It is quite fashionable for educated people to say that they do not believe in ritual, just as it is to say that they do not believe in God. It is rather sad because words after all represent certain processes or phenomena. Over a period of time the word gets separated from the phenomenon it represents and so loses its significance. Let us take an example. Before taking a meal many people say grace. This is a way of thanking all those who have contributed in making the meal available to us. This would get us into the right frame of mind to appreciate and savor the meal. This would initiate a series of processes that ensure that the food leads to good health. The individual acts that constitute the whole process, taken by themselves, may appear to be meaningless. In fact often they do.

If we look at the process like this, in bits and pieces, then we do not see its significance. An ordinary person is likely to discontinue the practice, as it appears to be a useless effort. But educated thinking persons also do that is sad in deed.

A thinking person is expected to cultivate an empty mind. He would know that ideas (thoughts) need free space to play and evolve. A mind crammed with ideologies and dogma creates obstacles to free flow of ideas. Knowing this a thinking person would try to keep his mind open, free for ideas to come, to play around and then to go. He would not store them and claim ownership over them. He is free and the ideas are free. If he notices a practice that does not seem to make sense at first glance, he would not reject it out of hand by calling it names such as ritual or superstition or blind faith. He would investigate and try to find out the essence of the practice. He would then be able to modify it to suit the specific space and time (also called culture).

Let us take an example. It is customary for people to greet each other when they meet. This is the opening gambit (ritual) to establish a friendly atmosphere between them so that further interactions may go on smoothly. The act of greeting varies in each culture. We do not know how these practices developed and the practices of some cultures may appear to be weird. Should we then reject the whole process (ritual) of greeting? And then justify the rejection by saying that we do not believe in the ritual? Won’t that be rather far fetched?

Ritual is often used in spiritual practice. My primary focus is with this. The purpose of spiritual practice is to lead us to an experience of oneness, indivisible and undifferentiated. At the face of it all things (and people) in this world appear to have a unique and distinct identity. They are separated from each other and the differences seem to be irreconcilable. This is how it appears to our senses. We have been trained over centuries to believe as true what our senses are able to present to us. Our mind is stuffed with all such information. This is our frame of reference. All new information is accepted or rejected by reference to this frame (also called paradigm).

With this background it would be obvious that for a spiritual experience we have to go beyond our senses and beyond our mind. How do we do this, since these are our most valued tools of knowing? The ancient sages solved this puzzle by using them to go beyond them. The senses and the mind are our best friends and the worst enemy. If we treat them in a friendly way, they behave as our best friends. If we challenge them, they become a stubborn enemy. Logic, arguments, debates cannot defeat the mind or the senses. We will continue to remain trapped in the earlier paradigm. We have to fool it into complacency. We give in. We surrender. We do things mindlessly. No arguments, no debate, no logic. We act on faith and then faithfully watch for the quantum leap. We may endlessly repeat a particular name or sound or we may endlessly perform an apparently pointless act till the trick happens. And let me assure all the non-believers that it does happen. The only condition is that the act is performed with complete faith. There is absolutely no room left for doubt to spoil the show.

The funny thing is all of us do this in life. We believe in something or the other, be it science or spirituality or a political ideology, or the jackpot. We all have our own private faiths. Why not be a little more open to those of the others?

We may not like to believe it but the fact remains that the world runs on faith.

Author - Ganoba Date