Video Information: 26th Advait Learning Camp, 27.11.16, Shivpuri, Uttrakhand, India
Context:
Khalil Gibran:
"Let there be spaces in your togetherness."
"Stand together, yet not too near together" .
~ What is togetherness?
~ What is Love?
~ How to love others?
~ What does it mean by let there be spaces in your togetherness?
~ Who is being referred to in these lines?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Context:
Khalil Gibran:
"Let there be spaces in your togetherness."
"Stand together, yet not too near together" .
~ What is togetherness?
~ What is Love?
~ How to love others?
~ What does it mean by let there be spaces in your togetherness?
~ Who is being referred to in these lines?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00One of them says, let there be spaces in your togetherness, the other one says, and stand
00:12together, yet not too near together, so it is not very clear, yet not too near together.
00:23You see to whom is this being said?
00:27This is being said to the mind, to the personality, to the one who has a partner.
00:41The one who has a partner certainly is the one who is retaining a personality that calls
00:49for a partner.
00:54So he is carrying his own thoughts, opinions, likes, dislikes, all the traits of the personality
01:11is still in him.
01:15And so is the other person, both of them are different beings and that is the reason why
01:22they are requiring each other, one person requiring the other person, getting it?
01:29Both of them still are retaining their individual characteristics.
01:36Now when you are still a personality and in this situation you come too close to the other,
01:48then only two or three possibilities remain.
01:54One possibility is in order to retain your personality, you extend it and dominate the
02:01other because all kinds of personalities, all kinds of views and opinions demand protection.
02:13They cannot tolerate or survive their opposites.
02:20So when they come in contact with someone who does not agree to them, who does not subscribe
02:27to them, they want to have the other one be like them.
02:34You say, I think like this, I live like this and now that you are close to me, now that
02:39you are a part of my life, you too must think like this and live like this.
02:44That is one possibility.
02:45The other possibility is the other one somehow gathers more power over you and the other
02:51one says no.
02:53You see, my ways of living are superior and I can prove that through argument or this
02:58or that and you live like me.
03:03And the third possibility is these two remain in continuous friction.
03:11The game of dominance keeps continuing because both of them are personalities and personalities
03:20by definition are eager to expand because personalities are insecure.
03:30Even the most liberal of personalities cannot tolerate disagreement beyond a point.
03:41So given the situation, if the two come very close together, all you will have is friction.
03:50At the level of the personality, there must be separation and what does that mean?
03:56That means that there must be space for the two to live in their own particular universes.
04:07You live in your universe, I live in my universe, you retain your likes, I retain my likes.
04:14Because at the level of personality, anyway there is no union possible.
04:23And if you try to enforce a union, it would result in even more suffering and tragedy.
04:33You are trying to bring two incompatibles unnecessarily together.
04:39And mind you, no personality is compatible with another personality.
04:45As long as you are a personality, you cannot really be compatible with any personality.
04:50It is not a matter of type.
04:54Because all personalities, I repeat, want their own protection, furtherance, continuation,
04:59personality is ego.
05:01So, Khenel Jubran is saying, let that not come very close, which by definition cannot
05:15be close to anything else.
05:19Personality by definition is exclusive.
05:24Let your hearts be close to each other, that is the only place where a union is possible.
05:34But beyond that, do not try to have an artificial nearness or artificial oneness.
05:43Keep space, maintain a distance.
05:50Do not start saying, I wear this way, so you must also wear this way.
05:56Because we are soulmates now, so our eating habits must match.
06:00We are together for life.
06:04So let us keep visiting wherever we go together.
06:17That cannot happen.
06:20For a while, that might work because there is the initial warmth of togetherness.
06:28But after that, it will just become a cause for irritation.
06:38Is Khenel Jubran saying that you must maintain a distance with your loved one?
06:45No, he is not saying that.
06:47He is saying only that can come together, which has the potential to come together.
06:57Hearts can unite, minds cannot, to the extent you are mind, maintain distance.
07:07To the extent you are a personality, maintain a space.
07:14And to the extent you are the heart, merge into the other, be totally one with the other.
07:27But that need not even be said because when you are the heart, where you are the heart,
07:33union happens on its own.
07:36It is inevitable.
07:37It is like water meeting water, just happens.
07:45The problem is when you try to idealize the situation because you have read stories, because
07:57you have watched movies and you say that there must be convergence, oneness, unity even in
08:10places where it is not possible.
08:16In places where it is not possible, maintain space, maintain a dignified distance, otherwise
08:31you will end up exploiting the other or being exploited.
08:41As human beings, we all are very different in many ways, at the level of body, at the
08:47level of mind, we are all very different.
