For any quality in this universe one can find an opposite quality also. Good – Bad, Day – Night, Long – Short, Beauty – Ugly, Hot - Cold and any such number of qualities! One, who can understand this duality with the right perspective, can have an undisturbed life. Such person need not and will not have any worry about life or affinity towards destiny, God, heaven, hell and such entities. Such person is a self sustained person. He does not need any thing from others. As this person is beyond all this requirements, there is no harm to any body due to such a person. One who deeply involved with this duality can not have any life other than a disturbed life. To transcend duality and become free is not a difficult task. The only necessity is the real willingness to be like that. The difficulty lies in bringing in the willingness. This discussion is a small step towards removing the misconceptions with in us rather than bringing in willingness with in us. Once the misconceptions are understood, there is a better possibility of being willing to look into these possibilities.
Let us have a detailed discussion on the concept of duality. All these qualities can be classified into two groups. One set of qualities is entirely based on our senses. They are qualities like hot – cold, bright – dark, noise – silence and so on. Another set of qualities is mainly created by our reactive thoughts and senses are used to support the reaction of thoughts. Qualities such as good – bad, beauty – ugly and so on are such qualities supported by our reactive thoughts. There is not much harm in the dualities of first set of qualities as they are physical aspect and these dualities in these aspects exist because of the limitations of our sense organs. The duality exist in the second set of qualities is the most dangerous and this duality is the cause of each and every problem, violence and uneasiness in this planet. If a certain percentage of the human population can understand this duality and can transcend this duality, the problems in the whole existence will be solved. We may consider this discussion as a micro level attempt to such a reality (Hopefully!).
Let us take the quality hot & cold. Our body temperature is about 28 deg C. If a object which comes to contact with us is say at 30 deg C, we say it is hot while another object which is at 26 deg C, will be cold to us. If we are suffering with high fever, the object which is at 30 deg C will now seems to be very cold. Few days ago it was hot to us. The feeling of hot or cold depends on at what temperature we are. On the other hand the sense of hot or cold is relative to the temperature of our body. Similar is the case with any qualities directly related to our senses. Normally, we are not much affected by the duality in these qualities as it is required to protect our body to some extent.
The duality constructed by our mind such as good – bad, beauty – ugly, heaven – hell, etc are dangerous and they are the root cause for every problem of us. The mind, with the help of reactive thoughts creates such qualities. So, now the root cause is shifted to our thoughts. Reactive thoughts are the result of qualities such as fear, dependency, possessiveness and such qualities. Hence the root cause is shifted once again. Thus it is an endless circle. We have to break this circle some where. It does not matter where we break this circle. It depends on the individual capability and tendency of each one of us. We may discuss all such qualities and, may be with a bit of effort from our side, it is possible for every one of us to break the circle at one or the other point. If we can do that, we have already made a change with in us. Hence changing the world as we like to have is not far away.
Even though we know how the senses work for us, it may be relevant here to discuss it once again so that we may be able to approach our problems with the right perspective. Let us take the sense of hearing for our study. We know that the sound is produced by the vibration of the sound source. This vibration is transferred to the medium around and the particles in that medium starts vibrating and finally these vibrations reaches our ear. The ear drums starts vibrating and the vibration is transferred as electrical/chemical signal and this signal is carried over to the brain. The brain process the information by means of comparison. It pulls out already stored sound information and compare it with them. It recognize the pattern and then pull out the information stored along with those pattern of information. With that information, we recognize the sound and related information about the sound. Now whether we like it or not, the recently gathered information is stored in the memory. With this work, the active part of sense recognizing is complete. Now based on the type of information received, there may be another active process initiated by the brain. For example, the information received is some thing related to further action to be taken, another process of active brain function should be initiated. It is just a possibility. Now, we never stop at this active part of brain function.
Now, instead of being aware of this active process, we direct our awareness to one or few of the lead given by the active process of comparison. Our awareness is such a powerful phenomena, it immediately initiates a reactive processing. It is reactive process because that process is not about any fact, but a possibility brought out by the comparison process of our mind. With this reactive process initiated, we go as far back as possible to retrieve information from brain and project to future as far as possible. The past is already completed and whatever information in our brain is the information of whatever already happened (There is an exception here). The future has limitless possibilities and the brain can not project it with the facts already available in memory. But as our awareness was directed to that direction, the brain has to project the future. Now the brain is in a deep trouble. At this point, we need to remember that all actions of brain shall be recorded in the memory, whether it is an active process or reactive process. To come out of this trouble, the brain pull out the memory stored as a result of reactive thoughts in the past also. Here we have to note that the result stored in memory due to reactive thought is not the fact or information which had happened. But it is the result of projection of future at certain time in the past. Hence the mind project the future with the information stored in the memory, which was also a projection, stored at some point in the past. Now we can understand the chaos situation of mind. Over a period of time, our mind start processing only the (past) projections dumped into our memory, which is junk information rather than processing the memory of facts actually happened in the past. Now probably we may understand why young ones are more target oriented than the old ones, with very few exceptions. These exceptional ones are who learned to be aware (at least to a certain extent) of the active process of their brain rather than the reactive process of brain.
We deviated much from our discussion of the concept of duality. But this may be required to understand the concept of duality.
With the above discussion, we recognize that there is more garbage in our memory rather than the facts. Over a period of time, our brain starts processing major part of garbage with a little bit facts which it can recognize. The irony is with so much of garbage in our memory, our brain seldom recognize the facts. Out of ignorance, we consider the result of garbage processing as our way of life. Because of these garbage, our mind fixes a reference point for each and every perception and hence a quality is attached to it and hence the duality.
For the purpose of constructing the duality concept, let us assume, until now we have not seen flowers. We happened to visit a flower garden in a distant land. On entering the garden, for the first time in our life we are seeing a flower. The brain process the visual and fragrance of the flower and store it in the brain. At this point of time, there is no duality with respect to the qualities of the flower. This is because there are no qualities of flower at all with in our mind. This is because, this is the first time we are seeing the flower and there is nothing else there to compare. With out comparison there are no qualities. As we progress into the garden, we see the same type of flower with another colour. Now our memory already have information to compare. Once the active process recognize the flower with new colour and compare it with already available information and store the result back in memory, the reactive thought process spring out and construct the qualities out of the two flowers we have seen. Based on the garbage in our mind, we attach the quality beauty to one of these two flowers. Now the flower has a quality called beauty. If you have followed this discussion it is clear that the quality is the result of reactive thought process and the result of garbage with in our memory. The flower does not have any quality as such. The quality is attached to the flower by the observer and it is the result of reactive thought process of the observer.
