Dr. Vijai S Shankar MD.PhD.
Published on www.academ-advaita.com
The Netherlands
21 November 2019
Many Actors (9)
“In life”
The objects never tell you that they will give you happiness, so please buy me. It has never told you that. You just think that you will become happy if you buy an object. You think many objects will give more happiness to you.
The object has never given any information that it will give you happiness. It is information given by your mind to you. The mind gathers information and it is fine.
When you go back to your house to whomever you are living with, you will ponder, what was I inferring everyone to be? What was I thinking everyone to be? My goodness. Now I know who everyone in my family is.
You will know, my goodness, where was my attention and God was right here in front of me as my family and what was my reaction? My goodness. And I am searching for God?
Up the hill in a church, in a temple and down the hill at home? And intelligently God is moving right close to me. God is moving as somebody and God is moving as me in my house
I did not even know God is so close. My goodness. God is just here and everywhere too. And I just did not know. Slowly your attention will come to yourself. From others to you. Because the attention is usually on others’ mind. Is it not?
The attention is on others’ mind to their role appearance as ‘I’. Similarly, from your appearance to your mind. From your mind to your real self. The journey comes back. If you start the journey from your ‘I’, others will remain as others separate from you.
Once the others’ ‘I’ disappears, can your ‘I’ be there? Your ‘I’ is there because of the others’ ‘I’. The mind is so habituated to think they are others. That will qualitatively change.
It will make you realise how the role player will keep searching for enlightenment. How the role player thinks another role player can give you enlightenment. How the role player thinks another role player can tell you who you really are.
You yourself do not know who you really are. How on earth can another ‘I’ know who you really are? If anyone can know who you really are, it should be yourself. Is it not so?
When you have understood your body, understood your mind, understood your many roles as illusory, the matter is over. Finished. Your journey in life is complete. You have arrived at the destination which is your real home: your real self.
The enlightened live every moment in life as it is patiently. They are neither in anxiety nor impatient.
Author: Dr. Vijai S. Shankar
© Copyright V. S. Shankar 2019
Editor’s Note:
Intermittently you may leave the mind and enter life. This is no replacement of one for another. That is the function of mind to leave or replace one for another. That is its function; let it be so. Maybe the one has lost its special appeal or become too difficult to bear, whilst the other is more appealing. When you leave the mind, you enter life. You do not leave life ever, though clouds may cover the light of the sun. The clouds are by the intelligence of life, presenting a contrast. When you leave the mind, which has been your fellow-traveller for generations, you enter life. It has no entry signs, no welcome mat, nor is it registered in any library. Individuality disappears. You are complete.
Julian Capper. UK
German Translator’s Note:
It is the materialistic way of thinking that is inherent in man that prevents the realization of both the true identity of man and God. Materialistic means here not only the striving for profit and possession, but the idea that matter is real. The mind may say: "But this door here, for example, is made of wood, that cannot be denied! Yes, the door consists of wood, but wood is matter, which consists of molecules, molecules are atoms and the atoms are composed of subatomic particles, which on closer inspection are nothing but light, or "energy". This energy temporarily appears as wood, which temporarily appears as a door. Neither the wood nor the door is real, because both are only a temporary appearance of the omnipresent, eternal light, or "God". Transient and perishable is the meaning of illusion, which in the ancient writings of the wise is called "Maya". That which does not change and is everywhere, the real, is energy or light which reflects all material things and is therefore called “God“. This understanding has nothing to do with faith, it is the simple conclusion of what both ancient Indian wisdom and modern science can convey to the skeptical mind about the nature of matter. Dr. Shankar's work and also this article reveals to the reader the meaning of the ancient wisdom from the point of view of the modern man, who in many cases, despite or precisely because of his highly developed science, has not given up the search for the divine.
Marcus Stegmaier, Germany.