The newspapers are full of horrible world events. Walking on NYC streets shows homelessness in full display and disparity of income is on full show back home in India.
Could there be a panacea to all of these very real problems?
Going deeper into spiritual teachings of Hinduism, Buddhism, Tao Te Ching, and Christianity, it seems that there is an obvious solution. Its best summarized by the Sanskrit word Advaita – or – non-dualism – and that there is no division, fragmentation in life at all – no matter how different we appear on the surface. (Sources cited at the end of this post)
Let’s start with established science at the moment: 13.8 billion years ago, before the “‘”big bang” giant explosion – everything that exists today, our entire universe, matter – was in a space smaller than an atom. So even science agrees that there was just that one particle to begin with. Then, the “big-bang” happened, and energy started expanding – the entire universe remained formless for about 380 thousand years, and then started to cool down – where gravity and electromagnetism formed the first atoms – Fast forward billions of years and EVERYTHING that you see, including your own body – came from that single source…
Now think about your own body – trillions of cells, fuse to create organs, each with a different function, some more “important” than others – if you want, and sometimes doctors need to, you can see them as separate but for all practical purposes, in day-to-day life, they function as one whole. If few cells decide to go their own way, it wreaks havoc on the body, also known as cancer.
Our world can be visualized similarly – where everything – humans, animals, plants, fish, oceans, mountains, etc., appear as separate entities – but function together like our body does. What then happens if a particular species (e.g., humans), or groups of humans decide to go their own way? With all these wars, and human sufferings, “dualism” insulates us from the suffering, because its faraway, and we numb ourselves with distractions such as binge watching, scrolling and fast food, pretty much like in early stages of cancer – a patient does not notice any problems. But overtime, the damage increases, comes closer to home impacts us directly and we sit up and take notice, and hope it is not too late.
Dwelling on our “self”, or ego, and thinking of ourselves as “separate” from others creates a wall between us and others, leading to a feeling of insecurity and loneliness. To test this theory, I will start to treat everyone with equal love and care, putting their needs first (or at least equal), and starting with immediate family, moving on to friends and then work colleagues, neighbors etc. According to “The Bhagavad Gita” and my spiritual teacher, Eknath Easwaran (1910-1999)‘s commentary on it – this selfless action will diminish my ego, and soon I will perceive that everyone is my family – and with that, the abyss between ‘myself’ and ‘yourself’ will be filled in.
This is also recommended by Sri Krishna, in The Bhagavad Gita (2-71) – “Those are forever free who renounce all selfish desires and break away from the ego cage of “I”, “me” and “mine” to be united with the lord. You do not have to be Hindu, or even a believer in God to understand this – so for those who would only believe “science”, just replace “lord” with that primordial particle that existed before “big bang” – from which everything got created.
So, the hypothesis is – that we are all ONE, and to test it, I will live the values from my spiritual teacher, through his many books, especially his translation of and his detailed commentary “The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living – Volumes 1-3” – Starting with implementing his eight-point program, and meditating on Advaita, specifically #6.
Sources:
The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living – Volumes 1-3
Michael Singer’s Living Untethered (Amazon Link)
Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 2, Shlok 71
