The crisis of self-identification or how to understand who I am? From words to deeds. Match the scale of values ​​and emotions with a simple exercise

Following the technical and scientific progress more and more worries come into people's lives and a person finally loses all life orientations. The boundaries of individuality are erased, a society with a progressive economy dictates to a person who he should be, a person turns into a consumer, into a machine for receiving pleasure. How can you find yourself in all this crazy kaleidoscope of scenery?

Stop and hear yourself

We often seek happiness in external manifestations of this world and change in accordance with market conditions. Today I am an actor, tomorrow I am an entrepreneur. The fashion includes family values means my new project- family. Meditation and yoga have become mainstream, and now I'm already conquering the peaks of the Himalayas and mastering various asanas. But where am I in all this? How to find yourself and stop being a product of marketing? How can I understand what I want, what is my nature and purpose?

The first step on the way to yourself is to try to listen to your heart, to catch the state of inner silence and silence. To do this, it is not necessary to go to the Himalayas and go to the caves. You just have to try and slow down. endless stream time, react less external stimuli, feel this moment. This is what meditation is. We can find answers to all our questions within ourselves. Time mercilessly brings us closer to death, in the bustle of life we ​​forget about main goal of its existence. In the end, we die without knowing the meaning of life.

Who am I and why am I suffering?

The first question a person should ask himself is: “Who am I and why am I suffering?” This is the starting point. Without understanding the nature of one's "I", everything else loses all meaning. After all, not knowing who I am, I will not understand where I should go. Get as in wise proverb: "A sailboat moving without any purpose, no wind will be fair."

In the Caitanya-caritamrta (Madhya-lila 20.102), which is one of the main works of the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition, Sanatana Gosvami asks Lord Caitanya:

‘ke āmi’, ‘kene āmāya jāre tāpa-traya’
ihā nāhi jāni - ‘kemane hita haya’

"Who am I? And why am I haunted by the threefold sufferings? Without knowing this, how can I be auspicious?”

What are these threefold sufferings?

1. Suffering, the source of which is ourselves - our body and mind (in Sanskrit adhyatmika).
2. Suffering that other living beings inflict on us (adhibhautika).
3. Disturbances that bring us natural disasters and cataclysms under the control of the demigods, devatas (adhidaivika).

In response, he heard these words:

The commentary on this verse reveals the meaning of this statement:

"You are pure creature. You are neither a gross material body nor a subtle body composed of mind and intellect. You are actually an eternal soul, part and parcel of the Supreme Soul, Krishna. Therefore, you are His eternal servant. You belong to the marginal potency of Krishna.

There are two worlds: spiritual and material, and you are between two energies: spiritual and material. You are connected by relationships both with the spiritual world and with the material world, and therefore you belong to the marginal energy. With Krishna you have a relationship of simultaneous identity and difference. Because you are an eternal spirit, you have the same qualities as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but as a very small spark of spirit, you are also different from the Supreme Soul. Therefore, your nature is at the same time identity with the Supreme Soul and difference from It. This can be illustrated by the example of the sun and sun rays or on the example of fire and sparks flying out of it.

Error in first step

Man mistakenly identifies himself with the material body and mind. We can see how the whole world works for the sake of the body. All human activity, whether science or art, ultimately comes down to the search for pleasure. Industrial and information Technology exist only to be more and more rational with material point vision to use the resources of the Earth for their own enjoyment.

This fundamental mistake leads a person to a dead end. Scientific progress is followed by a regression of personality. The whole system of values ​​and coordinates of a civilized society is collapsing. The motto of today's life is the slogan: "Consume and conquer." The virus of exploitation penetrates into all spheres of our life, including, unfortunately, religious ones. Religion should also, in the opinion of most people, satisfy the needs of man, although its true meaning is to free man from the oppression of the consequences of his activities and direct him to the path of serving God.

If, from the point of view of reason, we analyze what the communist and post-industrial ideology has led us to, as well as any other material “concepts of happiness”, we will see that people have not become happier, rather, on the contrary, the level of emotional comfort is increasingly approaching zero.

The whole problem is that the living being has turned his back on God. This entire material world was created by the Lord only so that we could feel independent from Him and, in the end, having played enough, were disappointed in our miserable attempts to play the role of the Creator and returned to Him, to the spiritual world. This independence is illusory. In fact, we all depend on God for absolutely everything, even in the digestive process, what can we say about other aspects of our life!

