Author
Deepali Konaje
Co- Authors
Aishwarya Nair Trusha Navalkar
Editor
Trusha Navalkar
Illustrator
Deepali Konaje
Cover Art
Creation of Adam by Michelangelo, Sistine Chapel
To make the most of this book As you will have noticed by now, this book has a different layout than most other books. This has been done by design to aid the ‘SeeingUnseeing’ process as described in the back cover. To get the most out of this book, as we would like you to first get acquainted with the method of reading this book. Opening the book: The right-hand flap of the book has a series of random questions, questions that have occurred to all people at some point in time. You will realise that you yourself have asked some of these questions before. These questions will give you a feel of what the book is trying to engage in and set the tone for the journey of ‘reading’ this book. This book doesn’t claim to answer these questions. The book will only hold your hand and guide you along the path to the place that holds all these answers- a place that you will be given a glimpse of in this book. You will also realise as you go along the importance of a ‘journey’. It is possible that you may come up with more questions along the way. You can write them down in the blank space provided at the end, or doodle them as this is pre-dominantly a illustrated book. This is pre-dominantly a work of graphic design. The illustrations are the core of the book. As the saying goes ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’, we encourage you to spend some time reflecting on the illustrations and interpreting them. As you employ all the faculties of your mind and summon all your life experiences up until now to interpret the illustration, you’ll be surprised by your own ability to deduce and derive meaning which is unique to yourself. Once you feel you have spent sufficient time with the illustration, it’ll understandably throw up some more ideas and questions. You may then open the flap. Each illustration is accompanied by a brief text to guide you along the journey and lend clarity to your introspection. Go back and forth between the text and the graphic for a better understanding. As you move forward you will develop newer insights on the preceding concepts. Feel free to go with your gut and move forth and back between the illustrations to facilitate better understanding of the concepts for your sake. The end of the text is accompanied by questions that come up during its reflection and lead to the next illustration. The text is merely an accompaniment to the illustration. For best clarity of concepts and enrichment of experience, it is imperative that you don’t rely entirely on the text. This is a lesson in the art of ‘Seeing’, a lesson that will also teach other important lessons- like the need of slowing down. This book is best engaged with with a slow, patient approach rather than the fast-food approach to life that has become the norm. We hope that you derive the deeply satisfying pleasure of finding the answers for yourself, rather than passively being handed the wisdom on a platter.
Seeing/ UnSeeing Our Rational Mind - Perceptions of Reality - Mist of Singularity - Differentiation causes duality
An aspiring Soul - A Self - A journey to where?
Towards Self - Freeing ourselves from ourselves - Love makes the world go round - The need for a path
Not just the Mystics - Mindfulness - Simply Listen - The Experience
Our Rational
Mind
We have all been bitten by the curiosity bug at some point, egging us on to question the existence of the Universe and OUR significance in the existing scheme of things. This tendency has been heavily romanticised in cinema with the hero and/or heroine gaping in awe at the vast expanse of the night sky, usually culminating into a life-changing epiphany. To a lot of people this is more reality than
“Yeah, spirituality is cool, God on the other hand, not so much.” cinema.
We have been conditioned to place our faith in an absurd imagery of God since childhood. God sits above the clouds, manufactures and pushes things into or takes away from our universe and we are expected to accept it without a question, without a doubt. Isn’t this imagery reminiscent of that of a puppeteer pulling the strings in a puppet show?
Instead of rejecting a case for the existence of such a sadistic God, let’s look at a more convincing argument in support of it, a perspective by Albert Einstein. He argues that the Universe could have been chaotic, random and ugly—and yet we have this gorgeous synthesis at the origin of the Universe itself, giving birth to the galaxies, the planets, DNA, life. He insists that the harmony we see could not have been an accident. We’re not necessarily talking about the design of humans; we’re not talking about an intervention that gave us eyes, noses and ears, but where laws of physics came from.
So what is the real nature of God? A thousand
people would have a thousand different perspectives of ‘The Entity’ according to their conditioning and experiences. Somebody’s God is a semi- human, someone else’s a benevolent bearded man and yet another’s an unjust, egoistic power-consumed
tyrant. Each of these ‘Gods’ and countless other personal perspectives are limited by human attributes and span of experience. We utterly fail at being able to think
Thus all the images we hold of ‘G-o-d’ are really self-images.
beyond ourselves.
The drive to explain and represent ‘G-o-d’ gave rise to terms such as Supreme Reality/ The Force/ The Positive Energy and metaphors in idols of worship, mythological stories, rituals etc.
The problem is when we started taking these metaphors as the ‘Real Cause’ or ’God’. It is because of this that the rational mind refuses to believe in other peoples perception.
