[Reprinted from a post(s) on bahaiteachings.org]
In
previous parts of this series I have attempted to lead up to the most
challenging question of life for a human being, an innate question built
into our very core: “Who am I?”
This fundamental question comes with many variations: “What do I want to do” or “want to be,” or “should I be?”
When we ask ourselves this important question, our minds
can inform our bodies and spirits in confidently choosing a direction in
life. We will, each one of us, decide to make our own path, follow
another’s, or choose none at all, letting happenstance guide our lives.
Regardless of our direction, we need our mind to help
direct us. Mental illnesses don’t make it any easier–just look at
Wikipedia’s long list of them under “mental disorders." Also:
"One in five Americans experienced some sort of mental illness in 2010, according to a new report from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. About 5 percent of Americans have suffered from such severe mental illness that it interfered with day-to-day school, work or family." [Source: ABC News, Jan. 19, 2012]
Being bipolar myself for more than 35 years, I can attest
to the suffering mental illness can cause–but also to the progress
medicine has made in effective treatments, both chemical and behavioral.
One of those effective behavioral approaches—mindfulness
meditation, which I discovered during a six-week class during my mental
illness treatments—helped provide a key to my own self-awareness. I
found that a regular practice of mindfulness not only aids treatment,
but also allows fuller expansion of normal life activities and brain
functioning.
Often we only think about pleasing our outer senses: touch,
taste, smell, hearing, and vision. Yet even comas and REM states prove
the mind and spirit still works without them. The Baha’i teachings also name five intellectual, spiritual or inner senses:
…imagination which conceives things; thought, which reflects upon realities; comprehension, which comprehends realities; memory, which retains whatever man imagines, thinks and comprehends. The intermediary between the five outward powers and the inward powers is the sense which they possess in common – that is to say, the sense which acts between the outer and inner powers, conveys to the inward powers whatever the outward powers discern. It is termed the common faculty, because it communicates between the outward and inward powers and thus is common to the outward and inward powers. – Abdu’l-Baha, Some Answered Questions, p. 216.
Obviously our bodies and minds and spirits use these structural tools for discovering the reality we call Me.
Precisely
by reason of our discoveries into the realities of our own selves over
the millennia, we have developed our five inward powers that are
equivalent to our outward powers. Those inner powers have now far
surpassed our physical powers alone. Our mental powers created
technology, which gave us the ability to see inside our own brains with
CAT scans and MRI’s, and increasingly learn what it means to be human.
So–why do I exist? The Baha’i teachings say that we all exist to grow spiritually—to fully develop those inner senses and powers.
We can live like the animal, rely only on our outward five
senses, take what we want and not care about others’ feelings, or we can
utilize our inward, spiritual senses, and find ways to live in harmony
and prosperity with our fellow human beings.
The opinions and views expressed in this article are those of the author only and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of BahaiTeachings.org or any institution of the Baha’i Faith.
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