Women's day-March 8
March 8'13-It was the International women's day.The day being Friday,I entered my office in my trendy casuals of white shirt and blue jean.HR team invited and treated the honoured people of the day with the candy.A gentle man who just then passed by, enquired about this royal treating.He put up a long face and said with a wry smile,"Men..do we not deserve a day to celebrate??..The sad part of this world is that this has now become a world for women."I gently gave a smile to this gentleman for his misconception and started writing this article as soon as I reached my cubicle.Some may find it confusing cause my latter part of explanation is vague.I put in one line.Men and women by birth are two separate tombs(!) of human civilisation. By the then blending of so called culture, each being nourishes the opposite within.Its been said even in scriptures that each man has a character of the opposite gender inside and viceversa.
You can find common themes throughout many of the world’s religions: Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, as well as those that existed long before modern religious history. One of the more common motifs that appears cross-culturally is that of the virgin birth. We all know the story of Jesus and how he was said to have been born of a virgin. In Buddhism we also have the story of Buddha being born from his mother’s side. Both of these stories are simply ways of communicating a deeper truth.
The Virgin Birth
We’re usually taught to focus on the historical aspects of these births—what happened and whether somebody was or wasn’t a virgin. But this misses the point. If we just look at the historical facts of some religion and try to decide whether they’re right or wrong, we miss the significance of the teaching. These stories of virgin birth refer to the birth of that which is born without the coming together of opposites. Our human birth is the birth of opposites. It’s the coming together of male and female, and that produces a human being. Our humanness is a manifestation of the opposites, our hearts beating, opening and closing, our lungs breathing in and then out and then in and out. So our physical birth is always a birth of opposites, which is quite beautiful in and of itself. The whole world around us is the manifestation of opposites, no matter what its expression. But this notion of the virgin birth addresses our “second” birth, our birth after we were born. It’s the birth, in our consciousness, of a vision that’s not based in duality. These stories recognize that what we really are is in fact the source of all opposites, of both male and female, both this and that. It’s the birth of a unified vision right into this world of time and space.
Jesus’s virgin birth is trying to tell us that this person, Jesus, the Christ, was really a manifestation of what was beyond the pairs of opposites. And that person is also you. Certainly he had a human body and a human mind, just like you. In fact, he referred to himself as “the son of man.” Later, others began to refer to him as “the son of God.” Jesus knew that he had a human body and mind, and yet his consciousness was not of the world of opposites. The virgin birth points to our own awakening from the ego. At the moment of awakening, it literally feels like we’re being born again, or like something completely new and unexpected has shown up in our consciousness. It literally is a virgin birth—a birth not of duality, but a birth of nonduality, a birth of that which is far beyond all dualities.
Beyond the opposites
We don’t have to go a long way to find this virgin birth; we can investigate our experience right here and now. Like everything else in truth, it’s already present. If you look into this moment and become quiet and sensitive, you can intuitively feel that there’s something about you, right here and right now, that’s not definable as male or female, as this or that. There’s something about you that’s not definable at all. There is already a sense in you of that which cannot be defined by any words. That’s the consciousness that’s birthing itself into recognition, possibly at this very moment. It may start out as just a glimpse, a taste, a feel, but if you give great attention to it, a recognition dawns that there it is, in your experience right now.
The fact that our true nature is ultimately nondual is precisely why when we’re born into this material world we find ourselves attracted to our opposite. It doesn’t mean that all men are attracted to women, or all women are attracted to men, but if you really look at the deep intimate or romantic relationships of human beings, you’ll see that there’s often something in you that is attracted to your opposite, something that you don’t feel like you have. That’s our spirit’s deep desire for union, for coming together, for remembering our unified nature. Always there is that which is neither male nor female, but both and beyond. All you have to do is turn, right in the moment, into the depth of your own experience to see this. Let go of your mind trying to define anything, and you’ll see for yourself that what you really are is something beyond all definition.
Equal within
There’s a wonderful quote from a very famous Zen master called Huang Po. What it describes is the unity of spirit, that our truest nature is neither this nor that, but both. It also elegantly describes the natural nobility found in all of reality. To begin to experience the truth of what Huang Po is saying here, you must understand how he is using the word “mind.” He uses it in the way that we use the words “consciousness” or “spirit.” By “mind,” he’s not referring to the thinking process, but to the context in which all form, including thought itself, appears. He said: “Mind is the Buddha, and the Buddha is all living beings. It is not less for being manifest in ordinary beings, nor is it greater for being manifest in the Buddhas.” This is Huang Po’s way of saying that all is one, and whether it’s ordinary or extraordinary, it’s all an equal expression of spirit. It all has its ultimate value, ultimate goodness, and ultimate nobility. It doesn’t matter if it’s known or unknown. It doesn’t matter if it’s exalted or small, high or low. When we see with our eyes wide open, we see that everything intrinsically is an expression of divine reality and is filled with ultimate worth and value.Search continues..
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