Dr. Vijai S Shankar MD.PhD.
Published on www.academy-advaita.com
The Netherlands
15 January 2019
Surprise
“Daily”
Humans are thrilled and overjoyed in the moment when they are surprised by an event which is focussed to them. They recognise the label of the event in the moment which is informed by their memory in the moment.
The memory in the moment neither informs the details nor the sequence of events in the event in any moment. Also, memory neither informs the moment when memory started nor when the moment in life started.
Wisdom reveals that, in daily life, memory in the moment only recognises the label of an event in the moment that is in the present. However, neither the details nor the sequence of events that follow in any event that is present in the moment in daily life is recognised.
Wisdom reveals that memory has details of any event that was in the moment that was in the past. Wisdom signifies that within a moment only a label of an event is present and not the entire event. Wisdom reveals that only the label in the moment surprises humans and not the event in the moment.
This wisdom signifies that humans are surprised by labels in the moment that recognise events that were in the past. Memory has labels of events, but memory of labels does not surprise humans, but only memory of similar events in the past surprises humans.
The enlightened are calm and steady and not surprised by what happens in the moment. The enlightened are grateful for the moment and for the memory that informs what happens in the moment.
Why the enlightened are not surprised but are only grateful for the moment and what happens in the moment, is the question?
Wisdom reveals that every moment in life renews itself and in between a moment in the mind and in life is moment as well. This signifies that a moment in life and in the mind is eternal.
Wisdom further reveals that every moment happens by itself. Also, that the moment cannot be controlled by man or his brain. Wisdom also reveals that the intelligence in life manifests the moment and neither man nor woman makes the moment in life. The enlightened accept man or woman how he or she is in the moment and are not surprised by what or how they are in any moment.
Sri Ramana Maharishi has declared that what is meant to happen, albeit illusory, will happen. Sri Adi Shankaracharya has declared that man is not the doer in Nirvanashadakam. Kenopanishad verse (1.3) declares that word and mind cannot access the Absolute One. Bhagwat Gita chapter 3 verse 27 declares that man is not the doer.
The enlightened understand that the moment in daily life is manifested by the intelligence in life and is done neither by man nor by his brain. The enlightened are grateful to daily life as it is in every moment and are not surprised by what is in any moment in daily life.
Author: Dr. Vijai S. Shankar
© Copyright V. S. Shankar 2018
Editor’s Note:
Expectation and anticipation are fellow-travellers for each one of us. It is therefore no surprise that we may be joined by surprise on meeting what is in any moment in daily life. The wise declare that what we meet in the moment is a label of the meeting but not the details of the meeting, and that we meet what we are meant to meet, like it or not. The intelligence of life has also gifted man with memory. We all take pride in an excellent memory whose benefits, albeit illusory, are well known. The enlightened are gifted with deep understanding that what is in the moment, the moment that is beginningless and endless, is as it is. There is no surprise.
Julian Capper, UK.
German Translator‘s Note:
When you are surprised by an event, it means that you live in your mind. For only in the mind are there expectations of what will happen and what will not. The expectation that something ordinary will happen is only in the mind through comparison with what we have in mind about past events. The enlightened live in the timeless here and thoughtless now, in which memory has no real place. Therefore, as Dr. Shankar shows in this article, they are not surprised, for the Enlightened Beings do not believe in the mind‘s expectations of life as real.
Marcus Stegmaier, Germany.