If not initiated into the philosophy of religion, our quest usually begins with these questions: Who am I? Where am I from? Who created me? What am I really made of? What is God’s true nature? Am I greater than this existence on Earth?
Perceptions of
Reality
The waves, the foam, the bubbles are all effects of the interaction of the ocean and the moon. The pots, the plates, the saucers are all effects of the interaction of clay, water and the skilled hands of a potter. There are plural expressions of any cause. Try removing the cause, the effects stands nullified and we are left with nothing. If we take out the clay; the pots, plates and saucers won’t exist; at least not in their fully functional form. If there was no seed, there would be no plants, flowers or fruits. Many of us believe that we are more than just humans, that we are the Universe/ Energy/ Nature/ made of Ultimate Units/ an Ultimate Force which started it
Aren’t we all, by aforementioned logic, multiple expressions of the same Cause? All all- ‘The Cause’.
humans, plants, nature, water, earth, galaxies, energies, forces are nothing but reflections or manifestations of the same cause. It has been repeated by many mystics that this undefinable entity expresses itself in its creation.
If everything is an expression of the same cause, am I made of what universe is made of? If one is to believe America’s most loved astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, the answer would be in the affirmative. Tyson makes a scientific case for his stand - “The atoms of our bodies are traceable to stars that manufactured them in their cores and exploded these enriched ingredients across our galaxy, billions of years ago. For this reason, we are biologically connected to every other living thing in the world.
We are chemically connected to all molecules on Earth. And we are atomically connected to all atoms in the universe. We are not figuratively, but literally stardust.” If I am made of what everything else is why can’t I feel myself in everything else around me, and vice versa? Why can’t I see the....entity in everything and everyone?
Mist of
Singularity
We seek ‘The Entity’ using our intellect and we see him as our intellect facilitates our understanding of it. For example we try to look for It everywhere with all our 5 senses? We pray to something which we can touch, see, hear, talk, and smell- something which we feel is ‘real’.
‘greater than’, different and separate from the rest. This differentiation creates duality. This duality hinders our understanding of ’The Entity’ which is just one and all permeating.
of sorts. The moment we
I think I understand this somewhat, but I still am not consumed by the feeling of connectedness that i feel when I am say, singing a patriotic song in a choir alongside my classmates.
Why isn’t the search stopping? Haven’t we already tried and associated the entity in almost everything around us? In prehistoric times we looked for It in elements of the earth and celestial bodies and now in this postmodern era of scientific awareness, we try to find It in a sub-atomic particle. “I have always wondered, when a sculptor chisels down a stone into a beautiful goddess, what makes it an idol of worship? What makes thousands of people bow down before it?” It is our belief, our faith. We infuse divinity in stone, creating a prejudice
worship something- a book, an image, an idol- we create a sense of differentiation, that this object is something
Hence, refraining from designating divinity to only certain objects is the first step in removing the cloak of duality and experiencing the sense of unity with everything. Leo Buscaglia’s words deserve some reflection, “I honor the place in you where the entire universe resides. I honor the place in you, where lies your love, your light, your truth and your beauty. I honor the place in you, where...if you are in that place in you ... and I am in that place in me...then there is only one of us”
What is this ‘place’ in me and where in me does it reside?
Differentiation causes
Duality
An aspiring
Soul
Ms. X is 21 years old. According to a theory, 300 million cells die in our body every minute. Every single cell regenerates over a certain period of time and by every seven years, we develop a new body. With this calculation, Ms. X is living in her 3rd body at the age of 21. “Hmm.. Despite our bodies not being constant, we do seem to base a whole lot of our understanding of our ‘selves’ on them. So this constant ‘I’ or ‘Self’ is not our body. If we aren’t the body, who are we? Ms. X, a 2nd year B. Com student was a shy, lazy girl and who in a span of few years became
a C.A working in an M.N.C, a proactive, inspiring woman; so our personality keeps changing too. What has remained constant in us all these years which we refer to ‘I’
or ‘me’ my ‘self’? That ‘I’ is our
true Self, an unchanging Entity, which is in each one of us. The True Self is beyond this material existence.
I never thought of myself this way before. If the ‘True Self’ or ‘Entity’ is already in me, how will trying to reach it benefit me?
The Self
Most of us pursue spirituality to get a better sense of life, be at peace with ourselves or to get over our fears, or just to put to rest that sneaking curiosity. The end result of them all is supposed to be happiness. We seek happiness in people (relationships), material satisfaction, stability, conformity, socially constructed notions of beauty and success, prestige and respect. “Such elaborate chase and yet happiness remains elusive!”
