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“When a wise man has carefully rid himself of carelessness and climbed the High Castle of Wisdom, sorrowless he observes sorrowing people, like a clear-sighted man on a mountain top looking down on the people with limited vision on the ground below.”

~ Dhammapada 28

When, through constant awareness or heedfulness, the wise one has dispelled heedlessness, a great thing has been accomplished. But that is far from the end of the matter. Now he must climb the high tower of wisdom (discernment). Being high, it will take both time and intense effort, for there is no elevator to the top. The Short Path and the Quick Path simply do not exist. There are, indeed, shorter and quicker paths, but frankly our distance from the goal is so long that to bother with such comparisons is laughable and a waste of time.

Once that height has been attained, sorrow is over for him. As Swami Yukteswar Giri pointed out: “Finding God will mean the funeral of all sorrows.” For Wisdom is God. Everything else is ignorance.

Once that state has been established in the consciousness, then the sorrowing state of others is clearly seen and–contradictory as it may seem for a sorrowless person–keenly felt.

Although he perceives, even feels, the sorrows of the sorrowing, yet he does so from such a distance that his mind is in no way seized or agitated by that suffering. The same factor that renders him incapable of suffering enables him to objectively observe the miseries of those he would help. He can see both where they came from (what caused the suffering) and where they should be going (to remove and avoid the suffering)–a perspective completely impossible to most of them. Does such a person decide to help suffering humanity? No. Having arisen to such a level, it becomes a matter of spontaneous volition on his part.

Today’s quotation and commentary are a guest feature written by Swami Nirmalananda Giri, the abbot of the Atma Jyoti Ashram. Please click here to read more by the insightful and inspirational author.

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