08:55Those differences cannot be wished away.
08:57Every personality has a pattern, if the other one, this as a help starts breaking your pattern,
09:13but that would lead to a little friction as well.
09:18When the other one starts breaking your pattern, then he is not acting as a personality.
09:25Let me tell you something.
09:28Personalities are never interested in breaking somebody else's patterns.
09:35Personalities are interested only in continuing with their own patterns.
09:41In continuing their own patterns, if they break somebody's pattern, that is just incidental.
09:51That is never really their intention because the personality can never be so compassionate.
09:59The personality is always a little reserved, a little self-involved, a little selfish.
10:16To really be in a position where you can look at the other's patterns and challenge
10:21them, you should have first looked at your own patterns and challenged them.
10:28And if you have done that, then anyway you are not acting as a personality because challenging
10:34and breaking patterns is the work of the heart, not the work of the mind or the person.
10:43So in the job of pattern breaking, distances are not to be kept.
11:01Distances are advisable only to personalities.
11:06The one who has now seriously entered the work of breaking patterns is no more a personality.
11:15He can deliberately reduce the distance.
11:19He can deliberately come close to the other, even forcibly, if need be, because he is not
11:29now applying force to serve his own personal ends.
11:37He is now not coming close because his own personality is important.
11:44He is now coming close because there is something far bigger that needs to be done, not the
11:51petty task of maintaining your petty self.
11:56When we are saying people explain to this mind, mind wants to comprehend this, how do
12:12I know that at this particular moment that I am…
12:14When the mind is busy with its own mechanisms, the mind says, I do not need the heart.
12:22I am my own master.
12:25I am quite clever and smart.
12:28I do not need to listen.
12:32And when I say to the extent to which you are the heart, I mean to the extent to which
12:38the mind is surrendered to the heart.
12:47Surrendering of mind to heart does not mean anything outlandish.
12:51All that it means is that the mind has no personal agenda now.
12:55Personal agendas are there only as long as there are personal insecurities.
13:00When the mind is no more afraid, no more in the need to preserve something or secure
13:11something, then the mind is left with no personal agenda.
13:15What will I do now?
13:19Nothing of my own to defend, nothing of my own to protect.
13:26No personal needs to fulfill, what to do now?
13:33Only one thing is left then, you poke your nose in other's affairs, that is called compassion.
13:45Otherwise you are greatly jobless, what to do?
13:50Your own shop is closed, forever.
14:01So you become a consultant, advising others on how to run their own shops.
14:05Yes, yes, please keep going.
14:13Are these words only for the man who has a partner or is it a caution to the one who
14:21does not have a partner?
14:23Everybody has a partner, there is nobody who does not have a partner.
14:30These words apply to everybody who is entering into a relationship with anyone else and we
14:37are always in a relationship with something or somebody.
14:40So these words are for everybody, they are universal.
14:48When you know that you are selfish, why unnecessarily enter somebody's life?
14:55Don't you know what you will do when you will enter somebody's life?
14:59You will use that somebody to further your own selfishness, is that not obvious?
15:06Is that not obvious?
15:07The man wants praise from everybody, the man marries, what will he want his wife to
15:12do?
15:13Praise him, simple.
15:14That's it.
15:15So maintain a distance, that's why Khalil Gibran is advising, maintain a distance.
15:25If you impose too much upon your wife, then the relationship will be just this, keep praising.
15:36Maintain a distance, you do not yet deserve to come too close, just maintain a distance.
15:49As long as you are not surrendered, as long as you are a mind centric personality, Khalil
15:58Gibran is advising that you maintain a certain self-discipline.
16:06The self-discipline is, I do not deserve to go too close to anybody.
16:16That is a kind of penance, it's a kind of sadhana, tapasya.
16:25Even what I am, I do not deserve to touch somebody very deeply.
16:33I do not deserve to go too close to somebody.
16:37If I come too close to anybody, I'll just spoil the other one with my touch.
16:45Also because I'm a personality, so I'm vulnerable.
16:48If I come too close to somebody, not only am I going to hurt, but I'm also going to
16:53become liable to hurt.
16:58I'll cause hurt and also get hurt.
17:06So better you maintain a distance.
17:09The distance would never be likable, the distance would be a kind of suffering.
17:17But that suffering is necessary to remind you all the time that you are not close because
17:22you do not deserve to be close.
17:27You are not close because closeness is less important to you than the preservation of
17:33your personality.
17:35You wanted your personality, you remain close to your personality.
17:38You wanted closeness to your ideals, to your ambitions, then your ideals and ambitions
17:47are your beloved, you remain close to them.
17:51You do not deserve to go close to anybody else.
