The Fourth Step in the Spiritual Journey
How, Why, What, and Where is this Experience?
How does experience happen? Noting much is required to be mentioned about how does an experience happens. We all know through the various objects. All kinds of objects, even mental objects; as mentioned earlier, various categories of Mind such as Intellect, Imagination, Ego, Memory & Reflected Consciousness, are also capable of experiences.
Why experiences? When there is something outside, we go behind the outside objects to make it a part of us due to the illusion of separation. Grab it and consume it in every way that we know. We keep going behind one object after the other, thinking that we are incomplete without it, so let me make it my own and feel complete. We all know the plight of this chase; nothing much is required to be mentioned here.
What is experience? It is just knowing.
Let us examine what actually is experience a little more deeply. Any experience, be it seeing, smelling, touching, eating, drinking, walking, etc., is pure knowing. Say you are having chocolate icecream; after eating the ice cream, can you describe eating the ice cream? We cannot describe the experience; we rather describe ice cream's attributes, that it was sweet, icy, etc. Quality of experience can also be attributed as good or bad, but what is an experience of eating ice cream, for that matter, experience of anything cannot be explained. It is just knowledge that stays. Experience is pure knowing. We can know about the object per se, but not about the experience. That was an individual experience; what about multiple experiences being experienced at the same time. For, e.g., you are reading this article on your mobile or laptop, sitting on a couch, also sipping your favourite drink. These are multiple activities happening, but do we know them as separate experiences, or does it appears like one whole experience.
We can experiment with every kind of experience, listening to music, rock climbing, eating a favourite or disgusting dish, talking to someone, etc. It is an illusion created by the mind that it appears that different objects give different experiences. Experiences are nothing but knowing of them. We can differentiate objects but can never differentiate the experiences achieved out of objects. Examine deeply..............
Where is the experience happening?
Now the crucial step, where does the experience is happening. Though it is happening inside us, is the taste, sound, image really out there or here where there is this Self?
When we see any object outside, say a mountain, we only see a shape and colours brought to our eyes through light, and only a beam of light enters the eyes, and somehow the same shape is formed as an image in our mind is comprehended as Mountain. Mountain is a name that is given to a specific object with a such and such shape and colour. The image is already inside. How can one perceive something that is outside, which is entirely a different entity than oneself? It is impossible to perceive. Similarly, if you examine any sound coming from a distance, where do we hear the sound? Here where the Self is.
If we take time and start examining every experience to this minute detail, we will soon realize that objects are inanimate in themselves. Any attribute or value is added to objects when experienced by the Self.
Experiences of varied nature collapse as pure knowing when it reaches the Self.
The duality of experience and experiencer is created through the mind. That is again due to the conditioning. This realization is purely experiential hence can be acquired right now if one is ready to experiment and examine. This collapsing of differentiation between the seen and seer, observer and observed is much easier when the mind is calmer, hence in most of the traditions calming the mind becomes the first step. However, at every single moment, there is this Oneness of Experience and Experiencer.
Realizing this oneness is the Enlightenment, from where the actual journey begins.
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