Creative Thinking: The ‘cage’ is illusory
In this world of ours, we are all a bit crazy (Yes, you and I, too!). Maybe not all the time, but quite often we definitely are. Do you disagree? You believe that you are totally sane and, almost surely, you are — from a clinical point of you. You are a rational human being who behaves in a rational way. How “rational”? Can you honestly deny that once in a while you act without using your power of thinking sensibly?
You have been taught to consider yourself as an empty container which needs to be gradually filled up. Such teaching has been carried out by education and by all the conditionings you have continuously endured by society and environment. “Don’t do this because it’s wrong!,” “Don’t say that because it is not polite,” “Don’t do that thing because it’s unseemly.” Many are the prohibitions you received since childhood. Also many are the injunctions they imposed upon you to do specific things because politeness, fashion or customs require a specific behavior. You are caged, imprisoned in a strangulating net of “do” and “don’t do,” “say” and “don’t say,” even “think” and “don’t think.” Such a net was created by other human beings who gave themselves the right to decide, to establish certain rules and who were then smart enough to make others obey them. This is the way behavioral habits were born on both the physical and psychological level.
You live as if you were in a prison and you are so well accustomed to your state of being a prisoner that you don’t even think about the possibility of being the free master of yourself and of your choices. If every now and then someone realizes that he (or she) is entangled in a snare, he starts wishing to get loose. At that point, he begins to suffer for all the constrictions he has to undergo and desperately tries to find the strength to free himself from the bars of the cage. Here is an enlightening (literally) little story.
Once upon a time the inhabitants of a village were terrorized by a monster called “Darkness.” It hid in a cavern and no one dared to defy him, so he kept them all in slavery. One day a young boy decided to “dare,” went into the cave, lit a candle and “Darkness” disappeared!! The monster had never truly existed, it had never actually been there. It was only the people’s belief that had given him the shape of reality.
Until you, yourself, realize that the “cage” is not real, it will continue to be a psychological and intellectual creation which can only exist as long as your acceptance gives it life. The moment you say: “I don’t believe it any more,” such hindrance instantaneously dissolves. Can you picture yourself saying these words? When you try to find your way out of a predicament, you endeavor to unlock the door without seeing that it is already open. If you convince yourself that all you need to do is turn the doorknob, you will prove to yourself that the door had never been locked.
How can you practically do this? It’s not so difficult. It is enough for you to confidently learn to say either “yes” or “no,” “I want” and “I can.” Your potential to be a free, creative spirit will soar above the restraints of conventions and conditioning. It will pass through them as if they were fog dissolving into the sun of knowledge, of awareness and of truth. The problem is that, as the Latin satiric poet Juvenal (1st century AD) wrote: “All human beings desire to acquire knowledge, but few are willing to pay the price.” What price? Start from commitment and then add a pinch of faith and an ounce of willpower.
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