Why should education train the senses?
Sensations are an excellent instrument for knowledge and education. It is through sensations that we learn: by seeing, observing, hearing.
Training our senses significantly shapes the way we perceive ourselves and the world around us. The real question is, does our education help the child see consciously? To hear, smell and feel with attention?
The difference lies in a little more presence, a little extra consciousness that transforms our perception and adds a new dimension to our rather ordinary sense-making faculty.
Let’s say we need to put something in a container. Is it possible to do that simply by looking at the object and deducing which container can hold the totality of that object?
This is what one develops when one can consciously enhance the sense of sight. This kind of training is not only restricted to the eyes, but can be given to the ears to observe sounds and understand the nature of something simply by hearing the sound.
Training the sense of smell can help us identify the different types of smells and the quality of them. Similarly for taste and touch as well.
This training transforms our relation with the world from a transactionary, inattentive and transient experience to a conscious, wholesome awareness of our connection with the world.
It is to design a space with different objects not merely from a perspective of comfort and convenience, but to harmonise all the different parts to create a conscious space.
This new kind of perception that springs from a conscious identification carries the secret of welcoming the joy of ever new and deeper discoveries of ourselves and the world ~ The Mother
Rightly pursued, the development of the senses can shape the way the child relates with the world.
Why should education train the mind?
There is something between the sense perception and the reception of the brain. A very subtle presence, it collects the data provided by the senses and evaluates the messages it receives.
It is during this evaluation that the response gets muddled by feelings and triggers.
According to Swami Chinmayananda, the mind is a flow of thoughts that is constantly changing.
The mind is a persuasive authority that can make the world look worthless or buoyant, depending on its state. It is this tendency of the mind that falsifies our experience of the world.
This is why the training of the mind also becomes essential. A mere training of the senses or a mere training of the mind is incomplete. The mind can be considered the sixth sense making it part of the senses.
The Bhagavad Geeta also speaks of training both the senses and the mind simultaneously.
कर्मेन्द्रियाणि संयम्य य आस्ते मनसा स्मरन् |
इन्द्रियार्थान्विमूढात्मा मिथ्याचार: स उच्यते || 3.6||
karmendriyāṇi sanyamya ya āste manasā smaran
indriyārthān vimūḍhātmā mithyāchāraḥ sa uchyate
Those who restrain the external organs of action, while continuing to dwell on sense objects in the mind, certainly delude themselves and are to be called hypocrites.
यस्त्विन्द्रियाणि मनसा नियम्यारभतेऽर्जुन |
कर्मेन्द्रियै: कर्मयोगमसक्त: स विशिष्यते || 7||
yas tvindriyāṇi manasā niyamyārabhate ’rjuna
karmendriyaiḥ karma-yogam asaktaḥ sa viśhiṣhyate
But those karma yogis who control their organs of perception (senses) with the mind, O Arjun, and engage the organs of action (leg, hands, speech, functions of reproduction and elimination) working without attachment, are certainly superior.
How do we train the senses and the mind?
It is pertinent to look at a story from Mahabharata relating to Arjuna in order to delve into this question. Arjuna approached his father, Indra to train and learn under his guidance.
What are the necessary skills a warrior must inherit is a crucial question to ask. The use of weapons, building physical strength and resilience, war strategies and overall the science of warfare are the core competencies a warrior seeks to develop.
This might sharpen the senses and imbue a deeper consciousness through attentive endeavor of these practices. How then, do we nurture the mind?
Indra observed Arjuna’s steady progress. He summoned him and expressed his wish to train him in other areas as well. He invited Chitrasena, the king of Gandharvas and asked him to train Arjuna in singing, dancing, arts and aesthetics.
Image courtesy: Subhadeep Bhadra
Indra’s parenting teaches us something extremely profound here:
As the child becomes aware of his creative potentialities, his sensitivity and his sense of beauty are awakened. This can have unexpected consequences on his way of being and thinking ~ Sri Aurobindo
Applying our senses and mind in both masculine and feminine forms can help develop a well-rounded and conscious individual.
The system of education which, instead of keeping artistic training apart as a privilege for a few specialists, frankly introduces it as part of culture no less necessary than literature or science, will have taken a great step forward in the perfection of national education and the general diffusion of a board-based human culture.
It is not necessary that every man should be an artist. It is necessary that every man should have his artistic faculty developed. His taste trained, his sense of beauty and insight into form and colour and that which is expressed in form and colour, made habitually active, correct and sensitive.
So as parents can we stay with the question, how do I nurture both the senses and the mind of my child? How can I enhance both the feminine and the masculine forms of my child?
More reflections on education to follow…
References:
1. A New Education for New Consciousness: Sri Aurobindo and the Mother on Education
