HOW MUCH YOU (DO NOT) KNOW YOUR SELF? = PHYSICAL QUOTIENT & INTELLECTUAL QUOTIENT

HOW MUCH YOU

(DO NOT)

KNOW YOUR SELF?

PHYSICAL QUOTIENT 
&
INTELLECTUAL QUOTIENT

We have seen in the previous Post how our wants and needs differ in their basic nature.

One of the most ancient questions ever asked was and is – How much do we really know our self?  How do we explore and know  our Five Quotients? Are these the only constituents of us, or, are there more?

It is astonishing to know – how little most of us  know our own self and how this ignorance of our own self affects our life every moment!

And, for this very reason, it is instantly beneficial to know more of our self. That is the purpose of this Post.

As human beings, we all, essentially consist of  five quotients:

(i)                  a body or the physical quotient

(ii)               a Thinking faculty or the Intellectual quotient

(iii)               The Emotional quotient

(iv)               The Social quotient and

(v)                 The Spiritual quotient

Each of these five quotients of us has its distinct needs. Each of these has its influence on the other quotients too. We will briefly deal with the first two quotients in this post and see the remaining three in the next Post ( due to space constraint).

PHYSICAL QUOTIENT

Our physical body has distinct needs – like Food, Water, air, Work, Sleep, Sexual satisfaction, safety, security, shelter etc, to satisfy its basic requirements like hunger, thirst, rest and movement.

Our body is the only VISIBLE, TANGIBLE part of us. Everybody sees, hears, touches, smells or tastes (!!)  your physical quotient only and identifies you with it. This is all they can do with their five sensory organs. Each of the five sensory organs has its origins  in one of the five universal powers, we talked of in the previous Post. It derives its sensory power also from its originating universal power. More of it, in another Post.

Some needs of our Physical quotient, or PQ, are more urgent and immediate than others. When you don’t get air to breath, all that you wish for is – only air.

Body needs food a little less urgently than air, to satisfy its hunger. It needs – not any food, but wholesome, balanced diet. Sometimes, we eat not out of hunger, but out of habit or for social approval or to satisfy our taste buds.  Here lies the difference between need and want. Beware, if your wants travel in the opposite direction to the needs of you physical quotient.The PQ is not made to handle them at all. These wants are what we can term as BAD HABITS. Drinks, Drugs, smoking, excessive working, excessive sleeping, excessive eating, abstinence from eating are all BAD HABITS affecting the physical quotient. Your PQ will react adversely with some illness - to all these bad habits.

Body needs clean drinking water. Body itself needs to be cleaned periodically. But, applying scents etc is not a need but a want. Note that some wants are not against the body's needs, but enhance the body's utility.

Body needs movement and flexibility. Simply stated every part of it needs some work. In the absence of such work, the part lacking work tend to become inflexible and unhealthy.

Body picks up diseases due to various reasons - in which case, a cure becomes its immediate need.

Body needs a dress. But designer clothing is a want. Body needs a shelter from sun and rain. But, we may want many comforts in it.

Body when mature, develops the need for sexual satisfaction. Unlike other physical needs, this need usually involves another human being. Hence, this need needs to be addressed in mutually (and socially) acceptable ways. This need should not be allowed to develop into a mutually or socially unacceptable want. 

As we know, many wars between countries, many conflicts  between groups and many fights among individuals arise daily because of the want or desire for sexual satisfaction expressing itself in mutually or socially unacceptable ways. Sexual urge is a biological urge common to all living beings and human being is no exception. It pertains to PQ but has its reflections on IQ, EQ and social quotient.

Body sends out signals to us - on what it needs from time to time - all life. We must listen to those signals, identify body's needs and its responses to our actions - and take appropriate guidance from it. Hunger, thirst, pain, muscle pulls,  stomach heaviness, headache, sleepiness and so on are all distress signals requiring your attention. Feeling agile, healthy, light, refreshed etc are positive signals from the body - arising as a reward to you from some positive action of you. 

You must have (a) adequate awareness of what the body needs through its signals and from other scientific knowledge of the body (b) a commitment to keep it healthy strong and agile and (c) the willingness to get your body tested by experts (doctors, therapists etc) periodically for illness signals that you cannot detect yourself - through many of the modern tests.


