Pang of Conscience

In this morning’s conference call, discussing how the self’s reliance on models still shows up when we search for knowledge through tradition, feeling, or deference to the transcendent, I kept thinking of the phrase “pang of conscience”.  When we are stopped dead in our tracks and  think “I don’t want to be the kind of person who does this”; when we see how we are hurting someone, or acting out of greed, fear, and ignorance; then something can rescue us, can hold up a mirror.  Isn’t this a way that a deeper knowledge can break into our dark citadels of isolation?  At such moments, we are no longer in the driver’s seat, and knowledge can flow in.  When our agendas lose their commanding role, it might feel like a gut-level intuition, but the more important characteristic may be that we become the one who is listening, and real knowledge can then flow towards us, like a river irrigating the desert.  –Michael