The first session of the 62nd round of the Academy Branch Workshops was held on April fourth, 2018 at 09:45 a.m. This meeting was held by Master Dezhakam as the master of ceremony, Mr. Amin as the guest speaker and Mr. Hamed as the secretary. The weekly agenda was "Cognizance (awareness), Effective cognizance and Literacy".
Hello friends, I am Hossein, a traveler. Today’s agenda is “cognizance (awareness), effective cognizance and literacy”. An Iranian poem reads: “the competent is the one who is cognizant; knowldege turns the heart of an old man into young”. I wondered why a person with Ph.D. degree cannot understand a matter. We mistook literacy for cogniznce. We thought if a person is literate, they must figure out everything; but Amin cracked the problem and mentioned the components of cognizance; and now we all know that cognizance is diffrent from literacy. Now, I invite Mr. Amin to come and give a speech in this regard.
Mr. Amin: Hello friends, I am Amin, a traveler. Happy Nowruz to you all and I hope you have a prosperous year. When Mr. Dezhakam wrote his book “Crossing the Zone of Minus 60 Degrees”, he used a model of carnival and existance-city (physical body). In this way, he considered the physical body as a city and mentioned what happens to this city as a person smokes drugs. We were looking for a model so that we can describe hidden attrubutes and make them visible. Each concept has a definition and if the definition is right and accurate, the problem will be solved. When I was studying to get my B.A. (in 1999), some events happened so that I can find out this issue. Master Silver states that evolution is the direct result of successive problem solvings. I had a very bad academic situation in university but I benefitted that bad situation. I beleived in my beliefs and I wanted to do everything on my own beliefs. Human beings have strong and weak points but they only show their strong points not the weak ones. I participated in an exam without preperation and I got 11 [out of 20], then I studied that course for three days and took that exam again, and I got 5! I wondered how it was possible and I noticed that there must be some other factors (affecting the result of exam other than study). At that time, I was overwhelmed by negative senses. It is said that “novice is lucky” and it is true because a novice is empty of negative feelings, but later, as a person improves in that skill, and wants to enter an affair, it gets difficult for them, because they want not to lose their position. The same had happened to me: I was distant from my classmates. Then, I tried to get closer to them and then I realised if I was to be successful, I had to participate in classes. Before this, I did not attend my classes, because the Devil told me “you would not learn anything in class; therefore, try not to waste your time in class! If you study on your own, you will get a better result.” When I entered the class, I did not understand the lessons, but gradually, the skin of learning was cracked and I could learn. This is also experienced by Congress60 members as they enter here. At this point, I realised that having the knowledge, thinking and experiencing will change the result; thereafter, I could do whatever I was not able to do. In order to find our wants and the nature of these wants, we have to follow all these procedures. The interesting point is that lacking one of these steps will make some problems, for instance: suppose that acquiring knowledge is not included in the proess of cognizance, then what will happen? We will have no teachers and therefore, teaching and instructing will be meaningless. As a consequence, the relationship between the components of the existance will be disturbed. But in reality, human beings just work on one of these sides and the difficult of it is that they stick only to one side and ignore the others, for instance a person works on their knowledge and puts aside other practical parts. When we had gone to the Arbour day camp, we observed that Congress60 members were doing what they were asked but if we did not ask them to do a thing, they did not do anything to solve a problem. On the Arbour day, we had prepared everything including breakfast and lunch, we even had thought about the drinks, but we had forgotten the vital tools for palnting trees: spade and pickaxe. And no one was aware that we had left these tools. And it took us some time to return and take them back to the planting camp.
People are of two types: those who do whatever they are asked and those who map an issue out. Those who are well teachable and can get high scores will do their best in that topic and they forget other things. It is difficult for them to become ognizant, because it is hard to seperate a person from the topic in which they are successful. It is also difficult for them to pay attention to the points in which they are weak, because this needs lots of effort and self-sacrifice. Therefore, the process of cognizance happens as a person becomes humble enough to work on their weaknesses. Then why does the process (of being cognizant) happen in Congress60? Because all the members have passed an experience of being in darkness and this matter humiliates human beings. I have figured out that people will not be cognizant unless they suffer pain. When we put these parts together, we find out that to achieve cognizance, individuals must be obedient and map issues out, they also must be sociable and able to live in co-existance and have healthy and peaceful communications. If a person can strengthens these issues in themselves, the process of cognizance will grow in them. If they are not successful to do so, their process of cognizance will stop. The growth of cognizance is in need of permanent effort, the same as a garden requiring perpetual care.
Master Dezhakam: All the members of Congress60 should write the two CDs (Exploitation and the Right path). The pupils must submit their assignments to their guides, guides must submit their writings to the agents and assistants. The agents and assistants must submit their assignment to the Didebans (Mr. Hakimi and Mr. Salami).
Thank you for listening to me
Translated by Elahe
