Dominic Eddie Ralte
Asst. Professor, Salesian College, Dimapur
“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
One of the unique aspects of the human nature worth reflecting is our ceaseless quest for fulfilment. Unthinkable is our unhappiness when it comes to accepting what we are, what we have and what we do and our list of wants just seems never ending! Focussing our view on this negative aspect, we often pay little attention to our capacity to achieve a higher kind of perfection. This article, therefore, intends to strengthen the positive aspect rather than the negative. Also to be found down the lines are illustrations of the relationship between the internal and the external happenings of man and its contribution to the composition of a harmonious human experience.
A beautiful quotation by Mani Shankar states: “The vastness of space exists inside your mind. The farthest reaches of infinity lie in the space of your own heart. The abyss isn’t out somewhere. It’s right there. It is the gap between you and your unfocussed, clustered mind.” If this is the case then how does one fill in this gap? The greatest feature of humankind is his ability to initiate and welcome change. The theory of potency asserts man’s potentiality to cause change and receive change. Man is distinct; man is complete and perfectly capable of choosing who or what he wants to be. To support this fact, man has an innate power to instigate potency ‘to be’ what he wants to be and ‘to cause’ what he might likely want to happen.
“The world is my world” says Fichte. It is our underlying set of interests and values that serve to structure the world of our experience. If we open our eyes, we will encounter numerous sensations that become an inescapable part of our experience. However, we will not encounter meaningful objects until our minds make it to our world. A person might perceive the world cognitively as ‘matter in motion’ for one to manipulate and analyze. Another might perceive the world on an affective level filled with sentiments of love and expected tragedy. Yet another may view the world as a sphere of works and duties that need to be fulfilled placing emphasis on man’s psycho-motor aspect. As in our perception, so in our experience!
Moving on from the internal to the external one learns from the early Western and Eastern philosophers that man is made up of four elements namely, fire, water, air and earth. However, a significant component of man is his environment. It is man’s environment that plays a major role in shaping him and telling him who he really is. Human experience is a beautiful conglomeration of the past, the present and the future. We learn from the mistakes of our past as we build hopes of an unseen future. And unfortunately while we endeavour to hold on to the reigns of our past and future, we fail to maintain a firm grasp on our slowly slipping present. My mother once advised me, “Son, tread each step of your lif’se journey without regretful worries about the past and unduly worries about the future.” I saw how practical these words were as I ventured out in life, in the face of the prospects of a future career.
When the great spiritual guru, the Dalai Lama was asked what surprised him most about humanity, his answer was man himself. “He (man) is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present. The result being he does not live in the present or the future. He lives as if he is never going to die and then dies having never lived.”
Our response to the change posed would then be to emphasize the importance of the ‘internal’ and the ‘present’. While endorsing these, we must not however understate the role that the external aspects play in shaping us. What we need to understand is that these external things are only a help. The external is necessary, but we must not lose our identity while interacting and living in their midst.
We must realize that we, humans, are spectacular beings ever moving towards our identified goal and as we journey we ourselves must take on the role of the chief driver. The power and potentiality that rests within us possesses the ability to guide and lead us to self-fulfilment. What we really need is to go deeper into ourselves and understand and be one with our true nature. And in doing so we will realize that “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us”.
