Practical spirituality

“A man was struck with an arrow. At once he was lamenting to take that arrow out of his body. He did not inquire where from that arrow came, whether it was steel or bamboo, who had shot it, from what distance, and where might the shooter be now. His sole intention was to take it out and relieve his pain. When that was over he examined the arrow. Then he inquired about the shooter. Now from this what we know is that the immediate thing is to release oneself from trouble and then to inquire. First if you inquire, the pain will be continuing and this is sheer foolishness.”

Man’s thinking process and inquiry into the infinity of the universe is like the man hit with an arrow speculating as to why it was shot, who shot it, where the shooter came from, what his motives were, how he was dressed, who had made the arrow, and a string other questions irrelevant to his condition of having been shot, being in pain and losing blood. He will eventually die speculating about all this. See the commentary on Wikipedia if you want. 

This is what our “normal thinking mind” does. Today, more than ever, we can see the immensity of data at our disposal, the sheer amount of information and interconnectivity, and yet who lives a happier life because of all this? The super-interconnected social networker addicted to one-liners and cool pictures on Facebook, or the recluse shut in a cave looking at the shadows on the wall, as in Plato’s Cave Simile? It must be somewhere in between.

This parable was reported by Shivapuri Baba when he was asked about things we cannot yet know in our present condition. It is all speculation, which is to be avoided if you have a fixed plan to adhere to. As in the Buddha’s injunction:

Once, when the Buddha visited a village, the inhabitants (the Kalamas) told Him, "There are teachers who visit our village, who explain their own teachings and condemn the teachings of others. Then others come and they too explain their own teachings and condemn the teachings of others. So we are always troubled as we are not certain which of these teachers has spoken the truth and which has spoken falsely."

The Buddha replied that it was natural that they should have doubts regarding matters which were open to dispute. Then he told them, "Do not be led by rumour, or tradition, or by the authority of religious texts, nor by false arguments, nor by appearances, nor by theories, nor even by reverence. But rather when you know through your own experience that certain things are wrong and unwholesome, do not lead to calm and happiness and are not beneficial, then give them up. When you know for yourselves that certain things are right and wholesome, lead to calm and happiness and are beneficial, then follow them."

So the immediate thing is to fix your Life Plan and live accordingly. It can be anything you want, but it does need to include a good mix. There has to be a way to care for the needs of the physical body without allowing needs and desires to get out of hand because desires and passions are infinite. There must be a way to correct or develop an appropriate moral structure, as we have been infected since birth by negative conditioning, accepting all kinds of useless and harmful emotions, actions and thinking processes. There must be a way to calm and tranquilise the thinking mind to allow for the enfolding of the deeper layers of being. With constant head chatter and immediately ingrained reactions to everyday happenings, you remain stuck in the smaller, more constricted areas of your headbrain and you are simply “human, all too human!”

You have to organise your time in today’s modern world to account for all necessities and simplify them as much as possible, as they tend to be too invasive and leave no time for inner quiet and silence. We cannot only try to be “happy” and avoid pain, because that is not the way the world is. The world gives us both pain and pleasure, the two ends of every stick, and we cannot exclude one and only pursue the other. It is really an appropriate mental attitude that can successfully deal with both pain and pleasure, a specific temperament that can be cultivated by right thinking. Review all the modern works by psychologists and psychiatrists and self-help authors like Dr. Wayne Dyer, M. Scott Peck, Gray, Peale – with care (see list – if you need some starters). The basic thing to do is not to remain at all times in your thinking brain. You can be freer if you have the Self-Awareness to watch what you’re thinking and who you think you are. First, there comes a sense of non-identification and greater objectivity, then the discoveries start coming, and when you see them, you affect your superficial mind and stop it from always having power over YOU. You start empowering yourself – your whole self. When you’re ready to look inwards, you’ll find that it’s all there, and you don’t need books any more, much to the chagrin of the self-help booksellers! There is nothing new under the Sun, it’s all variations on a succession of different themes. What’s the use of saying ”Be happy!”. First you have to be aware, then, whatever happens to you, you can find happiness in the smallest of things. The arrow we have to extract is our ignorance of our true condition as human beings, and our need to be.