There is a delightful Vedantic story about a lioness and her little cub.
Once upon a time, while they were traveling through the jungle, the cub became fascinated
with a butterfly and didn't notice that his mother had walked on.
After he stopped playing around, he couldn't find his mother anywhere.
He felt dreadfully afraid, alone in the dark, scary jungle, and he missed his mother.
All night long, the little cub waited for his mother to return.
In the morning, he saw a herd of sheep grazing in a nearby clearing.
Feeling sad and lonely, he approached the herd, seeking comfort.
The cub was still too young to fully appreciate the difference between lions and sheep.
And, even though sheep are usually afraid of lions, the cub was so small and helpless
that he was readily accepted into the herd.
This wonderful parable has been told by countless teachers of Vedanta.
It was a favorite of the famous Hindu monk, Swami Vivekananda, who exhorted his listeners
to metaphorically roar like lions.
Stories like this get adapted to facilitate whatever is being taught at the time.
Those of you familiar with the lion story will find an interesting addition here in
my version, towards the end.
The cub's loneliness and feelings of abandonment were eased somewhat in the company of the
sheep.
Sadly, the lioness never returned.
The orphaned cub remained with the herd and grew up amongst the sheep.
As he lived with them over the months and years, the sheep came to accept him as one
of their own.
The cub gradually learned their ways and even started to bleat like them.
Not surprisingly, the little lion cub grew up thinking that he was a sheep.
This story uses a powerful analogy to illustrate the problem of ignorance, a particular kind
of ignorance that can be called self-nonrecognition.
The lion considered himself a weak, defenseless sheep due to ignorance of his true nature
as king of the jungle.
Whenever the herd was threatened by a passing predator, the lion would tremble in fear and
run for safety, like the sheep.
The sheep's fear was well-founded, because sheep are a favorite food for many predators.
But the lion suffered from fear unnecessarily, due to his ignorance, due to self-nonrecognition.
Just like the cub grew up with ignorance of his true lionly nature, we too, start our
lives with ignorance of our true divine nature.
We fail to recognize ourselves as unchanging, limitless consciousness, atma, eternal, full
and complete.
And due to this self-nonrecognition, we consider ourselves to be mortal, limited beings, subject
to the afflictions of our bodies and minds, even though none of that can truly threaten
the innate fullness of atma.
When we fail to recognize our immortal, limitless true nature, we identify with our mortal bodies
and limited minds, just like the lion considered himself a weak, defenseless sheep.
And, just like the lion suffered due to ignorance, so do we.
One day, many years later, another lion was passing through the jungle and happened to
see the herd of sheep grazing in the clearing.
Standing amongst the sheep was a lion, grazing on the grass like the sheep.
The passing lion was dumbfounded by this incongruous sight.
As he moved closer to get a better look, the sheep sensed his presence and ran off in fear
for their lives.
And of course, the ignorant lion also ran off in fear.
Seeing all this, the passing lion became extremely curious, so he chased after the ignorant lion
to find out what was going on.
The ignorant lion climbed up a tree where he trembled in fear and begged, 'Please don't
hurt me!
Please don't eat me!'
The passing lion said, 'Why would I eat you?'
The ignorant lion replied, 'Because I'm a sheep and lions eat sheep.'
The passing lion said, 'But you're not a sheep, you're a lion, ' to which the ignorant lion
replied, 'How can I be a lion?'
Let's pause here to appreciate the story better.
The ignorant lion's concept of his own identity was thoroughly conditioned by his many years
of living with the sheep.
His ignorance had become deeply ingrained.
And as a result, even when he heard the truth, 'You're not a sheep, you're a lion,' his wrong
conclusion about himself was not dispelled; it continued unabated.
In the same way, we've all grown up with the notion that we are mortal, limited beings,
subject to the afflictions of our bodies and minds.
That ignorance, too, is deeply ingrained.
And as a result, when we hear the truth, 'You're not your body, you're not your mind, pure
consciousness is your true nature,' even then, our ignorance remains; it persists somehow.
In spite of the fact that knowledge destroys ignorance, merely hearing about the truth
of our divine nature can fail to remove our wrong conclusions, even when it's clearly
expressed.
To understand why, let's return to the story,
When the ignorant lion said, 'How can I be a lion?' the passing lion said, 'Come down
and I'll show you that you're a lion.
Don't worry, I promise that I won't eat you.'
He gave a small mirror to the ignorant lion and said, 'Look at your reflection.
Do you look like a sheep, or do you look like me?'
The ignorant lion was stunned by what he saw.
'I'm not a sheep!
I'm a lion!
I'm the king of the jungle!'
He thanked the passing lion again and again for removing his wrong notions and he strutted
off into the jungle boldly, knowing fully well that he was at the top of the food chain;
no predators could harm him.
Notice that merely hearing the words, 'You're a lion,' wasn't enough to remove his deeply
ingrained ignorance.
Rather than merely being TOLD the truth, he needed to be SHOWN the truth by looking into
the mirror.
That mirror represents the teachings of Vedanta, a mirror in the form of words.
When we look into the mirror of Vedanta, we can see our true, divine nature reflected
there.
We can see ourselves completely independent of our bodies and minds and utterly unaffected
by their afflictions.
In this way, the teachings of Vedanta don't TELL us the truth, they SHOW us the truth
of our own nature.
They destroy our deeply ingrained ignorance and free us from suffering due to identification
with our bodies and minds.
But, our story isn't over quite yet.
As night fell, the lion stretched out on the jungle floor and slept soundly.
He no longer needed the companionship and security of living with the herd of sheep.
The next morning, he awoke and saw the sheep grazing in the clearing as usual.
Having just woken up, he was drowsy, I suppose, and he walked towards the herd, purely out
of habit.
He joined them and started grazing on the grass again, as he had done for so many years.
The passing lion was still in the vicinity and happened to see all this.
As he approached the herd, the sheep scattered in fear, but the lion remained there, having
remembered that he was a lion.
The passing lion asked him, 'Why are you still living with the sheep and grazing on the grass?'
He replied, 'I guess it's just a habit.'
Habits can be very powerful and surprisingly tenacious.
Even though the lion clearly knew that he was a lion, his habitual sheepish behavior
and thinking continued nonetheless.
In the same way, even after we discover our true nature to be eternal and limitless, our
habitual wrong notions of being mortal and limited can continue.
False identification with our bodies and minds can persist purely out of habit.
So, Vedanta must address not only the problem of self-nonrecognition, but it must also address
this further problem of habitual wrong thinking.
Self-nonrecognition is removed by the practice called shravana, which is listening to a qualified
teacher unfold the teachings of Vedanta, clearly and methodically, enabling us to see our true
nature reflected in the word-mirror of Vedanta.
But shravana itself can't remove our habitual wrong thinking.
Another kind of practice is required.
And that practice is called nididhyasana, contemplation, which is specifically intended
to remove any lingering identification with our bodies and minds.
The last part of the story shows how this works.
To help the lion overcome his habitual wrong thinking, the passing lion gave him a mirror
and said, 'Be sure to look at your reflection each morning, before you do anything else.'
Every morning thereafter, when the lion looked at his reflection, he didn't see or learn
anything new.
But by repeatedly seeing his true nature reflected, with all its power and majesty as the king
of the jungle, his habitual sheepish behavior gradually faded away.
The lion needed to see himself in the mirror, again and again, to remove his habitual identification
with being a sheep.
In the same way, after gaining self-knowledge, we need to look into the word mirror of Vedanta
again and again, to remove every last trace of own habitual wrong thinking.
And, when we are totally free from any residual identification with our bodies and minds,
we will enjoy complete, unfettered liberation, moksha.