Know Your Conscience

'You are the Stone, You are the Chisel, You are the Sculptor' read the wall poster in my room which caught my attention as I was about to pen down few thoughts and ideas, as part of my routine. This article might contain few excerpts of those scriptures which generally come from my inner voice after encountering an intriguing or a disconcerting moment. I write this with the motivation and a sense of redemption of the way few things are moving.

Everything connected to us revolves around and depends upon our emotions and actions. Knowledge has limited means to this, since, knowledge leads to conclusions only. But it is the emotions, nourished by the knowledge, which puts one on drive. It is therefore all about how we see, what we do, and what we are. And to check ourselves on the moral grounds of our moves, we need to know about our conscience.

Conscience, to define, is the sense or consciousness of the moral goodness or blameworthiness of one's own attitude, intentions, or character together with a feeling of obligation to do right or be good. In simple, it is the awareness and assessment of a moral or ethical aspect of one’s own conduct. By comprehending and grooming the conscience, one could scale the heights of acceptance and pleasure. It is the gateway to understanding. Well, people often get annoyed or complain about others’ actions. It isn’t surprising in any way. Our mind, the most complicated machine, is used by various people for various purposes. We all of us share a common planet, but not a common aisle of wisdom. Right from our childhood, we have been groomed and raised in different circumstances by different mentalities - Some by knowledgeable parents, and some by elderly fools, the confused souls. And it is not naïve of me to call these 2^nd category elders as fallen or deteriorated children. And so, we shouldn’t expect the world to run on our terms. Instead, one should be easily adaptable.

Our conscience could mean everything related to us. It’s the real ‘You’ thing. The clarity of thought, nature of determination, power of discrimination, attitude, ego, greed, anger etc. reflect the conscience of a person.  Personally, it has been one of the few things that amuse me to think about. It is the answer to the most common question of all possible aspects -- “Why?” It has been successful in setting trends of human psychology driving people, by and large, from ‘love at river banks’ to ‘work at war tanks’.

Empathy is another aspect which is closely related to conscience. Empathy is the ability to share someone else's feelings or experiences by imagining what it would be like to be in their situation. Know people, develop your empathy, and accept the destiny. It will give you clear comprehension of activities and people around you. “You don’t need religion to understand people; you need Empathy” I read somewhere. Well said.

Maturity is another aspect which we, the humans, commonly refer to. It was, and still, is a general perception that the one who has a considerable knowledge and experience of life can be considered a matured person. But, I guess one cannot be a matured one without having a good conscience and quality of empathy. And as long as one is on the move to seek the peak knowledge of spiritual domain, or until one gains it, the bounds of maturity are mostly little known. Being matured and the feeling that you’re matured when you’re actually not, shows lot of difference and makes little sense. You could only discover it when you bloom or progress- being more open to life- and agree that you were an idiot some time before.

I’ll just make you think a bit regarding few things where we can question our conscience. We will start with our education. Oh, I wish that term could mean ‘only’ grooming our intellect and nothing else. But, in many cases, it is likely the other way around. There are some students who can easily manage to lead a mere successful life despite low grades among the ones who show pride in their marks (not authentic in many cases). But, it is naïve of ‘some’ of the latter group ones whom I’ve seen treating the former ones like kind of schizophrenic and unfit. Your real quest starts when you get to feel dubious about your knowledge and your wisdom is tested. Remember frog in the well story? Also you need to make sure that the accolade and acclamation you receive after some success shall not repress the on-going progress of the intellect. If it does, you continue to stay in that well. That very act doesn’t describe your success, it describes your limits. Ponder over the fact that the universe is ever expanding at over 71km per second. What we need is the ignition of a spark in our minds which shall pose the question: In what way would you dare to impact our society? Just going by the marks, showing pride in that-- both are useless. Gain the real wisdom and put your mark out there. Need an example? I’ll give you an enriching and inspiring one: Leonardo da Vinci. Just Google him and you’ll be stunned while reading about this great Renaissance man. He’s a real polymath: painter, sculptor, architect, musician, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, cartographer, botanist, and writer. Our world has given us enough resources and we’ve got enough challenges to strive for; and so, just trying to be a prince or princess in your own well can’t be justified. Know yourself. Get out of your well.

Yes, first know yourself. I bet not many of you reading this know completely about yourself. It’s the quest for the inner spark and self-awareness. Show the compos mentis. And do it alone. If you could experience the mystics of being alone, loneliness is a great thing, of course! It shows you the purpose behind every act. People say we need divine intervention for few things to happen. But, what’s not happening without it? It’s actually the divine play in which the most complicated machine -our mind- is intervening. All happens for a purpose. Agree me or not, I’m not even sparing the Delhi rape incident.

The recent brutal rape assault in Delhi has once again questioned the country’s laws and security practices. And the involvement of a juvenile in the rape leaves many areas unaddressed. It is pathetic to see the people of India, the land of spiritual courtesy and supremacy, falling down to corporal aesthetics. Now, whatever measures we take to control such ghastly attempts, howsoever we improve the social security & laws; we are incomplete. It is hard to disagree that the real change should start from within the individuals --their consciences. It’s not a matter of can. It’s a matter of should. The advent of love & sexual interests into the agglomeration of people right from the adolescence, nah, right from the childhood stage is no surprising sign, given that the circumstances are in such way. Spending time to find ways to keep them away from such injecting factors would not be a great idea, given the flexibility of those factors. Instead, they should be made to learn the amazing aspects of spirits and the divinity associated with it. And when (some) elders themselves are ‘fallen children’, how come the youngsters learn?

In this context, I find something worth mentioning just for the sake of my point. I remember reading a line from one of my favourite novels ‘The Da Vinci code’. It says, “Gentlemen, the next time you find yourself with a women, look in your heart and see if you can approach sex as a mystical, spiritual act. Challenge yourself that spark of divinity that man can only achieve through union with sacred feminine”. The use of the term ‘only’ in the sentence might sound obnoxious to some people. But, taking our conscience to a more holistic and sagacious approach would be a good deed.

Though I’ve come across a couple of points to tell you about conscience, I’d like to clarify a bit at the conclusion. Conscience is not about living a disciplined & spiritual life and flushing all the enjoyment, if you’ve been misled. It’s all about the basic things with which we should seek an early clarification -- the way you think, the way you feel, and the way you act -- as humanly, solemnly and morally as possible. Now let us choose the path of our journey… of wisdom and selflessness, hopefully, with no bounds.

 

Oh lord, give us the power…

Not to fly, but to sense the virtues

Not to curse, but to unleash our love

Not to segregate, but to embrace

And not just to know our lines, but to envisage our conscience.