But people are used to thinking that each of them is God. In government, at work, at home, after all. Thus, a person becomes more and more entangled in the intricacies of karma and his consciousness degrades. Thus, the living entity remains endlessly in the wheel of birth and death. It will be forced to be born and die again and again until it knows its own true nature.

I am spirit from spirit, not flesh from flesh

You have probably heard many times that you are not the body, but what next? Until a person realizes that he is not a body, but a particle of the spirit, existing forever and forever connected with God by the bonds of love, he will suffer.

Krishna says in Bhagavad-gita (2.20):

na jayate mriyate va kadachin
nayam bhutva bhavita va na bhuyah
ajo nityah shashwato "yam purano"
na hanyate hanyamane sarire

The soul is neither born nor dies. It has never arisen, never arises, and never will arise. It is unborn, eternal, always existing and primordial. It does not die when the body dies.

Each of us, one way or another, had the experience of this eternity of being, calmness and peace. We cannot imagine that with the onset of death we will not be. Our body changes, but we ourselves remain the same.

In order to understand this, a person needs to communicate with a self-realized soul, with one who already lives by these principles. Then gradually his consciousness will be purified and his life will acquire a different quality, he will understand what it means to live as a soul. Proper Communication born in the heart real faith and faith gives determination to go on spiritual path. But this is only the beginning.

Winning and losing are relative terms.

An interesting paradox: when we suffer a fiasco, whether it be a collapse of a career or a sudden onset of an illness, we experience pain, fall into a deep depression. We immediately experience a spontaneous reassessment of values. But everything that, from a material point of view, we consider a defeat, in fact, is a new step for us on the spiritual path.

So, any crisis turns into a spiritual blessing for us, if we have learned to correctly accept the lessons given to us from above.

The process of knowing yourself is incredibly exciting and worth any of our efforts. The happiness that we will gain by discovering our true nature is incomparable to any material wealth, because the most important wealth is knowledge about yourself and your relationship with God, which should eventually develop into love for Him. Knowing ourselves, we will gain freedom and harmony in the heart, which will extend to the whole the world. Making others happy is devotional service to God.

But we must remember that the Lord gives us freedom of choice. To stay in the nets of karma or get out of its fetters is up to us to decide.

Sources:

1. "Bhagavad Gita As It Is", A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
2. Srimad-Bhagavatam, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
3. "Chaitanya-charitamrita", A.Ch. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

Anna Gorbunova

Good day, dear friends!

Among abundance life circumstances, a constant cycle of problems, as well as tasks, we lose ourselves and turn into robots. Do you know the complete lack of understanding of what kind of person you are? What are they capable of? And what do you live for? How to understand who you are is the main question of today's article.

Finding yourself and your true purpose- the most important task of every sane person. Some manage to immediately get on the right path, while others need half a lifetime to find their place and cell in the universe.

How do we understand the correctness of our choice and development vector? Of course, this internal sense of harmony and peace of mind . But it happens that when we hardly open our eyes in the morning, we clearly and concretely understand that we are living not your life, but someone else's set of dry rules.

You graduated from high school, went to higher education educational institution, getting a profession. And then, a series of responsibilities and the words “should”: must find, highly paid and sometimes not loved, must marry or get married, be sure to start a family and become like everyone else.

And just then, a red phrase appears on the forehead: “ I can't find my life! And everything is here!". Familiar, right?

Changes in consciousness

I personally know people who, having given up on the next rules, have chosen road of another traffic. They boldly packed their bags in one hour and bought a one-way ticket, escaping from the annoying moralizing of local omniscient personalities. Having left far from his native places, a person rediscovers the facets of his soul. Whether it's a life alone with nature or a secret bunker in the suburbs, it's all driven by the desire to live independently and the way you want.

Here we again come close to the question, who am I really? Often, deceiving ourselves and keeping silent, we step on the same rake: betray dreams and take the path of least resistance.

Dreams of becoming famous singers, astronauts or artists, cut off real prospects the city or country in which we happened to be born.

Examples of personal defeats of relatives or parents, instilled already comfort zone, which later became a fortress, leaving which meant betraying the paradigms of ancestors.

Awareness and unpleasant cell sensation, into which we have driven ourselves on our own, begins to put pressure gradually. First, we are not comfortable with people, then with the environment, and then with ourselves. Why so?

The answer is simple, historically, the more in our lives material the happier we should feel.

A ghostly race for wealth, power and obsession desire to possess, burns down our real, not consumer perception. As a result, we, surrounded by iPhones and branded items, sit in the corner of our concrete boxes and dream of real freedom. But do we need such a present and future is the million dollar question!

