106. The boy who became Everything🔗

A young boy was considered to be very dull. One day his father took him to the local school where all the boys of the village learnt their lessons. He met the teacher and said, 'My son is not a bright student. Will you allow him to sit in the back row of the class so that he is in the atmosphere presided over by Goddess Saraswati? I know you are kind and compassionate. Please guide him. He will be lucky if he learns anything.' The teacher readily agreed, and the young boy joined the school. He would be present every day before any of the other boys came in. He would dust, sweep and mop the room, set up the teacher's wooden table and chair and sit down in a corner to listen to the class most attentively. No one expected him to gain anything out of the classes.

One day he humbly asked the teacher, 'Sir, when can you give me some guidance?' The teacher said, 'Right now! Here it is: Aham Brahmasmi (I am That). Recite this audibly or silently, but continuously.'

With determination and inspiration, the young boy learnt the phrase without bothering to ask the meaning of it. Nor did the teacher bother to tell him the meaning. He did not feel the necessity to do so.

'Aham Brahmasmi,' the boy went on repeating at home. His father asked him, 'Do you know the meaning of those words?' The boy's eyes bulged out. 'Meaning?' he asked. It had never struck him that the words might have a meaning. The father told him, 'The words mean, I am That, I am Brahman.'

The boy went to his uncle's house the next day and continued reciting, 'Aham Brahmasmi, which means Father is Brahman.' The uncle heard this and said, 'It doesn't mean that! It means: I am Brahman.' The boy was surprised but kept quiet. On the way back home he was reciting, 'Aham Brahmasmi, which means Uncle is Brahman.'

The village priest passed by and heard him reciting this. He stopped him and said, 'Son, it does not mean Uncle is Brahman, it means I am Brahman.' The boy was amazed. 'How can just two words mean so many things - father, uncle and the village priest are all Brahman!' His head was reeling and he sat down on a nearby slab of stone. He started reciting with the spirit of asking the words themselves what they really meant.

The sun went down and darkness came. The stars and moon started shining.

The boy went on reciting 'Aham Brahmasmi' to find out its real meaning.

At dawn, the ultimate knowledge dawned on him: not just his father, his uncle and the village priest, but he too - and everybody else - was Brahman! Everyobdy and everything was Brahman. He experienced the state of Advaita. He became a realized soul.

Understand, the moment the boy understood he was ignorant, an alchemy process was triggered in his system. When you don't know that you don't know, it is ignorance. When you know that you don't know, it is innocence. Then the knowing can start happening.