A man cut down a tree one day.
A Sufi who saw this taking place said:
'Look at this fresh branch which is full of sap, happy because it does not yet know that it has been cut off.
'Ignorant of the damage which it has suffered it may be - but it will know in due time.
'Meanwhile you cannot reason with it.' This severance, this ignorance, these are the state of man.
-Attar of Nishapur
This command is concerned with the basic fundamentals at the core of a given thing. It operates on several different levels, and rightly so for all that it implies about what is and isn't 'Real'. Unfortunately most people have preconceived notions about the nature of Reality. They tend to split into two distinct camps of thought.
The first group of people consider there to be multiple realities independent of one another. For them the world neatly divides up into mental, physical, and spiritual planes. We live in this world, and God/Goddess, spirits, demons, etc. live in their respective places.
The second group tends to think that Reality is only what you see, and feel. They do not believe in other planes of existence, and confine themselves to only what they can comfortably measure. There is only this world and that is that.
Both points of view are flawed. The planes are not independent, but are coexistent and conjoined. As a result there is really only one plane of Reality, but with mental, physical, and spiritual components. In reality (pun intended), about 90% of what you experience is created by your own mind.
On the personal level this command asks, "Who are you?" Not your name or history, or genealogy, nor your social standing or your group, nor your achievements, but simply who are you at the core of your being? In our world we have been stripped of this question. As a result people tend to wander zombie like through life. They go through what society expects of them, and fulfill the imagined desires of the people they value, and then wonder why they are unfulfilled.
Sadly, this is because they never answer the question of their own identity. The Vast majority of people are doing things they don't want to be doing because they don't know what they want. How can you know what you want if you don't know who you are?
In life, we are bombarded by lies, omissions, half-truths, and attempts to dominate our wills, some are real and some are things we do to ourselves. Only through our ability to logically analyze information may we see these things for what they really are. This being said it is important then to look at the subtle roots of things, and often to do this we must step outside ourselves to do that.
There is this Drummer and he has a nice gig with his band in this upscale bar. While he's taking a break one evening he notices this pretty girl, and begins a conversation with her. All goes well, and they begin to date. He works late at night, so all of their dates begin well after midnight, but for the most part things are good between them. This continues for a few months, and then they begin to fight constantly. Eventually she dumps him, and he forever afterward refers to her with less than charming words.
He never did step outside himself to look at what was going on. If he had, he would he have seen having all their dates begin after midnight, and never any 'normal' hours the message she was getting? Was she wrong to interpret it, as "I don't like you enough to make any real plans with you"?
Some people wonder why God doesn't answer their prayers, and never look for the reason he might choose not to answer them. A fisherman may go fishing everyday; curse his bait and never realize he is hitting a dry pond.