Skill- a wonderful skill, having mastered which, life is much easier. Any decision you make will be yours alone.

You are free from blaming other people for this or that fate and the result of what happened. Being yourself both a whip and a carrot, you can model a picture of the world, which is ideal for a specific stage of your formation and evolution.

Methods for finding yourself

A huge stumbling block is lack of purpose, as such. Every day he lives out of inertia, out of habit and a certain alignment. Where did you lose yourself in all this?

To more clearly demonstrate the situation, I will give an example. Imagine yourself as the captain of a ship that plows the vastness of the oceans without a compass and clear coordinates.

Three questions arise: “Where to? What for? And for what reason? ". Equivalent to these three questions, many live their days. The reason is banal confusion and and own strength.

Some people collect opinions, others collect idols in order to somehow help their reflection in the mirror to find themselves real. Most of them do not understand what they want, what they strive for, but one hundred percent know what they would not want.

In solving this problem, the following points work fine. Stock up on the desire to pull yourself out of a state of stupor in front of the future and work through the exercises.

On these reflections, I will put an end to it. In such matters right advice no, and each of you is able to serve as a healer. Subscribe to update my blog and recommend it to your friends for reading.

In the comments, tell us about whether you managed to find your place in life and understand who you are?

See you on the blog! Bye Bye!

Today I want to discuss another topic that haunts many people. Most of those with whom I communicate, sooner or later ask the same question - who am I really? In this article, we will try to figure out the answer to this question.

On the topic of enlightenment, we often hear that there is no specific person. You are not this body or this person that you think you are, you are something more, and so on. Of course, we can believe that this is so, but faith alone is often not enough.

Well, says the person who has heard that he is not the body, if this statement is true, then who am I really? And reflections on this topic can lead a person into such nonsense, getting out of which is very, very difficult. To prevent this from happening, I consider it necessary to talk about it right now.

Let's try to answer the question of who you really are. To begin with, you cannot be what you can believe. And you, in turn, believe in everything that appeared after you appeared. In the beginning there was you, and only after that did faith in everything else appear.

Who am I really if I'm not what I believe in.

You are convinced that you are human. But did this belief appear immediately, at the moment when you were born? Obviously not. First you appeared, and then you were convinced that you are a man. And now you believe that you are human. Ask yourself the question - who was I really, before I believed that I was a person?

You are convinced that you are the body, but did this belief appear with your birth? Again, first you appeared, and after that you were convinced that you are the body. And this belief was confirmed by the fact that you can feel and control your body. By the way, you could feel this body long before you accepted on faith that you are this body. Now ask yourself one more question - who am I really, if you put aside the belief that I am a body?

You can also believe in other things that you can relate to yourself. Here is the fact that you are a man (woman), and that you are a parent, and that you are some kind of specialist, and that you are an adherent of some particular religion, etc., etc. And before all these things you already were. In the beginning there was you, and then there was faith in all this. And now again ask yourself the question - who am I really, if you put aside any belief about who I am?

Who am I really before all beliefs?

Based on different religions, we come to the conclusion that every person has a soul. The soul is more than just a body. The soul is what gives life to this body. And one of the possible answers to the question of who I really am is the answer - I am a soul.

Indeed, the soul existed before I was born in this body, and beliefs appeared after I was born in this body. This indicates that the soul was before any beliefs. So maybe the soul is who I really am?

If you think so, then ask yourself one more question - did the belief that there is a soul appear at the moment of your birth, or did it appear later? And if you reflect on this topic, you will come to one very weighty conclusion - the conviction that there is a soul, as well as the conviction that there is God - appeared after you appeared. You were here before all these beliefs.

And again we return to the question - who am I really, before all these beliefs? Who am I really, if I put aside all the beliefs that are inside me? Ponder at your leisure on these questions and perhaps it will lead you to some inner discoveries. Well, we continue.

Well, if I'm not a soul, then what am I really?

We can still look for an answer to the question of who I really am for a long time. And there can be many answers to this question. And indeed, you can say a lot about who you really are. But here it is necessary to understand that any answer you come to will be like a conviction.

Even if you say that you are nothing, or you are not, then this will also be a conviction. And here we come to the conclusion that everything you can say about yourself is nothing more than a belief, or faith. Therefore, now, I suggest that you digress from the question of who I really am, and talk about where, in terms of time, you are.

To understand who I really am, you need to understand where I am in time.

