VAGDEVI SPIRITUAL PROCESS [#15018] FREEDOM FROM ILLUSIONS

Unlike all living beings other than human beings, the human beings have infinite choices about what to think and how to think in matters of life, to choose from many alternatives, to make more or less independent decisions and conduct accordingly. That is why we say that the man has spiritual freedom. One can think that he is actually a soul that does not perish, and keeps ‘living’ till eternity or he can think that when his body stops to function, the life ends and all the matters relating to life end when he dies. When we start thinking about life, in general; our existence in this universe, on the planet earth or elsewhere; that is, about the state of our being; we get involved in spiritual thinking. At least, that is how I think about spirituality.

Of course, I do not mind if many people think and believe that one is involved in spiritual thinking, if and only if, he relies on the hypothesis that life has a lot to do with what is not purely physical. I think, as long as we accept that in our lives we interact with things that are purely physical in nature, we stay with a ‘conviction’ or ‘doubt’ that there is a possibility of existence of something that is not purely physical.

Perhaps, most of us will agree that it would be good enough if we accept that all our efforts to know and understand the meaning and purpose of life may be considered as ‘spiritual efforts’. When we make such efforts, we cannot escape from thinking about the physical and non-physical, real and imaginary, the truth and untruth or factual and illusory.

Illusions can be of many types. They can be emotional, intellectual or related to the man’s Ahamkara (I am-ness or in common language things related to the ego). They can be related to the sensory perceptions or interpretation of what has been perceived. They can be related to our mental process, conduct or expressions or understanding of things expressed by others. It, therefore, becomes necessary for us to think (with clear intentions to know about the truth of things) about what we perceive, how we understand, how we conduct and how we express to others and also to ourselves, and, above all, to be very careful and vigilant about how we think. If we find that our intellect is limited than we have to find ways and means to manage things despite that limitation.

It is not difficult to realize that most spiritual efforts generally revolve around removal of many kinds of confusions and trying to attain freedom from as many types of illusions as possible, for if we fail to do this we would never be able to know where we were being lead to in our life by our circumstances.

Under the sub-heading of “Freedom of Illusions” in the last few chapters so far we have tried to prepare a framework so that when we discuss many practical aspects relating to illusions that misguide us in our lives we may be able to view them with clarity when we actually encounter them in our lives. Once we are able to recognize them, we would be able to deal with them.

[This series is being presented by Promod Kumar Sharma, who has also authored “Mahatma A Scientist of the Intuitively Obvious” and “In Search of Our Wonderful Words”.]