Spiritual fission and fusion

As a person moves along the path of spirituality, many of the widely accepted motivations in society stop making sense to him. Normal society runs after money, and the accumulation of wealth while for such a person, the utility of money becomes limited to only its functional use. 

Similarly, society gives a lot of premium to the family while for such a person the concept of family may change significantly. He sees clearly the center of that bond within the family. He realizes that the strong bond among the family members is centered around supporting each other's survival and comfort. As such a person is undergoing a transformation of his own understanding of self, his needs and desires related to survival and comfort also undergo a significant change. This transformation may create a gross mismatch between his concept of the family and the concept of the other family members.  

Similarly, he may find himself out of the place with respect to many social traditions and rituals. While these social traditions and rituals may be absolute truth for the other members of the society, for him, many of these traditions and rituals may not carry much meaning. 

In this situation, such a person becomes a misfit in society as well as family. He appears to be an alien to society and the society appears alien to him. Sometimes these differences go to the extent that society expels or even kills such people. It so happened with Socrates and Jesus Christ. However, in most cases, the people moving on the spiritual path are themselves at a crossroads. They have an internal conflict between their own likes and dislikes stored deep down in the unconscious mind and the guidance they receive from the divine. During family and social interactions, these old attachments in the unconscious mind resurface and become barriers in the spiritual path.

For example, a person on the spiritual path may minimize the need for money. He may keep his needs at a minimum. However, the family members may have a different level of consciousness and may consider many more things to be essential. He may not feel the need to engage in shallow discussions with different people living in society. However, the family may be getting pleasure and enjoyment in such interactions.  He may realize the futility of many social customs, however, the family members may be quite keen to follow these social customs and rituals. 

It has so happened with everybody on the path of spirituality. Gautama had to leave his family to pursue the path. Krishna had to leave gopis to follow the mission of his life. Rama also had to proceed to the forest with Lakshmana and Sita. It's not logical to expect the entire world to move on its path. The one moving along this path will have to realize sooner or later that he needs to drop each and every possession including the family and the society. One may live in the same family or society, but one has to be a "Vairagi" mentally. The attachment has to metamorphose into compassion. Compassion can not come unless one actually connects to the divine. Till that time, one may develop sympathy but not compassion. Compassion is the realization of the pain inflicted on others due to ignorance of true nature. The one moving along this path also realizes that it is not possible to make anybody else move on this path unless the other realizes the futility of the fixations and attachments himself. 

As a person moves along the spiritual path, he starts losing interest in the ionic bonds wherein one person is the giver and the other is the taker. He also loses interest in the covalent bonds wherein two persons form a bond to support each other. Rather, he becomes more interested in nuclear fission whereby people give away their accumulations and distribute huge amounts of energy to their surroundings. In fact, such a person is even more interested in nuclear fusion, whereby a few people with spiritual inclinations fuse together to create the energy to make this world a better place to live like the fusion of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.