If the above result can be projected little further, there is no quality at all to any thing which we observe. The qualities of the observations are due to the dualities built in to the memory of the observer.
If we can extend the above projections further, we ourselves may not be having any qualities as such. The qualities we observe about ourselves are just because of the duality built into our mind due to the garbage in our mind.
Please not that the above discussions are not yet facts for us. These are all just possibilities. We shall just keep these possibilities in our mind and at later stage there is probability of getting more clarity on this.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Building Belief Systems
As we mentioned some where earlier we have enough intelligence to understand about ourselves. But the question is whether we are applying our intelligence to realize our capabilities? The most probable answer is a big NO! Even if we try to understand with in the limit of the constraints we have, some where on the way of intellect, at the point where our intellect is unable to find a solution, we take escape route and build an image around it. Here after we live under the image rather than living with knowledge.
Our mind has immense capability. It can create a new world of our own with in a moment. Such is the imagination capacity of our mind. When ever our intellect can not solve a problem, with our present experience, by the nature of ourselves, we still seek for a solution. The easiest path available is to seek information already available with some body, who already knows about this problem and a probable solution. Up to this point it is fine. The real killing problem starts when we get some thing, which seems to be an answer to our problem, our mind grasp a part of it and with its own imagination power, present it as a solution of our problem. If our mind is functioning with its full power, then with the discriminating power of intelligence, it can verify the solution. But due to our present way of life, our mind seldom functions with its real potential. Due to our present life style and the way we live, the mind mainly works with reactive thoughts. Very seldom it works with active thoughts. Hence there is no real discriminating power with in our mind. Because of this reactive thought process, what ever information it received due to our seeking, it build images and then build a belief system with in us. Once this belief gone into our system, we are already gone. The belief system with in us is built by reactive thought and once the reactive thought becomes a belief system and embedded into ourselves, the mind try to make each and every one of our actions in conformity with our belief system. The mind assumes that the belief, which has gone in to our life process, is the reality. But the fact is not that. Once we are into a belief system and as we think it is the reality, we never look beyond that belief system. Hence to bring in a real change with in us, we should be careful enough not to build a belief system with in us. If we already have one, the biggest effort is to break the belief system, which is not an easy task. Those who have gone through some of the works of J.K (J. Krishnamurti) can recognize this fact very easily.
Hence to bring change in the world, one of the change we need to bring with in ourselves is the demolition of belief systems with in us, carefully built by the culture, society, religion or what ever such entities. We may analyze the source of fear on another day. With out demolishing our belief system with in us, we can not escape the bondage from our reactive thought, rather from the image we have built about ourselves. It is not an easy job, unless we understand the logic behind the happenings around us. It is not an easy job, unless we understand we really do not have any need for such belief systems. This can happen only when we have enough inner freedom to be away from fear and insecurity. Every one of us is having fear on so many things and feeling of insecurity. To be free from fear, we need to understand our fear and cause of that fear. Unless we get out of the image about ourselves, it is not at all possible to bring in any change with in us. Unless we bring in any changes with in us, we can not change the world around us.
Hence, if we are not ready to demolish our belief systems, images and fear, it is better to accept the world around us with out complaining. Even if we complain about the world nothing is going to change about it unless we bring in the necessary changes with in us. This habit of complaining about the world just boil with in us and spoil our health with out yielding any positive result, so better not to bother about it, unless we have at least the smallest instinct to bring in the necessary changes with in us.
Our mind has immense capability. It can create a new world of our own with in a moment. Such is the imagination capacity of our mind. When ever our intellect can not solve a problem, with our present experience, by the nature of ourselves, we still seek for a solution. The easiest path available is to seek information already available with some body, who already knows about this problem and a probable solution. Up to this point it is fine. The real killing problem starts when we get some thing, which seems to be an answer to our problem, our mind grasp a part of it and with its own imagination power, present it as a solution of our problem. If our mind is functioning with its full power, then with the discriminating power of intelligence, it can verify the solution. But due to our present way of life, our mind seldom functions with its real potential. Due to our present life style and the way we live, the mind mainly works with reactive thoughts. Very seldom it works with active thoughts. Hence there is no real discriminating power with in our mind. Because of this reactive thought process, what ever information it received due to our seeking, it build images and then build a belief system with in us. Once this belief gone into our system, we are already gone. The belief system with in us is built by reactive thought and once the reactive thought becomes a belief system and embedded into ourselves, the mind try to make each and every one of our actions in conformity with our belief system. The mind assumes that the belief, which has gone in to our life process, is the reality. But the fact is not that. Once we are into a belief system and as we think it is the reality, we never look beyond that belief system. Hence to bring in a real change with in us, we should be careful enough not to build a belief system with in us. If we already have one, the biggest effort is to break the belief system, which is not an easy task. Those who have gone through some of the works of J.K (J. Krishnamurti) can recognize this fact very easily.
Hence to bring change in the world, one of the change we need to bring with in ourselves is the demolition of belief systems with in us, carefully built by the culture, society, religion or what ever such entities. We may analyze the source of fear on another day. With out demolishing our belief system with in us, we can not escape the bondage from our reactive thought, rather from the image we have built about ourselves. It is not an easy job, unless we understand the logic behind the happenings around us. It is not an easy job, unless we understand we really do not have any need for such belief systems. This can happen only when we have enough inner freedom to be away from fear and insecurity. Every one of us is having fear on so many things and feeling of insecurity. To be free from fear, we need to understand our fear and cause of that fear. Unless we get out of the image about ourselves, it is not at all possible to bring in any change with in us. Unless we bring in any changes with in us, we can not change the world around us.
