TRUE CHANGE: CHANGE IN CONSCIOUSNESS

INSIGHTS

TRUE CHANGE: CHANGE IN CONSCIOUSNESS


Call it the expressions of unending selfishness or the result of deep insecurity, a human being manages ‘not to change’ deep inside, while adapting his public behaviour very cleverly. Desire and fear lurk in his consciousness but he learns to show himself as highly service-minded and not afraid of material loss or criticism of any kind. His public behaviour makes him not only acceptable in the society but quite good in his own opinion. However there are skeletons in the cupboard and he therefore lives in conflict and his daily life lacks true peace.

Change in behaviour is not a big deal. You will achieve it with some intelligence. You succeed in conforming to the demands of family members, colleagues or the society in general. This business of getting social approval begins in school days when many a student gets the approving nod from his teachers. They say he is well-behaved. Words like obedient, loyal and disciplined are heaped upon the so-called good student. Less importance is given to the question if he is creative or if he is free from inner conflict. The poor boy may have suppressed many a curiosity or explorative urge in order to satisfy the expectations of the teachers and other elders. There is then no holistic growth for he is not learning in an atmosphere of freedom. The pressure of expectations makes him a second-hand personality.

Change in consciousness is of very great value. Your intelligence has to penetrate very deep in order to bring about it. You then show care and love to people not just because that is expected from you but you see clearly how lack of care and love is injurious to yourself and others. You directly notice the foul smell of insensitivity and indifference even as they arise in you. If you are a scholar, a speaker or a writer then you have a lot of knowledge. It does not ensure however that you have changed. Information does not mean transformation. Through constant intellectual activity, you may gather a lot of knowledge. Through direct perception, your consciousness changes. Hidden fears and lurking desires leave you when the magical faculty of seeing (which is not thinking or analysis) exposes their illusory nature.

You change in behaviour when thought operates. Change in consciousness takes place when attention works on thought. Thought is concerned with the self, which is its own creation. When you think, you cannot but keep the interest of the self as a priority. When you pay attention to how thought operates, there is no priority. There is only an effort towards understanding what is. This effort at understanding the movement of the self is distinct from the usual cerebral activity of reading books and forming concepts.

We must see therefore the importance of silence. Sitting silently, we may take a look at the way our thought operates. Without interfering with rising memories, without encouraging or suppressing any of them either, we may learn a lot through alert watching. While clever thinking brings to our view many solutions to problems, this seeing takes a quantum leap and dissolves problems. Words have power, we have always heard. Thought has power, we know it too. Do we realize how much power alert silence has?

by Swami Chidananda

Varanasi

March 15, 2010