you may walk, cycle, drive, sail, ride or fly. But if you want to reach India, standing all the time on Indian soil then you must know that, in reality, there is no ‘reaching’ as the place is already reached. There is no distance between where you ‘are’ and where you ‘want’ to be. Yet, because of not knowing that I am at the destination, there seems to be a distance. That ignorance which creates the apparent distance can go only with the knowledge that I am already on the spot. The moment I ‘know’ it, apparently it seems that I ‘reach’ it and in that reaching there is no sense of grand achievement, but the discovery of a monumental stupidity, a wonderment as to how on earth I missed it for ‘sooooo’ long!
The same observation can be extended to Self-knowledge. If there is a distance between who I am and who I want to be, then there are many ways to achieve it. For example, if who I am is rich and who I want to be is to be poor then I have to do something. If who I am is uneducated, unmarried, then to be educated or married I ‘have’ to do something. If who I am is unhappy because of lack of education, job, money, marriage, etc., then I have to get any or all of these, to get rid of unhappiness. To get rid of unhappiness is to say I am no more unhappy for the lack of job, etc., but that does not make a man to say ‘I am happy’.
In case somebody says that, it is just a momentary outburst and soon he is overwhelmed by many other reasons to be unhappy as the euphoria never lasts. Many during the World Cup matches have announced to this effect that they have never been so happy before. What it really means is that the causes of unhappiness are waiting on the wings for the euphoria to pass. Since unhappiness is not one’s nature, one cannot remain with it all the time. No one will enjoy and not be tired of unhappiness. Everybody wants to get rid of it. Happiness is one’s nature and nobody ever is tired of happiness.
If I am unhappy because of a cause, then I must do something to get rid of the cause, so that no more I am unhappy. Similarly, if I am happy because of a cause, then I have to maintain that cause at all costs to continue to be happy. That is why happiness-with-a-reason fails as sooner or later the reason disappears and the ‘I’ is left behind high and dry, miserable, unhappy. The causes of relative happiness and unhappiness are playing constant hide and seek. And many beliefs, systems, gurus, secular and religious propaganda keep the hide and seek going in the life of an individual and society. If who I am is unhappiness and who I want to be is happiness, then many come away with many different programmes, promises, ways and tricks to make me happy. The circus goes on.
If who I am is happiness and who I want to be is happiness, then there is no distance to be bridged either in time or in place. ‘I am’ who ‘I wish to be’ and the distance is caused by the ignorance of the self. How many ways are there to reach the already reached? How many ways are there ‘to be’ what one already is? The reaching is a misnomer. One must know and the knowledge here is not a mere information but an awakening to one’s own Self, when the Self is being pointed out by the teacher who knows the Truth.
There are so many nuances to knowledge. Mere words or information are not knowledge. Words do not ‘create’ knowledge. Sense perception creates the impression or thoughts and we name those experiences ‘to create’ knowledge. One may go on seeing the mountains. One shall be aware but cannot describe the experience without naming the objects. The first experiencer of the global voyage saw every place and named them all and the next generation is content with gathering names, words, in the name of knowledge. They have all the words but no direct knowledge of the place.
Similarly, in the case of Self-knowledge, one can gather all words, but need not know what it is. The beauty in Self-knowledge is that it is one’s own nature, the universal Existence, the limitless truth. It has no names like any other thing in the universe. It’s all a Nameless Expanse. Contemplate on this.
But the difference is when one can objectify and name the world around, the Self is ‘the subject’ and cannot be named. One cannot even call it as ‘the subject’ as there is nothing other than it to have a subject-object relationship.
Therefore, we cannot be proud of words, information as knowledge of the Self. There the knower – the ‘I’ thought itself - is a misnomer. Instead of attempting to know the Truth or name the Absolute Self, it must understand the limitation of the name. And the first name is ‘I’ which must resolve itself in the Nameless.
The whole teaching is to help the ‘I’ to remove the carpet of the name or names on which it is standing. ‘I’ is the carpet. ‘I’ is the one who is standing on it. The teaching helps to pull the carpet to convert it to a magic carpet that at once is everywhere and no more there is an attempt ‘to move’ to reach places! One is at once everywhere and that is the happiness, bliss, immortality or whatever one wishes to name!
How many ways are there to reach the ‘over-reached’? In fact, one cannot ‘reach’ as there is no distance either in time or space. The teachers help us to understand this and help us to discover the biggest surprise of all in our life – ‘reaching’ where we recognise that we had never left the all pervasive abode or existence in the first place!
On Guru Purnima day, let us remember this and make the discovery the greatest celebration.
Swami Suddhananda
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