Hence, if we are not ready to demolish our belief systems, images and fear, it is better to accept the world around us with out complaining. Even if we complain about the world nothing is going to change about it unless we bring in the necessary changes with in us. This habit of complaining about the world just boil with in us and spoil our health with out yielding any positive result, so better not to bother about it, unless we have at least the smallest instinct to bring in the necessary changes with in us.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Energy with in Ourselves
We know that, few tons of radioactive material with chain reaction initiated is sufficient to destroy the entire earth. For radioactive materials, the atomic structure is such a way that with certain amount of energy, the atom can be split into smaller atom with release of enormous amount of energy. The release in energy is calculated by the formula E=delta m * c^2. Where, delta m is the difference in mass of the original amount of material and the total mass of the splited material. That means a fraction of the mass of the radio active material involved in the chain reaction is converted into energy and this energy is used to destroy the earth. The other materials (non radio active), the force with in the atom is so high, it cannot be easily split. On the other hand, if the other atoms can be split in to its basic building block and energy, that will generate much higher energy. That means the energy contains in few Kgs of other materials are released at an instant, it may be sufficient to destroy the entire earth.
To understand this a bit better, we need to go back to the concept of creation that was discussed earlier. Before creation (about 4 billion years ago) there was nothing in the cosmos except energy (at no vibration or at very high frequency of vibration at which, it can not hold form) and the mass-less Bosons. As bosons are mass less, cannot be consider it as matter and hence energy is the only existing entity at that time. When the energy starts vibrates (meaning, the mass-less particles start vibrating), the bosons are converted to fermions, which are the building blocks of atoms. As the particles started forming, they had their state of vibration. With the quality of that vibration (or frequency of that vibration), different atoms are formed. That means the atoms are different forms of basic energy, which vibrates at different frequencies. On the other hand whatever material we see in this cosmos are energy that vibrates at certain frequency. Depend on the frequency of vibration it holds different forms. Modern physics with theories of quantum mechanics establishes this fact. And the LHC in France/Swis is to confirm this fact experimentally.
To put it in raw words, whatever forms we see in this world are nothing but vibration of certain amount of energy at certain frequency so that it holds that particular form. When the frequency of vibration is increased to a level at which the energy cannot hold its form, it will annihilate in to bosons and release as a mere energy with out form. Those who still recollect a bit of physics learned in school can understand these terms easily.
In the case of an atom bomb, only a fraction of its total mass is converted into energy to bring destruction, the remaining mass is converted into other materials.
Every one of us must have studied Chemistry in our high school and we might have come across the periodic table. As per the periodic table about 110 base materials (May be few less than this number) are available in this earth, with atomic number ranging from 1 to 110.
We have also seen that our body is a heap of chemicals that are bonded together with certain force and, the body and force together constitute ourselves, as we perceive now. Let us take a dead body and separate the chemical compounds in to the base materials indicated in the periodic table. Of course we do not have the technology now. But let us assume if we can do that we will end up with a maximum of 110 different types of atoms and the weight together will be definitely more than few Kgs. If we can break all the atoms and release the energy, it is more than sufficient to destroy the whole earth.
Of course, we do not have the technology to do that, but it is the fact. This explanation given is just to appreciate the fact that our body itself contains enormous energy (mc^2), which is sufficient to destroy the entire earth, if is completely released in an instant (if we have the technology for that). It is the process of annihilation, the reverse process of creation. Over and above that we have certain energy which binds these bunches of atoms in the form of chemical compounds to form a human being. Probably, that energy must have more capability than the energy of the atoms in our body to keep them together.
This example must have demonstrated about the absolute energy content of just our body content it self. But we know, we are more than the body. May be at this point of time, we are not in a position to define what is that with in us which is more than this body. But one thing is certain. If the body has this much energy, the some thing which is more than the body and which keep the body in control must have much higher energy. If this much energy is directed in a certain way, definitely we can have a world in the way we like to have!
With this discussion, probably we are able to get a glimpse of one dimension of our nature. We may have to see countless dimension of our nature to find out our real nature. But just seeing by intellect may not be sufficient. We may have to experience what we are seeing intellectually to achieve our aim. Let us attempt to the extent possible for us.
Please bear in mind that every one see the environment in different perspective. As an individual, we see certain things in certain perspective and some body else in another perspective. Both of the seeings are correct with respect to those individuals. The quality of the impressions in that individuals perception is depend on the quality of his perception. If one learn to see the same thing in different perspectives, at a certain stage, he/she will only see the thing and no quality shall be attached to the seeing. This concept we shall discuss more at later stage when we discuss the concept of duality.
The above discussion is just to see ourselves in a different perspective than what we are seeing normally. Other than that it doesn’t have any significance. Hence arguing for or against this perspective has no meaning in the context of this discussion. Hope you can understand this point.
We know that any event shall be perceived by different individuals in different ways. No two perception of the same event shall be the same. We are constrained with the inability to see the events with the perception of some body else. This is the reason for the chaos of this world. Because each one has his/her own perception and divide themselves from others by means of their own perception.
Let us assume,we are walking along the road. We have certain perception of usage of road at this moment. When we started riding cycle on this road, our perception of usage of road changes little bit to suit our new avatar with cycle. When we start using motor bike on the same road, our perception of usage of this road changes still further. Finally when we are car users on the same road, our perception of road is completely different from the previous versions. And most probably, when we are moving on the opposite direction of the same road, again our perception of usage of road may be different.
The point here is that our perception of road usage at any moment shall be with respect to what we are at that moment. Mind that, what ever be our mode in the above list(walk, cycle, motor bike, car, etc.) at that road, there are many others using the same road with other modes and we were also in the other modes at certain point of time. Still our perception is only with respect to our current mode. We have conditioned our intelligence in such a way that we never or seldom perceive the usage of road with respect to the modes other than what we are currently in. We never perceive any event with more than one perspective. This leads to division between individuals and become the source of all the problems in this world. Onece we learn to see any event or any moment with more than one perspective, the division between the individuals starts disappear and hence the problems of the world also.
This example of energy with in us is just to understand that there are many ways to see any thing. Once we are able to appreciate this fact and start seeing things in more than one perspective, we are already started changing with in us. If we progress like this, it is not far away to have a world of our choice
To understand this a bit better, we need to go back to the concept of creation that was discussed earlier. Before creation (about 4 billion years ago) there was nothing in the cosmos except energy (at no vibration or at very high frequency of vibration at which, it can not hold form) and the mass-less Bosons. As bosons are mass less, cannot be consider it as matter and hence energy is the only existing entity at that time. When the energy starts vibrates (meaning, the mass-less particles start vibrating), the bosons are converted to fermions, which are the building blocks of atoms. As the particles started forming, they had their state of vibration. With the quality of that vibration (or frequency of that vibration), different atoms are formed. That means the atoms are different forms of basic energy, which vibrates at different frequencies. On the other hand whatever material we see in this cosmos are energy that vibrates at certain frequency. Depend on the frequency of vibration it holds different forms. Modern physics with theories of quantum mechanics establishes this fact. And the LHC in France/Swis is to confirm this fact experimentally.
