Let there be light of mindfulness!
Awareness is our only source of light. But often it is not stable or strong enough to penetrate reality. It constantly flutters, and it can be clouded with many hindrances and impurities. Mindfulness is the empowered, compassionate awareness! So Buddha taught mindfulness as the direct/right path to liberation, freedom from suffering. After all, mindfulness is the only real power we have; everything else is just an illusion. Without mindfulness, we are just automata conditioned by our genes and the environment. It is foolishness to fight with darkness. All it takes is bringing light, and the darkness simply disappears. Let there be light of mindfulness!
Ignorance is a bizarre condition in which we don't even know that we don't know. No amount of trying and thinking hard would help us escape from this condition. All our beliefs, opinions and ideas only create a great veil of illusion that we know. So Lao-Tzu says: If you want wisdom, empty your mind. Meditation creates necessary conditions of clarity, stability and strength of the mind from which insight can arise. As Buddha says: Wisdom springs from meditation; without meditation wisdom wanes.
CK. Kamaraj
29 January 2022