Human Suffering and the Solution
Humanity undergoes many different types of struggles both individually and collectively. There is a struggle for physical survival and many living beings are deeply engaged in this struggle. When humans are struggling for their very survival, it becomes impossible for them to think beyond merely getting food for the next day. When in human society some oppression causes people to have inadequate amounts of sustenance to sustain their life, when there is war, when there is turbulence, it distracts the minds of people from the deeper pursuits of the heart except for rare individuals whose hearts and souls already dedicate themselves to the divine, and who have felt the divine touch. The people engage in survival and the material world dominates their lives.
When a few accumulate wealth and others starve because of that accumulation, by poor distribution of wealth in society, it leads to oppression that is physical, psychic and spiritual. It leads to resentments and hatreds, turbulence, war and suffering in human society. These become a vicious circle of oppression and the oppressed desiring to be free from oppression, harboring resentments and hatreds towards the oppressor. The oppressor desires to maintain control and wealth so they suppress that which might endanger their wealth and safety. As it continues, the oppressed become the oppressor. The oppressor becomes the oppressed and the wheel of karma keeps turning. This condition in human society has brought about so much suffering. How to change this in a time when the world stands upon the brink of war again as it has so many, many times? What is the solution to this dilemma of human suffering? What is the solution to the world's difficulties? Why are we meditating in a pleasant place when so many people are suffering in the world? One may ask oneself these questions because this suffering is at its heart a spiritual dilemma.
Because of the oppression of materialism upon the human spirit, the human beings do not know how to let their hearts fly, how to open their spirits, engage in grasping for material wealth. In grasping for material wealth, naturally if that wealth is limited, one has to take as much as one can, and eventually someone else will not have so much. It is a natural condition. In the human society today there is a great deal of oppression due to the extraordinary emphasis upon materialism. Only those individuals whose minds are balanced and are neither in a state of hatred or reaction nor in a state of grasping and hoarding, can bring sanity into the human society at this stage. The human spirit longs to be free. It longs to escape the bondages that tie it to mere survival. Even when you meet survival needs and the material wealth is there, still there is a restlessness in the mind, a restlessness of the heart. In this restlessness, people long to find something and if there is nothing, they turn to pleasures of body, pleasures of mind and entertainments. What happens when the entertainments end? Still the restlessness is there. Still the unhappiness is there. Still the moodiness is there. There is the longing for something more, something which will satisfy one's very essential being.
That restlessness of mind and spirit does not find peace through materialism. It is unsatisfied even with one more car, a nicer house, and wealth and pleasure. The human spirit is more than this. The human spirit wants to sing, to be alive, to be whole, to be complete and to feel free. The human spirit doesn't want oppression by poverty, commercialism, war or totalitarianism. The human spirit wants to be free of these oppressive forces and to live in freedom. What does it mean to be free? When freedom is intellectual, people may think as they like, dress as they like and do what they like. This type of freedom satisfies a great many human needs. Still those who have this type of freedom realize they do not feel free, they do not feel that their spirits are complete. Why is this? Why does the spirit need more?
What brings real freedom to the human spirit is an awakening of humanity within each and everyone and the divinity that lies quietly within that humanity. That brings a person to real freedom, to real dissolution of oppression of spirit. This freedom does not depend on material wealth. It does not depend on governments or politics. It is a freedom of the human heart. The substance that the human spirit is composed of brings the brightness, the sunshine into the life of each and every person. When the human spirit is bright, happy, filled with hope, filled with joy, then the life is good. It doesn't matter what external circumstances are. To know this type of joy, this type of freedom of spirit one must look very deeply within. One must inquire into the nature of one's own being. One must find the love that is unconditional, the omnipresent, all-compassionate Self within, the one without differences, not defined by body or mind, not defined by any resume of achievements or list of failures. The spirit undefined by all of these defines itself by its own existence, its own strength. This the human spirit, alive and vital.
Human life is a flow of ideas, a movement from the crude to the subtle, a movement from that which is stagnant to that which is dynamic, to that which is sentient, peaceful, blissful, that which is love, beauty and compassion. These are qualities of the spirit. These sentient qualities separate spirit of a human being from the mere survival of the body and mind. All the noble people in this world who have done great deeds, taken great risks, had great visions and dedicated their lives to the betterment of living beings have had this type of spirit. The spirit of such people is defined by the flow of expansiveness, dharma, a flow to truth, to hope, joy and vision. These are subtle movements from mind to heart to spirit, where hope, vision and dedication move in a united way to bring a person to the pinnacle of human life.
From this dedication, love, sincerity, vision and hope, comes so much good for human society, so much beneficence comes to human society from people who inculcate this in themselves. These are individuals undaunted by circumstances. They refuse to give in to problems. It doesn't mean they don't have problems. They may have Himalayan problems but they refuse to give in. They refuse to be confined or defined by their own woes and weals nor by oppressions of society. Their spirits soar. They choose to look on the bright side. They choose to have hope. They choose to have dedication. They choose to do something great with their lives. Such people choose to enliven their humanity, their spirit, their spirituality and not to find oppression within the woes and weals of human society, within the confines of materialism, within the struggles and deficits that come in the world of survival.
The human spirit needs to fly. It needs a great ideology. It needs a shelter, ideals that form in the mind that are expansive and that have vision. This ideological flow from survival to vision, hope, truth, light, compassion, joy and love is the journey of the human spirit. In the heart of this joy and hope, in the heart of this vision, in the heart of this love lies the unity, the underlying wholeness of this entire universe where all beings have their source, where all things are alive and whole, where there is that which is eternal amid the ever-changing forces of the universe.
This is where humanity meets divinity, where the human spirit moves beyond the confines of "I" and "mine" and egotism into the realm of the sublime, into the wholeness of life, into the very source of all and everything. In this realm, there is no duality, no pain, no grasping and no fearing. For even though the façade of life is ever moving and changing, ever new, deep under the waves there is a calmness, a stillness, a changeless universe whose very nature is peace, whose very substance is love, whose very core is the essence of your existence and the existence of all beings. At the core of every one of you, at the core of every being, at the core of all life is the Self. At the core is the consciousness that is pure, pristine, unchanging, the witness of all that is, all that has ever been, all that will ever be, ever self-reposed, peaceful, self-inclined, whole, the witness, the knower, the seer. His nature is love without definition, without confines. His essence is peace and truth. In the source, all dualities and differences find resolve and the restless human heart finds its home.
Here there is no coming and going, no beginning and end. Here the universe is but an unstruck note. Here all that has been or ever will be is at peace. From this very source, this essential Self, the nature of all beings evolves. From this, creation is born. This unconditioned love holds creation and all beings. When eyes open into this ocean of beatitude, all beings return. Let this be your shelter in the storm, your haven in dark times, your hope and your strength, your fortitude through thick and thin. When you bring this strength of spirit into the world, you can make a difference. All people who awaken the strength of their spirit, their fortitude, vision, hope and their determination can lead this world from darkness, war and human sufferings into wholeness of human society and peace that cares for the welfare of all living beings.
The pursuit of your spirit, the understanding of your innermost truth is integral to your capacity to serve the humanity. They go together; the blind cannot lead. Only those who awaken their hearts, made their spirits strong, and know the unity of all life can endure through thick and thin and find the happiness that is without definition or confines, the happiness of the human spirit that does not depend on circumstances. This greatness of spirit is in each and every one of you. You are each and every one capable of bringing this forward in this very life. Do it and do it now! Be great! Be great in your service to living beings, your sacrifice to the welfare of all beings, your love. In your sadhana, your service to the divine, know your heart. Become truly human and in so doing, touch the shores of divinity.