To put it in raw words, whatever forms we see in this world are nothing but vibration of certain amount of energy at certain frequency so that it holds that particular form. When the frequency of vibration is increased to a level at which the energy cannot hold its form, it will annihilate in to bosons and release as a mere energy with out form. Those who still recollect a bit of physics learned in school can understand these terms easily.
In the case of an atom bomb, only a fraction of its total mass is converted into energy to bring destruction, the remaining mass is converted into other materials.
Every one of us must have studied Chemistry in our high school and we might have come across the periodic table. As per the periodic table about 110 base materials (May be few less than this number) are available in this earth, with atomic number ranging from 1 to 110.
We have also seen that our body is a heap of chemicals that are bonded together with certain force and, the body and force together constitute ourselves, as we perceive now. Let us take a dead body and separate the chemical compounds in to the base materials indicated in the periodic table. Of course we do not have the technology now. But let us assume if we can do that we will end up with a maximum of 110 different types of atoms and the weight together will be definitely more than few Kgs. If we can break all the atoms and release the energy, it is more than sufficient to destroy the whole earth.
Of course, we do not have the technology to do that, but it is the fact. This explanation given is just to appreciate the fact that our body itself contains enormous energy (mc^2), which is sufficient to destroy the entire earth, if is completely released in an instant (if we have the technology for that). It is the process of annihilation, the reverse process of creation. Over and above that we have certain energy which binds these bunches of atoms in the form of chemical compounds to form a human being. Probably, that energy must have more capability than the energy of the atoms in our body to keep them together.
This example must have demonstrated about the absolute energy content of just our body content it self. But we know, we are more than the body. May be at this point of time, we are not in a position to define what is that with in us which is more than this body. But one thing is certain. If the body has this much energy, the some thing which is more than the body and which keep the body in control must have much higher energy. If this much energy is directed in a certain way, definitely we can have a world in the way we like to have!
With this discussion, probably we are able to get a glimpse of one dimension of our nature. We may have to see countless dimension of our nature to find out our real nature. But just seeing by intellect may not be sufficient. We may have to experience what we are seeing intellectually to achieve our aim. Let us attempt to the extent possible for us.
Please bear in mind that every one see the environment in different perspective. As an individual, we see certain things in certain perspective and some body else in another perspective. Both of the seeings are correct with respect to those individuals. The quality of the impressions in that individuals perception is depend on the quality of his perception. If one learn to see the same thing in different perspectives, at a certain stage, he/she will only see the thing and no quality shall be attached to the seeing. This concept we shall discuss more at later stage when we discuss the concept of duality.
The above discussion is just to see ourselves in a different perspective than what we are seeing normally. Other than that it doesn’t have any significance. Hence arguing for or against this perspective has no meaning in the context of this discussion. Hope you can understand this point.
We know that any event shall be perceived by different individuals in different ways. No two perception of the same event shall be the same. We are constrained with the inability to see the events with the perception of some body else. This is the reason for the chaos of this world. Because each one has his/her own perception and divide themselves from others by means of their own perception.
Let us assume,we are walking along the road. We have certain perception of usage of road at this moment. When we started riding cycle on this road, our perception of usage of road changes little bit to suit our new avatar with cycle. When we start using motor bike on the same road, our perception of usage of this road changes still further. Finally when we are car users on the same road, our perception of road is completely different from the previous versions. And most probably, when we are moving on the opposite direction of the same road, again our perception of usage of road may be different.
The point here is that our perception of road usage at any moment shall be with respect to what we are at that moment. Mind that, what ever be our mode in the above list(walk, cycle, motor bike, car, etc.) at that road, there are many others using the same road with other modes and we were also in the other modes at certain point of time. Still our perception is only with respect to our current mode. We have conditioned our intelligence in such a way that we never or seldom perceive the usage of road with respect to the modes other than what we are currently in. We never perceive any event with more than one perspective. This leads to division between individuals and become the source of all the problems in this world. Onece we learn to see any event or any moment with more than one perspective, the division between the individuals starts disappear and hence the problems of the world also.
This example of energy with in us is just to understand that there are many ways to see any thing. Once we are able to appreciate this fact and start seeing things in more than one perspective, we are already started changing with in us. If we progress like this, it is not far away to have a world of our choice
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
The Process of Image building
What we consider ourselves is just the image we built about ourselves in our mind. And it is the out come of our reactive thought. The reactive thought itself is an unwanted process happening with in our mind. Let us analyze how this image has been built in to us, to the extent possible for us so that there is a possibility to destroy this self image and go into the reality. In other words, if we can understand the whole process of reactive thoughts, there is a possibility of stopping the reactive thoughts itself.
We build image about any thing based on the concept of duality. For example, we build the images like good or bad, beautiful or ugly, tall or short, hot or cold and so on. Whatever image we have about ourselves, there is an exactly opposite of that image is available with in our experience. Because any thing and every thing we experience in this world is relative to some thing, and hence duality is inevitable. In most of the cases, the point of relation is set by our mind it self, which is again based on our knowledge or experience. The mind fixes a reference point and then we measure the attribute. One side of the reference point is of one quality and the other side of the reference point is of other quality and hence the duality. Duality ceases to exist if and only if we demolish the reference point from our mind. As our experience in life increases, the reference point also keep on moving to the direction depend on the quality of our experience. If our experience is in such a way that, there is no more requirement for such a reference point, the duality ceases to exist. Let us just keep this idea with us for some more time and discuss in detail at a later stage, when it is more relevant.
Let us discuss some concepts of Transactional Analysis, which is part of modern psychology. Transactional analysis is an integral part of any interpersonal skill development courses. In modern psychological terms, the image is built by the psychological transactions between people.
