Who are you? This is one of my favorite questions. I think one can experience bliss by pursuing this question in a certain way. Let me try and do that- to take you through this question in that certain way so you could experience the bliss. There is a deeper bliss for grabs if one can let others experience this bliss. Wait, do I smell Blissoception here- bliss within bliss within bliss, may be!
So when I ask "who are you", what comes to your mind? Your name? But what if you change your name? Your profession? Your family? Do you recognize that possibly every cell of your body changes during your lifetime? So your DNA is you? What if your biology completely changes? So would this answer be outside biology? People around you could change, so the answer could be outside your sociology? But there is something about you, something which is invariant.
Would this invariant be tricky if you are person who evolves a lot? Look at Valmiki, he starts as a hunter and transforms into a great writer who gave us the Ramayana. Or look at Siddhartha who became Gauthama Buddha. How about Steve Jobs 2.0 or Arvind Kejriwal 3.0 who doesn't shout at people! Would you have one core idea of these people. Can you find consistency within those inconsistencies? Or order within chaos? Nonlinear dynamics seems to do it in a completely different context. So can we then speculate such an idea in this context?
Some people say Adi Shankara or Swami Vivekananda are avataars of Shiva, would that sound crazy? If I tell you that Rama, Krishna, Varaha are avataars of Vishnu would that sound crazy? Rama and Krishna are two different individuals, so how can they be the same? Understandable, they are human, but how can you say Varaha(pig), Matsya(fish) are same as Rama? Can you say Apple and Amazon are same? Can you say they are different avataars of AI? Does this go back to speculative human mind's ability to see similarities to learn from a different example?
So we conceptualize the idea of a soul. Soul is that DNA of you or that identity or that software of you. Soul is not a static piece but a dynamic evolutionary software which is basically a summary of you. Soul is to the body what juice is to a fruit. One may provide several such examples since the idea is quite abstract. This is mere speculation and if one asks if it is true, the answer is that is just an idea which gives perspectives. Soul gives qualitative perspective of things while material explains the qunatitative perspectives. So Soul is you- your cognition + your emotions + your matter.
Now that you define your soul, you can then start nourishing it. You nourish your soul by nourishing your mind, body and heart. You nourish your body with exercise, mind with reading/brainstorming and heart with social work/art - experiences of emotions. Your soul emerges from these three and is particularly connected with your values and sense of goodness. Your mind, body and heart in unison give you reasons to see an incompleteness within you and a sense of completeness outside.
Sodium needs to lose electron. Chlorine needs to gain an electron. They can do an exchange, but they would have extra charge and this brings instability. So they form a cage structure and guard each other. The sodiums repel a positive charge which pursue chlorine and chlorine repels negative charge which pursues sodium. So there is a sense of incompleteness which leads to instability. This is resolved by seeing stability outside the atoms, in the molecule world. We see lack of satisfaction with ourselves and thats when our social life begins. We stopped being individuals and became specialized interdependent folks in society. We are incomplete without the folks who made the phone, the ones who grew the food and so many more. So your soul finds completeness in humanity.
These qualitative aspects helps you be at peace with yourself, helps you escape dichotomies, to source new ideas. But this is speculation and we could be wrong. So we need science to rigorously probe the ideas sourced by spirituality. So does science have to clash with spirituality? If spirituality is defined this way, then may be not. Creativity source of qualitative ideas and the ability to stay humble and keep claims grounded can exist- science and spirituality.
Now, that we understand the soul, can we have a speculation of what to expect by understanding the soul
1- Do we compete?
If we all have different makeup within our souls, why would we compete? Is Gauthama going for the same currency which Steve Jobs is going for? If all our souls are busy shopping for something else, how are we competing? We may be going for coming items at times, but our paths will split soon. We are on a different journey, so we don't compete, we do it differently and try to survive. This ideology helped Steve Jobs build amazing products. Can we explore this as a business strategy?
2- Is there a universal emotion?
How can I be a rockstar? If everyone is different, how do I sing something which everyone likes? Is there universality in emotions? Do all souls have something in common? Why do all souls feel proud on seeing a proud? Why do all souls feel the same on seeing a baby cry? Why do all souls feel good when a poor woman eats? Why do all souls share these primitive emotions? Evolutionary reasons? Can this help in producing art with universal appeal?
3- Enemy versus "agree to disagree"
If someone does something which is opposite to me, do I see that person as an enemy? Or do see scope of enrichment? Do I see scope for the soul to stumble upon things which she couldn't get so far? Does this help me entertain thoughts without having to accept them?
4- Empathy
Does my soul respect the other souls? Does my soul see the spirit of namasthe- I have a soul in me and you have a soul in you, your soul and my soul are different, so we are equal because we can never the same. So I am neither inferior to you nor am I superior to you, so we are equal and my soul greats the soul in you. If this sense of respect is ritualized everyday, wouldn't we feel so good? If you see everyone else as a reflection of you, wouldnt you find yourself everywhere and feel happy? Can you find happiness outside yourself? Wanna explore?
5- Randomness
If I face uncertain situations, does it enrich my soul, does my soul have a qualitative perspective of things? So would I enjoy uncertain situations because I am adding more liquid to my reservoir? Would this help me face life better? If life is uncertain with me, why should I be uncertain with life?
Once I can design my soul and control my soul, wouldn't I be able to change my life? Wouldn't the impossible be possible? Can I rewire myself? Are these mere speculations? If they are so nice to hear, how would they feel after execution? Should we give it a try?