So where are we going wrong? If we observe our objects of chase, we’ll realise that they all are external and temporary. They are short-lived and can be snatched away from us in a fleeting moment. So does it then make sense to invest our emotions and energies in something so fleeting? Shouldn’t we instead look for something that’ll provide us the assurance of permanence, of infinity- an all-encompassing pool of elixir which we can dip into as and when we want? Where does spirituality stand in this mad chase of happiness? From the preceding discussions, we can infer that happiness, in fact is intimately connected to pursuing spirituality and the notion of ‘Self’. Like there is a
saying, “There is a part of
you that is perfect and pure. It is untouched by the less-than-perfect characteristics you have acquired by living in a less than perfect world. This part of you is a still and eternal star. Make time to reach it and this
will bring you untold benefit.” The spiritual journey
is to explore,understand/feel/ experience and express ourselves in terms of the highest values/ attitudes in our daily lives in a natural and balanced way. When we say, Spirituality is a journey within, what we mean to say is ‘Spirituality is the journey of coming closer to the actual, pure, unchanging, true ‘Self’. Like Rumi says “Don’t go off sightseeing, The real journey is right here.”
How do I start pursuing this ‘Self’ ? How do I overcome myself and reach my higher potential? What makes me truly happy? So do I have to be ‘good’? to reach this pure and untouched ‘True Self?’
A journey
to where?
Towards
Self
Great saints have always emphasized that unless we make efforts towards our character formation which is developed on the foundation of love, spiritual progress is not possible. Spirituality and character formation go hand-in-hand. Both are in fact codependent. “You become what you think.” Rings a bell? As it is rightly said, “The process of going within, disconnecting from harmful habits of thought, feeling and reaction, connecting to your innate spiritual resources, and reconnecting with your external life, is personally empowering in a lasting way.” How many times do we hear statements like “I am so shy!” “I am so fat!”? “I am so lazy!” Don’t we always question our potential? And of course at the opposite end of the spectrum is thinking too highly of ourselves. ‘Jaanta hai mera baap kaun hai?’ (Do you know who my father is?), “Oh my god! look at what she’s wearing I wouldn’t be caught dead in it!” Our own stubborn tendencies like being shy or angry exist to act as stepping stones for us to climb over , overcome and finally evolve into a better person. By doing
so we are not trying to be perfect, we are just trying to be our natural ‘Self’. One does not have to be
Ms. Goody-two-shoes to indulge in spirituality. The practice of spirituality can turn us into better human beings. Ms. goody-
two-shoes then is not the starting point, but the end point! We have all heard of IQ and EQ but what about SQ- our spiritual quotient? Unless we increase
our spiritual quotient, all the personality development classes, degrees and high paying jobs are nothing, all worthless. Just think about the scams and controversies famous and successful people routinely get into.
By knowing and trying to become our ‘Self’ more do we eventually come to balance our lives? Know how to live our lives? So do we pursue spirituality to know how to live our life and conduct ourselves every day? I understand that my spiritual practice-cum-character building are connected to the quality of my life, but it is easier said than done. I am very impulsive and it has unknowingly affected me and people around me negatively. How do I be fine with someone I don’t get along with? Can broken relations be mended? If someone does a lot of social service, is he/she really a genuine person?
Freeing ourselves
From Ourselves
We tend to perceive divine love within the framework of human love. For example, the ultimate
form of unconditional love that we have been exposed to is by our parents. We know that our parents love us, but we also understand that if we do something wrong they will punish us. Therefore, our understanding of divine love is peppered by attributes of parental love, i.e. being punitive, judgemental, angry. “Logically speaking, if God had to punish us for us doing something wrong, He wouldn’t have given us free will.
We interact with so many people everyday however we are mostly unconscious of the influence our mere thoughts, words and actions have in theirs and our life. The personal relationships we have, we could say are karmic relationships. Mystics say, our souls have chosen each other in order to create an atmosphere for us to experience something. “Are you saying I chose my enemies and what they’ll do to me!?” For relationships
it is their nature to be challenging, they are there for a purpose that requires us to have an experience thus creating a challenge. It is up to us to either be a ‘result’ of what happened or choose to ‘be and do’ of what happened thus taking us closer to realizing our ‘Self’.
When our behavior socially reflects that we are connected to our soul, we listen to our heart, we become more giving than taking,
more loving than fearful. As the great mystic says ‘God does
not love, He is love’. Just
a small ‘Hello!’ with a genuine heartfelt ‘smile’, saving someone from a coffee spill over, providing a helping hand to someone struggling creates a chain reaction of spreading cheerfulness and love. Love is indeed what makes the world go round. What a heart-warming thought. I am now getting more and more convinced about the merits of spiritual practice. But I am still doubt-ridden. How will I know what to do and what not to do? Firstly, where do I start? How do I navigate myself through dilemmas?
