Memory of the Whole.

QUESTION:

If we are from this whole and part of a whole, why do we feel so separated from this most of the time ? Only when it rains and we are silent enough to stop and listen do we connect. The rest of the time we forget who or what we are. Why is the memory so easily erased if this is our natural state to be?
(posted by Emma Devi, 'On the Verandah', 23 February)

REPLY:

To answer these questions in a way would only reinforce the enigma. The obviousness of a predicament is in the paradoxical nature of consciousness. Let us try to see it from two diametrically opposing perspectives.

First and foremost, there is no separation on any levels what so ever! This sense of separateness is illusory, in reality it does not exist. Separateness is being perceived at a local level only, yet the nature of consciousness is essentially non-local. The subject (observer) and the object (observed) are forever united in oneness of the experience where the subjectivity is actualized by the process (of observing) itself. The perceiver and the (manifested world) perceived cannot be separated for an instant and are in fact an integral part of universal continuum.

If it were not so there would be no possibility for any experience at all. Just like when there is no connection to the ethernet there is no reception, no signal, nothing. The five senses provide the mind with information which allows for the experience of the physical world to be perceived as real. Coalesced with impressions left by countless previous experiences and stored deep in the recesses of the mind they provide fertile ground for sprouting of all sorts of desires, thoughts and ideation. The process is powered by the complex network of subtle charges which are electrical in nature and needs the source at all times for its function.

When the senses shut down (during the dreaming state) the mind is left to itself to wonder for there is no shortage of impressions (as mentioned earlier), and the vividness experienced in dreams is the proof of an autonomy of mind from the senses. When in turn the mind shuts down (during the deep-sleep) the experience of 'nothingness' (on waking up from that state) betrays the fact that there was a witness to the process. Who is witnessing the 'nothingness' of the deep-sleep state, when the mind is switched off ? These gives us an insight that there is a witness beyond the spheres of the mind. For the faculty of mind is just an instrumentality, which has no authority of its own.

If I am not the senses. Not the mind. Than who am I? Who is experiencing all this and moreover, who is making it felt as if the experience belongs to ''me''? That line of questioning is inevitable if we to understand the whole business of separation properly. Some identify the sense of ego as the source behind separation. The sense of ''I'' is what holding an incarnated soul together as a unit, from the uniqueness of its DNA vibrations to the interactive patterns of individual behavior. Egocentricity is certainly a major hindrance for harmonious co-existence, but can we blame the I-sense for the identification with the experience which is the real cause of misery? After all ego has no existence of its own and its function is what gives variety to an act were individuality is a mirrored infinity in its dynamic dimension. Moreover, the complete distraction of an ego is detrimental to the embodied being in as much as there is still a need for normal functioning of all bodily systems and the immune one in particular.

Is it at all possible to be connected while still being subjected to the limitations born of human condition? What is than stands on the way if there is continuity of energy throughout all the states of consciousness, why do we feel separated from the source? After all the source, the energy and the matter are one if the understanding of the modern physics to go by. Where does the separation comes into?

The separation is all in the head. It is in the dual nature of the mind. Mind is an instrumentality of consciousness very much like a lens, it serves as a channel to actualize the experience by narrowing it down to the individual level. It's as if Consciousness limits itself in order to enjoy particularity of any given experience. This trick is possible because of the dichotomized nature of thought. Thought in its essence is a fluctuation (a wave, a ripple) on the surface of the mind. As long as there is a thought process there is a sense of separation, because the surface of the mind is disturbed and cannot reflect Consciousness fully. Soon as the fluctuations subside the mind becomes still and reflects nothing but Consciousness. That is because the mind in its state of quiescence is Consciousness.

When mind is drawn outward by the incessant activity of the senses, it gives rise to the world of phenomenal experiences (of the physical world). When the mind turned inward (like in concentration, meditation, absorption) it will gradually move in the direction of the source (of bliss). Mind fluctuates between two extreme polarities, that of Absolute Dynamism (in its outward move) and that of Absolute Silence (in its inward state). When it's enjoying the outward activity it takes on the quality of the external experiences and (as if) looses its connection to the source. Yet soon as its finds its way home to the Silent sphere it becomes that which it is and always has been.

No matter how paradoxical that sounds, the mind can experience both the dynamism and the silence simultaneously. For that the mind needs to turn within on a regular basis, so that the deep silence experienced during the periods of inward strokes will eventually spill out into and infusing with the dynamic phases of activity. When the mind is thoroughly soaked in silence it will regain the ''memory'' even when being absorbed in the activity of the senses. In truth the term memory has little to do with the actual process, for the notion of memory is only applicable to the relative spectrum of life. For when the mind is awakened to its own nature and purified from the latent tendencies it becomes transparent in the midst of any experiences, mental or physical makes no difference. The ''memory'' here is in the form of a fully integrated knowledge that Awareness is independent from all forms of activity and is the only criteria of life lived in freedom from suffering.

So the separation does not exist yet what constitutes for the feeling of being separate is the degree of awareness throughout all the spheres of human interaction from it's innermost silence to its outmost dynamics of nature.