Transactional analysis talks about the ego states with in individuals. The ego state of an individual can be classified into three states. They are Parent ego, Adult ego and Child ego. Every one has all the three ego states, but at a different proportion. The traits of an individual depend on how the three ego states are mixed with in an individual. The parent ego is authoritative ego, adult ego is matured ego, and child ego is the playful ego. When ever a person communicates with another one, he/she always will be at one of these three ego states. That doesn’t mean, he communicates always with the same ego state. That particular ego state depends on his/her personality, situation, and few other psychological conditions. The same is the case with the other person also. Wile communicating, the first person can be in any of the three ego states and the second person also in any of the three ego states. Hence there are nine possibilities of interpersonal communication. The each communication between two persons is called transaction. The transaction is not only verbal communication, but also the communications like gestures. Hence the transaction between two persons shall be Parent to Parent, Parent to Adult, Parent to Child, Adult to Parent, Adult to Adult, Adult to Child, Child to Parent, Child to Adult and Child to Child. When ever the persons transacting are in the same ego state, the transaction will be a healthy one. If they are in different ego states while communicating, the result of the transaction will always be negative.
Then there is a thing called STAMP in transactional analysis. It is an impression that happens with in the mind of personnel involving in the transaction, created as a result of this transaction. Each transaction will have a stamp for each individuals participating in a transaction. To make it clear let us assume, the first person involved in the transaction is at its parent ego state and the second person involved in the transaction is in child ego state. The first person says “You are idiot”. By transacting this he collect a stamp which has an imprint that “Others are always idiots”. The second person who is in the child ego state, seeing some body says him as “Idiot” collects a stamp with the imprint of “I am always Idiot”. If the second person involved in this transaction is with his adult ego state at the time of transaction, he may collect a stamp with some other imprint, probably a healthy one, depend on his mind conditioning. And also the point to be noted here is one can not be in the same ego state always. For the functioning of life, one has to have all the three ego states at different moments. Even a child need to have parent ego at certain circumstances.
The essence of transactional analysis is that with any communication between individuals, they collect stamps and store them in their mind or memory. With so much communication happening between people, we can imagine the amount of stamps we have collected and dumped into the mind and memory during our life period.
The image we have about ourselves is nothing but the bunch of such stamps we have collected during our life time. Let us assume, we came up in an entirely different environment and the transactions happened during our life time are of entirely different nature, what we consider as ourselves might be an entirely different set of qualities. To make it precious, what ever we have noted about ourselves is just an image of ourselves and it is not actually our nature. This image may change depend on the circumstances we are in. On the other hand, the projected image of us is a game of our mind only. To put the whole thing in another perspective, what we consider as our personality is just the projection of our own mind. This projection is based on the stamps collected by ourselves AND OUR PARENTS, GRANT PARENTS, GRANT ….GRANT PARENTS (they collected the stamps by themselves and then passed on it to us and we pass them to our children) and dumped in to our memory. The minds analyze the memory and give the projection of our mind. But it is not our real nature. What we consider ourselves is just the result of the type of transactions we had in the past. If we would have been had different types of transaction, our personality must have been some thing else. And this discussion now leaves a big question, then WHAT IS OUR REAL NATURE? Since we have this question, there is a scope to find our real nature. I do not know the real nature of us to write down here. The option available is to find out ourselves together, if we are willing to find out. I am definitely willing to find it out.
I am not sure, whether the point intended to be made clear is brought out or not. The intention of this discussion is we are not the one we consider as ourselves. What we consider as ourselves is just an image projected by our mind. Our basic nature may be entirely different from what the mind has projected about us, because the mind with reactive thought can only understand the relative terms or duality of the life. Once we look beyond this dualities of life, then only we will be able to understand the real nature of us. Once we understand that real nature, the next moment we can bring the change we want to have in this world.
Here the term understanding has much deeper meaning. It is not just an intellectual understanding. It is basically experiencing the fact. To bring in this understanding, we may discuss various aspects of life, energy, cosmos and at the end of each discussion, we shall return to this point of discussion. On the other hand, from this point of discussion we shall branch out to multiple directions and then come back to this point to take another branch. In this way, we will be always in focus of what we want to achieve at the end of this discussion.
The aim of this discussion is, to be aware of the internal change required with in us and prepare ourselves for to adopt the change with in. By this change with in ourselves, we can see the outside world with the right perspective and we can change the out side world, if we need to change it. To facilitate this, we need a better understanding about ourselves and probably these discussions may show the route for understanding about ourselves.
We build image about any thing based on the concept of duality. For example, we build the images like good or bad, beautiful or ugly, tall or short, hot or cold and so on. Whatever image we have about ourselves, there is an exactly opposite of that image is available with in our experience. Because any thing and every thing we experience in this world is relative to some thing, and hence duality is inevitable. In most of the cases, the point of relation is set by our mind it self, which is again based on our knowledge or experience. The mind fixes a reference point and then we measure the attribute. One side of the reference point is of one quality and the other side of the reference point is of other quality and hence the duality. Duality ceases to exist if and only if we demolish the reference point from our mind. As our experience in life increases, the reference point also keep on moving to the direction depend on the quality of our experience. If our experience is in such a way that, there is no more requirement for such a reference point, the duality ceases to exist. Let us just keep this idea with us for some more time and discuss in detail at a later stage, when it is more relevant.
Let us discuss some concepts of Transactional Analysis, which is part of modern psychology. Transactional analysis is an integral part of any interpersonal skill development courses. In modern psychological terms, the image is built by the psychological transactions between people.
Transactional analysis talks about the ego states with in individuals. The ego state of an individual can be classified into three states. They are Parent ego, Adult ego and Child ego. Every one has all the three ego states, but at a different proportion. The traits of an individual depend on how the three ego states are mixed with in an individual. The parent ego is authoritative ego, adult ego is matured ego, and child ego is the playful ego. When ever a person communicates with another one, he/she always will be at one of these three ego states. That doesn’t mean, he communicates always with the same ego state. That particular ego state depends on his/her personality, situation, and few other psychological conditions. The same is the case with the other person also. Wile communicating, the first person can be in any of the three ego states and the second person also in any of the three ego states. Hence there are nine possibilities of interpersonal communication. The each communication between two persons is called transaction. The transaction is not only verbal communication, but also the communications like gestures. Hence the transaction between two persons shall be Parent to Parent, Parent to Adult, Parent to Child, Adult to Parent, Adult to Adult, Adult to Child, Child to Parent, Child to Adult and Child to Child. When ever the persons transacting are in the same ego state, the transaction will be a healthy one. If they are in different ego states while communicating, the result of the transaction will always be negative.
