UK is going through the buyer's remorse or rather the decision maker's remorse after the Brexit referendum. The decision seems patently wrong (if the experts are to be believed) and it is very tempting to point it out as a limitation of democracy. It is important to understand that democracy is the best system humans have invented and the ability to self correct is its biggest strength. Blaming the demographic who voted for 'leave' is easy, but who doesn't make wrong decisions in their life (if we assume for a momen that the decision is wrong). I guess, we need to let democracy and the ability of people to assess their understanding of the world and as a result change their decision, take its course. I guess democracy is way better than the rule of organized religions where the scope of analysis and self correction way limited.
Other things
A few days back I made the attempt to explain Advaita Vedanta (AV) in a half written draft blog which I will probably never publish. It was purely an exercise to figure out whether I had understood it. I used the self-invented 'Conception-Death' analogy (CDA) and the 'wave' analogy (WA). The CDA is simply that whatever was present at 'conception' and isn't at 'death' is you. 'That' is manifested consciousness. 'You are that' (Tat Tvamasi). WA in its pure form says that the wave is akin to the manifested consciousness while the overall cosmic consciousness is akin to the ocean. The wave is the ocean. The WA covers the second statement of AV - 'I am Brahman' (Aham Brahmasmi). Interestingly I took ages to come to the CDA and WA as the essence of AV and it only occurred to me as I write the blog that they correspond perfectly well with the two profound statements of AV. Reinventing the wheel, eh?
I now find myself in the position of a person who has just won a massive lottery and has not idea how to spend the money. Because winning the lottery doesn't give you a clue about what to do with the money. I can let my limited brain try and figure it out and eventually reach a conclusion which probably has been preached for thousands of years, or show some gumption and try the methods being suggested by the brains-trust of AV, who have invented various ways of living the AV way. The brains-trust is in no way unanimous about their conclusions and therefore it is slightly harder to decide who to follow. The best way is to probably adopt the common methods which your brain agrees with too and prod your brain to work through the rest of the methods.
The teacher who has probably best helped me take that final bridge towards a clear understanding of AV is FH and it is might not be a bad idea after all to give FH a chance to help me live the AV way. AV way is not easy. A lot of AV way is trying to beat the intuition and the natural inclination of the mind. You are trying to row against a strong current and if your muscles are not stronger you get tired pretty quickly. Most important is that it is not fun. And most importantly (again) if it is not your natural tendency to persist, it is pretty hard to keep rowing. But rowing you must. Because there is no other way. If the muscles get tired rest and keep going. If it gets boring, and your brain seeks interesting short term pleasures, let your brain enjoy them for a short while and then keep rowing again. It takes a while for the brain to enjoy the boredom or enjoy the rowing. There probably is a destination, probably not. I don't know. The rowing might get easier as I develop some muscles and the brain might eventually find the rowing more addictive than the little pleasures.
The question that often distracts me from the AV way is the 'WHY?'. Unfortunately the question has been strongly embedded in my brain since childhood by my grandfather, along with a strong skepticism about everything, I am quite incapable of motivating myself to whole heartedly pursue pretty much anything. I guess in this case I might have to at least give the brains trust a chance. And I mean a really good chance. In the words of Morpheus 'You take the blue pill and the story ends- you wake up in bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes'. I guess I need to take the red pill.
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