Love
makes the world go round
We all take an education. We don’t seek that in our spare time or after we grow old and retire. Instead, education is a foundation laid on which we spend the rest of our lives. Spirituality is an ongoing process, a way of life; so that we evolve every moment we live.
You can begin your spiritual journey right now. The very fact that you are reading this means that you want to embark on the journey, that you have embarked on the journey. Like all
good things in the world, it’s never too late to actively engage in spirituality. You could start by reading the Speaking Tree, or exploring Einstein’s musings on God, or even reading religious texts of all religions. It’s okay to be a sceptic. The number of scientific proofs for essentially spiritual concepts is shocking. Question and form links between all that makes sense to you; from divine ratio being the secret design that is manifest in the world around us, to black holes where even Einstein’s theories fall apart. Seek inspiration from real life. Just look into the eyes of a toddler or give into the occasional urge to hum a tune or do a jig. Spiritual quest is not necessarily retiring from active life and taking sanyaas
in the mountains. It’s those small decisions we make daily, those small attempts to be more conscious and mindful of every passing moment of our lives, trying to listen to our inner, actual Selves.
Sri Chinmoy had said, “When you follow a spiritual path, your conscience will tell you what to do and what not to do.. .remain calm and quiet; otherwise, your vital being will imitate the voice of your conscience and confuse you.” There will of course be dilemmas and conflicts and even more questions.
As you go along, seek guidance from those who seem a little further along the same path, seek
a guru who will be able to provide you support and wisdom where needed and gently egg you forward. All this sounds somewhat demanding, can pursuing spirituality be simple?
On a separate note, I feel science too can lead to spirituality.
A Path
Not just the
Mystics
A home maker says doing her daily duties on time and taking care of her family is spirituality to her. For a teacher it is that moment when a challenging student grasps the concept and performs beyond expectation. It is important to
experience spirituality in our everyday life, to find a ‘divinity’ in everything we do, listen or read to make us
more sensitive. For that we need to be conscious of our thoughts, words and actions which we can only achieve by living in the present. In the words of Andi Puddicombe, mindfulness is “Not being lost in thought, not being distracted, not being overwhelmed by difficult emotions, but instead learning to be in, here and now. How to be mindful, how to be present.” As defined by dictionary, mediation means- ‘Continuous and profound contemplation or musing on a subject or series of subjects.’ In other terms it could also be said as be-ing
what you are do-ing.
How do I constantly remember my true ‘Self’ even while even working? How do I detect a spiritual experience when it happens to me?
Mindfulness
Popular perceptions of the spiritual experience range from that of a sadhu with matted hair walking in a state of trance uttering incorrigible words, to a bunch of sufi musicians swaying rhythmically to their music, to the Buddha meditating with eyes closed and a halo glowing around his head. The
spiritual experience is not a monopoly of the mystics. Our lives are peppered with instances of spiritual connections.
It could be a random line in a book that we are reading or just a song that we hear when travelling which reflects our current state of mind and answers our questions. There is a small voice in us that keeps guiding from within especially when we are about to do something wrong. Being aware of that voice is a divine experience in itself!‘The Entity’ which
manifests itself in its creation The Nature/ Universe, is talking to us every day, every minute, every second, but are we listening? A spiritual experience doesn’t have to be ‘magical’. We have all had a spiritual experience in
some degree. The are moments when we are so engrossed in an activity like say writing, that the words just seem to flow out from nowhere. After a while as you read it, you ask, is this me who wrote it? Like dancing or singing when time seems to stop ticking and the world seems to stop revolving, that everything else is irrelevant except for the act itself. When you look up at the night sky and feel dwarfed by the massiveness of the universe yet strangely feel like an integral part of it at the same time, that right there is a spiritual experience happening to you.
The spiritual experience is an intensely personal one, only you could feel it, understand it for yourself. For descriptions sake, one can say it’s that moment of ‘unity’- with oneself, with others, with nature, with the world, with the universe, with a more powerful entity. Spirituality doesn’t seem all that mystical anymore. I realise now that I have had several such spiritual experiences in my life. I am now curious to know, why are we born as humans?
Simply
Listen
We could have been an eagle, a squirrel, an ant, anything, but our soul chose to be human.
Our soul takes birth in this physical form, in our body, not to learn something new but rather just to remember what we already know.
For the best of us is within us already; our Self. The purpose of life is to realise this Reality in a process of gradual evolution. When this realisation gets established as our natural state of being, it leads to a state of balanced and integrated life, wherein there will always be a condition of deep inner peace and Self-contentment in the midst of all the chaos and strife of life’s activities. It gives my a life a sense of meaning, our existence is not as random as we think. As very rightly quoted by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.
“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.”
The
Experience
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