Wednesday, October 26, 2011

A Lecture about the Importance of Intuition and Feelings

Please click on the link below to get to know about the importance of intuition: about how Humans must allocate greater importance to feelings and intuition in our present context where, since about the 15th and 16th Centuries Humans have given overwhelming importance to reason at the cost of their intuitive abilities.


http://www.ted.com/talks/iain_mcgilchrist_the_divided_brain.html


allow a minute for the program to load and expand to full screen using the appropriate 4 arrows icon.

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Is a Little Irreverence Permitted?

 A day or two ago I had sent a query to Sri M (author of ‘Apprenticed to a Himalayan Master’) about Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. It essentially was about my reading of a particular aspect of Sri Ramakrishna – that even he was being proper, and in being proper he was not true to himself. I saw this as an attempt by him to project his character and which most humans are guilty of, and I found it surprising that even Sri Ramakrishna was a victim of this weakness.  I particularly refer to what has been given in the Chapter ‘Introduction’ of The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna Vol. 1, p.69 a particular interaction between Sri Ramakrishna and his disciples has been given as underneath.

Sri Ramakrishna: “Do you think I enjoy this suffering? I wish to recover, but that depends on the Mother.”
Narendra: “Then please pray to Her. She must listen to you.”
Master: “But I cannot pray for my body.”

My remark :  (He is trying to be proper than trying to be honest because he clearly does not enjoy suffering as he has himself stated above)

Narendra: “You must do it, for our sake at least.”
Master: “Very well, I shall try.”

A few hours later the Master said to Narendra: “I said to Her:‘Mother, I cannot swallow food because of my pain. Make it possible to eat a little.’ She pointed you all out to me and said: ‘What? You are eating enough through all these mouths. Isn’t that so?’ I was ashamed and could not utter another word.”

I feel Sri Ramakrishna was being correct and proper but not honest to his innermost heart. In his heart of hearts he desired to eat food. He strongly felt the urge to be able to eat. Instead of being correct and proper had he been honest to his innermost true self, he could have frankly told Mother “ But I am not getting the satisfaction of having eaten when all of them are eating with their own mouths. Please bless me with that ability and I shall be more than satisfied!”

Sri M replied that he had a great regard for Sri Ramakrishna as one of the great Saints of India and as such he would not be able to answer the question.

In this interaction with Sri M and my subsequent ruminations about it, I realised how in the past I have drawn conclusions about various people and how such conclusions have coloured all subsequent judgments about that person.  Based on a fragment of a person’s pronouncements I have drawn permanent conclusions about the entire person. To cite an instance, I once had read an interview of Sri Satya Sai Baba. In the interview the questioner had asked if he had ‘seen Shirdi Sai Baba’.  “This body has not seen him”, Sri Satya Sai Baba had replied.

To me the way the words were chosen and the way the sentence was formed implied an underlying meaning of the impermanence of the body and a lasting soul; the undervaluation of the importance of the body and so on. At a later stage in the interview Sri Satya Sai Baba had proudly claimed that in all the years his body weight had never exceeded 110 kg. To me this struck me as a contradictory claim to the insignificance of the body. I had even remarked cynically to my friend Raghavendra about it. One such fragment of evidence would colour my total perception of a person and would make me undervalue all his pronouncements and wisdom. It could even be true that some of his other understanding may actually be profound, but the assessment that I would draw from my understanding of the interview would hamstring Sri  Satya Sai Baba in my estimation of him. Such an attitude would prevent me from absorbing his wisdom if he was indeed wise.

Similarly, a total assessment of Sri Ramakrishna based on a fragment of his conversation can hamstring the possibilities of my drawing valuable lessons from his books. In the past I have also been guilty of laughing at people for their peccadillos and I now see a need to apply some restraint in making fun of people.

But what the hell! Maybe the world needs this banter and being too sombre and tight without having some fun at the expense of others even though it may be undesirable would make this world too aseptic for comfort. A little bit of irreverence, even at the risk of inviting the wrath of the Universe may be preferable to an ultra-clean universe, without banter, fun and humour.


xxx