Namaste, Welcome to SAM-VAD (Together In Conversation), as we begin today ‘let us remember this about ‘Attention’.
Our life experience would ultimately amount to whatever we had paid attention to. Attention: is important and most of the times we are so indifferent to it. It is as fundamental as food; and we go blundering about, seeking ways to assuage the craving, instead of learning how to provide ourselves with what we need, sensibly and calmly. Once the mechanism is brought to our attention and we begin to study it, it is as if a veil has been stripped off ordinary life, and we become freer in our action and choices.
This week I bring to your attention a collection of statements titled ‘Unnecessary’ from the book titled ‘Reflections’. It is a collection of fables, aphorisms and statements that challenge the conditioned mind.
It confronts the reader with unaccustomed perspectives and ideas, in an attempt to set the mind free so as to see how things really are.
Unnecessary
People who have organized their lives around the stability of relative ignorance regard all enterprises which do not fit in with their preconceptions as unnecessary.
They seldom pause to think, of course, that “unnecessary” is the ideal term to preserve ignorance and especially timorousness: “If the Good Lord had expected us to fly, He would have given us wings.”
These are the very same people who would have called scientific research unnecessary if they couldn’t understand it within their own logic-system, but who would rush for antibiotics as soon as someone else had developed them.
It is “unnecessary” for the monkey to start to believe that bananas could be cultivated, not just collected, because he is a monkey.
It is “unnecessary” for the savage to question whether fire is not occasionally sent down from heaven by a thunder god, or whether he could make it, because he is a savage.
It is “unnecessary” for a child to believe that we have to earn a living, because he is still a child, even if he has to grow up.
It is “unnecessary” for the adult to believe that he needs intellectual education if he is a manual laborer.
It is “unnecessary” for the educated man to believe that he may need a different or higher form of education, because he already defines his state as the best or highest.
But nobody can stop the process of learning, real questioning, even if only because our ancestors started on this course many thousands of years ago. They set us on this course, and we cannot escape from it.
Statements from ‘Reflections’ by Idries Shah
I am sure that you will enjoy reading this book; you can buy your copy from the following link:
Enjoy reading it with your family, friends and near and dear one’s.
Concluding today’s post and podcast episode, I thank all who take time out and read (the blog post) and listen to the episodes each week. For those who listen and have not subscribed to the podcast I suggest you do and click on the bell icon so that you can be notified for all the new episodes that get uploaded every week.
Namaste!
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