Feeling Connected : Joy
By now you might have guessed what I mean Joy could be different than happiness. Actually it is. You can manifest happiness at will but joy is something you will have to strive. Some people many be just be content with the happiness and there is nothing wrong in it. But we are not here in this planet just to be happy we all have a much higher purpose. Think as if all your fingers have some kind of feeling and feeling and it found a way to be happy and content and did not participate in the purpose of holding a object in your hand. Would it fulfill its higher purpose. We all come to this earth with a after a lot of struggle and suffering and we all have a higher purpose. We all are part of a much bigger consciousness and we are just offshoot of those consciousness. So our goal can not just be happy our goal is to gain eternal bliss which is sometimes refereed in eastern philosophies as "Mokshya" which you can only strive towards your higher purpose. We are going to talk about in future parts. Now what is a higher purpose. To understand a higher purpose we need to understand what we actually are. Now no one in this world truly and fully understand what are are. If you talk to a scientist or a person from medical field.He will say we are a biological living organism who is adopted into the environment of planet earth and we have manifested through millions of years of evolution. Which started as a single cellular organism in a warm soupy ocean in the earth to a multi cellular organism like a fish and reptile or bird or mammals and finally to monkeys to us. They are actually correct in ways. If you ask a theologian , depending on which religion he follows he will tell god created this universe in 7 days and in the 7th day he created a male and female Adam and Eve who then in turn created us. Now he is no incorrect either. If you take into account gods days could be much different than us as time is relative so we can not scientifically refute that its not correct. Some scientist may argue what... we have evidence of evolution we have fossil records of things evolving. Now to that point I would say lot of things in the theology are not meant to be interpretative of a detailed record of fact because it deliberately misses the details. There is no written documentation of what God did to create the world. Now its like a parable of three blind men where all of them went to a elephant and one hold it legs and said an elephant is like a tree trunk and the second went in and he hold its trunk and said its like a fire hose made with rubber and the third man went and hold the ear and said its a like a think piece of leather. Now how can a elephant be three radically different things ; are they all wrong . No in fact they are all correct. When a concept or something is much bigger than the observer which we are at this case there will be multiple version of fact and they could be all correct. Take an example we being the most intelligent species on the planet and earth being the only place we known , but still for thousands of year we have been believing the earth is flat as its so much order of magnitude bigger than anything in our experience we never had a clue how can we stand and not fall over on anything that is spherical. It took us to create telescope and look at the other planets and then do some real convincing to get to the point that earth actually being spherical and being an enormous size than us we do not fall over and it appears flat to us. Similarly think as if you are an ant climbing on an Eiffel tower would would have any clue what is the shape of the tower. The only way to understand anything by any real means we would have disassociate that thing from the observer and then try to understand from a disassociated point of view. Now how would we disassociate from life without being in heaven to observer the life to understand it. We can not by any known means. So if we can not be certain of it then it may be in our best interest to use any hypothesis if that gives us some desirable result and ignore any hypothesis that takes us away from desirable result.
Now some scientist may say the biological purpose of any living organism are here in earth is to survive and reproduce. Now if you look closely survival and reproduction are very inter related. We are indeed surviving by reproducing among other ways of survival mechanism we have like healing , immunity and regeneration. So is that it. In a way it is. But there is something special which we have only within us that make us different than may be a something that is not living. That is consciousness which could be the key to understanding the life. We all including all animals have consciousness and we are aware of our existence. But the only reason I will exclude animals for this discussion as their consciousness is little less developed than humans , that does not mean they are not totally off limit from discussion of the topic. So all humans basically share a type of realization of existence that is consciousness which is the connective source in human. Its like all leaf of the tree are connected by the tree sap that flows among all of them making them all part of the same tree. However for a moment think as if you are a leaf you have a independent existence and you feel as if you a different from other leafs. Which is actually true as you born and die as a leaf which has a different cycle from the other leafs however if you only realize you are a leaf and you will do everything to make sure you as a leaf will survive and thrive without any realization that you are part of a bigger thing called a tree you are probably leaving not up to the bigger purpose. There is no denying the fact that we have our own will and choice which could be different. However if a cell or a leaf only focuses on thriving and reproduce taking all the resources of the plant or an organism it will just grow into a cancerous tumor and ultimately end up in catastrophe not just for the entire part of the growth but may be for the entire organism itself. So its very critical to feel the higher connection and realize that just like a single leaf we are part of a tree and to be healthy and fulfilled the tree as a whole has to be healthy and fulfilled. Now you may say I am such a small part and I do not think I can really contribute in a meaningful way. Have you thought if every leaf in a plant thinks the same and don't contribute to the plant for food utilizing photosynthesis then the whole plant might slowly decay and weaken and then die ultimately killing the leaf as well. So the first thing to do is to realize that we are part of a higher consciousness which includes every type of consciousness from a small living organism like a fish or a small shrub to bigger life forms like whale. We are all connected through a single thread which is consciousness even though we do not realize them. So first thing we would need to do to feel the joy and bliss is to share a sense of empathy towards all living creatures as if they are the leaves of the same tree we are part of. Once we have build the empathy for everyone we will slowly realize the connected link that we have long lost and share the same energy that flows through the collective consciousness. Once we get connected to everyone and every living organism we will slowly share all the pleasure that any living organism share like you can be delighted to see a squirrel jumping from a tree to tree holding a nut or a rabbit munching a carrots as if its the first carrot he has ever eaten. You will also feel the same for other people and share their pleasure. And moreover this realization and practice of the realization will liberate you from the smaller daily setbacks.