17:56You are married to your own thoughts and personal agenda and ambitions.
18:17Your quiet self is your spouse.
18:20Now why do you need a husband or a wife?
18:24You are all the time sleeping with your dreams and ambitions.
18:29Why do you need another person to sleep with?
18:33Even in your dreams, all you see is dollars.
18:40So you already have a sleeping partner.
18:45Why do you need a wife now?
18:47So maintain a distance.
18:51Go to the other only when you have returned to your virginity, only when you have returned
19:03to your simple purity.
19:07Now you are fit to be close to anybody.
19:27You are surrounded by so much.
19:45How is closeness anyway possible?
19:47You are surrounded by a lot, the other one too is surrounded by a lot.
19:53And if you try to come close to each other, would closeness happen?
20:06You are wearing 40 layers of protective clothing.
20:12The other one is also wearing 40 layers of protective clothing, including 40 layers on
20:19the face.
20:20So 80 layers in between you and the other person and the two of you are trying to kiss
20:25each other.
20:30Even the cloth would not be fully wet.
20:35Forget about lips meeting lips, there are 80 layers in between.
20:45The distance is already there, Kanil Gibran is saying acknowledge it.
20:50Do not try to enforce nearness, because nearness is anyway not possible given what you are.
21:06Even when people become husbands and wives.
21:35Do they ever drop these 40 layers of clothing?
21:43They may beget 5 sons and 10 daughters, while all the time being wrapped in their 40 layers.
21:58It is possible to biologically mate and reproduce, while mentally you have never been naked
22:09in front of the other.
22:13Mentally you have always been carrying your protective layers, your armors.
22:19But biologically you can meet and mate and beget sons and daughters.
22:29It is quite strange, you see.
22:35Being mentally exposed is so difficult that requires an innocence.
22:53Pulling down your trousers does not make you naked.
23:03Nearness is an act of real love, real boldness and real innocence.
23:33Yes, of course.
23:45Mostly our children do not arise from our love, they arise from our chemicals.
23:57And that is why the very beginning of the child's life is mired in misfortune.
24:08It is a tragedy of sorts that you can have kids even without love.
24:20It is a tragedy that you can have kids even when you are mentally yourself a kid.
24:32You have not attained to any kind of maturity.
24:37Forget about attaining to your maturity, travelling from your birth till your youth.
24:46You have just surrounded yourself with layers and layers of more and more conditioning.
24:53And in this dirty situation, you find that your biological apparatus is all set to reproduce.
25:04And an unfortunate child comes into this world.
25:12The husband, the wife, the father, the mother are wallowing in their own darkness.
25:30And now they have this child in front of them.
25:36What do you think they are going to do with him or her?
25:43And that's the way most of us are brought into this world and that's the way most of
25:47us are raised.
25:55Rare is the man who has ever seen his wife naked and rare is the wife who has ever seen
26:09her man naked.
26:15Nakedness is not so cheap.
26:23Nakedness is the height of spiritual ascension.
26:32To be naked means you must have the guts to peel off layer after layer, layer after layer.
26:40Like layers of an onion are peeled off.
26:43You must be able to peel off everything and then be left with just nothing.
26:49That is when you are naked.
26:51Now that is when you get the right to bring another life into this world.
27:03After you are firstly thoroughly clean yourself, now you have earned the rights to be a parent.
27:17The funny part is those who have really earned the rights to be a parent are hardly ever
27:22interested in now becoming a parent.
27:29They are not interested at least in becoming a biological parent.
27:35They may now start taking many, many, many people as their sons and daughters, but they
27:42do not feel the need to have a son or daughter coming out of their own flesh.
27:53So they become wider parents.
28:00They become fathers and mothers to hundreds and thousands.
28:30But as long as you are the personality, it will be very difficult for you to accept that
28:59your children are not your children.
29:01Because personality always demands ownership.
29:04It is insecure.
29:07It wants to lay claim.
29:12It wants to be assured that whatever it possesses will not be snatched away.
29:17So it wants to say my children are my children.
29:19I have a right over them.
29:22I have a right over them.
29:24Who are you?
29:26It's my family and my children and my private affair.
29:34And that's why Akhalil Jipran needs to assert your children are not your children.
29:39You are just a medium through which they came.
29:58Not from you.
29:59They come through you.
30:00Not from you.
30:01If you pass through a door and enter somewhere, then you do not have the right to that door.
30:29You do not have the right to that door.
30:36You do not have the right to that door.
30:40You do not have the right to that door.
30:43You do not have the right to that door.
30:46You do not have the right to that door.
30:49You do not have the right to that door.
30:52You do not have the right to that door.