Can enlightenment be reversed?

One of the definitions of enlightenment is "Small mind merging into the universal mind". When you feel one with the whole existence.

The classic example of waves in the ocean is the closest way to explain the relation of a living being and this universe. However, today while looking at my glass of water, a thought crossed my mind and I thought of penning it down.

Let's say the whole universe is a glass of water. Now a part of this water is frozen and the resulted cube of ice is a Jeev. This Jeev identifies himself to be separate from water. He lives his life, gets enlightened that it was part of the water, and thus dissolves back.

After the dissolution, the Jeev does not remain. It is only water. Can the next ice cube form be the same as the previous one? Let's call this new ice cube as Prani. Are Prani and Jeev the same soul or different? As Jeev got enlightened, would Prani also get enlightened that quickly? Or can this process be reversing of Jeev's enlightenment?  Could it be possible after Rama and before Krishna, the same soul came in this world just as any other non-enlightened being?

For non-enlighten beings, this dissolution may not be complete. We may just touch the source and come back. Or maybe we just try to see this source while remaining in our own identities. Even a tiny bit of this dissolution is capable of reconfiguring the wiring of Jeev or Prani. This is what happens in our deep meditation. Something changes. The person before and after the meditation is not the same. Even though the subtle changes are not reflected immediately, a meditator can easily see a change in him or her over the period of time.

The water knows all the ice cubes formed from its water. Though the ice cubes would never know the water until it dissolves completely in it. But after dissolution, the ice cube does not remain. Does that mean ice cube can never know other ice cubes completely? Or maybe a super ice cube can dissolve into the water, download the information and then come back in the same ice cube form. This ice cube could be our body and the thing which dissolves could be our mind. The quantum physics says matter actually does not exist. The world just appears to be. So, the real us is just our mind. This mind is nothing but energy, like a small wave of energy in the infinite pool of energy.

Life in a Hexagram

Meditation is the food of our soul. It helps us experience the theories of life explained by scholars time and again. These experiences are as exciting as it gets. Here is one such experience which left me in awe.

This universe is made of five elements - Earth, Water, Fire. Air and Space. And so is our body. Our body remains alive only if air passes through it, i.e. if we breathe. A baby is born in this world weighing 3/4 kilos. He or she eats food and drinks water and grows into a 60/70 kilos adult. The food he or she eats comes from the earth which is grown with the help of sunlight (fire) and water. All of this happens within space. There is space in the body. That is why we can eat food, drink water or breathe. Our body is like a hexagram with these four elements - earth, water, fire, and air.

Earth and water flow downwards and are represented as feminine energy like Dharti Mata and Ganga Mata.

Similarly, fire and air flow upwards and are represented as masculine energy like Agni Dev and Vayu dev.

A mother holds her children, feeds them, nourishes them. While a father teaches his children life skills and helps them achieve their goals in life. The feminine energy in us keeps up grounded, and masculine energy helps us rise upwards. Though a healthy life is a balance in these feminine and masculine energies, a life happens only when these two energies meet.

Our body is like a hexagram, i.e. a combination of two triangles, one pointing downwards and other pointing upwards. This hexagram has a lot of significance in many religions like Hinduism, Jainism, Islam, and more. The more we learn about the symbols, the more interesting it becomes.

However, the most intriguing part of this is the fifth element of the universe - space. Is it possible to capture the space in any symbol? Well, it is something where all of this happens, or for that matter where a symbol is created. In some beliefs, the universe is said to be made up of only four elements - earth, water, fire, and air. Space is not considered as an element. The subtler we go, the more difficult it becomes to understand. Meditation can help us experience the space, the very existence.

Experiencing these elements within us can open up a whole new perspective to look at this universe. It is so rightly said that you are the universe. The play of these elements which continues in our bodies to keep us alive is the very same which keeps this universe alive as well.

Inspired by Gurudev Sri Sri Ravishankar's meditation.