Physical fitness requirement is not the same for all.It can  be (a) health related (b) sports related  or (c) skill related.The fitness required to climb a steep hill is not the same as the fitness required to carry huge weights or the fitness related to run a mile.You can't sacrifice health related fitness for any reason. Others are Add-ons.


You need to look at your whole body and examine it periodically - with the help of a mirror, or with an expert. You must also try to experience every  major change in your body by touch perception. Your body deserves all this attention from you. No doubt - this should not become an obsession in itself.

The important question about your body is - 

How much of your body do you really see, touch, experience directly and claim to know in your life? 

Your sensory experience of your body is STRICTLY LIMITED TO - THE OUTERMOST LAYER OF YOUR SKIN. 

You do not see, touch or otherwise experience directly anything inside that outer layer -  like your bones, nerves, heart, lungs and every thing else inside you. You are also quite sure that you don't want to see or touch them in your life!!.

What each of these parts inside you are doing at this moment is unknown to you. What goes inside you, be it air, food, drink or any thing else, you bid them adieu at the entrance of your body. What your body does with them happens without your conscious experience. 

And it is good – that you heart beats without your permission, your lungs, pancreas etc do their job without your knowledge and your blood circulation happens without your approval. You are not a competent master of them – and therefore they are put beyond your experience and control. The outermost layer of the skin is given to you and others - to see, to clean, to touch, to smell and enjoy - which is less than 0.01% of your body.

 
In effect, it is your body; you live with it for a hundred years – and yet you don’t know it . Most of what you claim as your body  functions totally out of your control!

And - that is good for you!!

INTELLECTUAL QUOTIENT

The intellectual quotient is awake and thinking when we are awake. Like breathing and heart beat, thinking is always on, as an automated process when we are awake. When we sleep, a small part of it is busy weaving our dreams and finishing some unfinished business of the waking time. Our IQ is a bundle of all of our past SENSORY INPUTS plus a little synthesis of the same done within the IQ. 

In intellectual quotient also, needs and wants are some times traveling in opposite directions. You need factual  information relevant to your needs. But most of the time, you go after or get information which is unnecessary or is at least  of secondary importance. What you need is not what you get. 

The paradox with IQ is that it too, like most of PQ, acts almost autonomously. 

As an experiment, try to stop the stream of thoughts going on in your IQ, for one minute. Try now. You can try as hard as you want. But You won't succeed in it. Alternatively, try not to think of any specific thing, say, the small mosquito – for five minutes. Try that. Same again.You fail. Now, think of your “spouse only” – and of none else - for next five minutes. That also, you can’t.  You are so frail in your IQ.

I know. We have experimented this in hundreds of workshops on thousands of people. Right now, you are a servant of your IQ most of the time. You have no fundamental freedom to think what you want - even if your country has granted you the fundamental right to think what you want.

You are barely conscious of the one thought which your IQ flashes before you each moment, without your permission, and takes it away and puts the next thought before you the next moment. Life has been going on as an un-ending movie show of thoughts placed before you by your IQ.  

Surely, you do try to learn a few new things consciously and put new info inside the IQ – but what the IQ does with it – is beyond your ability to control – most of the time. Also, you do direct the IQ periodically in certain directions  by trying to think of specific things – but, if you carefully observe, it is always trying to digress away  from the direction of thought you have chosen.  You do make efforts to think of specific subjects – and you do have a work-out in that effort with your IQ – but, the IQ doesn’t stop there. It goes off in other directions the moment you stop your exercise. Even when you are on your IQ exercises, it is constantly trying to run off. We talk of concentration. But, it is of a binary format. One moment on the subject, next off the subject, next on - and so on and off it goes.Try it next time and watch.Yet, your concentration exercises do benefit you immensely.

Like your Physical quotient your Intellectual quotient functioning is also  put out of your control – most of the time, and in many ways., because you are a very imperfect master of your IQ too.

You do benefit from that arrangement - as in the case of PQ.

We will know more about them soon..In next post we will examine the last three quotients.

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