By Ananda Vrndavanesvari Devi Dasi
From the moment we are born we are knowledge-seekers. We want to know where we can find food, shelter, love, and happiness. We want information to help us avoid pain, suffering, and loss. We spend our lives building on that knowledge, adding information gained by study and experience. Perhaps in earlier times society was more inclined to seek knowledge of truth. Today it seems we are after happiness, more than truth or no matter what the truth. And of course, the search for the self is generally not the first order of the day. “Know thyself”, as the ancient Greeks taught, doesn’t make many of our bucket lists. The goal of a good spiritual practice is the search for the self. However, we should be aware that the human body, which is our primary search engine for knowledge, comes with four defects. They are: we make mistakes, we are prone to illusion, we have a propensity towards cheating, and our senses are imperfect. So keep these in mind as you seek any kind of knowledge, especially transcendental knowledge.