Vipul Agarwal, Delhi, 19 February 2024
Scriptures give a lot of premium to the quality of honesty. This world is full of dishonest people and most of them are doing well in life. Therefore, at times, we doubt the value of this quality. However, if we examine it a little deeper, that doubt arises because of two fundamental errors. Firstly, we do not appreciate the wider meaning of honesty and, secondly, we see the consequences on the surface and miss the deeper impacts.
Honesty has a very deep meaning. First and the foremost requirement is to know oneself. There are layers and layers of the unconscious mind. Unless we examine, observe, and get to know these layers. we don’t know ourselves. Unless we know ourselves, how can we be honest? After all, honesty requires transparency. How can a black box be transparent? Secondly, even if we know the ins and outs of the black box and the black box becomes completely transparent, how can we disclose this to others? It is not possible to disclose these secrets to even our spouse or closest friends because we like to play with the images. We create an image of ourselves that is quite spic and span and keep implanting that image in the minds of others. If we tell the inner truth, this image will be destroyed. That image is so dear to us that we do not dare to be honest.
Thus, there are two primary barriers in the process. Firstly, knowing the black box and, secondly, to be able to disclose the inner truths to the person we are interacting with. We do not understand how we are caught in the loop. Since we keep telling lies about ourselves, almost the whole of our lives, slowly and unconsciously, and also consciously to an extent, we start believing in those lies.
Psychologically, if a lie is often repeated, it starts appearing like the truth. That’s what happens with all of us. We start mistaking our own image that we have created to be ourselves. That makes the process of inner examination all the more difficult. Thus, on the surface, such a person may appear to be doing well, but there is a lot of trouble inside. The inner soul is imprisoned and if we talk to a person who is caught in the loop, there is a great desire to be set free. That brings restlessness to the personality.
So, lack of awareness in daily life makes the black box darker and darker, which in turn makes it difficult to examine. This makes our mental image appear more and more real, which increases our fixation on that mental image, which in turn makes us more and more artificial and dishonest in our relationships. In the process, the soul, as a prisoner, keeps crying for freedom and the restlessness keeps increasing. The first step to set free the imprisoned soul is examination and observation. The moment we observe the inner world with equanimity, the black box starts becoming transparent. We see the difference between the mental image and the self clearly. The soul gets the strength and we start becoming honest in our relationships. Pretensions drop. We behave as we are in reality. That brings a lot of strength to the relationships.