Then there is a thing called STAMP in transactional analysis. It is an impression that happens with in the mind of personnel involving in the transaction, created as a result of this transaction. Each transaction will have a stamp for each individuals participating in a transaction. To make it clear let us assume, the first person involved in the transaction is at its parent ego state and the second person involved in the transaction is in child ego state. The first person says “You are idiot”. By transacting this he collect a stamp which has an imprint that “Others are always idiots”. The second person who is in the child ego state, seeing some body says him as “Idiot” collects a stamp with the imprint of “I am always Idiot”. If the second person involved in this transaction is with his adult ego state at the time of transaction, he may collect a stamp with some other imprint, probably a healthy one, depend on his mind conditioning. And also the point to be noted here is one can not be in the same ego state always. For the functioning of life, one has to have all the three ego states at different moments. Even a child need to have parent ego at certain circumstances.
The essence of transactional analysis is that with any communication between individuals, they collect stamps and store them in their mind or memory. With so much communication happening between people, we can imagine the amount of stamps we have collected and dumped into the mind and memory during our life period.
The image we have about ourselves is nothing but the bunch of such stamps we have collected during our life time. Let us assume, we came up in an entirely different environment and the transactions happened during our life time are of entirely different nature, what we consider as ourselves might be an entirely different set of qualities. To make it precious, what ever we have noted about ourselves is just an image of ourselves and it is not actually our nature. This image may change depend on the circumstances we are in. On the other hand, the projected image of us is a game of our mind only. To put the whole thing in another perspective, what we consider as our personality is just the projection of our own mind. This projection is based on the stamps collected by ourselves AND OUR PARENTS, GRANT PARENTS, GRANT ….GRANT PARENTS (they collected the stamps by themselves and then passed on it to us and we pass them to our children) and dumped in to our memory. The minds analyze the memory and give the projection of our mind. But it is not our real nature. What we consider ourselves is just the result of the type of transactions we had in the past. If we would have been had different types of transaction, our personality must have been some thing else. And this discussion now leaves a big question, then WHAT IS OUR REAL NATURE? Since we have this question, there is a scope to find our real nature. I do not know the real nature of us to write down here. The option available is to find out ourselves together, if we are willing to find out. I am definitely willing to find it out.
I am not sure, whether the point intended to be made clear is brought out or not. The intention of this discussion is we are not the one we consider as ourselves. What we consider as ourselves is just an image projected by our mind. Our basic nature may be entirely different from what the mind has projected about us, because the mind with reactive thought can only understand the relative terms or duality of the life. Once we look beyond this dualities of life, then only we will be able to understand the real nature of us. Once we understand that real nature, the next moment we can bring the change we want to have in this world.
Here the term understanding has much deeper meaning. It is not just an intellectual understanding. It is basically experiencing the fact. To bring in this understanding, we may discuss various aspects of life, energy, cosmos and at the end of each discussion, we shall return to this point of discussion. On the other hand, from this point of discussion we shall branch out to multiple directions and then come back to this point to take another branch. In this way, we will be always in focus of what we want to achieve at the end of this discussion.
The aim of this discussion is, to be aware of the internal change required with in us and prepare ourselves for to adopt the change with in. By this change with in ourselves, we can see the outside world with the right perspective and we can change the out side world, if we need to change it. To facilitate this, we need a better understanding about ourselves and probably these discussions may show the route for understanding about ourselves.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Self Image
Now we have a fair idea of what we are, the complexities involved with in us and with in the universe. All along we wanted to change every thing or every happening in this tiny earth with in the vast cosmos by ourselves or by some body else. We still can change that with the understanding of whole complexities of this cosmos and the complexities of ourselves. But we need to change a bit with in ourselves to make us capable of changing the happening in earth. Self analysis is for the purpose of understanding what we need to change with in ourselves.
If we are required to write down about whom we are, depend on our descriptive nature, we may write about ourselves any thing from three sentences to 30 sentences. No ordinary person can write more than 30 sentence about him/her self. If one can do that, he/she must be a story writer.
This is the time to start self analysis. If you are willing to do, prepare an analysis report of yourself as far as possible and make it as a record. If you are willing to change yourself and see this record after few months, you will surprise about your image you will be having about you at that time. Yes, what we have just written down is our image about ourselves, which we have with in us. What is this image? How this image has been formed within us and got into our mind? Do we need this image or do we change this image? If we get all these questions, we are again in the right track.
I would like to ascertain one thing here. Any body who reads this page is definitely an intelligent person. You must have been gone thru certain formal education which ever field it may be. The education must have been made you as an intellectual being. By intellect, what I mean is you have become a logical person. What ever you think you try to attach some logic to that. But the irony is whenever we are not able to attach any logic to something which we come across, instead of asking questions and finding a solution, we just go into our belief system and start BELIEVING those things. We never try to understand the logic behind what we believe or, at least gaining intellectual knowledge about our belief. Yes, belief is a wonderful thing to have, if we believe every thing and trust every thing what ever come across to us, beyond any question or doubt. But having an intellectual mind we are not able to have that sort of belief also. Hence if we analyze some thing using our logical mind and when it goes beyond our capability with respect to logic, we just escape the logical route by taking a belief route. This is mere escapism. We are lazy to analyze further and find the answer. It is because of our laziness we divert ourselves to the belief route just for those concepts which we can’t understand but somehow we need them for a mere psychological satisfaction or for psychological process of covering up things which we are unable to understand. We never reach any where by this escape route and psychological covering-up process. The best thing we can do on such situation is go as far as possible with in the logical mind and stop were we are not able to proceed any further, and keep it for a later time. In this way at least we have kept a possibility open. By escaping thru the belief route for certain things (only), we are sealing possibility of knowledge. Being with an intellectual mind, knowledge gives more freedom to us rather than the belief.
That is the reason I said, we are in the right track if we get some question about us, as we started the self analysis. So in the first stage of self analysis, we actually analyzing our image about ourselves rather than actually analyzing ourselves. There is a vast difference between analyzing our image about ourselves and actually analyzing ourselves. We may discuss about this at later stage. Now let us start with what we consider as ourselves – The image about ourselves.