By now you might have guessed what I mean Joy could be different than happiness. Actually it is. You can manifest happiness at will but joy is something you will have to strive. Some people many be just be content with the happiness and there is nothing wrong in it. But we are not here in this planet just to be happy we all have a much higher purpose. Think as if all your fingers have some kind of feeling and feeling and it found a way to be happy and content and did not participate in the purpose of holding a object in your hand. Would it fulfill its higher purpose. We all come to this earth with a after a lot of struggle and suffering and we all have a higher purpose. We all are part of a much bigger consciousness and we are just offshoot of those consciousness. So our goal can not just be happy our goal is to gain eternal bliss which is sometimes refereed in eastern philosophies as "Mokshya" which you can only strive towards your higher purpose. We are going to talk about in future parts. Now what is a higher purpose. To understand a higher purpose we need to understand what we actually are. Now no one in this world truly and fully understand what are are. If you talk to a scientist or a person from medical field.He will say we are a biological living organism who is adopted into the environment of planet earth and we have manifested through millions of years of evolution. Which started as a single cellular organism in a warm soupy ocean in the earth to a multi cellular organism like a fish and reptile or bird or mammals and finally to monkeys to us. They are actually correct in ways. If you ask a theologian , depending on which religion he follows he will tell god created this universe in 7 days and in the 7th day he created a male and female Adam and Eve who then in turn created us. Now he is no incorrect either. If you take into account gods days could be much different than us as time is relative so we can not scientifically refute that its not correct. Some scientist may argue what... we have evidence of evolution we have fossil records of things evolving. Now to that point I would say lot of things in the theology are not meant to be interpretative of a detailed record of fact because it deliberately misses the details. There is no written documentation of what God did to create the world. Now its like a parable of three blind men where all of them went to a elephant and one hold it legs and said an elephant is like a tree trunk and the second went in and he hold its trunk and said its like a fire hose made with rubber and the third man went and hold the ear and said its a like a think piece of leather. Now how can a elephant be three radically different things ; are they all wrong . No in fact they are all correct. When a concept or something is much bigger than the observer which we are at this case there will be multiple version of fact and they could be all correct. Take an example we being the most intelligent species on the planet and earth being the only place we known , but still for thousands of year we have been believing the earth is flat as its so much order of magnitude bigger than anything in our experience we never had a clue how can we stand and not fall over on anything that is spherical. It took us to create telescope and look at the other planets and then do some real convincing to get to the point that earth actually being spherical and being an enormous size than us we do not fall over and it appears flat to us. Similarly think as if you are an ant climbing on an Eiffel tower would would have any clue what is the shape of the tower. The only way to understand anything by any real means we would have disassociate that thing from the observer and then try to understand from a disassociated point of view. Now how would we disassociate from life without being in heaven to observer the life to understand it. We can not by any known means. So if we can not be certain of it then it may be in our best interest to use any hypothesis if that gives us some desirable result and ignore any hypothesis that takes us away from desirable result.
Now some scientist may say the biological purpose of any living organism are here in earth is to survive and reproduce. Now if you look closely survival and reproduction are very inter related. We are indeed surviving by reproducing among other ways of survival mechanism we have like healing , immunity and regeneration. So is that it. In a way it is. But there is something special which we have only within us that make us different than may be a something that is not living. That is consciousness which could be the key to understanding the life. We all including all animals have consciousness and we are aware of our existence. But the only reason I will exclude animals for this discussion as their consciousness is little less developed than humans , that does not mean they are not totally off limit from discussion of the topic. So all humans basically share a type of realization of existence that is consciousness which is the connective source in human. Its like all leaf of the tree are connected by the tree sap that flows among all of them making them all part of the same tree. However for a moment think as if you are a leaf you have a independent existence and you feel as if you a different from other leafs. Which is actually true as you born and die as a leaf which has a different cycle from the other leafs however if you only realize you are a leaf and you will do everything to make sure you as a leaf will survive and thrive without any realization that you are part of a bigger thing called a tree you are probably leaving not up to the bigger purpose. There is no denying the fact that we have our own will and choice which could be different. However if a cell or a leaf only focuses on thriving and reproduce taking all the resources of the plant or an organism it will just grow into a cancerous tumor and ultimately end up in catastrophe not just for the entire part of the growth but may be for the entire organism itself. So its very critical to feel the higher connection and realize that just like a single leaf we are part of a tree and to be healthy and fulfilled the tree as a whole has to be healthy and fulfilled. Now you may say I am such a small part and I do not think I can really contribute in a meaningful way. Have you thought if every leaf in a plant thinks the same and don't contribute to the plant for food utilizing photosynthesis then the whole plant might slowly decay and weaken and then die ultimately killing the leaf as well. So the first thing to do is to realize that we are part of a higher consciousness which includes every type of consciousness from a small living organism like a fish or a small shrub to bigger life forms like whale. We are all connected through a single thread which is consciousness even though we do not realize them. So first thing we would need to do to feel the joy and bliss is to share a sense of empathy towards all living creatures as if they are the leaves of the same tree we are part of. Once we have build the empathy for everyone we will slowly realize the connected link that we have long lost and share the same energy that flows through the collective consciousness. Once we get connected to everyone and every living organism we will slowly share all the pleasure that any living organism share like you can be delighted to see a squirrel jumping from a tree to tree holding a nut or a rabbit munching a carrots as if its the first carrot he has ever eaten. You will also feel the same for other people and share their pleasure. And moreover this realization and practice of the realization will liberate you from the smaller daily setbacks.
