We have given a name to everything – people, objects, sensations, feelings, phenomena. As soon as we know the name of something, our experience of that thing is mediated through that name and all the accumulated information held therein.
When I see something, the initial nanosecond of just seeing it is instantly overridden by the thought/label, ‘kumquat’, or ‘plant’, to use an example. Or when I see a plant I haven’t seen before, I am eager to know its name even before I observe it fully and really ‘get to know it’.
A name cannot help me ‘know’ the plant in a direct and unmediated way.although it might tell me things ‘about’ the plant – it’s genus, species, family, characteristics etc. But you have to see that this is information ABOUT the plant, information that has been selectively gathered and organized through an agreed system of classification and nomenclature.
But there is an unbridgeable distance between knowing about something and knowing something, not unlike the distance between the finger pointing at the moon and the moon itself and not unlike knowing about pain and knowing pain itself.
The names and naming of things have become so embedded in our perceptual processing and meaning making that we flounder, cognitively and emotionally, when we don’t have a name for something. It is as if, without the name, we cannot possible ‘know’ or ‘see’ the object. It is as if the object is bizarre, unreal and inconceivable or unknowable to us without a name.
(Note, this is the reason why, when we experience certain symptoms, we are so anxious to find a collective name for them i.e. a diagnosis. Somehow, the name gives us a sense of relief and assurance, ‘Ah, now at least I know what it is, I can deal with it’.
The tragedy is that the name prescribes our condition as much as it describes it. In other words, it is just as likely to cause new symptoms as it is to describe existing ones.
Besides, knowing a name or some descriptions of something is not the same as knowing the thing itself. I might know the name ‘meditation’ and I may have lots of information about it but do I actually ‘know’ it?
If we get this,, we will see that much of what we claim to ‘know’ is nothing more than a bunch of information about something which we have not had direct experience of.
But more important than that, what is more beneficial – description or observation? Would we benefit and help ourselves much more if we took the time to observe our symptoms and allow our innate wisdom to guide us the way it does in all other creatures?
My personal experience is that we have an extremely efficient and elegant internal guidance system/intuition that can direct us far more effectively and accurately than any other external naming and organizing system. This does not mean that the external systems are useless but that they are best used as a secondary support system if and when necessary. Meanwhile, since most of us have lost touch with our internal guidance system, it would be marvellous if we learned to reconnect with it).
Have you wondered if a tree ‘sees’ us? Does it look at us and think, ‘human’? Perhaps not. But it seems likely that it ‘senses’ us. It seems to me that it does have some sense of our presence though I have no idea what the mechanism of such sensing is like nor can I say for certain if any of this is true. It just seems to me likely that just as I am able to sense the object or phenomenon that I’ve labelled ‘tree’, so is it likely to sense me. But how or in what form, I couldn’t tell you.
The point of all this is to say that we have the capacity to sense, to know, outside of the confines of our language and thought. It is this direct perception or direct experience that gives us an insight into reality as it exists before and beyond and outside of human thought. It is therefore possible to sense, to know directly who or what ‘I’ am, outside my name, my history, my biology and all other descriptions imposed on me.
Why is this important? Is it useful? I think it is essential because unless I know myself beyond the general attributes and descriptions around me, I will continue to live as a function and a product of those LEARNED and ACQUIRED attributes and descriptions rather than what is NATURALLY and INHERENTLY present.
Also ANY attribute or description is fundamentally limited and limiting. So, if I am to perceive, to know, without any doubt, the totality of me, then I have to see past all attributes and descriptions that I have acquired about me.
But once I know myself beyond all the attributes and descriptions of myself, in other words, once I know myself as I truly, originally and eternally am, than I know REALITY and I can live my life increasingly on the basis of this ultimate, unconditioned and unconditional reality and less on the basis of a capricious, conditioned and conditional reality.
What practical difference would this make to my life?
Well, for one thing, because I now KNOW that
• I am NOT what I do, become or acquire
• Everything that exists is already within me, or rather, is what I am including peace, joy, love, freedom and endless possibility
• The fullness of life – the kingdom of god – is within me and the more I experience this within me, the more I shall express it externally
I can now STOP
• Demanding that something or someone external to me is the cause of my happiness, my health and wellbeing or my wealth and abundance or the lack of it
• Desperately seeking to be MORE because I feel inadequate or unworthy or insignificant
• Waiting for the kingdom of god to be manifested by some supreme being or authority and instead start expressing the kingdom of god as the supreme being and authority that I AM
All this means that you live less fearlessly, more confidently, more assured of who you are and how you create your reality.
You realize that YOU are the PURPOSE of Life and that you can stop looking for ‘your life purpose’ and start LIVING the purpose that you are.
Living the purpose that you are means living the JOY, the PEACE, the POSSIBILITY, the FREEDOM that you ALREADY ARE. In simple words, it means LIVING YOU.
Now, you may be wondering: If everyone’s purpose is to express the joy, peace, possibility and freedom that they are, how would we distinguish ourselves from each other? Would this result in a colossal redundancy of life?
Not at all. You see, ‘uniqueness’ is a built-in, inherent quality of each and every expression of life, of the Divine, of Infinite Intelligence, of which you are one. As I’ve said in other posts including this, you are naturally and inherently unique. Your uniqueness is NOT derived by anything you do, become or acquire.
So, how do you ‘live you’?
By living consciously, living in awareness of the perfection, the possibility, the joy, the peace, the freedom, the limitlessness that you are.
And how do you live consciously? In awareness?
Well, by first getting in touch with the truth, the reality of who you are, which is the practice of meditation. When you do, and the more you do, the more it spontaneously expresses itself AS YOU. It really is as simple as this although we are conditioned by a world that worships complication using it to limit access, to exclude most and to profit some.
No, things are essentially very simple and in that simplicity is an unequalled elegance. It is indeed the ‘kingdom of god’ within you and within me.
So, let’s get real. Let’s get serious about being happy and peaceful and we all want that. Let’s stop insisting that we’ll find the answers outside ourselves and through complicated systems of naming and thinking.
Let’s go within and sit in the ease and startling freedom of direct experience. Then, carry that presence with you in everything you do, wherever you are. Stay in awareness and be amazed at how much more alive you will feel and how much more insightful you will be!MENTORING
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