Your Conscious, Friendly Mind – Day 11
Your Conscious, Friendly Mind Day 11
Day 11: Have We Forgotten Who We Really Are?
The most unfathomable mystery of this world is that we always assume our outer garment determines who we are! We can remember many things, but cannot remember that we are Pure Consciousness, and not just the inert body. The whole purpose of the spiritual journey and of spiritual discipline is to return our mind to its stainless, innocent, pristine state of Pure Consciousness. All the enlightened masters tell us, “You have no problem other than your impure mind.” It is only in the clouded state of impurity that we lose our true vision.
Our human vision is clouded by the five afflictions of mind described by the great, ancient scientist of life, Rishi Patanjali, in his teachings on the eight-fold Yogic Path to Self Realization.
The five afflictions are avidya (ignorance or Self-forgetfulness), ashmita (ego), raga (attachment), dwesha(repulsion or aversion), and avinivesh (compulsive attachment to life and its consequent fear of death). Understanding these afflictions can create tremendous power of insight into the mysteries of life and the art of living.
The first affliction of the mind is ignorance or forgetfulness of the Self. Ignorance is a state of self-forgetfulness that is born of a naturally distorted, material perception. In ignorance, we see and accept the unreal as real and the real as unreal. It is the typical human way of seeing and relating to the physical world around us.
Our perception of the physical comes to dominate, to overpower and override awareness of the subtler, spiritual dimensions of existence and consciousness. We forget who we are. We forget that we are spiritual beings living in human bodies for the purpose of refining our souls through a human experience.
