Letter 4: On the 'Bigger Picture' and on the Supreme Being

Dear sister, 

Last night I had a strange dream. It was so vivid that, as soon as I woke up, I felt the urgent need to pick up a pen and let you know about it. This is how it went: it was all darkness, at first. Silence was absolute. Then, suddenly, a ray of light came down from somewhere, right on my face (or so it seemed); it was like when mum used to come in our room on an early weekday morning and unmercifully let the blinds fold upwards with a sharp sound, and everything in the room took sudden life. What was weird, though, is that a second light appeared just a moment after the first; and then another, and another, of different colours, shades, nuances, brightness. Accompanying the appearance of each light was a sound; different tones altogether, as if a million invisible pianos were being pressed all at the same time, creating an indescribable melody. It felt like being in a gigantic disco ball, one of those rotating ones which were quite popular some decades ago. What was even more interesting – and this is the thought which sparked my desire to tell you straight away – was the source of all those lights. After a while, I realised that I was the source of all that. One only source, and countless facets radiating from it. After I became aware of this, that ethereal world dissolved in golden, glittering dust. I was left with just one pressing question in my mind, which I scribbled down as soon as I got back to my senses: why putting boundaries where there are none?

Every day we face boundaries, sister. Some are imposed by society to maintain a sense of order, but not all of these are fruitful; in fact, many of them are just limiting. However, these are not the ones I want to talk about today. The boundaries which interest me are those that are self-created and self-imposed; it is with these that we can deal with more easily. ‘What kind of boundaries are you talking about?’ You may just well be wondering now. I am referring to all those elements which man has created and which uses to distinguish himself from everything and everyone else: religion; nationality; gender; sexuality. But there are also those which go beyond the mere interhuman relations: the division between a human being and an animal; with a plant, a rock, a star, with literally everything else which is not man. All these differences, sister, have been created by mankind to make sense of his own identity; how could he have ever possibly understood what he was, who he was, were it not for the fact that he understood what he was not first?

Now, do not get me wrong, I do not blame man for having done so in the first place. We are limited beings, after all, and we have been gifted with a mind which tries to make sense of everything which is around it in a rational way. Creating such boundaries was thus just the first step in this journey to understanding. What I disagree with, sister, is what man has forgotten: that all these differences in form and aspect are mere differences in appearance, not in substance. Man has forgotten the Bigger Picture: that there is only one Source, with countless radiations of it. Just as the disco ball I was telling you before. Man believes that the differences he sees are real differences, differences in substance; oh, how mistaken he is! But let’s try to make all this more concrete, otherwise you will probably curse me for being too abstract as always. 

Let’s take the example of the divine. All Religions and beliefs have the same goal – to believe in a superior being who is the mastermind behind our existence - and all worship the same thing. Dresses, rituals, buildings change; the substance of the act itself, its purpose, does not. What dress you decide to put on does not matter; rather, paramount is the faith and hope you put in the existence of something bigger than you. Is this not the essence of everything? And does it really matter how you call that ‘something bigger than you’? Call it Allah, God, Yahweh, Brahman, the Jade Emperor, Viracocha, Omoteotl, Energy, Spirit, Breath, Life, Source. Call it however you want; that does not change the essence of that Being. The names we have adopted throughout our collective history are just facets of the same thing; aspects which humans, at different places and times, have attributed to that same Divine Energy which everything underpins. These are just apparent, superficial differences; the substance is always the same. Schopenhauer, following Indian teachings, already talked about the importance of going beyond the ‘Veil of Maya’, the world of Appearance; of cutting through it, thus revealing the Truth behind. I dare say this was the same intention of Plato when he was writing about the Cave and its shadows, and the importance of freeing ourselves from the chains of ignorance in order to face the real Sun of Truth. Ideally, everyone could do this; regrettably, I know of what utopia I am talking about. 

You see, sister, what aggrieves me the most is the behaviour that man adopts in the face of such differences. Man has arrived to kill for such things; people squabbling over which version of the Source is the ‘true’ one, without realising they are talking about the same thing all along. How can people be so stupid to first create abstract concepts in their mind and then go out and kill fellow beings in their name? At times I shake with horror when I realise in what kind of world we live; it seems like Voltaire has never walked this earth. Where is tolerance? Where is acceptance, or the effort of understanding the alien? When I hear of someone killing another person because of matters of ‘faith’, I find myself shivering uncontrollably. In truth, I will never be able to understand it. This is probably because my mind conceives the world in a different way. No better, no worse; just differently, the same way reflected in my dream. 

Do not get me wrong, I have come to appreciate that becoming ‘aware’ is an effort not everyone can make - that not everyone is willing to make. It requires you to challenge yourself and your preconceived truths, at times dishevelling the pillars upon which your whole persona rests. Very few can do so; even fewer are disposed to do so. It is much easier to just point out the finger at anything which is different and condemning it as false, heretical, simply wrong. On my part, sister, I urge you to something which requires less effort and which everyone can carry out, were they actually be willing to do it. Do not let yourself be filled with hatred and fear for what is alien to you; for a sparkle of Brahman, of that Supreme Being, lies within everything which lives. Beliefs, cults, rituals, traditions are just human institutions; but the Energy they worship, that is something which goes beyond all of that, which overcomes all the boundaries and the seeming differences which men place (consciously or not) among themselves, to separate the inseparable. Why, in fact, putting boundaries where there are none? We are all part of the same, Big Picture. 

Farewell. 

Melody