Okay, now the list is ready. We have already written down what we consider as ourselves. The list may contain description of our physical nature, interests, attitude, and what we consider as positive and negative description of ours. Now let us go back and look at how we arrived at the conclusion about ourselves.
Let us take the physical description of ourselves. Naturally we have described our body here. We would have written as tall/short, long/round/oval face, long/short hair and so on. But what we describe about our physical aspect is just a comparison of what is there around us. Yes that is the only way we can describe our physical aspect. Here we will write the same thing even if we have written it a year ago or a year later as long as we are in the same society. This is reasonably straight forward. Now let us move to the description of our interests. Here the interests we have noted about ourselves is just what we though about our interest at that moment and at best, this is the interests we have on a few days span of time from the moment we have noted them. If we would have written about our interests a few weeks ago or shall write few weeks later, that would have been a different set of interests, depend on our exposure to new experiences in life. Same is the case with the description of attitude or any other aspects. The point here is that except about our physical nature, every thing else is entirely the projection of our mind. It is basically the projection of our mind at the time of observing those aspects. To express it in a subtle way, the description we give about ourselves is the observation of the projection of our mind at the moment and it is not the observation of ourselves. (It may be a bit hard to understand the difference between the projection of our mind and ourselves. It may be cleared after some more discussion). The projection of our mind could have been in any other direction, if we would have observed it in another moment. There are limitless numbers of possibilities about how we would have described ourselves based on the time in which we are describing ourselves. The point here is that the entire description of us we have observed is based on our reactive thoughts, which can change at every single moment of life. So what we think about us is not a fixed thing. It changes every moment during our life, except about our body. Even about the body, though we do not perceive, the reality is that it is changing every moment. Every cell in our body is dying and regenerating itself, which is happening at every moment of our life at certain part of our body. Some where I heard that each cells in our body dies and replaced by a new cell once in every 2.5 years. On the other hand, we are virtually having a new body once in every 2.5 years. Hence the fact is that what we describe about ourselves changes during every moment of life. We are not the same entity at this moment compared to what we were in the previous moment or what we will be in the next moment, as per our description about us.
I would like to remind you- please do not bring in the philosophical or religious concepts which describe about us at this moment. It is deceptive in nature and seals the possibility of self analysis. Let us be open about ourselves. Let us not deceive some thing and seal the option of knowing about ourselves. Same is the case when you are reading this blog. Please stay away from any urge of deception – towards or against the content, which will take away the possibility of self knowledge. Just try to relate the contents to your experience or try to experience it. If unable to relate it to your experience or not able to experience it, just stop there in that direction and move on to another direction. That will be far, far better than deceived by some idea.
If we are required to write down about whom we are, depend on our descriptive nature, we may write about ourselves any thing from three sentences to 30 sentences. No ordinary person can write more than 30 sentence about him/her self. If one can do that, he/she must be a story writer.
This is the time to start self analysis. If you are willing to do, prepare an analysis report of yourself as far as possible and make it as a record. If you are willing to change yourself and see this record after few months, you will surprise about your image you will be having about you at that time. Yes, what we have just written down is our image about ourselves, which we have with in us. What is this image? How this image has been formed within us and got into our mind? Do we need this image or do we change this image? If we get all these questions, we are again in the right track.
I would like to ascertain one thing here. Any body who reads this page is definitely an intelligent person. You must have been gone thru certain formal education which ever field it may be. The education must have been made you as an intellectual being. By intellect, what I mean is you have become a logical person. What ever you think you try to attach some logic to that. But the irony is whenever we are not able to attach any logic to something which we come across, instead of asking questions and finding a solution, we just go into our belief system and start BELIEVING those things. We never try to understand the logic behind what we believe or, at least gaining intellectual knowledge about our belief. Yes, belief is a wonderful thing to have, if we believe every thing and trust every thing what ever come across to us, beyond any question or doubt. But having an intellectual mind we are not able to have that sort of belief also. Hence if we analyze some thing using our logical mind and when it goes beyond our capability with respect to logic, we just escape the logical route by taking a belief route. This is mere escapism. We are lazy to analyze further and find the answer. It is because of our laziness we divert ourselves to the belief route just for those concepts which we can’t understand but somehow we need them for a mere psychological satisfaction or for psychological process of covering up things which we are unable to understand. We never reach any where by this escape route and psychological covering-up process. The best thing we can do on such situation is go as far as possible with in the logical mind and stop were we are not able to proceed any further, and keep it for a later time. In this way at least we have kept a possibility open. By escaping thru the belief route for certain things (only), we are sealing possibility of knowledge. Being with an intellectual mind, knowledge gives more freedom to us rather than the belief.
That is the reason I said, we are in the right track if we get some question about us, as we started the self analysis. So in the first stage of self analysis, we actually analyzing our image about ourselves rather than actually analyzing ourselves. There is a vast difference between analyzing our image about ourselves and actually analyzing ourselves. We may discuss about this at later stage. Now let us start with what we consider as ourselves – The image about ourselves.
Okay, now the list is ready. We have already written down what we consider as ourselves. The list may contain description of our physical nature, interests, attitude, and what we consider as positive and negative description of ours. Now let us go back and look at how we arrived at the conclusion about ourselves.
Let us take the physical description of ourselves. Naturally we have described our body here. We would have written as tall/short, long/round/oval face, long/short hair and so on. But what we describe about our physical aspect is just a comparison of what is there around us. Yes that is the only way we can describe our physical aspect. Here we will write the same thing even if we have written it a year ago or a year later as long as we are in the same society. This is reasonably straight forward. Now let us move to the description of our interests. Here the interests we have noted about ourselves is just what we though about our interest at that moment and at best, this is the interests we have on a few days span of time from the moment we have noted them. If we would have written about our interests a few weeks ago or shall write few weeks later, that would have been a different set of interests, depend on our exposure to new experiences in life. Same is the case with the description of attitude or any other aspects. The point here is that except about our physical nature, every thing else is entirely the projection of our mind. It is basically the projection of our mind at the time of observing those aspects. To express it in a subtle way, the description we give about ourselves is the observation of the projection of our mind at the moment and it is not the observation of ourselves. (It may be a bit hard to understand the difference between the projection of our mind and ourselves. It may be cleared after some more discussion). The projection of our mind could have been in any other direction, if we would have observed it in another moment. There are limitless numbers of possibilities about how we would have described ourselves based on the time in which we are describing ourselves. The point here is that the entire description of us we have observed is based on our reactive thoughts, which can change at every single moment of life. So what we think about us is not a fixed thing. It changes every moment during our life, except about our body. Even about the body, though we do not perceive, the reality is that it is changing every moment. Every cell in our body is dying and regenerating itself, which is happening at every moment of our life at certain part of our body. Some where I heard that each cells in our body dies and replaced by a new cell once in every 2.5 years. On the other hand, we are virtually having a new body once in every 2.5 years. Hence the fact is that what we describe about ourselves changes during every moment of life. We are not the same entity at this moment compared to what we were in the previous moment or what we will be in the next moment, as per our description about us.