So when I ask "who are you", what comes to your mind? Your name? But what if you change your name? Your profession? Your family? Do you recognize that possibly every cell of your body changes during your lifetime? So your DNA is you? What if your biology completely changes? So would this answer be outside biology? People around you could change, so the answer could be outside your sociology? But there is something about you, something which is invariant.
Would this invariant be tricky if you are person who evolves a lot? Look at Valmiki, he starts as a hunter and transforms into a great writer who gave us the Ramayana. Or look at Siddhartha who became Gauthama Buddha. How about Steve Jobs 2.0 or Arvind Kejriwal 3.0 who doesn't shout at people! Would you have one core idea of these people. Can you find consistency within those inconsistencies? Or order within chaos? Nonlinear dynamics seems to do it in a completely different context. So can we then speculate such an idea in this context?
Some people say Adi Shankara or Swami Vivekananda are avataars of Shiva, would that sound crazy? If I tell you that Rama, Krishna, Varaha are avataars of Vishnu would that sound crazy? Rama and Krishna are two different individuals, so how can they be the same? Understandable, they are human, but how can you say Varaha(pig), Matsya(fish) are same as Rama? Can you say Apple and Amazon are same? Can you say they are different avataars of AI? Does this go back to speculative human mind's ability to see similarities to learn from a different example?
So we conceptualize the idea of a soul. Soul is that DNA of you or that identity or that software of you. Soul is not a static piece but a dynamic evolutionary software which is basically a summary of you. Soul is to the body what juice is to a fruit. One may provide several such examples since the idea is quite abstract. This is mere speculation and if one asks if it is true, the answer is that is just an idea which gives perspectives. Soul gives qualitative perspective of things while material explains the qunatitative perspectives. So Soul is you- your cognition + your emotions + your matter.
Now that you define your soul, you can then start nourishing it. You nourish your soul by nourishing your mind, body and heart. You nourish your body with exercise, mind with reading/brainstorming and heart with social work/art - experiences of emotions. Your soul emerges from these three and is particularly connected with your values and sense of goodness. Your mind, body and heart in unison give you reasons to see an incompleteness within you and a sense of completeness outside.
Sodium needs to lose electron. Chlorine needs to gain an electron. They can do an exchange, but they would have extra charge and this brings instability. So they form a cage structure and guard each other. The sodiums repel a positive charge which pursue chlorine and chlorine repels negative charge which pursues sodium. So there is a sense of incompleteness which leads to instability. This is resolved by seeing stability outside the atoms, in the molecule world. We see lack of satisfaction with ourselves and thats when our social life begins. We stopped being individuals and became specialized interdependent folks in society. We are incomplete without the folks who made the phone, the ones who grew the food and so many more. So your soul finds completeness in humanity.
These qualitative aspects helps you be at peace with yourself, helps you escape dichotomies, to source new ideas. But this is speculation and we could be wrong. So we need science to rigorously probe the ideas sourced by spirituality. So does science have to clash with spirituality? If spirituality is defined this way, then may be not. Creativity source of qualitative ideas and the ability to stay humble and keep claims grounded can exist- science and spirituality.
Now, that we understand the soul, can we have a speculation of what to expect by understanding the soul
1- Do we compete?
If we all have different makeup within our souls, why would we compete? Is Gauthama going for the same currency which Steve Jobs is going for? If all our souls are busy shopping for something else, how are we competing? We may be going for coming items at times, but our paths will split soon. We are on a different journey, so we don't compete, we do it differently and try to survive. This ideology helped Steve Jobs build amazing products. Can we explore this as a business strategy?
2- Is there a universal emotion?
How can I be a rockstar? If everyone is different, how do I sing something which everyone likes? Is there universality in emotions? Do all souls have something in common? Why do all souls feel proud on seeing a proud? Why do all souls feel the same on seeing a baby cry? Why do all souls feel good when a poor woman eats? Why do all souls share these primitive emotions? Evolutionary reasons? Can this help in producing art with universal appeal?
3- Enemy versus "agree to disagree"
If someone does something which is opposite to me, do I see that person as an enemy? Or do see scope of enrichment? Do I see scope for the soul to stumble upon things which she couldn't get so far? Does this help me entertain thoughts without having to accept them?
4- Empathy
Does my soul respect the other souls? Does my soul see the spirit of namasthe- I have a soul in me and you have a soul in you, your soul and my soul are different, so we are equal because we can never the same. So I am neither inferior to you nor am I superior to you, so we are equal and my soul greats the soul in you. If this sense of respect is ritualized everyday, wouldn't we feel so good? If you see everyone else as a reflection of you, wouldnt you find yourself everywhere and feel happy? Can you find happiness outside yourself? Wanna explore?
5- Randomness
If I face uncertain situations, does it enrich my soul, does my soul have a qualitative perspective of things? So would I enjoy uncertain situations because I am adding more liquid to my reservoir? Would this help me face life better? If life is uncertain with me, why should I be uncertain with life?
Once I can design my soul and control my soul, wouldn't I be able to change my life? Wouldn't the impossible be possible? Can I rewire myself? Are these mere speculations? If they are so nice to hear, how would they feel after execution? Should we give it a try?
Loved reading it. Quite insightful. I've written about the same question but have a huge difference in the approach. I'd be glad if you could check it out at https://shubhbadhwars.wordpress.com/2020/04/07/the-existence-of-an-individual-identity/
ReplyDeleteThis solved all doubts of my life.
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