I’m still learning.
I grew up with the belief that there was only one path to Truth and rightness with God—Christianity. I left that notion behind many years ago. While Christianity in its purest form (not the politicized and judgmental version often on display today) has much to offer a Truth seeker, so do many other worldviews.
One of the perspectives that I’m relatively ignorant of is the Sikh religion. I was fascinated to read a short overview of that faith in a recent Daily Meditation from the Center for Action and Contemplation. Sikhism has a compelling origin story with tenants that align with the Wisdom Tradition that forms the foundation of the great faiths of the world—there is a Divine power in the universe. A spark of the Divine is within each of us. Developing our connection with the Divine is a worthwhile endeavor. Our separateness from the Divine, each other, and creation is an illusion as we are all a part of the whole.
If you’re interested in a compelling example of a winsome worldview that is probably closer to your own than you realize, read on. If you do, you’ll broaden your mind as you take another step toward Becoming Yourself.
In an interview for the Daily Meditations, Sikh activist Valarie Kaur tells a brief story of Guru Nanak (1469–1539), founder of the Sikh faith:
The story goes that every morning a man named Nanak sat by a river and meditated on the world and took the pain of the world into his heart until it crescendoed inside of him. One morning he did not return from the river. People thought him a dead man, a drowned man. The sun rose and the sun fell. The sun rose and the sun fell. And on the third day, a figure was spotted, seated in a cemetery covered in ash. It was Nanak, but not Nanak. He had been rebirthed in those waters and his first utterance was “Nako Hindu. Nako Musliman.” There is no Hindu. There is no Muslim. This was more than treat your neighbor as you would yourself. This was more than taking in the stranger. This was: There is no stranger. There is no you-against-me at all. We constitute each other. [1]
Kaur describes how his followers transformed their culture:
[Nanak] began to sing powerful mystical poetry, accompanied by a Muslim bard. For twenty-four years, Guru Nanak traveled in each of the cardinal directions on foot…. Everywhere he went, his songs held a vision that landed in people’s hearts: We can all taste the truth of Oneness, and when we do, we are inspired to care for one another, and fight for one another. Perhaps what was most powerful about Guru Nanak is how he distilled the mystical heart of all the world’s wisdom traditions into its essence: love.
Guru Nanak’s followers were called Sikhs, seekers or students…. Sikhs believed that people of all castes, genders, faiths, races, and places were equal…. It was a radical experiment that rebelled against the caste hierarchy and feudal order of the era, a mysticism that inspired revolutionary social change…. The ideal archetype in the Sikh tradition became the sant sipahi: the sage warrior. [2]
Kaur’s grandfather’s example shaped the trajectory of her work:
My grandfather was the first sage warrior I knew…. Papa Ji tied his turban every day, clasped his hands behind his back, and surveyed the world through the eyes of wonder. When he listened to kirtan, sacred music, he closed his eyes and let the music resound wondrously within him; he wrote poetry in his garden….
As I fell asleep each night, Papa Ji would sing the Mool Mantr, the foundational verse that opens the Guru Granth Sahib, our sacred canon of musical wisdom. It begins with the utterance “Ik Onkar,” which means Oneness, ever-unfolding. “All of Sikh wisdom flows from here,” Papa Ji would say. All of us are part of the One. Separateness is an illusion: There is no essential separateness between you and me, you and other people, you and other species, or you and the trees. You can look at anyone or anything and say: You are a part of me I do not yet know. [3]
As featured in the Jan 16, 2025 Daily Meditation from the Center for Action and Contemplation (cac.org). [1] Adapted from Valarie Kaur, “Becoming a Sage Warrior,” Daily Meditations, October 28, 2024, Center for Action and Contemplation, video, 38:13. [2] Valarie Kaur, Sage Warrior: Wake to Oneness, Practice Pleasure, Choose Courage, Become Victory (One World, 2024), xix, xx. [3] Kaur, Sage Warrior, xxi–xxii.
