Becoming a human being again

Sri Anishji entreats us to stop ‘doing’ and ‘becoming,’ and just ‘be’!

- Sri Anishji

You might feel that the title is rather strange because we all are human beings already; so, where is the question of becoming human beings again?

Let’s look at it carefully. The word ‘human’ is a combination of two words: ‘homo,’ meaning ‘man,’ and ‘humus,’ meaning ‘earth.’ And the word ‘being’ is most interesting here. It could mean ‘a certain intelligence to create, to relate, to connect, to communicate’ and also ‘a certain level of wisdom, peace, and joyfulness.’ Additionally, it could mean ‘a certain state of composure, consciousness, and awareness, and a capacity to evolve further.’

Look at the above attributes of ‘being’ carefully. These are all the qualities which make us human beings, distinct and different from all other forms of life. These attributes put us in a better position to perceive the world and experience life more deeply.

But many of us are not in our natural state of ‘human beingness’ all the time. When I look around, I find most of humanity has lost human beingness and has either turned into a ‘human doing’ or a ‘human becoming.’ Let’s understand this.

Human doing

Many of us are constantly engaged, or shall I say distracted, in or by some form of ‘doing.’ Many a time, we are not even mindful of our doing or the effects of that doing on our body and mind. Maybe it is because of our inability to just ‘be’ because of our super-active minds and uncontrolled thoughts. Even when we are not doing anything externally, our inner chatter is constantly active: there is a massive amount of doing that keeps happening in our mind space all the time.