The function of the barriers we build [IB6]

Fable of the goldfish
The goldfish in his tank called a sé the son and said to him: "Today is a boring day, let's do something together: let's go for a walk and see what the men locked in their glass enclosure are doing." 

I have heard you talk to each other about the Fable of the Goldfish, and I must admit that you have extensively questioned Ananda's words, especially considering that the fable, to be honest, was so short.

In this regard, however, there is one thing to note: the fact that a fable is short does not mean that it is possible to have nothing to say on the contrary, many times shortness brings with it an indefinition that precisely as such allows us to find and say everything you want to find and say.

It is a little bit the same speech we were making about symbolism: the same symbol can give rise to many interpretations, especially when it is considered disconnected from the context, since in that way the one who dominates is the interiority of the one who examines the symbol, which, of course, tends to interpret the symbol according to a key that suits the doors of her personal interest.

But let's go back to our little tale of the goldfish, small, but in my opinion, very beautiful.
First of all I would like to point out one thing: you turned it around in many ways, you went to look for the hair ... in the water, this is true, but ... but there was one very evident thing that you did not notice; perhaps precisely because it was so obvious, right, creatures?
Think about it: the father fish and the son fish ...
Does all this remind you of anything?

It does not remind you of something you had already talked about about another fairy tale (because you remember that the tales we propose are linked together by a logical thread so that one can lead back to the other, a bit like all of reality , on the other hand)?
Yes, dear ones, you are absolutely right: the fable of the apple tree! In fact, if you think about it carefully, symbolically the father fish and the son fish could be the teacher and the disciple. What do you mean?

Suppose the parent fish represents the master.
The master, therefore, sees that the disciple is crystallizing in his trantran, in his everyday life, basking in what he has (perhaps even in teaching), ending up stagnating because he is very happy and satisfied with the situation in which he is comes to find: a safe place, a teacher, his certainties, his quiet life and on and on and on.

As Master he cannot let things go like this and so he is forced to take the initiative to move his disciple out of stagnation, since he cannot do it alone. Here then is his proposal to do something different, something that breaks the balance in which the disciple had found himself and which satisfied him to the point of making him stop.

The key lies in the use of the term "together", that is, in the phrase "we do something together". Because "together»? Because if he had told him "go and do" the disciple would have experienced the proposal as an order, passively, while doing "together" presupposes going towards a new experience because you want to do it and, therefore, in an active and attentive way.

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Think of how many times we have told you: "study this or that" and you may have done it because we told you so, but without hearing it and, therefore, it did not help you; or you have not even done so.

Then we indirectly proposed the same things to you, giving you the stimuli for discussion and deepening and here, having become an active part because the interest born in you moved you internally, you got busy and tried to understand more and more. deeply even our most difficult speeches.

Therefore, this too is the role of the Master: to take the place of the experience by becoming an additional experience that induces you to live more actively what you have to face, providing you, perhaps, the right emotional tensions or the stimuli that most can help you make what you face useful for yourself.
But let's go back to our fairytale.

Doubtless the crystal bowl represents a barrier.
A double barrier, we can say: in fact, a barrier is such on both its faces while constituting, perhaps, a different type of barrier for those on one side or the other.
Ironically, the crystal bowl prevents the fish from entering more deeply into the external world but, at the same time, it also prevents man from entering more deeply into the reality of the world of the two goldfish!

You talked about barrier as a defense mechanism.
And this is quite right: how many times do you put in front of others the barrier of your coldness or your cheerfulness, or indifference, or hardness for fear that showing yourself as you really are could constitute a weakness in which others can break through and succeed to hurt you?

For the law of ambivalence, however, it is equally true that a barrier can also be an attack mechanism towards what is external to oneself: often coldness exists to induce the other to be more understanding towards you, the cheerfulness is a way to force others to have a certain sympathetic vision of your way of being, indifference is used to arouse interest, hardness to break the resistance of others and on and on and on!

In the fable there is, however, an important detail that, probably, can give way to another series of considerations that are of some interest.
The barrier, in fact, in this case is of glass. Why glass? For various symbolic reasons, creatures.

First of all, glass, you know, is fragile, just as, in reality, every barrier that you can place in front of you is fragile, so much so that there is none that, as long as you want it, you cannot be able to break.

And again: glass because it is transparent.
What do I mean? I mean that, being transparent, it shows you what is beyond the barrier itself and that it can provide you with insignificant elements to understand yourself and, therefore, change your way of being.

Think about your barriers: they are annoying things, often seemingly insurmountable but, nevertheless, with their existence they signal to you what it is that you have to overcome, what is the reason (yours, not others') of their presence; in short, they serve to slow down, but also to show you the way to break them down.
A bit like theIo which constitutes a barrier for every embodied man but which, just in itself it has the germs for its own defeat and its own dissolution.

And again: glass because it allows you to see the rest of Reality.
In fact, as we said lately, every individual needs others and every stimulus, every experience is placed there not for a single person but for all the people with whom he comes into contact.

So seeing people to whom your barrier does not belong but who collide with it (since you have erected it) provides you with stimuli to try to cancel it, shows you what their reactions are in front of it. revealing you as in a mirrorthanks to their reactions, that part of yourself that you must try to meet, recognize, understand and, ultimately, overcome. Disgust

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