Ego is our identification with
the body and not the soul. It is forgetting our real identity – that we are
divine beings here on a temporary stay. Our permanent home is being one with
the Eternal Bliss. Ego is strong in most of us. It comes from nurturing a
separate identity from a very young age.
Our identification with the body and the feeling that we are special and
separate from all others comes from clinging to our peculiar thoughts, faiths
and beliefs. We consider what we believe
and think to be the only view of world
and life that is correct, while all other views as wrong. By doing so, we move miles away from
right perception and seeing the truth of life.
The soul is the light that shines
within us. This light is usually not seen as it is clouded by our karma,
thoughts and beliefs. We have layers and layers of set thinking, habits and
actions which act like concrete walls and prevent the light of soul from
shining through our presence and existence. There are certain teachings which
are essential to peaceful life and coexistence and nurture and help to blossom
the divinity within us. Teachings which stress on essentials like truth,
patience, compassion, morality, wisdom guide us and help us live to a
successful material life and receive grace to realise the inner truth.
Certain other beliefs like money is most important factor in life, man’s
worth is measured by the level of success he achieves in accumulation of
property, people and power in his life cloud the inner reality and take us
far away from the truth. Such beliefs strengthen the ego and distance us from
God. These truths are well illustrated in the story given below:
Two friends – Upatissa and
Kolita lived in a small village. Once there was a religious show in the village
and while watching it both realised that this world and life were not real. They developed an intense desire to search for
the path to liberation. A wandering ascetic came to their village. They
approached him to learn the truth. But there were not satisfied with his
teachings. They decided to go in different directions in search of a teacher
who could show them the way to truth. They decided that the first one who found
the Inner truth should inform the other friend. They wandering around searching
for a very long time but did not find the right teacher nor the truth. So they
returned back to their village.
One day, Upatissa came across
a venerable teacher and heard from him the gist of Dharma. When the teacher
uttered a particular verse, Upatissa was
freed of the fetters of the mind and entered into the flow leading to
enlightenment i.e. he became Sotapanna. As per their previous agreement, he
went to his friend Kolita and explained his meeting with the new teacher and
the verse through which he became Sotapanna. When he repeated the verse, his
friend also became Sotapanna. They remembered their former teacher and went to
him and said: We have found the path and the way, the verse by which we
overcame the fetters of the mind. Buddha has come and he has formed the Sangha
and has shown all mankind the path to
deathlessness. Let us go to him.
The teacher refused to go. He
said that he had been a teacher to so many pupils and it was not possible for
him to become a pupil now and become disciple of Buddha. It would be like
turning a jar into a drinking cup. The majority of the people were ignorant and
needed teachers like him. The few wise could go to Buddha.
So both the friends and many
of their followers went to Buddha. They were admitted as monks. Within a
fortnight both of them achieved enlightenment. They became the chief disciples
of Buddha. Once day they met Buddha and told him about their former teacher.
Buddha said that the teacher’s false pride had prevented him from seeing the truth
as truth. He was mistaking that which is not truth as truth and he would never realise the truth.
The essence of Divinity cannot be achieved by clinging to false beliefs. Let us
do SitaRam mantra japa, mediate and go within ourselves to see the real from that
which is not real and achieve the Light.
