The Light of Incidental Understanding

Today I had a meeting with a friend in Puchong, so here I am at the nearest Papa Rich Cafe, having my vegetarian nasi lemak dinner and doing my weekly blog post. It's the beginning of another busy week and I'm glad that I have the opportunity to blog before diving deep into my work.

Over the years I've found a way to cope with work-related stress. We tend to treat work as too important when in fact it is not. How many times have we rushed to deliver presentations and proposals only to have decisions delayed or projects simply cancelled in the end? Customers often make use of vendors to do the hard work for them. My philosophy is that, whatever I do must have learning value. I don't mind doing 'stupid work', which does not come to fruition in terms of monetary rewards, but I still benefit from acquiring some new knowledge or skill in the process.

I realized that, what drives me is a desire to learn. Learning gives me a high. There is no greater pleasure than the pleasure of understanding--that sudden clearing away of obscuring clouds, to reveal a clear vista of comprehension. Big life-changing eureka moments are rare but those small aha moments do come on a daily basis. One must seize and relish them every time they appear.

They could come in the form of an insightful remark by a friend, or an inspiring moment in a movie or a touching passage from a novel. It could also come in the middle of a humdrum corporate meeting. The workplace is the arena of interaction between many egos. By observation how other people's egos work, you get to know your own better.

Every little insight we gain throughout the day contributes to our growth. Over time we will come to realize that the major hindrance to our spiritual growth is actually our ego. The more we diminish our ego, the higher we soar spiritually. Spiritual growth is fueled by the nourishment of understanding and accelerated by the elimination of the ego. The ego blocks the our arteries of spiritual nourishment. Hence we should pay as much attention to the accumulation of the ego, like what we do towards cholesterol levels.

Ego is merely fear congealed. It is a protective layer that the soul creates to help us avoid pain. But it soon becomes a hindrance to our growth. By opening up our vulnerable self, we allow the light of understanding to shine into the dark corners of our soul. So let there be light, and watch a universe unfurl itself from within.