A potter makes many different things from the same clay, each with very different uses. While we use a matka to cool the water, we use a clay pan to cook food. It is the same clay used to make both of them, but they have very different functions. Plastic granules are used to make so many different things. We can make plastic chairs from those granules, as well as the water tank at the top of the building. We get so many different pictures on the TV screen. They are nothing but tiny dots on the screen that are illuminated based on the program being broadcast.
Similarly, we have so many different thoughts all throughout the day. These thoughts are nothing but the movement of electrons in different parts of the brain. Different people feel happy or sad with different things. It all depends on how we were born and brought up, and how we have perceived different experiences. The same situation may be perceived as a challenge by one and as danger by the other, as good by one and as bad by the other. It seems very real. When a child feels very tense because of a fight with his best friend, the parents know they will be reunited the very next day. But the tension is real for the child. His brain makes him feel sad about the loss of his best friend. What is it really? Just certain movement of the electrons in the brain that may excite certain sensations in the body that make us feel uncomfortable.
When we look at the things and thoughts in isolation, they look very different. Some things and some thoughts look very exciting and make us feel good, while others make us feel bad. But all of them share the same origin. Devas and Danavas also share the same origin. That's why, in Indian mythology, Mukti is not exclusive to Devas. Danavas also get Mukti. What is this Mukti? It's just merging with the whole, when there is no division between the unit and the whole. Like a drop of water merging with the ocean. The bigger challenge is whether this drop can realise, while being only a drop, that it is part of the ocean and therefore shed its fears and insecurities as a unit, while being the unit. I think that's the biggest challenge in this world, and only very few have been able to do it.
When we enter the cinema hall and the lights are off, we get completely lost in the movie. We laugh as well as cry with the scenes. We get so immersed in the movie that we forget our real-life problems for 2-3 hours. The same thing happens when we enter this body. We identify so strongly with the sensations in different parts of the body and the thoughts in the brain that we forget ourselves, our real nature. Remembrance of the whole, or the ocean, while being in this body is the biggest challenge in this world. Generally, we feel an unpleasant sensation or thought and want to quickly turn towards a pleasant one. That strengthens our sense of division between the two. The more we get engaged in these escapes, the more we are distant from the whole. Constant awareness of the whole if the key to get rid of illusions.
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