Huge surprise!! Science is finally setting its foot on enlightenment, but the researchers might not know that they are doing it, in fact. Check this science cover story by New York Times on "
When the Mind Wanders, Happiness Also Strays" out.
In this era, science is the dominating force. Science churns out technology, explanations, knowledge which saturate our lives with logic, the need for evidence etc. This actually brings us away from enlightenment, or you would say, the few major paths you can adopt to reach enlightenment, namely Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Taoism etc. Look at the explanations of all scriptures today. They talk about 'proofs', they talk about 'evidences', they talk about 'explanation on how a Prophet is coming to this and that'. These are not what the scriptures are originally about anyway.
When science hits itself at how to become more happy, things get interesting.
"When asked to rate their feelings on a scale of 0 to 100, with 100 being “very good,” the people having sex gave an average rating of 90. That was a good 15 points higher than the next-best activity, exercising, which was followed closely by conversation, listening to music, taking a walk, eating, praying and meditating, cooking, shopping, taking care of one’s children and reading. Near the bottom of the list were personal grooming, commuting and working."
Sex is one of the cores of a lot of religion scriptures, especially those in the east. They try something really simple, how does being in the moment feels like? It feels like sex!
And in Christianity, the core concept is Love. When you are loving, when you are deeply in love, a lot of these times you transcend your mind. You go into the moments of now without judging what they are. That's why, God is love.
And look at the quote, 'eating' is so far behind on the list! That's why Buddhism and Hinduism said, 'taste every bite like it will never repeat again'. That's why Christianity wants you to pray before a meal, not to thank God, but to bring you to this moment, this moment you are eating your meal! Don't stray away, enjoy every bite as it's God's truly special gift!
And that's why religions practice fasting too. When you enjoy your first meal after such a long time without devouring anything, even a simple piece of vegetable tastes like heaven. Urm, isn't it true with all things you eat? Why you don't feel that bliss? Coz your mind takes you away!
Every religion works the same. They want you to be in this moment, to be truly happy, to end your suffering (going into nirvana? go to heaven?).
But today, when everyone talks about logic and reasons, religion starts to fail. Religious scriptures tell you to experience, not to think. In fact, the ultimate core of religion is to reduce your mind less and less, until to nothingness. Christianity and Islam have a good start on this though, to submit, to believe without a hunch. This works like a charm if you do not think, do not go and prove whether God exists. But look at the people who preach today. Do they actually know what they are doing? Do they actually know what the scriptures want them to do?
Science can be reduced to one word: philosophy. Yes, that's why there are such thing called Ph.D.
Religion is not. Religion is about totality. Totally experience it.
I would like to quote Osho. He has quite a good way of presenting this:-
"Philosophy is concerned with the mind. Your head is enough; your totality is not required. Really, any question can be tackled in two ways: philosophically or totally; intellectually or existentially. For example, if someone asks, "What is love?" you can tackle it intellectually, you can discuss, you can propose theories, you can argue for a particular hypothesis. You can create a system, a doctrine ---- and you may not have known love at all.
To create a doctrine, experience is not needed. Really, on the contrary, the less you know the better because then you can propose a system unhesitatingly. Only a blind man can easily define what light is. When you do not know, you are bold. Ignorance is always bold; knowledge hesitates. And the more you know, the more you feel that the ground underneath is dissolving. The more you know, the more you feel how ignorant you are. And those who are really wise, they become ignorant. They become as simple as children, or as simple as idiots.
The less you know, the better. To be philosophical, to be dogmatic, to be doctrinaire --- this is easy. To tackle a problem intellectually is very easy. But to tackle a problem existentially --- not just to think about it, but to live it through, to go through it, to allow yourself to be transformed through it --- is difficult. That is, to know love one will have to be in love. That is dangerous because you will not remain the same. The experience is going to change you. The moment you enter love, you enter a different person. And when you come out you will not be able to recognize your old face; it will not belong to you. A discontinuity will have happened. Now there is a gap, the old man is dead and the new man is born. That is what known as rebirth --- being twice-born."