First, let's talk about the past and the future - after all, these are the places where you spend most of your time. To answer the question of who I really am, you should find out what is the difference between the past and the future. More precisely, what is the difference between the past and the present, and what is the difference between the future and the present.

Of course, here you can immediately say that the past is what has already passed. The future is that which has not yet arrived. The present is what is right now. But how does this help you answer the question of who I really am?

Do not rush to conclusions, but rather think carefully about how the past and future differ from the present. The past is no more, the future has not yet arrived, which means it does not exist either. Can the same be said about the present? Obviously, the present is the only thing that exists at all. Everything else (memories of the past and thoughts about the future) is in the present.

What makes the present real? What makes it possible for this present to be? What distinguishes the present (what is) from the past or future (what is not)? Perhaps it is your presence that makes the present real? And this, in part, lies the answer to the question, who am I really?!

Watch attentively. You are right now, that's a fact. You cannot be either in the past or in the future – that is also a fact. Thoughts about the past and the future are possible only now, at the only time when you are. At the same time, the future becomes real every second, that is, it comes to you. And the present, every second becomes the past, that is, it leaves you. You are at the center of this whole cycle of events. You are the cause of time. Now ask yourself - who am I really?

To understand who I really am, you need to understand where I am in space.

Let's return to the conversation about the body, or rather, to the space in which this body is located. Considering yourself an ordinary body, you take it on faith that you have freedom of movement. It seems to you that when you go on the road (even if you go to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee), you begin to move in space. But in order to find the answer to the question - who am I really, you need to think about the reality of your movements.

I will ask you a very simple question - if right now you take a step forward (either to the right or to the left), and then ask yourself the question “where am I now?” What will be your answer to this question? Most likely the answer will be here. And if I ask you to go to another room and ask yourself the same question, what will be your answer? Obviously the answer will not change.

What does it say? Everything is very simple - it means that wherever you go, in every second of your journey you will be here. The movement is around you (inside you), but you always remain still. Upon closer examination, it turns out that it is not you who are going to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee, but the kitchen is approaching you in the process of supposedly your movement.

Now again ask yourself the question of who I really am, but only with the understanding that you are in the center of the movement. Any movement is possible because of you, but you always remain motionless.

Who am I really, considering all of the above.

I don’t know how much you understand what is being said in this article, but I am trying to convey this topic in the most digestible way. Therefore, I consider the question of who I really am, from all sides. On the this stage we came to the following conclusions - you are not what you can believe in, you are not what you can say about yourself, you are what makes time possible, you are what makes movement possible. And we made all these conclusions, trying to find the answer to the question of who I really am.

Let's make one more conclusion. To do this, try to imagine that you are not. As soon as you imagine this, ask yourself one more question - if I were not there, then what would be? In search of an answer to this question, try to discard all beliefs. For example, you can say that everything would have remained, but I would not have been. How can you know about it? Do these thoughts look like ordinary faith or another belief?

If you go deeply into this task and really imagine that you are not there, then you will soon come to the conclusion that when you are not there, there is nothing at all. Everything exists only because you exist. Or - everything has the opportunity to exist, only thanks to your presence. Now ask yourself the question again - who am I really?

If you was ordinary person(this body), could you be the cause of time? And the reason for the movement? What about the reason that makes this world possible? Obviously, the answer to the question of who I really am cannot be - a person or a body.

So who am I really?

Given all of the above, we can draw one very weighty conclusion - you are what makes everything else have the opportunity to exist. Faith, beliefs, past, future, movement in space, and in general - this whole universe exists thanks to your presence. Based on this, the closest to the truth, the answer to the question of who I really am will be - I am what illuminates everything that happens, I am what makes it all real, I am what gives life to everything else.

Is it possible to somehow concretize the answer to the question, who am I really? You can say that you are God, since thanks to you everything can exist. But even this statement is possible because you exist. In other words, you make everything real, including talking about God.

There is nothing concrete to say about who I really am. You can say something concrete about yourself, but at the same time you must understand that any specificity is possible thanks to you. For example, if you say that you are the whole universe, with all its manifestations, then this will not be true either - it will be just a concept that is possible thanks to you.

You are what makes all these concepts and descriptions of you possible, but you are none of these concepts. I have nothing more to add here.

If you want to get as close as possible to the answer to the question of who I really am, then I recommend that you read the book Homecoming. It contains all my experience of spiritual search. What I started with, and how it all ended. You can download the book by clicking on the link below -