I am not a spiritual person and I am not keen on influencing other people on what they should believe in. Still, I would like to share my thoughts. Closeness to God or enlightenment to me is about reaching a height of awareness of closeness through the casual but intense remembrance of God. Simply going through the procedures or practice of ritual is not going to bring us there if both the mind and soul are not there. The body can physically perform the rituals but if the soul and the mind are not concurrently synchronized or coordinated, that level of awareness will still be unreachable. Sometimes, the mind needs to be dulled into submission through some conspiracy with the body. The mind is like a jealous keeper to the soul, overprotective even, a parent even, practising, on its own volition and belief that it must protect and hide the soul at all times. The soul is shy, like a child even, a willing party to what the mind requires, even though it is the most purest of the two in terms of spirituality and is the most knowledgeable, possessing in the secret of things, of even the universe and of God. But the soul is ever willing to partake into any activity that the mind wants or requires. The soul is born with the knowledge while the mind is born without it. There is therefore, a latent difference between the two. One is born with it, and the other, born without it. While the mind shows forth into this world, the soul hides. While the mind realises its thoughts into physical form, the soul remains unseen, thinner than the wisp of smoke. Unity occurs when the soul leads over the mind and the mind over the body. When the man acts on this earth, God is ever willing to allow any activity that the man wants or requires. The man does not know, but he is the reflection in a reflection. He carries with him, the paradigm of reality. The mind is the man, the physical body, in which he exercises his will of movement is the earth and his soul is God. The microcosm of the man is a reflection in a reflection. Once on a spiritual journey, the man is thus a reflection in a reflection looking for its source; seeking to unite.
Religion is introduced to appeal to the mind, not to the soul because the soul already knows. Religion is a structured appeal to the mind into releasing the soul so that the whole man can perceive the truth Religion has been introduced in phases, through many prophets, in line with the evolution of the mind to progress in its apprehension and perception of God. Religion therefore appeals to the mind to release the soul, so that it can come out and lead the mind. The mind may be intelligent but it is actually shallow because it relies on the fundamentals of equations to arrive at conclusions. It is limited by the pitiful amount of knowledge that it has acquired from parents, from friends, from people and from schools and from books written by other people. Because it was born empty and is dependent on stimuli, dependent on events and the written word to form some structure of understanding, it holds this concept and live with it and nurture it until some time that new knowledge or stimulus arrives to challenge that paradigm. Even then, the mind is strong and proud of its acquired knowledge, even though it stands on a platform of constructed lies and partial truth. Like a gatekeeper, rigid in its demeanour, it stops and questions any new knowledge that comes before it, with its own barrage of cynical queries and tests, until none can eventually pass, none can eventually influence it into believing. The mind demand proofs of God’s existence, falling back upon its own web of knowledge that it has woven, limited to the acquired knowledge through the limitation of exposure to expositions, thus limiting its ability to welcome Truth even when Truth appears like a man in front of him. That is why miracles must happen, because miracles lie outside the scope of logic or any equation. That is why, not many can see the Truth even when miracles happen, not many intelligent people can discern the meaning when the text has been around for a thousand years and that is why there are so many agnostics.
Glimpses of the intangible truth can only be attained when the mind is dulled, when the mind is subdued. When the gatekeeper is dulled and corrupted through physical intoxication, it is only then that the soul can steal through the gates, to reach out and touch the world and allow the man to see the truth through its own eyes, see the love and mercy of God in this world and perceive the connectivity of all. Only then, can we perceive a greater experience of life through more polished and sharper eyes than the mind. And there are windows which the soul steals through to reach out to God, to feel love and to give love. It is not through the unity of mind, body and soul that nearness is reached. It is through the subjugation of the mind into a helpless state that nearness can be attained. If not, then we will always be self-righteous and proud, carry this judgement of others around us, our vanity through the apparent knowledge of truth, not reaching or collecting the experiences of nearness. By just doing the rituals alone, a person can rationalise that he has reached some level of Godliness or spirituality, that he is favoured above others. But sadly that is never really the case, for Godliness is about humility, acceptability and constant remembrance in whatever situation.
Enlightenment is not permanent, but is just a series of events in our lives, through which we experience. Others spend a life time to convert the mind while for some, the conversion will be just a matter of minutes. Enlightenment can even last only for a few seconds. Events of enlightenment are not perpetual as we are led to believe, but that the occurrences of enlightenment are real but even as fast as the lightning that flashes across the sky, leaving an indelible mark on the thought, like a branding iron on skin. All of us would have experienced it somehow or another in our lives. It would feel like a oneness to all, the self receding from the tangible to the intangible. It can happen during sexual orgasms, in the taking of fast, in the periods of deepest grieve, in the gesticulations of dances and movements. It happens when the mind is not exactly in control. It happens when the mind is subdued by the physical body. It is likened to having reached the pinnacle of an orgasm, like an eagle soaring in the air and gliding down towards earth. These are the small windows through the soul peeks and allows the mind to see that the rope extends from this earth, from this body through the sky and into space and from space, into the ethereal.
Thus, in every person, the mind is the enemy and the real friend, the soul. Knowledge of the soul, an awareness of the soul, the tangibility of the soul from the intangible concept opens the portal for the connection, like a rope, to the Ultimate One. The search for the hidden treasure thus lies inside and not outside. The journey to be taken is within. To acknowledge and understand the soul, is to perceive God.
