THE GREATER UNDERSTANDING

THE FIRST THING YOU HAVE TO DO is look for yourself. Because there's two of you. There's you and the Other You. There's the one who's here and the one who's watching. And you need to find the one who's watching. He can help you. You need him and he can show you.

If you have problems with this just think of your conscience. Sometimes it watches you, catches you doing something. Catches you like your mother with your hand in the cookie jar. But it's not your mother and you didn't do anything wrong anyway. And after a while you notice that the Other You is not judgmental. He just stands there and watches you do whatever it is you're doing.

And when you turn around and see yourself looking, you may be surprised and do a double-take. Like walking in front of a mirror. You'll be self-conscious. At first because you feel observed, perhaps naked, and you thought you were alone. Then because you see yourself through other eyes, unfettered by bias, prejudice, or emotion.

But if you can stop looking at yourself and start seeing your Other Self, you'll see in him a friend. Someone who understands you. Someone you can talk to. Someone who knows you best and can answer your unanswerable questions. He can show you the seed . . . the seed that is in you.

Until you've identified the seed you cannot know which way to grow. There's no point trying to be the best pumpkin when the seed says you're a watermelon. This is called polishing the diamond.

You see, there is “The Understanding”. First there is our understanding, yours and mine and it is limited to its infinitesimal insignificance. Then there is the understanding of mankind or humanity. It is the accumulated knowledge of all who have preceded us in this world and have recorded it somewhere. And there it lies on the shelves, a greater body of knowledge than any one of us can go through in a single lifetime. But it lies there on the shelf, locked into itself, immobile, static.

But ours, our understanding, limited as it may be, ours is infinite in its potential because we, you and I alone, can reach into the unknown and pull out a kernel of knowledge from that great unknown, that other place, the Greater Understanding.

Somehow we all hope that at some time at the end of our lives we will crawl through the long dark tunnel to the light at the other end and someone will be there to give us the explanation. But as we progress, as our insight grows and we shed our coats, we shiver in the cold with the sudden realization that there is probably no one at the other end of the tunnel, no one to explain it all. It is then we falter. It is then we fall. It is then we despair.

BUT THERE IS AN EXPLANATION! That kernel of knowledge that you dug out of your Other Self came from somewhere didn't it? Where do you think it came from? It must have come from that other place, from the Greater Understanding, from the explanation. And you and I, when we crawl through that long dark tunnel and come out at the other end we won't need an explanation. WE WILL BE THE EXPLANATION!

Jay Frankston
Little River, CA 95456
wlp@mcn.org