Empty Vessels

I remember watching some videos of Om Swami a few years back where He referred to the following quote:

“Empty vessels make much noise.”

It took me a long time to realise its true meaning. An empty vessel has nothing, no merit, just its outer shell and it makes much noise. A filled pot or vessel, however, will rarely make any noise. How does this apply to us? Well it’s simple. Sometimes we give ourselves a gigantic sense of importance, when in essence we are empty. It dawned on me that empty vessel relates to the one who has yet to grasp a deeper understanding of things, and who is happy talking, explaining and boasting about things on a surface level. The entire purpose of such ‘vessels’ is to make noise and regurgitate what they read, learnt or achieved.  On the other hand, those who really grasp the truth, are focussed and understand the depth of life remain established in humility, contentment. They are the filled vessels and you’ll notice that they don’t have much to say. Firstly because they are so humble that they will allow the empty vessels to talk, and secondly because they are so focussed on their own purpose of life.

An empty vessel is just ego talking and it will make noise (talking, judging, etc) at every encounter – whether that’s with another vessel (person), the floor(situations) or with anything (life) at all. Noise, noise, noise. And why? Because being so empty the vessel constantly has a point to prove. Haven’t we all been there? And don’t we all make a trip down that lane every now and then? You must be nodding right now:)

But when we fill ourselves with purpose, compassion, humility, self-acceptance and acceptance, we no longer remain empty vessels, instead we become filled pots. The noise reduces drastically and most encounters remain silent. After all how much is there to share, talk and explain? How many people will we try to impress? Why keep chasing? The filled vessel rejoices in silence. At least that’s what I figured – empty vessels make much noise. So I won’t be noisy. Let me wrap it up, right about now.

P.S: Here’s a sad truth which I realised after typing this post: It may have taken me a few years to gain this wisdom, but turns out that the meaning was available on Google, anyway! I guess this post was noise too!:D