Philosophy, or science, is neverending. How can a mind ends? When you ask questions, you have answers. You ask how those answers come, you have another set of answers. And you know it too, these answers will come over the course of time. When you are working things out using your mind but not experiencing it, you are in a loop, forever and ever. That's 輪回. You go in a cycle, and you come back. You are stagnant. You never move forward. You never grow.
In fact, check
Gurdjieff's books out. He actually combines a few east meditation techniques (Sufi's technique, or Islamic techniques) into the scriptures of Christianity, and in the course, he brought a lot of his students into enlightenment. Quote one of his students,
Ouspensky's notes when he got out from the house after 3 months of practising the technique confined in a house:-
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Then Gurdjieff said, "Come with me," They were residing in a Russian town, Tiflis. Gurdjieff called him out and they went into the street. Ouspensky writes in his diary, 'For the first time I could understand what Jesus meant when he said that man is asleep. The whole city looked to me as if it was asleep. People were moving in their sleep; shopkeepers were selling in their sleep. The whole city was asleep. I looked at Gurdjieff: only he was awake. The whole city was asleep. They were angry, they were fighting, they were loving, buying, selling, doing everything, now I could see their faces, their eyes: they were asleep. They were not there. The inner center was missing, it was not there. Ouspensky then said to Gurdjieff: "I do not want to go there any more. What has happened to the city? Everyone seems asleep, drugged."
Gurdjieff said, "Nothing has happened to the city, something has happened to you. You have been undrugged; the city is the same. It is the same place you moved around three months ago, but you couldn't see that other people are asleep because you were also asleep. Now you can see because a certain quality of awareness has come to you. You have become aware in every small measure by practising the technique. You have become aware! A part of your consciousness has gone beyond dreaming. That is why you can see that everyone is asleep, dead, moving, drugged, as if hypnotized."
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And check
Pythagoras out. You thought that he is the man of mathematics and philosophy? Actually he discovered those after he got enlightened! Interesting, no?
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It is claimed that Pythagoras went onto Egypt with a letter of introduction written by Polycrates, making the journey with some Egyptian sailors who believed that a god had taken passage on their ship. Arriving in Egypt, Pythagoras tried to gain entry into the Mystery Schools of that country. He applied again and again, but he was told that unless he goes through a particular training of fasting and breathing, he cannot be allowed to enter the school. Pythagoras is reported to have said, " I have come for knowledge, not any sort of discipline." But the school authorities said," we cannot give you knowledge unless you are different. And really, we are not interested in knowledge at all, we are interested in actual experience. No knowledge is knowledge unless it is lived and experienced. So you will have to go on a 40 day fast, continuously breathing in a certain manner, with a certain awareness on certain points." After 40 days of fasting and breathing, aware, attentive, he was allowed to enter the school at Diospolis. It is said that Pythagoras said,"You are not allowing Pythagoras in. I am a different man, I am reborn. You were right and I was wrong, because then my whole standpoint was intellectual. Through this purification, my center of being has changed. Before this training I could only understand through the intellect, through the head. Now I can feel. Now truth is not a concept to me, but a life."
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It's exciting to read in the New York Times report that:-
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“I find it kind of weird now to look down a crowded street and realize that half the people aren’t really there,” Dr. Gilbert says.
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In fact, not just half. You would say, almost all.
Maybe one day science will transcend itself into the realm of enlightenment. We do not know. But after reading that report, I can't really know, how many people actually know what they are reading? Or, are they there AT ALL when reading it? Visit "
How to Consume Contents: the other way" by me. I didn't mention the context of "being there", but in fact that's the center of the post anyway. Be there, relaxed, no mind no judgment, and you will have pleasure reading everything.
Wait, no. You will have pleasure every moment of your life.
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