One of my students recently had a doctor’s appointment. When the subject of spirituality came up, the doctor commented that every spiritual group claims to have all the answers. Yet, the spiritual groups disagree with one another. They each claim to have the one valid knowledge. I think we can all agree there is a degree of truth in the doctor’s point.
So who is right? Are all of the spiritual groups wrong? What is going on here? So many are so adamant that their knowledge is the correct one. It ranges from the atheist to the devoutly religious. Is this a commentary on the spiritual oblivion of our time? Is there a way out of this dilemma? Isn’t it interesting that people generally believe what they believe, simply because they were born in a certain country, to a certain family, and grew up with a certain group of peers? How can that be the proper foundation for one’s perspective on the nature of life and existence? Furthermore, life seems to be permeated with paradox… irreconcilable facts. How can we sort all of this out?
Personally, as a young man, I was compelled to take a step back, look, think, and feel before I went along with any particular viewpoint. I needed to figure it out for myself. To me, it was about understanding the nature of life and existence. All the pieces of the puzzle of life needed to fit together. All paradox needed to be reconciled. I needed to use all of my resources to do my best to fathom the mystery of it all. I had to think rationally. I had to feel deeply. I needed to see how physics, anthropology, the arts, linguistics, and all aspects of life come together in a unified and harmonious manner. After all, isn’t that the nature of Truth? If something is true, shouldn’t it hold up to all forms of scrutiny? This path of exploration has spanned a lifetime. A brief overview of my conclusions follows. I believe they will provide some insights we all share.
Watching moths dance around a candle flame at night seems to say it all. Every moth is drawn to the candle flame, but no moth is able to grasp it. They simply dance around it. Similarly, in physics, the unified field is the non-tangible essence of all that is. It is the one thing that is the source of everything. Similarly, Iswara (God) is understood to be beyond fathomability—intangible, undefinable, ungraspable. We all sense that there is something called Truth. We all long for it. We all try to grasp it. We all try to define it. We all try to fathom it. We all feel the need to grasp it. Yet, physics, like Iswara (the Transcendent) tells us it is ungraspable. Everything, all of us, dances around it like moths around a candle flame.
However, the ancients tell us that there is a state that can be attained, where all of the pieces come together at the depth of one’s being. All paradoxes resolve. But even then, we, like the moths, continue to dance around the candle flame that some call Iswara, or the Transcendent, or God, or the unified field. We remain in the dance, but see beyond it. We are in the world, but no longer of it.
That state is not perspective, religion, philosophy, attitude or belief. To think you understand that state is to “understand” it too soon… for it is not just an understanding. It is a state of consciousness. Like the candle flame, it cannot be grasped. It cannot be fathomed. It cannot be defined. Yet, the pursuit of it is inherent in the nature of life… all life. From the amoeba to the human, we all reach for that undefinable something.
There are certainly levels of understanding of science, of every religion, and of every field of life. Personally, I searched to find whichever offered the deepest understanding with the most rigor and clarity. That turned out to be most readily available through Vedic Knowledge. At the same time, like the candle flame, the beauty of that knowledge is that it is ungraspable. When those living from that place speak, their words join in the dance. Those words immediately cease to provide the deepest meaning, and become what the listener heard, as the dance, ’round the light of life, goes on and on.
Thank you for this beautiful reminder.
I love this metaphor! So simple and beautiful and clear.
I loved the moth. Thank you for the beauty of your thoughts and so clearly stated.
I very much appreciate your comments. My connection with all of you is very important to me. Your comments help me feel your presence, your hearts, your thoughts.
Very concise analogy… and a few of the moths “die in the flame”. Ryan
What a deep blog, with layers of meaning. I am so grateful to be a recipient of the knowledge you have attained and shared with all of your students. Thank you for your guiding light.
True Ryan, but fortunately they reincarnate back over and over until they get it right.
It is a matter of not just sensing the light, which all life does to varying degrees, but rather being fully awake to it at the depth of one’s being while on the surface, the dance goes on. Of course each and every moth thinks they know what that is supposed to look like. But they don’t. Your comment is appreciated…
Hi Liz, I appreciate your comment. You make a good point that there are levels of understanding and implications in this blog. That is, as you know. of course true for everything in life, but I was hoping levels would be noticed by people while reading this blog. As we have discussed in the past, every single thing has tangential understandings to it that reach out to include all knowledge of all life and existence. To truly know one thing is to know everything. As Newton put it, if we really knew but one grain of sand… Thanks for your in-sight.
How do we keep from becoming too cynical in orientation, when others don’t truly understand, but keep asking those difficult questions about the dimensions of reality in ways that keep challenging our convictions in the Veda, or other dimension of reality we choose to prophesize as the Ulitmate?
Hi Bill,
Some would say to keep the faith. But personally, I would suggest knowledge and understanding. As in this blog, there is a knowledge of the inner mechanics of nature. I go deeply into that knowledge in my classes and blogs. That knowledge helps us understand people and situations. Admittedly though, when people are overtaken by their own negativity, they tend to abandon what they know and what they understand. That is why meditation is the fundamental key. It strengthens the depth, the root, of ones being.