‘I’ - The alphabet
‘I’ - The alphabet
I is one of the five vowels. It is one the key alphabets to make words and creator of the English language. It is the 9th alphabet of the 26 alphabets. But the context is which I see it , in much larger.
I, is also very fundamental of all human beings. I is what I am taught to be, addressed as all through my childhood and adulthood. I have grown up to understand this is my identity. “I” is different from “You”. I has a separate name, a separate ego, which makes me unique and different from the others. The entire Hindu philosophy is based on this alphabet, seemingly, but which is much deeper in meaning beyond the alphabet. The Hindu philosophy tries to understand the “ I”.
The Hindu philosophy advocates the annihilation of the concept of I. It can take many a life time to unlearn what we have learnt, because it is the complete anti-thesis of what is taught to from our birth. The birth of the concept of “ I” in our minds and the journey to resist it until we become totally on with our natural self- Selfless without any concept of I.Is I the limited concept of the physical body – composed of the 5 sense organs.
The great yogi, Ramana Maharishi has defined I as, 'the impressions of anything remaining unconsciously in the mind; the present consciousness of past perceptions; knowledge derived from memory; latent tendencies formed by former actions, thoughts and speech.' The goal of every human life, as I see it is to enquire into the “I.” It is one of the greatest mysteries of life, this fragile sense of oneself. It is the most esoteric and mis-understood concepts created by the mind.
Probably, one cannot understand it or have the ability to comprehend it within the limitations of the mind. Understanding our identity is an ongoing process. It is not a static perception of the truth; however it is an evolving concept which perhaps can give an answer to the core sense of oneself.
Discussion
- ‘I’ - The alphabet -Sumangala Varun (04/01/14)
‘I’ - The alphabet
Introduction
The ninth alphabet in the English language, the letter I has many meanings. When we write only ‘I’, it means the self. When we say ‘eye’, which is also pronounced as I, it refers to an important organ in our body that aids vision.
Significance
The simple alphabet serves more than one purpose. When somebody keeps saying I, when she or he is talking about themselves, we can judge a little bit about their personality. It can be indicative that they are slightly egoistic. If somebody keeps talking about their own self; bringing their name into every conversation, it could mean that they value themselves much above everybody else. This is a simple conclusion, but it need not be taken as a rule, because after all, unless we are qualified psychologist, or has studied psychology, we cannot judge a person in the first few meetings.
‘I’ is also a vowel, and an important alphabet. Without the five vowels, words would not make sense. In the English language, a vowel plays the role of salt and spices in food. They are only few in number, and are needed only in small quantities, but they make the word complete. Without salt or spices, a dish would make no sense! Similarly, the vowel ‘I’ plays a small but important part in the life of the consonants.
‘I’ is also pronounced differently in different words. For example, in the word ‘little’, we pronounce ‘I’ as ‘e’. This is called the short i. In the word ‘I’, when we are referring to our self, it is pronounced as ‘aae’, in a longer way. Similarly when we say igloo, the ‘i’ used here is the shorter one. When we say ice, we use the longer pronunciation of ‘i’. *It is also the fifth most common alphabet used in the English language.
’I’ is also used in mathematics. It is used to denote an imaginary number. It represents the square root of minus 1.
We can learn a lot from this analysis. Nothing or no person in this world is unimportant. Every person, every alphabet is significant. Each thing has many more sides to it that what we can see. Likewise, when we come across individuals, who we think are insignificant, let us think again. They might be multi-faceted, and much more talented than what we give them credit for.
Conclusion
The next time we look at the humble ‘I’, let us remember that it is not so humble after all! There are many facets to this alphabet. Not just the alphabet, everything else has its own prominence in the world. There are many lessons to be learnt from even the smallest of things!
