What is the meaning of life? The simplest yet the most meaningful response to this question came to me from my spiritual teacher, Shri Ram Chandra of Shahjahanpur: “Life in life is the real life.”
When we ruminate further, we understand that life is an experience. And any experience can be either subjective or objective. An objective experience identifies with the material world and is fact-based, like ‘the sun rises in the east’ or ‘the earth is round’. This is common for all. Whereas a subjective experience identifies with the inner world and is opinion-based – like ‘it’s best to wake up in the morning’ or ‘let us begin our day with positive intentions’. It can be unique to each one; it is our personal perception of reality.
Objective and subjective experiences are not independent of each other. An experiment conducted at Johns Hopkins University, gave evidence that it is nearly impossible to separate the objective and subjective experiences. We cannot fully separate our perception from the actual reality.
“Our subjective approach to the world stays with us,” says lead author Jorge Morales, the Perception and Mind Lab. “Even when we try to perceive the world the way it really is, we can’t completely discard our perspective.”
For example, our spiritual experiences are subjective and can never be negated. The objective and subjective experiences are always to be integrated. Our feelings and perceptions are very much integrated with actual events or tangible things. We can integrate these in a masterful way, in a completely balanced way, and stay in harmony with Reality.
Integrating these two aspects depends on our inner vision. If you see through a red eyeglass, everything will have a red tinge. Peering through a blue glass will cause objects to appear blue. However, a clear colourless glass will show everything as it is. That is one of our goals – to see it all ‘as it truly is’ in our inner vision. Life is not decided on simply these two aspects but by the way we lead our lives.
Shri Ram Chandra used to say, “Life means liveliness; damnation for those who are dead at heart.” Think of a love-filled person versus a loveless person. You can sense the difference. Whenever we are in the company of greedy, selfish individuals, we want to run away from them. Somehow, our heart recognises what is missing.
In contrast, we always enjoy being around those filled with love. Not only are they filled with energising hormones pumped into their bloodstreams and nerves, but they can also induce such a state in us.
What is the power that makes them galvanise others, even thousands and millions of people, into a high-energy state? When we say a person is full of life, it means they have a heart filled with love.
On the other hand, some people can be alive physically but not really alive internally, because their hearts are not filled with love.
The experience of life when lived full of love, full of life, gives meaning to life, and can make the statement, ‘Life in life is the real life’ come true.
-Kamlesh Patel