I would like to remind you- please do not bring in the philosophical or religious concepts which describe about us at this moment. It is deceptive in nature and seals the possibility of self analysis. Let us be open about ourselves. Let us not deceive some thing and seal the option of knowing about ourselves. Same is the case when you are reading this blog. Please stay away from any urge of deception – towards or against the content, which will take away the possibility of self knowledge. Just try to relate the contents to your experience or try to experience it. If unable to relate it to your experience or not able to experience it, just stop there in that direction and move on to another direction. That will be far, far better than deceived by some idea.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Logic with in Creation and Evolution
We have seen that there is a complete logic behind creation and evolution. When we were children, we might have had funny images about the formation and birth of ourselves. When we grow up, we gained some knowledge about the mechanism of reproduction and we are capable of explaining it logically.
When we were grown up children, most of us might have had the question of how the first human came into the earth. When we asked this question, out of ignorance, we were told some funny stories and we started believing those stories. We learned the evolution theories and many other things by ourselves, when we were capable of acquiring such knowledge. But the funny stories gone deep into our memories due to the belief system we and our immediate ancestors had, and for most of us, still it is deep in to our memory. At the same time we are able to acknowledge the logic behind it, if it is presented logically.
There is complete logic behind each and every happening in the whole of cosmos. It is only that our present knowledge or experience is not capable of recognizing the whole logic behind happening around the cosmos. In other words, our present experience is limited to very, very few things which are happening around the cosmos and we will be able to understand with our logical mind only about that dimension of happening in the cosmos. If our experience is widened, we will be able to see another dimension of cosmos also, with complete logic. We are not able to see the other dimension of the cosmos at this moment with our logical mind does not mean that there is no logic behind the happening in the vast cosmos.
If a man who lived in earth 100 years ago, suddenly come in front of us, he will just get frightened at what we are doing now. In his experience what we are doing is completely miracles. When we take a small piece of material and talk to it and if we say, we are talking to some body in the other side of earth, it is a miracle for him. In his experience he can not speak with any body who is more than 100 meters away. But we know the science behind what we are doing and hence in our experience what we are doing is not a miracle.
The similar analogy is applicable to each and every happening in this earth as well as the whole cosmos. There is complete logic behind what is happening in the earth as well as in the cosmos. It may not be in our experience. That doesn’t mean what is happening around is miracle. The bottom line is that there are no miracles in this earth or in this cosmos. Every happening has a complete logic behind that. The fact is that our present experience is not relevant to the other dimension. That doesn’t again mean we have to accept the other dimension as told by somebody else without any understanding of what is told to us. If we do that mistake, the possibility of knowledge is sealed there and we will be just living as ignorant beings.
It is not that we are not capable of understanding these logics. We are the most capable beings in this cosmos to understand and experience the entire happening. What we need is awareness that every happening in this cosmos has logic and the willingness to see that logic. If we can allow our natural instinct of evolution, we will definitely search for the other dimension by ourselves, may be with a little help from those who have already experienced the other dimensions. In this way, even if we are unable to taste the other dimensions of cosmos, we are in the right track – The track of evolution of our being, and we are not far away from changing the world as we need.
When we were grown up children, most of us might have had the question of how the first human came into the earth. When we asked this question, out of ignorance, we were told some funny stories and we started believing those stories. We learned the evolution theories and many other things by ourselves, when we were capable of acquiring such knowledge. But the funny stories gone deep into our memories due to the belief system we and our immediate ancestors had, and for most of us, still it is deep in to our memory. At the same time we are able to acknowledge the logic behind it, if it is presented logically.
There is complete logic behind each and every happening in the whole of cosmos. It is only that our present knowledge or experience is not capable of recognizing the whole logic behind happening around the cosmos. In other words, our present experience is limited to very, very few things which are happening around the cosmos and we will be able to understand with our logical mind only about that dimension of happening in the cosmos. If our experience is widened, we will be able to see another dimension of cosmos also, with complete logic. We are not able to see the other dimension of the cosmos at this moment with our logical mind does not mean that there is no logic behind the happening in the vast cosmos.
If a man who lived in earth 100 years ago, suddenly come in front of us, he will just get frightened at what we are doing now. In his experience what we are doing is completely miracles. When we take a small piece of material and talk to it and if we say, we are talking to some body in the other side of earth, it is a miracle for him. In his experience he can not speak with any body who is more than 100 meters away. But we know the science behind what we are doing and hence in our experience what we are doing is not a miracle.
The similar analogy is applicable to each and every happening in this earth as well as the whole cosmos. There is complete logic behind what is happening in the earth as well as in the cosmos. It may not be in our experience. That doesn’t mean what is happening around is miracle. The bottom line is that there are no miracles in this earth or in this cosmos. Every happening has a complete logic behind that. The fact is that our present experience is not relevant to the other dimension. That doesn’t again mean we have to accept the other dimension as told by somebody else without any understanding of what is told to us. If we do that mistake, the possibility of knowledge is sealed there and we will be just living as ignorant beings.
It is not that we are not capable of understanding these logics. We are the most capable beings in this cosmos to understand and experience the entire happening. What we need is awareness that every happening in this cosmos has logic and the willingness to see that logic. If we can allow our natural instinct of evolution, we will definitely search for the other dimension by ourselves, may be with a little help from those who have already experienced the other dimensions. In this way, even if we are unable to taste the other dimensions of cosmos, we are in the right track – The track of evolution of our being, and we are not far away from changing the world as we need.
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