“But when they came back to their communities most of them spoke very little of their experience, while some disclosed nothing. And those who chose to share this information, which went against the understanding and the conditionings of the masses, did so at great expense. Some were hung, some exiled and some were excruciatingly tortured.
“Society has a way of punishing anyone who undermines its reality. As such, only those who comply with the conditions of the community are able to live on.”
“Ok, but this makes one think… why is it that anyone who finds the reality becomes contrary to or conflicts with the society?”
“Well, because the society wants to have every individual completely comply with its system so that the established routine can go on undisturbed. But one who has found the reality cannot be restrained by conditionings or value judgments or emotions! The enlightened one will only be guided by the intellect and knowledge. This time, the society will start to oppose those who depend on their own minds and own knowledge, hence giving rise to dispute.”
“Yes, but if this person complies with the customs of the community but maintains his freedom internally, there won’t be any problems..?”
“Of course! This is exactly why many enlightened people have chosen to remain silent instead of sharing their experiences. In fact, many haven’t even written about it.”
“But then how will others benefit?”
“Good question. But this isn’t what you need to know today. Have you found your ‘self’, your essence? Have you transgressed your superficial life and started to live the reality to start thinking about being beneficial to others?”
“You’re right, but it’s inevitable… One cannot help but want to share beauty, benevolence and reality with his environment…”
Gonul was still trying to understand how the true self can be found:
“How can we be cleansed from all our humanly conditionings so that we can find out true identities?”
“It’s actually quite simple,” Alph reassured, “by seeing everything as ‘One’!”
“Hmm… Good idea, but unfortunately, by calling many ‘one’, many does not actually become one!”
“On the contrary, while existence was, always and will always be ‘One’ you give it multiple names due to the obstruction caused to your brains by your five senses, and hence think it’s many!”
“What do you mean?”
“Let me give you an example. If I tell you there is a hand, there is a foot, there is a nose, an ear, eyes and lips, there are knees, and there is a neck, you will think I am talking about multiple things that are all separate from each other. Then, if I were to tell you all of these are actually ‘parts’ of a whole, you will think that all of these separate parts came together to comprise the whole, that is, the whole is the totality of these individual parts. Whereas if I had told you: ‘There is one body. Various sections of this body are known by different names. So even though it is only one body, due to the various names, one may think it is composed of separate parts, so take care to not fall into this error!’ it is a different matter…